*Rudolf's POV*

After weeks of a journey fraught with dangers and challenges, I finally saw the shores of the Slum Kingdom approaching on the horizon, seated on my small wooden raft.

Once great and powerful, this place was now home to the worst criminals, an abyss of wickedness and desolation. My task was clear: find my grandfather, retrieve the book – the original Valde Orum – and finally, kill my grandfather. I had to carry out this task mercilessly, without being swayed by my old feelings.

During the journey, I had a lot of time to reflect, to evolve. I wasn’t as ruthless as I wanted to be, as Umarth had taught me to be. Every time an unfortunate soul crossed my path and disturbed my mission, my hand hesitated – a little, but it hesitated.

After killing my father, I thought I would never hesitate again, but I admit that when I saw Elaine – my hated sister, I didn’t think clearly, coldly.

It was a hesitation I didn’t like, a hesitation that perhaps was the reason I was influenced by trivial things – like my family. So, during my journey, I thought about how to remedy this annoying trait of mine. And I had an epiphany, seeing human children during my journey. I had never killed children – I thought, it wasn’t my style, even though they were human.

And maybe, that was my weak point. It was that “sweet” side I had to eliminate. So, I started killing children, extending my journey a bit longer. At first, it wasn’t easy. In fact, it was extremely difficult, and in my dreams, I saw the faces of my victims, I was ashamed of my actions.

But then, seeing the bigger picture, I knew it was all necessary FOR ME, AND so, I continued my heinous actions. And I killed, killed, and killed until the act became more natural, easier. Until I stopped dreaming of my victims. At that moment, a sense of freedom began to creep into my mind.

The normality that once bound me dissolved, transforming me into a cold elf, cynical, insensitive to the pain of others. My evolution had been rapid and ruthless – much faster than I thought, like a storm that devastates everything it encounters in just a few moments.

The last days on the makeshift raft were torture. The sea had been relentless, and I, alone with my thoughts, had the time to plan the encounter with my grandfather.

The hatred I felt for him was boundless. I couldn’t wait to sink my hands into his chest and tear out his life, to see his hateful, suffering expression contort in a thousand pains. But first, I absolutely had to get the book, which he kept in my father's name, Arvedui.

This meant I would have to pretend to still be on “their” side, I had to pretend to still be a “Blueheaven”. I had to pretend to respect him – even though it was something I had been doing since I was a child to avoid being killed by that dog. The mere thought made my blood boil. It disgusted me to pretend respect for that damned old man, and it disgusted me to pose as one of them, but it was a necessary sacrifice for the continuation of my dreams – the dreams of my King, Umarth.

So, I was forced to wear an iron mask, to stifle my hatred for as long as needed.

Finally, after several minutes, my raft stopped against the kingdom's coast: finally, I had set foot on the shores of the Slum Kingdom. The landscape was desolate, like hell on earth. A glacial cold slowly enveloped me, giving me slight shivers, and the horizon was obscured by a violent sandstorm, which limited my visibility to a few meters.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Under my feet, I saw human remains, mixed in the cold sand beneath my feet: skulls, bones, remnants of lives long extinguished. Once, I would have felt disgust, but now nothing touches me. This place perfectly reflects my soul: arid, desolate, devoid of hope.

Without wasting more time, I donned my cloak to shield myself from the sand, and large goggles to protect my eyes. I didn’t know which direction to take, deciding instead to go straight ahead. I plunged into the storm, determined to reach the habitable area of the kingdom.

Every step felt like a battle against the elements, with the sand infiltrating the thin spaces of my clothing despite my coverings, causing particular annoyance. But my will was ironclad: I would not fail this mission, I would not be distracted by anything or anyone. I had to complete my mission, this was my mantra.

But just a few minutes after landing, my march was almost immediately interrupted. Despite the poor visibility, I noticed six people slowly surrounding me. They must have been desert raiders. Bastards who, having no more purpose in life, hid among the sandstorms, robbing and killing anyone who passed through.

They were threatening shadows, relics of a now decayed civilization.

One of them, probably the leader, approached me. “What brings a stranger – an elf at that, to our territory? Don’t you know there’s no place for the weak here?” he sneered, trying to intimidate me. The fact that he knew I was an elf meant they had seen me land: their presence here was no coincidence. But this didn’t surprise me much.

I looked him in the eye, without fear. “Leave. I don’t have time to waste with you…”

“Arrogant,” one of the others hissed. “Let’s see if you’ll still be so brave, filthy elf.”

With a gesture of my hand, I summoned my ice magic. The air around us cooled even more, and shards of ice materialized around me, beginning to dance. I confirmed that the raiders were nothing but simple human scum, lowly wakened ones. And this made the fight much easier for me.

Without hesitation, I used my magic to get rid of them as quickly as possible: Making a sharp ice column appear from the ground, I brutally impaled the first raider, lifting him into the air with a sinister scream before he succumbed, disemboweled.

The other two raiders beside him, however, weren’t intimidated and continued their senseless charge.

But before they could attempt any attack, I trapped them inside a water bubble. I enjoyed watching them suffocate like poor fools, but I had no time for self-congratulation. So I instantly froze the bubble, freezing them inside the now cold and brutal prison, killing them in excruciating agony.

The fourth and fifth raiders, terrified by my superior power, tried to flee, but their fate was sealed. With a quick hand movement, I created two thin and sharp spears that, at my command, shot forward like lightning, piercing their skulls almost as if they were butter.

The sixth, desperate, lunged at me with a mana-infused knife. But it would never be enough; he was too weak. Indeed, I blocked his arm with one hand, and with the other, I slowly froze his skull while that bastard writhed like a poor lamb freshly slaughtered, until he died with a stupid expression. Disgusted by what I saw, I crushed his now “crystal” skull, shattering his head into a rain of shards.

Silence fell in the air, broken only by the wind’s whistle. I felt I had become a bit more skilled in controlling my magic. So, I continued walking, leaving the raiders’ corpses behind. After hours of marching, during which I saw only a wall of sand ahead, I reached a cliff, almost falling into it, cursing. I didn’t know what was below, and the view was limited by dark clouds. I stayed for a few seconds watching the cliff, hoping to see something, anything. And indeed, after a few moments, the clouds moved by the action of the wind, and in a small gap, I could see the Slum Kingdom.

From above, it gave the impression of a wasteland of desolation and poverty, a place where hope had long since died.

I knew that descending there, I would face immense dangers, perhaps people stronger than me. But nothing could stop me. Or at least, that’s what I believed.

I will do anything to make my master happy. With one last glance at the sky, I plunged into the void, ready to confront my destiny.

END OF CHAPTER 55 – THE GOD-FORGOTTEN KINGDOM.