Executions were still going on.
The screams were not only of those who were being executed, but of those who were about to be executed. There was also the laughter of those who were maddened by fear.
Humans weren't the only ones who felt fear. So did the centaurs. In fact, thanks to that, John Carter's personal safety was guaranteed among the centaurs.
When John Carter engaged Tal Hajus, king of the centaurs, in single combat, he fought ferociously, believing that a victory would save his life. John Carter killed Tal Hajus, but he himself did not remember how. When John Carter saw Tal Hajus lying in blood, he knew he had won. He looked around him to see if it was real.A crowd of centaurs surrounded John Carter and watched him. no one said anything. No one called the winner. John Carter became worried. Are the centaurs resentful of their king being killed? Wouldn't they break their promise to spare his life and kill him? There was no escape for John Carter. To survive, John Carter decided to play for high stakes. John Carter sliced through the Tal Hajus chest with his saber, seized it's heart, and held it aloft. John Carter looked at the centaurs but got no response. John Carter summoned up the courage to bite into the still-steaming heart of Tal Hajus.
Then John Carter proclaimed loudly.
"I killed God! I eat God's flesh, I slurped God's blood! Now I just became a god!" "
It was a life-and-death performance. It shocked the centaurs. In fact, the centaurs showed no reaction because their king had been murdered and was mentally incapacitated. Then there's the cruel, bloody, savage ritualistic show. Centaurs were in awe of John Carter.
Thus, John Carter replaced Tal Hajus as the new king of the centaurs, Carter the conqueror.
Controlling people through fear was a common practice for whites to control Native Americans and black slaves. John Carter unwittingly followed suit.
Cerberus, the three-headed monster, was actually a dog. Sensing the master-servant relationship between John Carter and the centaur, it obediently accepted its new owner. But Dejah Thoris, wife of Tal Hajus, did not. She ran away from John Carter.
John Carter had to bring back Dejah Thoris to keep his authority as king. If he couldn't do that, he didn't know what the centaurs would do with him. For now he ruled over the centaurs, but there was no guarantee he could do so forever. In order to protect himself, John Carter had to continue directing and performing numerous horrors.
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The Argo Goes West
Ficțiune științifico-fantasticăIn 1900, creatures from Greek myth began to invade America, where the frontier line had disappeared. Theodore Roosevelt builds the Argo, a battle train and heads to the west where monsters await!
