The ritual war cries echoed into the night sky as several “people” danced near a massive flickering bonfire. Dancing within the penumbra of the moonlight and the shadow cast by a massive object that was only minutely illuminated by the bonfire below it. The group were mostly naked except for a few furs and skins, there were some that had pieces of golden armor pieces that had lost their resplendence long ago, and with no account for protection, but for decoration.  There was one figure that didn’t join into the celebration. A gangly, rail thin human with a large fur hugging hips for dear life, hips bowed in with agonizing disjointedness. Instead, it chose to stare up at the titanic body that laid upon the ground in front of them. 

A humanoid shape, now a cadaver, once clad in beautiful golden armor, now stripped down to it’s bare azure skin. A face that was no longer recognizable now that the eyes had been removed, and skin barely hung off the bone like strips of meat hanging from a hook. Colossal pieces of bone were intersected with chunks of sinew that made up the corpse. 

It wasn’t long before one of the other humans noticed the one that was not jeering and dancing, striding up to him staring at the corpse, slapping a hand on his bony shoulder, flashing a sneering grin at him and letting his face be revealed by the crimson light of the bonfire. A face that could match the rot of the corpse, with neon boils and pustules covering his face that seemed to thrum and shift with the movement of his jaw that looked as if it was going to rip off at any given moment.

“Krixus, why do you not join in the Ceremony? You look sickly. You must eat.” The rotted one spoke with conviction.

“I’m not that hungry.” Retorted Krixus drly.

The rotted one stared at him for what seemed like an eternity in a puzzling look before responding in a commanding tone. “Do you not partake in the feast? Yurthra died so that we may feast on his body to survive and conquer our enemies. This is an important ritual so that we may gain the power necessary to conquer the Ruthar and take their god. It is the future of our tribe. We have no food but Yurthra, we have no water but the coagulating godblood that flows through his veins. You will die if you do not consume.”

“Do not remind me of our customs, Ruthar. Why do we never wonder why they are dead? We know nothing of it.” Krixus responded, putting an injection of venom into the first sentence.

Ruthar’s yellowed eyes that hung inside of his sockets like a fading lightbulb in a rusted lamp gazed at him again, but this time with a cold, violent intent behind it. It was again another chunk of time before he responded, intense and gruffly. “The gods fought a war to protect us from the other heathens. The usurpers. They sacrificed their bodies for us to eat amongst the famine and storms. It grants us power as I said before. Are you a heathen, Krixus?”

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Ruthar continued to peer at Krixus. Some of the blisters began to erupt subtly, with an obsidian, blood tinged substance leaking all over the parched skin that stretched over brittle bone. 

Krixus stared back at him, with attention drawing to the vile things that were happening to his body. The celebration continued in the background for a few more moments before it was interrupted with a great roar of a single word, “Faruke!”. Immediately after, the sound of teeth gnashing and chewing against tough flesh turned into a chorus. Slurping of godblood ripped from the monumental veins and arteries. The feast had begun. 

Ruthar waited for only a moment before stating plainly. “If you are not one, you will forsake these heathen thoughts and consume with us.” 

As Ruthar turned to go and join in the cacophony of chewing and grinding, a sudden swift breeze blew past both him and Krixus, ending in a brilliant flash of blood, gore and bone as an arrow struck right through the side of Ruthar’s skull. 

Black ooze tinged Krixus’ face as soon the sounds of eating followed the clanking of weaponry. Over the horizon appeared a large warparty of similar looking humanoids, with their gaunt faces painted in the same blackish blood that was oozing from Ruthar’s wounds.

The members of Krixus’ tribe left the feast to partake in the battle, picking up their instruments of war to meet the enemy head on. 

The battle raged for hours in the backdrop of the night sky and the cadaver of the fallen god. Corpses of the tribesmen began to pile up, covering the crusted, dying dirt below in a fresh coat of blood and ooze. 

Krixus emerged wounded and bloodied but alive, from underneath two dead tribesmen, and surveyed the landscape before him. The bonfire began to simmer out, and the heap of bodies that lay before it were indistinguishable from each other.

He quickly began to move around as fast as his delicate bones would take him, checking to see if anyone was alive. There were a few of his tribe left, who began to emerge or awaken from the battle, mostly wounded much more than Krixus was, but with most of their faces covered in even more of the stygian liquid that oozed. 

Looking around for more amongst the decaying ground, he noticed a patch of turned dirt. Rake marks marked around it to distinguish it as an attempt of farmland. Centered amongst the dirt was the beginnings of a plant. Verdant, but tiny leaves stretched from a miniature stem. The humble beginnings of a fruit or vegetable dangled from them. 

Peering back at the corpses and the wounded who began to consume the flesh of Yurthra once again, a simmering rage began to boil inside of Krixus. The boil became too much, and he brought down his bare foot on top of the plant, crushing it into pieces. Grinding his foot down even more, he could feel the snapping of a bone while he did it, but the adrenaline of anger fueled it. Reaching down, he began to toss the dirt all over, and make sure that the specks of what remained of the plant were nowhere to be seen. 

The rage began to fade from his body, and the pain flooded his senses like it had been poured on him from a bucket. The suffering was pure torment, and Krixus began to limp towards the corpse. It looked wonderful, like a banquet before his eyes. The more he ignored it’s beauty, the more the agony surged throughout his body. He couldn’t take it anymore. There was no more submission. Bending down, he clenched his jaw against the flesh to enjoy it’s rich texture and heavenly taste. The godblood was a compliment to the beautiful meat. Pain left his body, and he could feel the emerging of pimples throughout his body, and a vicious nausea that could only be satisfied by continuing to consume.