Plup.
The last adversary collapsed, limp as a marionette with its strings severed.
Beside the body stood the last person still standing.
Alaric, half crouching in an awkward position, tried to collect himself, his breaths were ragged, laden with fatigue and exhaustion.
His body was a canvas of wounds. Cuts, bruises, lacerations and broken bones. His right arm was severed at its joint, a small fountain of blood flowing out, forming a small puddle beneath his feet and his already dark hair was now blacker from the blood soaking it. Yet the most gruesome wound on him was the terrifyingly huge hole in his chest, so deep that his ribs and even lungs were visible.
He was a pitiful sight.
After a few seconds of catching his breath, he weakly moved his head around to take a look through his remaining eye, what he found was nothing short of horrifying.
The battlefield was a desolate expanse, now a grim testament to the savagery that had unfolded. The once open plain was littered with corpses, their lifeless forms twisted in grotesque positions. Severed limbs lay scattered among the remnants of shattered armor and broken weapons. The very ground seemed to bear the scars of the fierce clash, churned up and disfigured beyond recognition.
Alaric stood amidst the carnage, his gaze sweeping over the scene of devastation. Friends and foes lay together in death, their bodies so mangled and burned that it was impossible to distinguish one from another. The sheer number of the dead was overwhelming, with corpses piled atop each other in grotesque heaps, forming small, morbid mounds. The earth was soaked through with blood, dark red and nearly black, pooling in the craters and crevices formed by the battle's destructive force.
The stench was unbearable, a foul blend of scorched flesh, iron-rich blood, and the acrid smell of decay. The air was thick with ash, and every breath tasted like death.
Alaric's fingers trembled. His breath grew shallower, while his vision began to go dark like he was about to pass out and die.
Although through sheer will power and the crazy amount of pain all kept him conscious… barely.
He coughed violently, blood spilling onto the earth. For a moment, he simply sat in the stillness, letting the silence consume him.
Then he whispered, his voice hoarse and heavy with fatigue:
"Looks like we still had the last laugh, huh?"
They had come here under imperial orders to single handedly repel a huge invading barbarian force rampaging across the border in the middle of an ongoing war. But at the last moment, their so-called reinforcements that came to help, instead turned on them. Betrayal and then slaughter. Everything spiraled into carnage.
After wiping his mouth and turning slightly to the side, he found another body.
A handsome young man with crystal blue eyes and a glassy gaze. The man lay atop a small heap of corpses, his body marred by horrifying wounds with half his torso gone. Yet strangely, his face was spared from all the devastation, being pristine as ever.
He was staring at Alaric with a distant look, conveying peace and tranquility before death.
"..."
After a long gaze, Alaric released a soft sigh. Limping towards the body with gritted teeth, he barely managed to close the young man's eyes with trembling fingers and a face etched with remorse.
Who would have thought that his secret would be found out so soon?
Who'd have expected them to discover his nature?
Why did he have to live with the fact that his mere existence was taboo, a curse and danger to him and those around him?
They just couldn't give him a way out. He had to either fight for survival or die trying.
As these dark thoughts churned in his mind, his expression twisted in anguish. He tried standing upright but failed miserably, collapsing to the ground.
"Damn it…"
His right leg was too broken to allow him to walk or stand straight. Time passed in agony. Eventually, he forced himself upright, leaning against a corpse. He glanced down at his ravaged body, then to the most dangerous wound of all, the hole in his chest. Faint pulses of sickly green flickered from within.
Inspecting it a bit, he snapped his fingers together, summoning whatever pitiful reserves he had left in his core and produced a pale, dark and ominous flame which flickered weakly in his palm.
The flame had a menacing look and a haunting glow, yet it was fragile, easily extinguished by a small breeze. But it would suffice for now.
With gritted teeth and a glint of resolve in his dark eyes. He pressed the flame to the joint where his other arm had been, cauterizing the wound and stopped the bleeding.
Next, he slowly pulled his hand away from the scorched flesh and turned his attention to the gaping wound on his chest. The bleeding had stopped long ago, but the real danger lay in the curse embedded within it, sending faint streaks of dark-green pulses every few seconds.
He resolutely pressed the flame against the wound, but was careful not to touch any vital organs, he couldn't help releasing a muffled groan tainted with horrific pain and anguish. His pale skin grew even more ghastly as sweat streaked down his face.
After several seconds of harrowing torture, he reluctantly pulled his bloodied hand away from the gaping whole. Though the flesh was burnt, it was finally rid of the curse.
Taking a few seconds to calm down, Alaric gazed at the distant sky.
The sun was already on the horizon, and the sky was red as blood. Dawn had come, bathing him in the final afterglow of the retreating sun.
For a moment, all the nightmares, burdens, and curses seemed to wane. Peace washing over him like a forgotten dream.
"Is… is this what freedom feels like?"
He spoke in a hoarse voice, deeply relaxed despite the terrible state of his body.
He lay there on the bare ground, leaning on a burnt corpse for some time.
Several minutes passed, and darkness began to enshroud the world in its inexorable presence.
Finally, he felt some strength returning to his broken limbs, and he slowly stood upright despite the excruciating pain coursing through his body and barely began to walk.
He took one last glance behind him at the devastated landscape, now a violent burial ground for countless enemies and his closest allies.
He turned, releasing a soft sigh filled with a whirlpool of negative emotions.
Shortly after, only a deep resolve was left burning in his eyes and very being as his face turned ghastly cold.
"I'll remember this… just you wait." He said softly before turning around.
But as he took his first step forward, a blinding light suddenly engulfed everything, pushing away all of the surrounding darkness.
In the sky, a figure appeared, surrounded by a halo of searing light and scorching heat.
The light was so intense that looking directly at its source risked blinding oneself.
Alaric couldn't discern the full form, but the six massive wings, the blinding brilliance, the searing heat enveloping him, and most especially, the intense aversion he felt left no doubt.
It was an Angel.
As Alaric stared at the Angel, it stared back at him and the battlefield, contempt and utter disgust radiating from its presence.
In a voice that was both trumpeting and soothing, it declared:
"Demon! For the sins carved into your soul, for the ruin left in your wake, and for all the lives you've claimed. Your judgment has come."
Alaric's face grew grim as he realized what awaited him.
Alaric's heart pounded in his chest, not from fear, but from the grim realization that he had no strength left to fight. His broken body could barely stand, let alone withstand the might of the being before him.
The Angel hovered above the battlefield, a celestial force of pure light and fire, its gaze piercing and unyielding. The judgment had been passed, and there was no escape. As the light around the Angel grew brighter, swallowing the darkness that had once loomed over the wasteland, Alaric felt the weight of his existence bear down on him, the sins of his past, the curse of his bloodline, all culminating in this moment.
With a final, weary breath, he closed his eyes, the words of the Angel echoing in his mind.
'This is it,' he thought, 'the end.'
But even as he stood on the brink of oblivion, a small, defiant spark within him refused to die.
"I won't go down without a fight," he whispered, his voice barely audible over the roaring light.
After a few tense moments, it replied shaking its head with a bit of ridicule:
"You and your kind are a true misfortune to the people of this world. The only path left for you is death!"
The Angel's radiance intensified, and in that blinding brilliance, the world seemed to pause.
His eyes opened again, burning with cold defiance.
He stood, shaking, broken, bleeding.
But still standing nonetheless.
A/N: Thank you so much for reading the first chapter of Ode to the Damned. I truly appreciate you taking the time to dive into Alaric's world, and I hope you enjoyed the opening to his journey.
Also, feel free to leave a comment or review about the chapter. I'd love to hear your thoughts!