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World Kings Part Two: Freedom
Chapter 9: The Sisters Bahn

Chapter 9: The Sisters Bahn

The southeastern coast of Xibalba was a bereft land. A dark, dismal place, even by Xibalban standards. The one part of the territory even King Impetigo couldn't claim. But the newly freed Thuren Bahn called it home. Having made it ashore a few hours prior, the former Xibalban ruler approached the entrance to his tomb of a palace. The giant stone doors were barely visible underneath all the withered overgrowth of the surrounding marcescent jungle. He stood facing the doors, recollecting the last time he stood there. Off to his right a skeleton of a tree snapped and cracked as an arid breeze forced its branches against one another. He turned and admired a dry, rotted corpse swinging in the wind, hanging by a noose. He approached the cadaver dressed in a tattered blue dress. patches of withered flesh dangled from its bones. A pair of antlers protruded from its skull, which had leftover strands of hair where old flesh was still attached. Thuren took what was left of one of its hands and lovingly caressed it against his cheek. Two orange flame like sparks ignited inside the hollowed out sockets of the skull. It's head reared back in a screaming gasp of breath before reaching up and yanking the noose free of the rotted branch. The corpse fell to the dirt with a thud. Thuren watched as muscle and sinew grew from nothing and began to attach itself to the rotting bones, as the body clawed and dragged its way towards him, missing skin slowly grew where it was absent. The corpse unnaturally clambered to its feet, noose still around its neck. "Faaattthheerrr!" Its voice was just as hoarse as his was when the angel freed him. But as it spoke it slowly grew to sound more familiar. "I knew not where they hid you." Thuren bent down and kissed the forehead of his youngest daughter whose face was still partially decayed but slowly regaining its living attributes. "Fret not Livia. Come, wake your sister. We have much to do." Livia smiled although her skin had not yet returned to her mouth. Thuren pushed the two large doors apart, dislodging the remains of the vines that had grown and died on the doors. The parting doors revealed a huge mausoleum-like room. White torches hanging from the pillars ignited, painting the room in an eerie white light. Inside the giant foyer, a beautifully embellished sarcophagus sat surrounded by five less elaborately decorated ones. One of the five which had an image of a bell etched into the side was already open. Thuren looked inside to find it empty. "Humph! Wake just your sister up. I'll raise the rest later." Livia, now fully restored to her former gorgeous appearance nodded and began to utter the unknowable language of the Aeons. A mint green mist began to swirl around her feet. It slowly made its way across the floor. As Livia spoke she covered her eyes so she could not witness that which she spoke back from the grasps of Lady Thanata herself. The spell forbids it, lest Lady Thanata take her soul in exchange. Thuren watched intently as the mist seeped into the middle sarcophagus. Once all the mist entered the sarcophagus Livia stopped speaking. After a moment of silence, a harrowing scream could be heard from inside the sarcophagus although muffled by the stone. A few seconds later the stone lid of the sarcophagus shot off with enough force to send it into the shadows of the foyer. A petite woman dressed in old Xibalban battle armor emerged from her former resting place. Her features, although not as gorgeous as her sister's, were fully restored and her long silver hair covered half her face as she looked around at her surroundings. Two skulls hung around her waist. One of a bat and one of a dog but both human sized, they rattled against her armor as she stepped out of her sarcophagus. "Father? Have you returned to us?" Thuren took an old cloak that was draped over one of the other sarcophagi and wrapped it around his naked body. "Yes, my dear Corrina. And now we shall take back my kingdom. But first we have much to discuss." The two sisters looked at each other then followed their father who was already ascending up the set of stairs behind the sarcophagi.

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