Guardian's Redemption

Chapter Forty Four

"Why couldn't you protect them Benjamin," his wife's voice reverberated in his mind. Ben could see her staring at him with an accusing look on her face. The man knelt before his wife, those blue eyes begging for forgiveness. She was disgusted with him and he cringed under that look while being trapped in her gaze.

Slowly the woman faded away leaving only the words of Sonya. "You killed my best friend. You let her die." The Lord of the Fire District came into view as a rolling cloud of dust went rolling by. Sonya was a child raised along side Ember, the two growing together and had often referred to one another as 'cousins' even though there was no hint of blood relation. Her anger could be felt from those deadly eyes.

His head turned to the side as he heard a weeping voice. A lump in his throat formed as he saw Ashley and Jessica bleeding and broken upon the ground. "Too weak to save us," the women stating over and over like broke records. Their wounds getting worse by the second as the blood was flowing from them. Ben's body was shaking.

"I am too weak," the man admitting out loud. The depression wrapping its tentacles around the man. "I am to pathetic to do anything. I am worhtless."

Ben was then falling through the terrain and fell endlessly into a dark ocean of depression and misery. There was no hope of ever getting out as the words of his failures echoing in his head. His mind was lost to the ocean as his failures were growing stronger. He came to a stop in this timeless plain of existence. There was nothing but this pit of despair.

Red malevolent eyes appeared in a blink in front of the man as the depression tightened its tentacle on him. The description of this emotion was beyond anything ever written about. Not a single being had felt this type of despair. To even give the label despair wasn't enough justice. "I can save them all," those red eyes gave a blink.

Ben had nowhere else to look except at those dark vermilion eyes. He felt the rage, power, and the evil contained within those eyes as they did nothing but blink at him. "I can save them all." Those eyes repeated again. Ben slowly gave a nod to them. He slowly reached out to those malevolent eyes, unsure at what they really were.

"How?" Ben asking.

"Give in to me, Benjamin," those eyes said. "Trust your inner instincts, release me and all you hold dear will be saved."

Ben reached out farther, his fingers stretching for those dark eyes. The tips of his fingers felt something solid and then a mirror suddenly came into existence. Ben watched a mirror image of himself came walking up to the mirror as if there was another side. His visage was exact to him in every aspect except those dark evil eyes, white hair, and skin paler than a winter storm.

"Give me control, Benjamin," his doppelganger said to him. "Release me."

Ben slowly gave a nod of his approval. "I release...you." the man said in a slow crawl . The mirror then shattered into a million pieces and Ben was sent into a fall. He opened his eyes in horror as he saw his doppelganger standing farther and farther away. The alternate version of him was laughing. "Now watch and learn how the true Hunter fights!"

———

Valaar stood upon the mortal plane staring at the pathetic mortal as he approached the puny human. It had been so long since the Archdevil had stood on the mortal plane since having been banished for the past five thousand years by an Archangel. Death on the mortal plane meant only banishment, even though he ruled the first layer of Hell, he had also wanted to rule the mortal realm has well.

His pawns had worked for thousands of years in preparation and the most recent ones had finally found a device that had allowed such a powerful creature to stand where he was now. The devil had marveled at the success of the operation and the holy city that was about to fall to his power. Valaar made a mental note to not punish the devil priest overly much when he raised the being back from Hell. Punishment was what Hell was about especially on the layer of rage.