Chapter 1: Reaching For The Peaks, In Death's Embrace
His first kiss!
He could feel her warm breath on his face, his arms wrapped around her waist as he closed his eyes and puckered his lips.
The atmosphere was perfect. The entrancing scent of the flowers beneath him, the wind clapping against their frames, and the warmth of the sun on their skins. They were alone, and it was perfect…
The softness of her lips pressing against his…
He anticipated, and waited but the softness never came. His eagerness transformed to anxiety in a few seconds of pause, then it evolved into confusion. He wanted to open his eyes badly, but he was cut in between believing she was just a bit too anxious or something else was wrong with this scene.
"…"
Something cold sunk into the side of his stomach, and his expression changed almost instantly. A metallic taste he was all too familiar with revealed its presence in his mouth, and his confusion took a sudden twist into rage. A confused anger that he had not expected to feel on this day and time.
The cold blade was drawn out of his abdomen, and the realisation struck!
He felt his arms loosen around her, staggering back as his eyes opened instantly. He was stabbed in the side of his stomach, and was bleeding out at a fast speed. As he lowered his hands and held his sides he lifted his head and looked upon the woman he endeared, confused and angry.
For a decade, he had loved her. He had waited, planned in patience, anticipating this day. The day he would finally hold her in her arms, and confess that which he had held within him for ten years…
Now, here they stood.
Her alluring face — the face he had always fantasied about, twisted into a cruelty that left him in a completely baffled state. He had not expected his from her, not now that they had just confessed all their undying feelings for one another. He wondered… Why here? Why now?
He was confused, angry and speechless.
"You must have a lot of questions, Rhys." She spoke calmly as the wind scattered her auburn hair into the wind, a vile gleam in her enchanting magenta eyes, her robes fluttering as she stood firm, an immeasurable coldness invading the beautiful atmosphere as she opened her mouth to speak,
"This is simple an absolution. He deserved to die, and I understand why you killed him. You are dying today for that same reason — the manifestation of an equal hatred. Or did you believe I'll live a happy life with the man who took everything away from me?"
There was silence.
Rhys collapsed on the flowers, and as they scattered into the air, spreading their fragrance under the burning sunlight he smiled. For the first time since they had met, he revealed a foolish weakness, a weakness exploited over and over in the past. He laughed out loud, nonchalant for his bleeding.
"I should have killed you the first time I met you, Lynn." Rhys sighed, leaning back and staring up to the sky as he sat calmly. He had known this from the start, but there was a sliver of hope he clung so fiercely unto. Maybe, just maybe he could finally get that peace he desired after all the suffering,
"I loved you, and it blinded me. I was powerless, and here we are. I always hoped and dreamed, that irrespective of all the vile sacrifices I made, I would gain the peace I always desired. I guess the one single desire was too much for me…"
The wind caressed his skin, his vision dimmed, then he dropped his gaze and focused it on Lynn. He was stunned to see warm tears streaming down her face as she stood firmly, and he felt his heart shatter completely as he listened to her,
"I love you, and it is not a lie. In as much as you were the one who ruined my life, you were there when everyone had abandoned me. You stretched your helping hand to the enemy, even if there was a very high chance you would be stabbed in the guts."
Lynn felt her grasp around the dagger in her hands weaken. Blood dripped down from the tip of her drenched dagger's blade to the grass, the cruelty in her eyes growing as she lowered her gaze to stare down upon the ground,
"The longer I spent with the man who tore down all I held dear, the greater my hatred. Even as I hated you, I found myself growing endeared to you. There was a conflict, I had to put an end to it all."
Rhys smiled, then he laid his back on the grass and closed his eyes, "I am going to die here. What about you, what would you do? Live a happy life under a collapsed throne?"
He bled profusely, his blood drenching the flowers underneath him.
Lynn smiled at him as she lifted her head, the smile seemed to translate differing emotions. As he felt his vision fade into the darkness, she opened her mouth to speak in her silvery voice, "I will just move forward, and maybe one day we would meet again…"
The darkness consumed him, and he embraced it completely. All that remained in existence was a consciousness that counted calmly. Year, Decades, Centuries. He lost count, lost track of time itself as he became completely absorbed by the darkness.
——
Then, it all froze.
Time, Consciousnesses…
All that remained of him now was merely a floating mass of partial existence — a fragment of his reality. Even as a light pierced the darkness, and it churned and twisted, evolving into an auditorium of demonic vileness, his existence persisted. The darkness settled, and the world around him cleared.
It was merely the interior of a palace.
In that palace, bold and domineering, stood a throne. It was a throne made of blood, the chorus of a thousand men and women singing in pain and agony as the blood leaked slowly from the lower edges of the throne, branching to stretch in varying directions. Horned skulls sat on the top of this throne, each and every one emanating a weird gold gleam.
Curtains made out of shadows hung on the walls, crystal chandeliers hung down from the centre of the coffered ceiling, scattering their bloody red gleam around the massive auditorium. A table was raised before the throne, quite elegant in its wooden workings to match the atmosphere of massive auditorium it was erected it, and a chess board was placed upon it.
His eyes locked on the table, watching the chess pieces scattered across it. He stared blankly for a while, then his gaze focused on Black's King which was the only piece of Black remaining standing on the board. It was pinned by a White Knight to the corner of the board, and the queen delivered a crushing checkmate… Black, had lost.
"This loop of suffering would only continue. Forever and ever, until we get tired and our hatred and pain consume us. Despair, is merely a deception…"
He raised his head, and there he sat.
On the throne, a crown of blood red crystals sitting on his head as he stared at the board — or, less confusingly, as this fragment of his existence stared at the board. He wore a robe fitting for the kings of high orders, a blood red cape of fur draped across his shoulders, and his long black hair set free, and allowed to scatter across his back.
"This is the hundredth and eighteenth. Are you broken now, or do you want to face the suffering for the last time before breaking apart to a million pieces?" He lifted his eyes and stared at himself, a cold gleam in his ink black eyes as he continued, "Or would you continue to delude yourself in mere fantasies… believing you can change that which you wrote with your own hands?"
We did not want to give up, not yet!
One more time… a hundred more times… as far as there was still hope — that 0.1% in a 100%, it would never occur to him that he needed to give up! He was not broken yet, he was still unsatisfied with everything he suffered for generations past! He would do it again and again, to make it right.
"I see… Then, let us play."
The chess pieces rose, and fell on their positions on the board. Then, the curtains fluttered as a sudden wind rushed into the room, carrying the screams of a thousand lamenting people, and then the screams quietened down as the curtains fell again. The chandeliers dimmed, and darkness rose.
As it all settled down into silence, White moved a piece: The Queen's Pawn.
Then the light flickered, then it was vanquished by the darkness.