We're now entering Chapter 4 of Fallen Flag: Heaven Kneels, I Rise — and this is where things start to truly cook. 😮💨
This one is all about the tension of destiny creeping in:
Allen's connection to the fruit deepens, even though he's just two.
Nature bends.
Serena starts to fear the weight her son was born with.
And Hades? That man finally speaks to his son like a warrior—not just a father—for the first time.
It's time.
The first signs were small—barely noticeable.
Crows stopped cawing in the mornings. The songbirds that once filled the gardens with light chatter grew mute when Allen passed. The island beasts—behemoth apes and scaled wolves that once snarled from the tree lines—now knelt with heads bowed whenever he drew near.
Allen didn't understand it, not entirely. At just over two years old, he could barely piece words together, but in his chest?
He felt it.
The hum. The pull. That song beneath the cliffs calling to him, singing through his bones like a forgotten lullaby.
And with every visit to the stone where the earth cracked, the voice grew louder.
Serena watched it all.
She tried not to let fear sink in. She was a woman who had battled the worst of the Grand Line, faced Warlords and worse, and came out smiling. But this?
This was something different.
Her son—the same boy who cried softly in his sleep after dreaming of his past life—was now being claimed by the island itself. By something old. Something sacred.
And perhaps… something dangerous.
She confronted Hades at sunset.
He stood at the cliffside, one hand resting on the pommel of a sword so heavy the earth beneath it cracked slightly.
"He's hearing it," she said, softly.
Hades nodded.
"It was bound to happen."
"Not this early."
He turned his head slightly. "The fruit doesn't obey time. It obeys calling. And Allen's already bled more in his dreams than most men do in war. He's ready. Or... the fruit thinks he is."
Serena didn't answer immediately.
Instead, she looked down to where Allen sat by the garden pool, quietly staring at the sky's reflection in the water.
So still. So silent.
Like he was waiting.
"You told me the fruit was cursed," she said. "Sealed away for a reason."
Hades looked at her now, fully. His eyes were sharp, yet tired. The kind of tired that came from carrying too many truths for too long.
"It's not cursed. It's sacred," he said. "But the world will call any fire that doesn't warm them... a curse."
That night, the voice came again.
Allen sat upright in bed, eyes glazed with gold light, whispering words no one had taught him.
A language older than the seas.
He rose and walked again, barefoot, quiet as mist.
But this time, he wasn't alone.
A shadow followed him—deliberate and heavy. Hades walked behind, silent, letting his son lead.
They reached the cracked stone.
Allen knelt down instinctively, small hands brushing the earth like a priest before an altar.
Hades watched him, arms folded.
"You hear it, don't you?" he finally said.
Allen blinked, then nodded slowly. No fear. Just truth.
The wind stirred.
Hades stepped forward and crouched beside him.
"There's something beneath us," he said. "Something only the broken can carry. It called out to me once. I walked away."
Allen looked up at him.
"I didn't," the boy whispered.
And Hades smiled—not joyfully, but with a grim kind of pride.
They sat there for a long time—father and son, one scarred by battles fought, the other by wounds invisible.
The stars above spun in silence.
Finally, Hades spoke once more:
"You don't know what you are yet. That's good. Innocence is a kind of mercy."
He placed one hand on Allen's head.
"But one day, when that fruit touches your soul… you'll see how heavy the heavens really are."
Then, without another word, he stood, turned, and left.
Allen remained kneeling.
The cracked stone pulsed faintly beneath his fingers.
Deep underground, within the sealed temple, the fruit stirred again.
For the first time in decades, its shell began to warm.
It had waited for a soul wounded deep enough to cradle heaven and tear it down if needed.
And now, it had found one.
[END OF CHAPTER 4 |
📘 Coming Up in Chapter 5 – "Chapter 5 — The Song Beneath the Stone"
The fruit's shell will begin breaking…
The island will react violently. Animals, weather, even the sea will start stirring.
Serena will confront Hades about the real name of the fruit.
Allen will finally touch it.
Ready to dive straight into the chaos of Chapter 5 next, heh wait then