The fallen kingdom

Ch# 23 (Galeshi's peak)

Hermis took the husk that was Faluq exclaiming, "I got an idea for this swine." It was a short while before Hermis returned.
"Well what are we standing here for?" he said. "We've got a war to stop and Gelfed's got an uncle to kill! God I miss my normal life of drinking and wandering. Ya know, a nice modest living."
Yaldrat approached Hermis, embracing him. "Your humor is your greatest armor, black blood. I promise like my beloved, your family will be avenged...... every bit of it."
Hermis smiled saying, "Thank ya king leechy."
Off we went towards the mountain. It was a matter of hours before we were in the underbrush beside the base of it. At its peak, the ground was flat and had four pillars. I could make out that it was covered in designs I'd never seen before, spiraling dips and curved lines that seemed to be more than artwork. They looked ceremonial.
Just as I had sensed, there was a massive amount of people surrounding the mountain. Their eyes were glazed over as in a trance. They were walking about aimlessly, occasionally bumping into one another. Their faces had gone grey and their eyes were blackened.
Yaldrat noticed each man, woman and child carried a blade made of silver. Hermis had the idea to climb a tree for a better vantage point, but as he climbed the tree a nest of birds was startled and flew off.
Almost as if they were vile beasts, the hoard of people turned to all face one direction. They were looking right at us. Then without warning, they charged.
We all climbed the tree, camouflaging ourselves in the thick leaves. We could hear them hacking at the tree trunk, pushing it and snarling.
"Don't harm them! They can't control this! It isn't them!" Yaldrat yelled out.
From high up we heard a voice call out, "Yes Yaldrat, why have any unnecessary bloodshed? You and Gelfed just come up and face me!"
It was Garrot. He was standing on the peak between the four pillars. Yaldrat and I vanished up to him.
"This must end brother, and this can only end in death," Yaldrat said. "Indeed creature," Garrot replied.
He hurled a large fire ball at Yaldrat who barely dodged out of the way. It hit me head on, shooting through both sides of me. The smoke was thick.

"Goodness me, I knew he had no training but I didn't think he'd allow me to burn him!" Garrot said laughing as he threw two more blasts before ceasing his fire.
After the smoke had cleared, Garrot gasped. There I stood, untouched and unfazed, smoke simmering off of my cloak.
"The knowledge you have of my solar kin lineage you learned through jealousy towards it, so it is limited," I said.
"What is this? Burn like you should!" Garrot screamed, throwing two more blasts that had no effect.
"Fire kills a solar kin! You should be ash!" he said in frustration.
"Perhaps I would be, if I were solar kin," I said with icy calm. "But I've become more now, uncle. I've surpassed the limits and follies of my forefathers. I have corrected my bloodline. I am the chaos kin."
"The chaos kin are a myth!" Garrot said retreating.
"And yet you see one before you uncle. Be you truly that blind? What you see is what was prophesied. I am the great balance."
"Ah I see. Well you will learn boy, the only balance in this world is control!" Garrot said reaching into his robe and pulling out a bottle.
"Stop him that's the potion!" Yaldrat yelled out.
I sprang forward but it was too late. The last drop was consumed and a flash of light erupted.
After the flash had settled, before us was not our brother and uncle, but something else. It was hunched over as if it were in pain. It had long limbs and a sunken figure with black skin, and was whimpering as if it were a dog that had been scolded for soiling the rug.
I saw something above its head, a new title.
Yaldrat began to walk over to it, saying,"Brother Garrot can you hear me?"
"Father get back! He's become something called a nether kin!" I cried out.
Just then the creature uttered the word "Burn" and in an instant Yaldrat caught fire, his screams radiating over the mountain.
I ran to my father, but only in time to catch his cloak as ashes fell to the ground through it.
"So it wasn't an immortality potion!" the creature laughed, standing upright as a dark blue robe covered his body. "I was confused as to why you'd need immortality but now I see it's an ascendance potion. It made you into a chaos kin. And me into the nether kin."
"Nether kin? What are you Garrot?" I asked.

"I am your opposite, and equal in every way. And I am destined to kill you," he said. "Kill me?" I said. "The prophecy spoke of a chaos kin who would bring balance."
"Yes that was half of it," Garrot snickered. "I took the other half of the prophecy so your dear father would never see it. It did say that a chaos kin would bring balance, but also that he would fall to the nether kin. Don't you see boy? I am the balance, not you!"
"Lies!" I said vanishing to Garrot, sword drawn, only to be grabbed and thrown onto the ground.
"Bind," Garrot said as chains shot from the ground and held me.
"Do they still sound as lies?" Garrot asked. "I'll admit I took the prophecy to be fallacy. A chaos kin, what nonsense. Then when I saw you, it struck me that it was correct. You are meant to bring balance, and that balance is the nether kin. I was going to negotiate with you, but seeing as I'm holding all the cards...."
He walked over to the edge of the peak and yelled, "Kill them all!"
I heard the screams of my friends but could do nothing. Each one was snuffed out, one by one. Even Hermis had been ripped apart and stabbed with silver blades.
Garrot saw the tears swelling in my eyes and taunted, "Oh don't worry dear nephew, I'm not going to kill you, no. I just won't let you feed. And soon the people of my kingdom will know you as a street beggar, a nothing."
"First though, I think I'll dig up that whore who spawned you and see what my brother was so entranced with," he said patting me on the head.
As he did, the collar of my cloak grabbed Garrot's hand and pulled him in.
The blackness before Garrot was immense. It almost had a pulse. Before him I stood.
"What is this boy?" the beast snarled.
"This is the end," I answered.
"The end? What is this place?" Garrot raged.
"It's forever."
"Stop with your short answers! What's happened?"
"My cloak took you in," I said. "You and I are one in the same now. You'll forever reside within my mind."
"This can't be!" Garrot screamed. "The prophecy handed down said the chaos kin would fall to the nether kin!"

"And I did," I replied. "Outside I had no chance against you, but in here you're my prisoner. The prophecy said I'd fall, but it didn't say you'd win."
"You're as foolish as your father," Garrot growled. "Don't you know what this means? I'll be with you forever, a festering tumor in your mind that will one day return as cancer."
"You won't be with me forever," I said triumphantly. "You'll exist until I cease to. Now listen to my brothers' and sisters' soulless hymns."
The hands of every child Garrot sacrificed began to rise up from the abyss in every direction.
"Cease to exist? You can't die! I'll be here forever, screaming in your dreams, contorting them to nightmares!!"
Garrot was screaming to an empty space. Gelfed had left.