In the world of Astreya, it is said that upon our creation, the people were blessed by the founding Gods. Everyone is born with a natural tattoo of their spirit animal. Every person gets the traits and abilities of their respective animal and in the most talented individuals, they may even be able to manifest it. But when I was born, my father, having a bear tattoo, and my mother, bearing a dove tattoo were horrified. For the tattoo on my back, the animal with which my soul was bound was something only whispered about in legends…
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The world is split into five continents. Five large land masses each containing numerous countries split amongst several empires and kingdoms. The largest was Seranim, home to the strongest, greatest empire, my home.
I grew up in the small town of Norm, in the Kingdom of Vaas. The weakest amongst the kingdoms which formed a part of The Great Calvarien Empire. My town was little more than a village and only had any importance due to the trade route that ran through its heart. The trade route ran North to South, North to the capital of the kingdom and south to our neighbors, the Kingdom of Seviya.
‘Right bastards’ my father would mumble under his breath. To our East and West were the towering peaks of the Dragonfall Mountains, the largest mounts in the empire which ran almost across the entirety of Seranim. My village was situated in one of the only passes that split the giant mountain range, named Feindall Pass, after the sword of Baalor, the God of War.
Long ago, too long to even imagine, there was a battle between the Gods and a divine beast, The Leviathan. The tale proclaims that the Leviathan was the first True Divine, the first being to surpass mortal limits.Then, in a show of it’s ever flowing love, it shared its success with the other mortals, allowing them to embark on the path of divinity. Together these beings remade the world. Creating a continent called Paleya where all of creation lived together in true serenity.
But the other Gods were jealous of the Leviathan, because its powers still surpassed them, it’s divinity became more profound and it reached a level of fulfillment none of them could hope to touch. So they colluded against it, they used its infinite love, its greatest strength, to bring about its downfall. Luring it to a place where it could not escape before attacking it.
It is said that the battle lasted millennia, and at the end of it, the landscape was drastically altered and Paleya lay scattered. When the Leviathan’s head fell for the final time, it landed on a huge mountain range on the largest continent, which had once been Paleya’s heart.
According to my mother at least. My father, however, told a very different story. He described the Leviathan as a ferocious beast, hell-bent on destroying the creations of the gods. He said it attacked Paleya with its strongest magical attack, and that if it wasn’t for the timely intervention of Baalor, all creation would have been destroyed. Instead, with the help of the other Gods, Baalor managed to stop the catastrophic attack, but Paleya was broken as a result. This pass, according to my father was created when Baalor planted his sword into the ground to fend off the fierce attack from the beast, and where it’s head fell after Baalor removed it.
No one could say for sure which tale was the correct one. But when I listened to my mother, my heart warmed when she spoke of the Leviathan’s love, and withered when she spoke of the betrayal. So i’m more believing of her words than my father’s. Though my father does call me ‘demon spawn’ and ‘bastard not from my seed’, so I’m not sure if I’d believe anything he told me.
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The year is 1505 AF, 1505 years after the fall of the Leviathan, in the 4th month of the Calvarien Calendar. In the small town of Norm, a small boy lays trembling on the floor, whimpering and sniffling but noticeably doing his best not to move. A woman is draped over the boy, crying loudly and holding him tightly.
“Move woman! I told you to get rid of him when we saw his mark!” A man standing above them shouts, brandishing a whip in one hand and a bottle of ale in the other.
“Ravad please!” The woman cries out, looking up at him with tear-filled eyes, “He is our so-”
“He is no son of mine!” Ravad screams, eyes crazed as spittle comes out of his mouth, “No son of mine!”
The woman, whose beautiful face is stained with tears looks even more pained as if someone had stepped on her heart. When she speaks, her voice is as weak and broken as her heart. “So...so I have slept with another Ravad?” She looks into his eyes, “I have broken our promise?”
Ravad takes a step back from his hurt wife, his eyes softening momentarily before the slosh of a liquid in a bottle brings his attention to his right hand which he raises to his lips. The ale seems to be fuel to fire though because when he lowers the bottle, his eyes are once again crazed. Ravad raises his hand and swings, bringing the whip across his wife’s face
“You must’ve ya wench!” He brings the whip down on her back and she screams, “Went and bedded with another did ya?”
Ravad unleashes a series of lashes upon his wife, ending up doubled over, panting from exertion. Loud boisterous laughter filled the room, covering the sounds of the two crying on the floor and when Ravad straightens up tears can be seen streaming down his face.
Ravad walks to the kitchen table, grabbing the knife that was laying on it. “Sarai, Sarai I loved you, I love you with all my heart, but you have birthed a demon and for that we should offer penance to Baalor,” Ravad says, reaching down and grabbing Sarai by the hair, dragging her off of the boy laying on the ground and pulling her to kneel in front of him, “We will be welcomed into his court, for I am his son, and you my wife, even if you are a slag.”
Sarai looks up, catching the wide tear-filled eyes of her frightened son, her only child and she couldn’t help but cry. “Az, my baby, my sweet, sweet boy, don’t cry, mommy will be ok.”
Ravad pulls her head back, and presses the blade of the knife to her throat, before looking at the demon on the floor in front of him. “Look closely, you evil child, if you hadn’t been born I would never have to give myself, MY WIFE!” Ravad suddenly shouts, causing the boy to flinch violently, “In penance for your abnormality.”
The boy’s eyes widen impossibly as he realizes what his father was saying and starts to crawl towards his mother slowly. “Mama? Mama, please don’t go Mama! Please!” He cries, clutching his mother’s robe, “Mama please!”
Sarai hugs her son close, thankful that Ravad was at least giving her this one last moment. Putting her lips to his ear she whispers, “Run my baby, run far, far away, this place of men if full of bad people, follow your heart, follow your mark, it will lead you to your destiny, close your eyes and run away from this place, never look back my dear Azrael, never.” Sarai then pushes her son away, causing him to stumble, but stubbornly he turns back, only to get his face splattered with a red liquid spewing from the cut made by the knife that Ravad rubbed along her throat.
Azrael falls backward and crawls away quickly as more of his mother’s lifeblood spews onto the floor in front of him. His eyes wide with pure terror, he could only scream, “Mama!”
When Ravad lets go of her hair, Sarai falls forward onto the floor. She musters only enough energy to simply look up at her sun and whisper, ‘Run’, before blood spurts from her lips, and her eyes start to dull.
Azrael was frozen for a moment before he spins. Doing just as his mother commanded, he runs out of the house and towards the mountains, not knowing where he was headed, not caring about the dangers, he just runs.
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As he watched the demon spawn run out of his house Ravad fell to his knees and prayed, “Lord Baalor, I have done many wrongs in life but I have lived true to my blood, true to my creed and true to my belief, guide me into your eternal chambers that I may guard you for the rest of eternity.” He raised the blade and pressed the tip to his chest, right above his heart.
Looking up to the sky, Ravad smiled, saying “I’m coming Sarai,” before plunging the knife into his chest, stabbing through the heart. Ravad fell back, beside his wife and managed to entwine his finger with her cooling ones before, with one last breath, he too died.