Chapter One
From the Ashes of Rigel
The foul, repugnant stench of Duma's caverns was sickening enough to drive any sane mortal running for the hills the very instant their nose caught a whiff of it.
Jedah, on the other hand, quite enjoyed the smell, considering he had grown up surrounded by poisonous swamps and gargoyles that likely did not understand the concept of soap. He rather liked being greeted every morning by the disgusting smell of toxic water that rushed through the spacious cavern and smelled like Mogall droppings.
This morning, in particular, was nothing special, as it consisted of Jedah sitting at a wooden table and reading the Rigelian Times while his daughter poured him a glass of tea.
"Here is your drink, father." His pale-skinned daughter spoke while she floated above the ground. Jedah had sacrificed two of his three daughters to Duma and never regretted his decision. Having subservient, soulless children was more tolerable than teenage daughters, after all.
"Thank you, Marla." Jedah smiled at his daughter while he took a sip of tea, but noticed that she looked rather perturbed.
"My name is Hestia…" Hestia floated away with a look of disgust while Jedah realized he had mistaken the two, and noticed that Marla was floating against the wall and staring at him in an unsettlingly way.
"Sorry, dear! It's just very easy to confuse the two of you." Jedah attempted to save face but realized his efforts were in vain as Hestia disappeared around the bend of the cavern. He resumed to read his paper and was granted only a few moments of tranquility before he heard a certain draconic god speak from behind him.
"Jedah…" Duma spoke in a whiney tone as he rhythmically tapped his green claw on the ground. Truth be told, Jedah wasn't sure why Duma bothered to stay in that emerald-colored body of a dragon, considering the wear and damage it had sustained over the years.
"If I ignore him, he'll stop asking…" Jedah thought to himself as he continued to read the paper.
"Jedah!" Duma's voice grew louder now. "Jedah Jedah Jedah Jed-" The ceiling of the cavern began to shake from the volume of his whining.
"Oh, for crying out loud! What is it that you need, Duma?" Jedah rolled his eyes, stood up, and turned around to face his god.
"I'm boooooored…" Duma sighed. It had been rather uneventful to hang out in a cave for a thousand years or so. "And hungry, but mostly bored."
"Well, Hades can't feed you because you frightened him last week," Jedah said. Members of the Duma Faithful would take turns feeding Duma, but Hades had become so sickened by the way Duma consumed his Dagon Fillet that he and his two Dread Fighter cronies had relocated themselves to the farthest point in the cave away from Duma.
"I know, I know, it's just…" Duma let out a drawn-out breath that warmed Jedah's skin as it drifted by him. "There's nothing to do here. Why can't I leave this cave?"
"Lord Duma, please, this cavern is your safe haven. If the peasants outside were to see you in your currently beautiful, but equally frightening state, they would not react well." Jedah spoke as Duma's eye located in the center of the god's head focused on him. "Do you have any suggestions of activities we could do within the safety of these catacombs?"
"Well, I've always wanted to have a birthday party," Duma said.
"A… A birthday party? How would we even go about creating a date of birth for a god?" Considering Duma was one of the Divine Dragons who had existed since the beginning of time, Jedah had every right to question how Duma would have a birthday.
"Well, we could say it was today," Duma suggested.
"But we can't just prepare a celebration in such a short time!" Jedah protested, then realized that as the head of the Duma Faithful, his best interest was Duma's well-being, and he knew that Duma would enjoy this event greatly. "Fine. What is your birthday wish?"
"To meet another dragon." Duma was always fascinated with the fact that he and Mila were not the only Divine Dragons, and had always wanted to see one ever since he was exiled from Archanea.
"I'll contact Mila immediat-" Duma's eyes glared at Jedah as he spoke.
"No. You know how uptight my sister is. She'll probably take one look at this cave and leave due to the 'rank decor'." Duma had always loathed the presence of his sister and how she had to coddle humanity with every action she took.
"So then where exactly shall I find another dragon?" Jedah asked.
"I don't know. We all came from Archanea, so try searching there." Duma responded.
"There is no chance in hell that I am sailing across the sea just to find you a playmate." Jedah folded his arms and glared at Duma, who lowered his massive head to meet Jedah's eye level. "Don't give me that look." Jedah noticed that Duma was now giving him a sort of 'puppy-dog' stare.
"Please? It'll be the best birthday gift ever…" Duma's eyes looked less like a giant winged reptile and more like a pleading child.
"Oh, fine…" Jedah rolled his eyes then began to walk away from Duma. "Your birthday party shall have to be delayed until I return, but I shall try to avoid coming back empty-handed." He strode towards the exit of the caves while Duma beamed with delight.
After a strenuous and boring voyage across the sea between Rigel and Archanea, Jedah had landed on the continent that had been Duma and Mila's home before they were forced out.
Upon stepping onto Archaean soil, Jedah was surprised at how cold the port town of Furia was. Regardless, after 'interrogating' a few of the locals with his magic, Jedah had been informed about the labyrinth of Thabes, where foul noises and infernal shrieks echoed out of the entrance. Surely, a dragon had to be found in that treacherous maze.
As Jedah stood in the crumbling, sand-coated halls of the labyrinth, he noticed that he rather admired the sense of dread this place gave off. Sure, it was covered with sand, which was coarse, rough, irritating, and got everywhere, but the actual materials that were used to construct Thabes looked rather nice.
But he did not have time to sightsee. He had a job to do. As such, he created a small ball of flame that circled his head and pierced through the darkness, then pulled a turnwheel out of his cloak.
This was now ordinary wheel though. This was Duma's Turnwheel, and unlike Mila's Turnwheel, which allowed the user to go backward in time, Duma's Turnwheel allowed the user to go forward in time.
Jedah spun the hand of the wheel forward, and multiple glowing holes emerged before him. Each portal acted as a window to the future, and if he were to step into one, he would be there. Due to the nature of creating the future, and how one small difference in what Jedah did could create a new future, there were multiple choices of the future.
One future depicted him taking a right turn and getting sliced into pieces by a squad of Dread Fighters. Another showed him jumping off a short cliff and landing on his head, and a final future showed him running from all conflict and standing before an ornate set of doors.
Considering he did not want to get killed in this god-forsaken labyrinth, Jedah stepped into the portal and found himself before the same pair of double doors. A Symbol of six eyes was engraved on the door, and Jedah pushed the doors open to reveal a dimly-lit circular room that had a raised platform in the center. Torches lined the side of the platform, and the same symbol of six eyes from the door was drawn on the floor with a scarlet material
Above the raised platform was some sort of… winged thing furled up and hanging upside down from the ceiling as though it were a bat. Its feathered wings were furled around its body, most likely in an attempt to retain heat.
If this thing were a bat, then it was a rather massive one. It easily dwarfed Jedah in size and looked to be about the same size of Duma.
"Now what do we have here…" Jedah whispered to himself as he continued to inspect this creature until it began to stir.
Its wings unfurled to reveal that there were six of them, and it flapped them to keep itself afloat as it descended from the ceiling. It had a long, purple body that had a noticeable lack of legs, and a horned head that was adorned with six red eyes that were focused only on Jedah.
Jedah's heart skipped a beat when he realized he had actually found a dragon.
"YOU DARE BRING LIGHT TO MY LAIR? YOU MUST DIE!" The dragon unleashed an ear-splitting roar and shouted at Jedah. "I AM THE WINGS OF DESPAIR! I AM THE BREATH OF RUIN! I AM THE CREA-" The dragon's eyes widened and it began to cough. Gigantic wads of spit flew out of its mouth and pelted the floor. "SORRY. SLEEPING FOR THE LAST FEW DAYS DOES THAT TO ME."
"You do not have to yell," Jedah spoke while he covered his ears, which were ringing.
"WAIT. YOU CAN UNDE-" The dragon took a second to process what this strange blue man had said and then continued to speak. "You can understand me?"
"Yes." Jedah took his hands off his ears and stared the purple dragon directly in its eyes. "You dragons have a language that you default to, and I have spent enough time working with one to understand that tongue."
"Wait, you know a dragon?" The dragon's head reared back and gained a look of curiosity. "I thought I was the only one who existed! Tell me more about them, please!"
"Before I deluge more of my information, I must know who you are and why you're sitting at the bottom of this deserted labyrinth," Jedah spoke.
"My name is… uh…" It paused, as it remembered it hadn't been given a name by its creator. "My creator, Forneus, referred to me as the Creation. He was a weak old man who tried to use me, so I killed him."
"Y-you were created? By a mortal?" This baffled Jedah as it was unheard of for a mortal to create a divine dragon.
"Yeah. He made me by taking a necrodragon and infusing it with the blood of a divine dragon. He also figured out how to raise the dead by placing masks on them. Like that one." The Creation spoke, then pointed to his left using his wing where a glowing symbol was sketched on the floor. A bright flash ensued, and then Jedah found himself staring at a Cantor that wore a large stone mask. The undead wizard just stood there, quietly groaning until it suddenly disappeared in a puff of smoke. "Okay, that's my life story. Yours?"
"I am Jedah, head of the Duma Faithful. I serve the God of Rigel, Duma, and I was tasked to find another dragon for him to interact with." Jedah fumbled with his turnwheel and began to spin it. So far, this dragon seemed to fit the bill for what Duma was looking for. "Would you be willing to come with me and meet Duma?"
"I mean, I don't have anything else to do besides stick around in this dank maze, so sure." The Creation watched as Jedah pulled an ornate wheel out of his cloak and summoned a massive, golden hole on the wall that shone through the darkness. "This isn't a trap, right?"
"Certainly not. I would never harm a member of your race unless their actions deemed it." Jedah spoke then motioned for the Creation to follow him as he stood before the portal into the future, where he had the Creation blast a hole in the ceiling and fly across the sea to Rigel with Jedah on his back. The Creation flew into the portal, and Jedah followed.
It had been a few days since Jedah had left, and Duma was starting to lose hope that he would come back. It had been excruciatingly boring to sit around all day and hope that a friend was coming, and his guards weren't known for having interesting conversations.
That sense of boredom was cured immediately when a massive glowing hole flashed on the wall to Duma's right, and a purple dragon about the same size as him emerged. This dragon had six wings that kept it afloat, golden fins along its neck, and sharp horns that looked as though they were designed for the sole purpose of piercing flesh.
As the Creation emerged out of the portal, he was greeted with the sight of a green dragon that had all the traits of a normal winged lizard, save for the large eye in his forehead.
Jedah watched as the two dragons stared at each other with blank faces, then figured he should step in.
"Duma, this is the Creation. He's a divine dragon created in a labyrinth. Creation, this is Duma, god of Rigel." Duma's eyes lit up the instant Jedah finished speaking.
"You were created?! That's so awe-inspiring!" Duma slowly walked towards the Creation and raised his left claw up. "It's a pleasure to meet you." The Creation assumed that he wanted to shake hands, but remembered that he didn't have a talon to shake Duma's claw with.
"The pleasure is all mine." The Creation lowered his head and felt Duma's talons grip around one of his horns. He slowly shook his head up and down as though this were a handshake until Duma removed the Creation's horn from his grip. "This is a pretty nice cavern you have here. Only real suggestion I have is putting a pile of skulls over there." The Creation used one of his wings to point towards an empty corner.
"You know, I was thinking the same thing." Normally, Duma would be annoyed if some stranger came in and offered him suggestions on interior decoration, but this was a dragon, not some filthy commoner. "So what are you into?"
"I uh… I don't really know…" The Creation didn't really know what he was into, seeing as he had been stuck in a labyrinth for his entire life until now. "My creator talked about using me to control humanity, so I guess that's a start."
"Okay, are we the same person or something?" Duma laughed to himself as he cracked a smile. Jedah smiled too; this was the happiest Duma had been in a long while. "I also love subjugating humans!"
Duma thought for a bit and realized that 'The Creation' wasn't that intimidating of a name. "You know what you could use? A title."
"Yeah, I was thinking of changing my name into something dark and brooding. I just don't know where to start." The Creation remembered the many hours he would spend trying to think of a name. At one point, he thought of 'Robin the Destructive Dragon', but then figured that Robin was a stupid name.
"So, for example, all of the dragons I know have names that end with an a. Like Naga, Mila, and myself, Duma." Duma spoke.
"So what word should I add an a to?" The Creation asked.
"We could do something like how I did my name. I just took the word doom, added an a to it, and then spelled it in an odd manner." After Duma spoke, the eye in the center of his head floated out of its place and began to glow as it hung in the air. An orange beam of light shone out of the eye, and he pointed the beam towards a wall. He moved the beam in all manner of directions for a bit until he no longer emitted light from it, then his floating eye lowered back into his skull.
The Creation inspected the wall that Duma had shone a beam on and discovered that his ocular beam was bright enough to burn a mark onto the wall. In fact, Duma had spelled out his name on the wall using the beam and even made a plus sign underneath his name. "Okay, your turn. Write your name on the wall." Duma instructed.
"I see." The Creation had decided on a name, then opened his jaws. Purple flames began to form in his open mouth, and a pillar of fire emerged from his mouth and blasted the wall with it to spell his new name out underneath Duma's.
"G… r… i… m… a…" Duma narrated the letters that the Creation was inscribing onto the wall. He watched as the Creation's flame breath died down, and he was left panting from exhaustion. "Grima, correct?"
"Y-yes…" From this point on, he was no longer the Creation. Now, he was Grima. A dragon who belonged to no one, and could carve out his own destiny.
"Pretty ominous nickname. Now we just need a title for you. Instead of something like 'Divine Dragon', how about we give you a darker title." Duma took a few steps back to give Grima space while he recuperated.
"How about 'Fell Dragon'?" Grima asked as he regained his composure. "That's cool, right?"
"You are just nailing it with these names today!" Duma spoke with excitement in his tone. "I really like having you around. Wanna be friends?"
"I thought we already were friends," Grima stated. He enjoyed the presence of this other dragon, and it was a nice change of pace from spending an eternity of solitude.
While Jedah watched with glee as Duma had the time of his life, he felt a smooth, yet cold hand poke his shoulder. He turned around to see Nuibaba, the arcanist who had recently joined the Duma Faithful yet had been a loyal servant since she came on board.
"Why is there a purple dragon floating around our lord?" She asked.
"That is Duma's new 'playmate.' " Jedah made air-quotes with his fingers. "Duma requested to meet another dragon, so I found this one in a derelict maze in Archanea."
"Hey, Jedah!" Duma yelled as he looked to his caretaker. "We should get the party started soon!"
"Yes, yes. Just give me some time." Jedah looked at Grima, who just floated there idly flapping his wings. "Grima, would you be so kind to help us decorate this cave?"
"Oh, uh… Sure…" Grima didn't like the idea of manual labor, but he also didn't want to be thrown out of this cave.
A few minutes passed while Jedah instructed the various members of the Duma Faithful to decorate the living space of Duma. Grima had been assigned to hang multi-colored streamers between the walls of the cave. He did this by having a Gold Knight named Hades toss the decorations into the air, where Grima caught them with his mouth and hung them.
"Okay, this is the last one. Ready?" Hades asked as he held the balled-up party streamer in his hands. Grima floated above him.
"Ready!" Grima looked down onto the blue-skinned man. He had done this task for a short while now, so he felt that he had the hang of it.
Hades tossed one end of the streamers up into the air, where Grima snatched it up with his jaws. He floated up with the rest of the streamer dangling from his mouth, where he tied it around one of the stalactites that protruded out of the ceiling of the caves.
What Grima didn't know was that Hades forgot to let go of his end of the decorations.
"Help! Dear Duma, please help me!" Hades fought the urge to look down as he dangled above the ground from the streamer, but succumbed to the urges and promptly realized that if he were to fall, it would be fatal.
"Don't worry, I'll save you!" Grima floated down until he was at the same elevation as Hades, then opened his jaws. "I'll carry you in my mouth. I promise that I will not eat you."
"Y-you sure?" Hades looked to Grima's six eyes with a terrified look of distress. He never trusted giant reptiles, but now seemed like a good time to start believing them when they swore to save his life.
"You have my word." Grima flew to the area behind Hades, then slowly moved his head closer to the armored man. He opened his jaws, and Hades felt his heart tremble when he saw Grima's mouth emerge from the top and bottom of his field of vision.
Grima closed his mouth when he made sure that Hades was covered by his jaws, and indeed felt the Gold Knight squirm inside his mouth. His jaws were only slightly larger than the man, though, so it was a rather snug fit.
Grima floated back down to the ground of the caves and spat his mouth, where Hades flew out and landed on the ground in a spit-covered heap. Said spit was a sickening shade of purple.
"I'm… I'm alive?" Hades slowly got to his feet and looked to his slimy hands. He then planted his face to the stone floor and began to feverishly kiss it. "I'm alive!" He turned around and looked up to Grima with a look of pure joy. "Thank you! Thank you thank you thank you!"
"You're… You're welcome." It felt rather odd to save a life, but Grima slightly enjoyed the pleasing feeling of satisfaction it gave him.
Cerberus, and his brother Cerberus, had both watched the unfolding events, and it seemed their boss had not noticed that his armor was now a different shade of color.
"Hey, boss. Your armor's… You're purple now." Cerberus spoke in a cold voice as Hades looked to his arm-guards. They were indeed stained purple instead of the normal gold attire of the Gold Knights.
"Oh, uh… I think my saliva stained your armor." Grima nervously glanced to the side but noticed that Hades look pleased.
"I always hated the color gold. Thanks for the new pigment." He gave a thumbs up to Grima then continued to speak. "You should tell Jedah the decorations are ready."
After Grima reported back that everything was in place, Jedah had gathered all of the members of the Duma Faithful to the main chamber of the cave, where Duma sat before a birthday cake with a candle in it.
"For he's a jolly good war god, for he's a jolly good war god. For he's a jolly good war gooooood, which nobody can deny!" The Duma Faithful (and Grima) sang while Duma grinned from horn-to-horn.
"Thanks, guys. This is the best birthday ever!" Duma looked down at the birthday cake before him, which was elevated by a raised platform. He lowered his head and swallowed the cake whole as Jedah and the other members clapped.
"Now, Lord Duma, what is your birthday wish?" Jedah raised his eyebrow while he asked. Duma began to ponder what he should wish for, but all he could think about was the conversations he had made with Grima.
"My wish is… That Grima gets to stay with us in the caves!" As Duma spoke, every member of the Duma Faithful gathered around him gasped in surprise. Grima's eyes nervously darted back and forth. He didn't want to appear needy, but he did like the idea of staying with Duma.
"But… Sire, we're already running out of room to have your servants rest. A large dragon like him wouldn't be able to fi-" Jedah was interrupted by Duma flashing him an angry stare while the eyeball in his forehead started to glow.
"You asked for my wish, and I gave it to you. He can sleep here in the main chamber." Duma used his claw to point at the center of the circular sigil on the floor.
"If it's any consolation, I can just sleep from the ceiling." Grima butted in, much to Jedah's annoyance.
"Grima's staying, and that's final." Jedah backed off while Duma's eye lost its glow.
"As you desire." Jedah held up his hands in surrender as he walked away.
"Well, I feel exhausted." Duma's eyes drooped as he began to turn around in a circular motion, then curled up on the floor like a dog. "Goodnight. Don't let the Mogalls bite." Duma watched with droopy eyes as Grima floated up to the ceiling of the cavern, and attached his tail to it so he could hang upside-down like a bat. "No, seriously. Those little monsters hurt."
The very next afternoon, Duma spent the afternoon chatting with Grima.
"I always hated how my sister coddled her people and tended to their every whim," Duma spoke as Grima floated before him.
"How would you treat humanity then?" Grima asked.
"They need to experience crushing lows so they can appreciate the joyous times. If they have to starve so they can be overjoyed at tomorrow's bountiful harvest, then so be it."
"I can see that. I don't think they should be coddled either, and hardship builds character." Grima thought he should mention that too much hardship could turn a person cold and distant, but didn't want to damage his friendship with Duma. "They should still worship us at the end of the day."
"Exactly. We are gods to them, so we should be treated as such. The people of Rigel worship me, and the foolish Zofians worship Mila." The way Duma pronounced the name of his sister sounded as though he was choking the words out.
"So if Mila is your sister, then why do you detest her so?" Grima tilted his head slightly to the side while he asked.
"I don't… detest her. It's just that we disagree over how to treat humanity. When I was exiled from Archanea, she followed me out of our bond as siblings, but when we arrived on this continent, we began to argue. This turned into a rather bloody conflict, and we struck a pact." Duma continued to speak. "The bottom half of this land shall be Zofia, which worships Mila. The upper half became Rigel, which is devoted to me. I can't hate her because she gave up her life for me, but at the very least I can disagree with her."
"That's understandable. Hopefully you two can make up and come to an agreement." Grima suggested.
"I doubt it, but who knows what the future will bring." After Duma finished his spiel, he realized he hadn't seen Jedah at all today. "Could you do me a favor and check on Jedah?"
"Alright." Grima began to slowly fly around the bend of the cave, which looked as dank and depressing as it did yesterday until he saw the blue-skinned man standing at a corner. He looked to be gathering object from a wooden crate. "Hey, uh, Jedah…"
"Yes, Grima? What is it?" Jedah sighed as he turned around and looked up to see the purple dragon floating above the ground. It's not that he disliked Grima, it's just that it felt odd to have two dragons in Duma's sacred home.
"Duma just wanted me to check in on what you're doing, is all," Grima spoke as Jedah turned back around, and discovered that he was lifting slabs of meat out of a crate and tossing them onto a cart. "Is that food for him?"
"Yes. He normally eats a herd of cows for lunch and a whole pigsty for dinner." Jedah pointed to another crate that was behind the one he just emptied, which had a large p drawn on it with ink.
"You really care for him, huh." Grima smiled as Jedah rolled his eyes.
"As head of the Duma Faithful, that is indeed my job." Jedah took the empty crate and tossed it aside to a pile where more emptied containers towered in a pile that almost reached the height of Grima's elevation.
"Well I mean, you look like you enjoy your work. I think Duma knows how much you enjoy it too." Grima noticed that now Jedah was smiling, which looked rather odd given his complexion.
"I live to serve, I suppose." Jedah laughed to himself. "Thank you for the compliments, Grima."
"You're a good man, Jedah. I hope to get my own weirdly-colored manservant one day." Grima laughed, then noticed that Jedah was now pushing a cart loaded with cow meat. "Do you want me to tell Duma that his food is on the way?"
"I would greatly appreciate that. Thank you." Jedah struggled to push the cart -which he suspected weighed more than one of Duma's hands- but eventually got it moving.
As Grima floated back to Duma's chamber, he looked to his green dragon friend before something else caught his attention. It was a woman with blue skin and a purple dress who sort of… floated slightly above the ground. All of his six eyes were focused on her, and only her, which Duma noticed with a sly grin.
"Excuse me, Marla? Can you give Grima and I a moment alone please?" Duma spoke in a gentle voice as Marla turned around to face him.
"As you wish, Lord Duma." Marla promptly teleported out of view, and Duma made absolutely sure that she was indeed out of view by checking his sides.
"So Jedah's bringing the food cart arou-" Before Grima could finish, Duma cut in.
"You like her, don't you?" Duma was grinning like a madman while Grima tossed a glare at him.
"No! I am above such petty feelings." Duma swore that if Grima had cheeks, they would be flush with pink.
"Your denial only makes it more obvious." Duma continued to press Grima for the truth.
Grima couldn't even formulate a response because he was too preoccupied with thinking about that Marla woman. He could only focus on her smooth, yet firm hands that looked like they could lull him into slumber just by their smooth touch. Her elegant figure that indicated she was a woman of class. Her resplendent beaut-
"Okay, okay! I maybe, sorta, kinda like her…" Grima's six eyes were shifting away from Duma and to the spaces next to him. He found the entire idea of a dragon having a romantic relationship with a human to be very odd.
"Well, then we're gonna set you up with her." Duma smiled with innocent glee as he tapped his claw on the ground. "Marla! Marla Marla Marla Mar-"
"Wait, no no no no no!" Grima desperately pleaded for Duma to stop, but his efforts were in vain as Marla teleported into the chamber.
"Yes, Lord Duma?" Marla tilted her head to the side in an incredibly adorable manner, while Grima nervously glanced at the stone floor.
"My friend Grima here was wondering if he could invite you to dinner on this lovely evening." Duma used his claw to point to Grima, who attempted to nervously back away into the dark recesses of the cave.
"If my Lord wills it, then so be it." Marla turned around to face Grima with her beautiful soulless voids that she called eyes. "Hello, Grima."
"H-Hi…" Grima gulped his breath as he stopped backing away, while Duma flashed him the closest to a 'thumbs-up' he could do with his draconic claws.
"Jedah! We're gonna need a table, some chairs, and an assortment of nice-smelling candles!" Duma called out, then was answered by the groaning noises that echoed from deeper inside the cave.
"As you wish!" Jedah spoke with a half-hearted tone that indicated he really didn't want to grab furniture and scented candles.
"I shall meet you for dinner in five hours." Marla smiled as she teleported away, again.
"S-see you then…" Grima began to uncontrollably cough as he glared at Duma. "I honestly can't believe you right now."
"Hey, I'm just trying to help you out." Duma raised both of his hands and made a shrugging gesture.
About five hours passed, and Grima floated before a small wooden table that Marla sat at the opposite side of. The table was placed in the center of Duma's chamber in the cavern, and Jedah had used illusion magic to make the only light source be the golden candelabra placed in the center of the table.
"Your food, sir and madam." Jedah -who wore a suit and looked absolutely miserable- approached the table with multiple platters in his hand. He placed them on the table then removed the metallic lids from them.
Marla's food consisted of a small salad and a glass of water. Grima's food, on the other hand, was a whole steamed pig, a couple steaks in a pile, and a few tubs of water.
"Thank you, father." Marla watched as her father disappeared into the darkness of the cave, seemingly leaving her along with Grima. She looked up to the dragon, whose uncomfortableness was as obvious as the horns on his head. "So you were created by a mortal?"
"Y-yes ma'am." Grima was practically shaking with fear while Marla took a bite out of her salad. He had no idea how to even go about seducing her, considering Duma had effectively thrown him into the vast, deadly ocean known as romance, and left him stranded without a life-preserver.
Marla, however, thought his nervousness was quite cute and reminded her of a flustered schoolboy trying to declare their admiration.
"Who was your creator?" Marla asked as she raised her eyebrow.
"He was uh…" Grima figured that he had nothing to lose at this point, so he figured he should stop being a coward and take life by the figurative horns. "He was a weak-minded fool who sought to use me as a means to an end, rather than a living being."
"Oh, my. That sounds dreadful…" Marla watched with curiosity as Grima swallowed his entire steamed pig whole. She couldn't imagine how tormented this poor soul felt, never having someone admire them or even worship them like Duma and his religious cult that she belonged to.
"It was decent. He fed me corpses for a while so I could grow, and after he gave his blood to me, I could discover his weakness." Grima finished chewing and continued to speak. "He was so busy carving a stone tablet outside my room that he didn't notice when I had a masked servant bludgeon him over the head with a rusty axe."
"At the very least, vengeance was yours." Marla finished her salad and began to drink her glass of water as she watched Grima gobble down the rest of his food.
"Well, yes, in a sense. But I got no satisfaction from watching him perish. There was still a rather empty feeling in my… my soul, I guess." Grima looked to the side and noticed that Duma was now asleep. He found it rather rude that his supposed 'wingman' was now slacking on the job.
"Do you still feel empty?" Marla turned her head to the side as she looked to Grima's empty plate of food.
"I guess." Grima let out a long sigh. "But enough about my boring life. What about you?" He then focused his six eyes on Marla; he didn't want to only talk about himself, after all.
"My life up until now has been rather simple, I suppose. My father, Jedah, left my sisters, Hestia, Sonya and myself, at a priory until we were around the ripe age of eighteen when he sacrificed our souls to Lord Duma so that we may become witches."
Marla leaned back in her seat and waited. She concluded that this conversation could go in two directions. One where Grima asked a second question, which showed that he paid attention or another where Grima just nodded his head and stated how awful it must be to have your soul ripped out of your body.
"How did that make you feel? You know, to have been left by your father only to have him show up and sacrifice you to Duma?" Grima watched as Marla looked back with shock in her eyes and sat upright in her chair.
It turned out that even draconic abominations of nature understood how to court a maiden. But what shocked Marla was that nobody had ever asked her how she feels. Nobody ever asked if she wanted to have her soul ripped from her being. Even her father acted as though her cares were nonexistent, and it took her now to realize that she wanted people to notice her.
"It… I-it made me feel… angry?" Marla had to struggle to get the words out of her mouth. "It made me feel… frustrated. I was frustrated that my father abandoned us and that he only returned just to use us to further his goals." There was something… cathartic about complaining to another soul, and it proved to be the relief that Marla didn't know she wanted, but desperately needed.
"Sort of like how my creator only used me as a tool." Grima figured that the best way to help someone feel better was to sympathize with them. "I understand how much of a personal hell that is, and I'm sorry it had to happen to you."
Silence followed suit, then a quiet whimper pierced through the calm like a ringing bell. Grima searched around the dark area of the cavern to locate the source of the crying until he determined that the origin was staring him directly in the face.
"G-grima… Could you please lower your head for a moment?" Marla's tears were ink-black as they streaked down her face while she got out of her chair and stood before him. Grima did as she asked and lowered his head, then was greeted by Marla slowly wrapping her arms around his upper lip in a hug of sorts. "T-thank you. No one has ever asked about my feelings before..."
"Are you going to be alright?" Grima attempted to speak without moving his mouth, which resulted in his voice being muffled.
"I-i'll be fine." Marla pressed her head to Grima's and continued to sob. Even though his skin was frigid to the touch, she couldn't remove her hands from it. His skin just felt too pleasing, and she was in severe need of someone to hold her. In fact, she felt so exhausted that she just wanted to rest immediately "I-I just need to lie down for a bit."
"That's alright. If you need me to find someone to help you sleep then I would be happy to oblig-" Grima couldn't help but notice that Marla was blushing as he was cut off mid-sentence.
"Actually, I was wondering if… I was wondering…" Marla choked the words out as she stared directly into Grima's six red eyes. She felt something raw, something new, something…
Something human. A strange new feeling that a witch should not be feeling was burning inside her core.
Affection.
"I was wondering if you would sleep with me." Marla finally spit her words out and immediately regret it. The look of pure fear in Grima's eyes was incredibly obvious, and the following silence only prolonged the feeling of dread in her gut.
Grima was now presented with a woman who had caught his eyes asking to lay with him, and took the appropriate response.
"I w-would be happy to help you sleep." He slowly pulled his head away from Marla, who looked back up at him with a sense of longing. "I must warn you that I am unable to sleep on the ground."
"Unable or just unwilling?" Marla raised her eyebrow as Grima nervously glanced from side to side. Sure, he lacked legs, but maybe he could curl up on the floor like a sleeping hound.
"Okay, I'll try." Grima began to descend in his elevation until his underbelly was practically touching the floor. Beads of sweat trickled down his brow while his wings began to flap faster and faster. What if he were to die the instant he touched the floor? What if he could never get back into the air and was reduced to a literal sitting target? What if-
His cares melted away the instant he noticed the reassuring look that Marla was giving him, and he quickly settled himself on the stone floor of the cavern without a second thought. The jagged and cold sensation that tickled his stomach felt odd as he laid out like a stretching cat.
"Thank you for humoring me." Marla smiled as she sat down and quickly kissed Grima on his upper jaw. She then adjusted the bun that kept her hair up and Grima discovered that her hair was long enough to reach her legs.
It was at that point Grima decided that he might have a thing for women with long hair.
As Marla began to snore, Grima realized that he had done it; he had gotten the girl. The question that remained now was whether or not Jedah was going to kill him to protect his daughter.
But those were problems that would arise on the morrow. For now, Grima took an immeasurable amount of pleasure from the warm, fuzzy feeling that Marla's embrace gave him.
Grima and Marla awoke to the infernal sound of what they presumed to be a sword scratching a rusted whetstone and quickly got up and floated above the air.
It had not been an object that made the noise, but rather a person. Duma, to be specific, was curled up in a ball and howling in pain.
"Make it stop! Make. It. Stop!" Duma's orange eye was now flashing rapidly as though it were in distress while he screamed. Jedah stood before him with his arms outstretched.
"Duma, what is wrong?" The devotion and care in Jedah's voice was as apparent as the stars in the night sky.
"Voices! Voices telling me to kill! Voices that won't stop!" Duma clutched his head with his claws while he shook.
"You're starting to degenerate. You need to separate your mind from your body or else you will become a mindless beast." Jedah had known that all dragons were doomed to fall into the madness known as degeneration, but had prayed that Duma could avoid the pain it brings.
"O-okay!" Duma got to his hands and feet, which were trembling along with the rest of his body, and began to close his two eyes. The orange eye in his forehead glowed with even more intensity than before, and it suddenly rose out of his forehead.
Duma alway had the ability to separate his spirit, represented by his eye, from his body, but he had never planned on doing it permanently. But if it held the degeneration back, then it was a price he was willing to pay.
"There. Are you feeling well?" Jedah asked.
"I will be fine." Duma's voice echoed around the room while Grima noticed that his draconic, green body was now laying on the ground like a corpse. "But we both know the degeneration will continue. We need to find the Brand Bearers."
"Brand Bearers?" Grima asked while Duma's floating eye turned to face him. Marla quickly whispered to him while he lowered his head to meet her eye-level.
"Prophecies speak of two children destined to slay Mila and Duma then go on to unite the continent. If Duma is able to absorb the soul of the children, he will reach nigh-infinite power and be immune to degeneration." Marla spoke to him then kissed on the head. "Thank you for last night, by the way."
"Ah, I see," Grima spoke before pulling his head away. "Thank you as well."
"I shall contact our network of spies and begin to search for them," Jedah reassured Duma and began to walk away. Marla and Grima both turned their heads to watch as Jedah disappeared into the dark tunnels of the cave, then began to question if anyone noticed that they were a couple now.
"Hey, Grima! Congratulations on getting with Marla!" Duma spoke with joy in his voice as they both turned to face the floating eye.
"Thank you, Lord Duma." Marla smiled then looked to Grima, eager to start her day with him at her side.
Hopefully, things would work out well and Duma would be back in action before the year ended.
To say the last six months had gone well for Duma and his followers would be an overstatement at best, and at worst would be a sarcastic insult.
On one hand, Mila had been sealed inside the Falchion given to Duma by Naga, and was now dead. Even Grima and Marla were both inseparable and both looked the happiest they had ever been.
But on the other, Jedah had located the Brand Bearers, which were two bothersome young adults by the name of Alm and Celica, but they had eluded his grasp at every turn. Alm had brought Rigel to its knees, killed Rudolf, and was on a warpath towards killing Duma. Celica had proven to be very, very gullible and was tricked by Jedah into sacrificing her soul, only Alm had somehow gotten her soul back, and now they were waiting outside his cavern with an army.
What troubled Duma the most was that Alm now had the Falchion, which was fatal to dragons such as himself and Grima. If Alm were to get in here and kill Grima, then…
Duma didn't even want to think about that outcome and glanced to Grima, whose eyes were burning with a feverish intensity.
All Grima knew was that there was an army gathering outside the front entrance to Duma's cavern and that he would be damned if they were going to lay a finger on his friends. Supposedly, this small group was lead by a bothersome 'Alm', who Grima had been wanting to eliminate after hearing about the trouble he had caused to Duma.
"Don't worry, Duma. I'll crush these bastards." Grima gave a reassuring look to Duma.
"No, Grima, you have to listen to me." Duma's floating eye stared directly at him. "They have the Falchion. They can kill you and me, and I doubt they would hesitate to."
"So? The fear of death only makes me fight with more strength." Even in his voice, Duma could hear the foolishness of youth that flowed within Grima. It was that very same youth that Duma wanted to preserve.
"Grima, I could never forgive myself if something happened to you. You're family to me, and family looks out for each other." Duma quickly turned his focus to Jedah, who had summoned a swarm of Mogalls around him. "Jedah, prepare the turnwheel."
"A great idea, Lord. We can smuggle you out of the caves and-" Jedah grabbed the ornate wheel from his cloak and began to spin it forward.
"No. It is my destiny to do battle here. Win or lose, the future of this continent shall be shaped by this battle." Duma looked to Grima, and he could tell that Grima knew where this was going. "See to it that Grima is relocated to safety. I'd rather end myself than see harm befall him."
"As you wish, Duma." Jedah could feel the tension in the air as he summoned a massive golden portal in the wall next to Grima.
"I'm not leaving." Grima stared Duma directly in his eye. "There is no way in hell that I'm leaving you to die."
"If I die today, then that is my destiny! There is no way in hell that I am letting you die, not when you have your whole life ahead of you!" Duma shouted while Grima backed up. "Think about this. You could either charge headfirst into suicide or live to fight another day."
"B-but… I won't be with any of you…" Grima's eyes shifted around while tears ran down his lower lip.
"I'm sorry it had to be this way, Grima. If it were up to me we would've ruled the world like kings, but I see fate had other plans for me." Duma noticed that Marla was watching from afar. "Marla, do you wish to go with Grima?"
Marla had loved Grima with all of her heart in the last six months, but now her heart was telling her to do something other than running.
"My place is at your side, Duma," Marla spoke with weepy eyes as she floated towards Grima, who lowered his head to meet his eye level. "I'll miss you most of all, Grima."
Grima had to choke the words out of his mouth.
"G-goodbye, Marla…" He spoke as Marla wrapped her arms around his head and kissed him.
Grima turned around and faced the portal. Before he left, he gave one final look to Duma. "Goodbye, Duma."
Grima steered himself through the portal, and he emerged back in his home underneath Thabes. It was almost as if the last six months had been nothing more than a figment of his imagination.
There was nothing in this abode of use to him.
There was no Duma to talk to and be around to make the days feel shorter and shorter.
There was no Marla to console him and love him with all of her heart.
There was no cultist members who knew his name and treated him like family.
The only thing in the abode was a large dragon, who curled up on the floor and began to cry.
Some time passed while Grima was alone in the labyrinth. All he could think about was Duma and Marla, and how they had probably been slaughtered by this Alm.
His thoughts were interrupted when the doors to his chambers creaked open, which caught his attention. He flew down from the ceiling and waited above the central platform of his room.
"This must be Jedah, here to bring me back to Duma!" Grima could only hope for the best and was greeted by the worst.
A boy with green hair and blue armor stepped onto the platform. Nine more people followed behind him, including a girl with red hair.
"Alm, what is that thing?" Celica asked as she tightened her grip on her sword.
"Alm?" Grima knew that there was no way that this scrawny boy was the monster who-
"Looks to me like it's a dragon, like Duma. Hopefully, Falchion works on it, in case it's hostile." Alm spoke as he gave a reassuring glance to Celica.
The way Alm pronounced Falchion sounded like he was using a sword. Grima, on the other hand, heard it as though he was using a weapon of mass destruction that had ruined his happiness.
This was the boy that had murdered Duma. His survival was a testament to that.
This was the boy that had slain Marla in cold blood like she was nothing more than an animal.
This was the boy who had ruined everything for Grima.
This was the boy who was going to have his insides broiled until Grima could see his head explode into a shower of blood.
Grima reared his head back and let out a screeching roar of pure, uncontrollable rage that sent shivers down Alm's body.
"Everyone, get ready for a fight!" Alm raised his sword on high while his band of friends cheered behind him.
Even though Grima fought with all his strength, he had been defeated by Alm. What surprised him, however, was that when he fell, he didn't die.
Instead, he found himself in some sort of pitch-black void.
"Hello?" He called out, only to be met with silence. Emptiness stretched out as far as his eyes could see, and he began to float in one general direction. Even the air felt as though it was empty; lacking in any warmth or coolness.
An unknown amount of time passed until Grima decided that he was trapped. Trapped in some sort of middle ground between life and death where he was the only living thing for as far as his eyes could see.
A bright flash of light caught his attention when he had just about given up hope, and he turned to see a floating parchment descend from above and float before him.
"Creation, if you are reading this, you have been defeated. However, as part of your grand design, you can never truly be killed. Your spirit shall linger until you can find a host with enough of my blood, as once you have a host, you can pull yourself back into the physical world." The message read.
Grima continued to read the following paragraph. "Before I gave my blood to you, I captured roughly one hundred Archanean men and injected a sample of my blood into them, thus ensuring that you shall always have a suitable vessel on standby. When an individual has enough blood, you shall begin to hear their voice. Simply whisper back and convince them to come to the spot where you were last slain. Once they stand atop your resting spot, you may possess them and use them as an anchor to pull yourself back into the physical world."
One final paragraph caught Grima's eye. "In the meantime, the longer you remain in this realm, the more powerful you shall grow. Eventually, you shall dwarf the sea itself in your scope." At the bottom of the paper was a small dash, and Forneus' signature.
Grima tossed the paper away in disgust; even in death, Forneus was breathing down his back. In his anger, however, he failed to notice an additional paragraph written on the back. It looked as though it had been scrawled on there in a hurry. "If someone with enough blood to be possessed strikes you down, then you will, unfortunately, be slain. Permanently. Their blood will counteract yours, and your spirit shall be torn asunder."
And so Grima waited.
And waited.
And waited.
A millennium of nothing but Grima rage growing with every moment, and his size increased as well. He had almost, almost given up hope right before he finally heard the soothing sound of someone whispering.
"My… My life is a mess…" The unknown voice was riddled with distraught. "My wife left me, my son hates me… I don't know what to do…" His whispers echoed around the area. This person must have enough of Forneus' blood to be possessed.
Now was Grima's chance; his moment to strike and claw his way back into the living world.
"I can… grant you unlimited power." Grima whispered back. "Just do as I wish, and go to where I direct you."
The man who had murmured to himself went by the name of Lagermil and was currently sitting by himself at a dimly-lit bar with his hands buried in his head. When a low, growling voice spoke back in his thoughts and informed him of unlimited power, his gut reaction told him to refuse the offer.
His desperation, on the other hand, made him accept. The voice instructed him to go to the old Thabian Labyrinths. Surely that was where his power was waiting.
What Lagermil didn't expect was that he would become the first vessel for a destructive god with a vengeance, and become infamous as the founder of the Grimleal.
So after discovering that Grima received an excellent backstory in Shadows of Valentia, I figured I should capitalize on this new info and write my own personal take on how he reacted to some farm boy running into his home and slaying him.
The second (and final) chapter of this story will be uploaded when I finish it, which should hopefully take a week.
