Vur stuck his paw out, grabbing the man who was about to stab himself in the chest. He lifted him and dropped him onto the ground a few feet away. Then he shuffled his large body forward and picked up a bound crocodile, putting it in front of the man with the knife. Everywhere he went, people were offering to sacrifice themselves to him, and it was annoying to bring them back to life every time. However, with the help of a few gestures, he could communicate quite easily with them and convinced the natives to sacrifice animals to him instead. He didn’t even have to hunt anymore since all the towns and villages he flew to during the past two months gladly gave him plenty of food.
“Any sick people here?” Vur asked and picked up the crocodile after the man performed the rites of sacrifice. He stuffed it into his mouth and chewed a few times before swallowing.
“I don’t hear any,” Zilphy said. “The sickness probably hasn’t spread here.”
“Alright.” Vur nodded and tapped his right foreleg. “Set up the statue, Deedee.”
Without a sound, the runes representing Diamant lit up, and the earth bulged and swelled before Vur’s feet. A lump of dirt rose up towards the sky, creating a pillar coated with gold. The natives let out shouts and gasps as the pillar expanded and distorted, limbs growing out of it. Soon, a golden dragon appeared, its head roaring towards the sky. At the base of the statue, Vur scratched out the words, “I’m flying that way next, Tafel,” and drew an arrow pointing to the right. With that, he spread his wings and leapt into the air, heading in the direction he had indicated.
The natives who were left behind exchanged glances with each other. “Was that really the god, Feathered Serpent?” one of them asked. “How come he looked more like a scaled lizard than a flying serpent? He didn’t have feathers.”
“Don’t blaspheme the gods,” another man said and clicked his tongue. He was wearing a garment that with tons of colored feathers on it. He was like a brilliant rainbow compared to everyone else. “I received an oracle that god would descend, but to think he would come the next day….” The man shook his head and sighed before staring at his bloody hands which were still holding onto a knife and crocodile heart. “We weren’t ready. Luckily, Feathered Serpent dislikes human sacrifices.”
“Chief!” someone shouted. “There’s people coming!”
The man wearing the feathered garb turned his head. The village fell silent, and a soft din filled the void, coming from the horizon. The villagers gathered their weapons. Even the women and children picked up farming implements and readied themselves. They gathered behind the chief as he walked towards the village entrance. The village had been built on a hill; it was easy to detect invaders. However, there were a lot more invaders than there were people in the village. There was a whole sea of people marching towards their village, cutting down trees that were in the way.
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“C-Chief,” one of the men said. “This…, should we run?”
The chief swallowed. Brave warriors were captured and sacrificed to the gods; it was a great honor to be a captive and offering. However, anyone who’d dare charge at that sea of people could no longer be classified as brave. They’d be idiotic! And, of course, the gods disdained foolish sacrifices. Just as the chief was about to announce a full-scale abandonment of the village, someone from the sea of people shouted out, “We mean no harm!”
The chief furrowed his brow. He recognized the man that had stepped forward; he was the priest of the neighboring village. The neighboring village was as small as his, their population coming nowhere close to the numbers in this mass of healthy, young men. “You mean no harm?” the chief shouted back. Every second he wasted talking to this priest was another second less for him to run. The mass of people was moving at a ridiculous speed with four people working together to topple one tree.
“We’re building a road, following Feathered Serpent’s path!”
The chief froze. Following Feathered Serpent’s path? “You’re building a road everywhere he flies?”
“That’s right,” someone else said from the crowd. “Whenever Feathered Serpent flies, his next destination is always a community of people. He cures everyone’s illnesses, eats our offerings, then erects a statue of himself before flying away.” The man pointed at the statue behind the chief before pointing at a statue in the horizon towards the direction the crowd had arrived from. “By building roads between the statues, we’ll unite the whole world! The foreigners that arrived by sea tried to trick us into thinking they were gods. Feathered Serpent wishes to unite all native people to force them out.”
The chief’s brow furrowed again. Is that really what Feathered Serpent was trying to do? Logically, it made sense…. He pointed at the path behind the sea of people. “How far does that road extend?”
“If you follow the path of god, it leads all the way to the capital of my empire!” another person boasted. “Of course, we’ve been building roads towards every statue on the horizon, but those are branches of the path of god, not the original route Feathered Serpent took.”
From behind the chief, a young man called out, “Where does Feathered Serpent intend to lead us?”
The few people in the crowd who weren’t working on the road exchanged glances with each other. “He’s a god. How are we to know what he intends? All we have to do is follow, not understand! Come, let the men of your village join us in worship of Feathered Serpent!”
The chief frowned. “How long have you traveled? How do you feed everyone?”
“We’ve traveled for two months. We ask the people we meet to spare some food. If there’s too many people for food to be split evenly, volunteers sacrifice themselves to consecrate the path of god. The great temples were built upon the blood and flesh of many; should the path of god not be the same?”
The chief thought back to Feathered Serpent’s terrifying appearance. Perhaps the great god didn’t frown upon human sacrifices after all? That was it! The great god spared him and accepted an animal offering instead because the great god wanted him to build the path of god, perhaps even sacrificing himself to consecrate it. “We’ll join you!”