"You insolent immortal! Insolent immortals! How dare you trespass the heavens!"
King Relik keeled over once more.
This voice seemed to come from all sides of the room, thundering in the highest decibels right inside his ear and scattering his brain waves. His insides twisted, his belly churned but there was no escape for vomit as the rope tightened against his rib cage.
The silver rope was a scorching chokehold around the base of his neck snaking a path of fire down his entire body, trapping his hands and legs together with no space left in between. A caterpillar caught in an infernal cocoon.
It was this that held him upright, as all his soul energy had been squeezed out of him.
Through a sweaty and blood-hazed vision, he saw one of his canines glittering bloodily on the floor. He had lost the other one earlier; it had fallen somewhere.
A phantom pain came over him in that instant.
His lips drew back in a twitching snarl, exposing two holes. His once dangerously yellow eyes had dulled to a wood-brown, vacant and unseeing in that empty chamber.
His dark hair was a mess. His earrings were gone.
This hollow that had become him.
Nothingness felt like this.
I didn't know what it meant to be so powerless. If I had known, I wouldn't have acted so recklessly.
Under this searing pain, he had been forcibly shifted into a human. He couldn't imagine what his body looked like under the bindings.
Nonetheless, that wasn't his utmost concern. His companions were strewn outside in grotesque positions in the corridor. Worse still, there had been no time to check their well beings.
The thought that brought the most wretchedness was the vampire, whose wounds he'd discovered weren't healing themselves. From the amount of blood he'd seen before getting trapped in this room, his companions were on their last breaths.
Relik had refused to accept defeat.
How could he? He had come too far to give up. After being so riled up, how could he let this person go without a proper beating?
Not even one strike had hit its mark, and there he was... At the brink of death.
He sucked in a noisy breath, swallowed a dehydrated throat with a contorted face. The air was heavy with the scent of burnt offerings. The sweat on that visible pallid skin had long dried out. He was stiff and dizzy, yet he couldn't pass out.
His companions needed his help.
How did it come to this? They had only come to seek answers. How did it become like this? His face twisted in extreme agony.
"I sense your heart, immortal. Have you finally learned your place?" It was so calm.
The tears that he'd been holding back spontaneously gushed out, blazing hot trails that mixed with blood and dirt, tickling his skin.
"Please," he croaked with as much articulation as he could muster. He heaved, face squeezing with each painful breath.
"I apologize! I have erred. Spare them. I beg you. They shouldn't die because of me."
"Sores like you should be excised before they fester. Pathetic!" The unseen voice rose with even greater wrath. The echo bounced across the walls and Relik momentarily chilled.
A bright flash of light came from the side and shattered the glass.
An electrifying thunderclap sounded, and a torrential downpour was released.
No. The king's body was seized in a full-body seizure as he dragged his aching neck to look at the window. Blood spattered the window, and ran down a jagged course.
He froze. Those wild eyes betrayed his inner feelings, and a thousand thoughts flashed through his mind before it all ended abruptly.
No!
The torrential downpour was a blood-rain. Another thunderclap followed like it was confirming his suspicions.
The last one was downright cruel. It shook the very foundation of the building and this sorry body of his that was being held steady by this roping furnace.
Relik looked on.
The knight in shining armour had turned into a leaf in the wind.
His head hurt.
His eyes opened and closed in a daze.
The image persisted: trembling, he pulled away. The room was blurred and darkened. His mouth opened and closed to taste copper. The earth reeked of wet metal.
The rain was insistent against the rooftop, pounding on the window panes, insistent against his heart. The unimaginable agony from the silver bindings was now a joke in comparison.
Someone just died - his lover.
He tried to reach out to him through their mind channel knowing quite well it had been blocked from the moment they ascended to the upper realm. His head slumped.
My dearest: you just promised me a long life. Why are you leaving before me?
Why?
And all for...
And all because of what?
All because of what!
If yet another person told King Relik that he was the strongest werewolf ever to be born, who knew what he would do to that person?
Then, he thought of his lover and guilt suffocated him. The groans of the wounded animal was heart-rending. He couldn't utter a word.
Unusually, that overbearing voice didn't speak again.
Unfair!
He began to struggle. Oh. The torment.
Not like this. He was fangless, clawless. utterly powerless and he was really going to die, but not like this. This couldn't happen.
Whether he could help it or not, his movements grew weaker and weaker.
Before Relik closed his eyes eternally with the heavy weight of infinite regrets, he was reminded of the warning that that lovingly intoxicating voice had whispered in his ears. If this wasn't truly merciless...
"Stubborn mule, you look before you leap."
He hadn't looked, and because of that he had led three others to an untimely end.
A lone tear dropped from the corner of his eye. It had no place to go.
"Forgive me..."
At that moment, another raging thunderstorm swept out the sky in the entirety of the middle realm. A grey moon appeared at its centre. This was the silver moon without its light.
The werewolves shook with dread. After some moments, a hoarse wail pierced the metallic air.
In that year, King Relik passed.
---
Hundred years ago.
Back then, King Relik was still very young.
They were waiting for the birth of someone.