Chapter Text
Alatus rests on the cliffside, keenly watching the village below as the sun dips behind him, which paints the entire region in a benevolent shade of warm orange-gold that only makes the mountainous landscape all the prettier. He has been sitting here for hours with nothing much to do; after all, he is only truly alive when a blanket of glittering stars cover the sky.
You could say that Alatus is old— after all, he has been alive for nearly a century now. Perhaps he could indeed be considered ancient in mortal years, but such would be faulty as he is no mortal. In all honesty, he does not quite know exactly what he is, but that does not bother him. Alatus regards himself simply as a creature who eats dreams and protects mortals when he can. In his free time, he’ll indulge himself in whatever delicacies of life he finds.
He travels all over the continent and does not particularly stay anywhere for long. At most, he settles down somewhere for a year or two before traveling to a different village. Alatus has become something of a living legend; all throughout the land, mortals and immortals alike whisper to each other about the creature that allegedly swallows dreams.
He doesn’t know if there are others like him. He doesn’t put much thought to it either— a solitary, quiet life suits him.
Few have actually glimpsed Alatus, for he does not like being seen. He often changes figures, but the two he has come to enjoy the most are his original form, that of a golden-winged birdlike creature, and the one he currently occupies: a human.
By now, the sun is almost fully below the horizon. Alatus jumps down from where he sits, nimbly maneuvering down the side of the mountain. Despite nighttime being when he is most active, his favorite time of day is sunset.
Sunsets, he ponders. Alatus is no fool; he has long caught the scent of conflict on the wind and somewhere in the back of his mind he wonders if his century of peace is about to come crashing down. New gods have risen to power and old ones have risen from their graves— something ominous is stirring. Alatus wants no part in it, yet if their dissension continues, the sunsets he can witness may be numbered. The dream-eater banishes such pessimistic thoughts from his mind with a decisive shake of his head as he lands softly on the ground, just on the outskirts of the humble village.
From there, Alatus’s nightly routine starts. He jumps silently from roof to roof of the houses, invisible to the human eye, and devours any nightmares he comes across.
Alatus hears a groan come from the house next to the one he is currently on top of. He jumps down from the roof and lands lightly, careful not to startle the sleeping mortals. Walking over to the window and peeking in curiously, he waits half a second to let his vision adjust to the darkness inside. Alatus recognizes the old man almost immediately; he is the fisherman who wakes up before the light of dawn to journey to the nearby ocean and fish for half the day, who then races against the noon sun to make it back to his village. For the rest of the afternoon, the man (very successfully) sells fresh seafood to the others in the village.
He is a hardworking man. Alatus had observed him for a while; often, the fisherman would take the money he earned and use it to buy medicine. Intrigued, Alatus observed him for a little while more and found that his wife was sick. The married couple only had one child, a son just as hardworking as his father, who was over in another village— presumably looking for medicine as well.
Their efforts were in vain, for one day the woman succumbed to death. The entire village mourned her passing, and even Alatus himself felt a pang of sorrow when he heard the news.
In the present, Alatus teleports into the house and looks at the man before him, who is tossing and turning in his bed, the blanket twisted uncomfortably around his body and a sheen of sweat on his forehead.
Sorrow fills his heart once again to see the old fisherman in such pain. He reaches out his right hand and touches two fingers to the man’s forehead. A steady light surrounds Alatus’s fingertips, and the dream-eater closes his eyes. With great care, he gently pulls his fingers upwards, away from the sleeping man. Intricate threads of misty silver hang between, suspended in the silent air. He cups his hand and gathers the dream.
Alatus's mind floods with images of the fisherman’s dream. It tastes as smooth as always, yet it holds the bitter grief of a broken heart. He swallows nonetheless.
The man sleeps soundly now, his breath even. One could even say he looks serene. Alatus leaves a qingxin flower on the nightstand before leaving.
Weeks pass. Alatus once again sits atop a cliff watching over the same village as the sun sets. This time, as he descends down the mountain, something flies beside him. He turns his head to see a raven with a wilting chrysanthemum in its beak. It drops the flower, lets out a piercing screech, and flies away. His sharp amber eyes narrow.
Alatus finishes eating dreams for the night and is about to return back to the mountaintop when he spots something in the distance. He walks closer out of curiosity, but his feelings soon turn to worry when he recognizes the outline of the thing to be no other than a mortal girl. As he comes closer, he sees that she is asleep, not harmed or dead. That immediately makes him let out a breath of relief, but he soon becomes confused again— for what is a little girl doing out here, all alone at night? Beyond the village lies bloodthirsty beasts, and Alatus does not want to see her come upon one.
He is about to pick her up and carry her home when footsteps sound behind him.
“You are the dream-eater the legends speak of, are you not?”
Alatus whirls around, standing in front of the girl defensively, one arm raised. However, his defensive stance drops when he sees that the person does not seem to be threatening him or the girl.
As they walk closer, the moonlight that filters through the trees illuminates the person’s features. The person is a woman, and atop her shoulder rests a raven. She wears robes the color of peach blossoms. On her waist is a silk sash that holds it together, and dangling from it are jewels that match her earrings and the hairpin that holds her midnight hair in a half-bun. She must be a wealthy woman from the village.
Alatus’s eyes flash and narrow in recognition when he sees the bird.
“Ah,” the woman says, her tone light. “I take it you are acquainted with my raven? He flew off earlier, perhaps you met him.”
Alatus nods. “Yes, I saw him before. And to answer your previous question, yes, I am a dream-eater.”
When he found the mortal girl, he had let his cloak of invisibility drop, for he hadn’t thought there were people around him. It is his own fault for letting himself be seen by this woman.
“What is your name, dream-eater?”
Alatus does not move from his position in front of the sleeping girl. Never before did he tell anyone of his name, but then again, never before had he been asked.
“Alatus.”
He keeps his answers short and simple. Although the woman is friendly, he does not particularly like interaction and wishes to return to solitude.
“Alatus, I see,” the woman responds. “If you are a dream-eater, why are you not eating the girl’s dreams?”
Alatus lets the smallest of smiles grace his features. “The rumors and legends are a bit misleading,” he explains. “I only eat nightmares. If they’re having a good dream, there is no need for me to take it away.”
The woman sits down on a rock, the raven on her shoulder letting out a little squawk at the impact. Despite the movement, her robes still look immaculate. “How interesting. But entertain me; isn’t the very notion of a good dream subjective? How do you decide what is a nightmare and what isn’t? To you, a certain scenario may look bad, but is it true? You are a dream-eater, not a mind reader.”
This halts Alatus, who frowns as he processes her words. For the near-century he has been alive, he never truly stopped to consider this. He simply eats nightmares from people who seem to be thrashing around, troubled by what they see in their sleep. And he has never been wrong about this either, he thinks— so what exactly is this woman saying?
The woman sighs, which brings Alatus out of his daze. The way she gazes at Alatus is like that of a mother; soft, and slightly pitiful.
“I know this girl,” the robed woman says. “She dreams of seeing her father. But her father is a bad man. To her, dreaming of such is a positive thing, but you and I know better, isn’t that right?”
She stands up and walks closer to Alatus. “Alatus. Is her dream not a self-imposed nightmare?” Her tone holds a note of urgency that makes him uncomfortable.
Alatus shakes his head stubbornly, glaring at the woman. “I do not know what sort of philosophy you’re trying to convey, but I don’t need to hear it. Please, leave.”
The woman stares at him a moment longer before giving a gentle smile and turning around. “Very well, Alatus. If you wish.”
Alatus waits until the woman is out of sight, her raven companion gone with her, before he at last turns and crouches down in front of the girl once more. To put it simply, he doesn’t quite know what to do. Her words echo in his head as he observes the sleeping mortal, and he truly does not know if he should eat her dream.
It couldn’t hurt, right? He thinks to himself. You’ve never been wrong.
He reaches out to touch her forehead, the familiar swirls of silver following his fingertips as he pulls away. He gently cups it in his hands and brings the dream to his lips.
Alatus closes his eyes as he eats it and is hit with a flavor he has never tasted before.
The bitterness he often met when eating a nightmare is not present. Instead, this dream tastes sweet. It tastes like a sunrise over the sea, a field of fresh flowers, the dawn after rain, a cloudless night sky. It tastes like everything that is possibly good in this world, and Alatus is sure that it is the best thing he has ever eaten.
From there, a hunger is born, insatiable after being resisted for a century. Alatus puts two fingers upon the mortal girl’s forehead and consumes another dream.
And another.
And another.
And another.
He is addicted to this, high on the taste of a good dream. He is greedy for more, his hunger uncontrollable. He becomes delirious— one moment he is devouring another dream, and the next his head hits the forest floor and he falls unconscious.
Alatus may be a dream-eater. But what is a dream?
When he looks back upon this moment in the future, the irony is not lost on him; for he had forgotten that a dream has two interpretations.
Alatus awakes to shouts. He cracks an eye open, still faint and lightheaded. He is surrounded by mortals.
Mortals… mortals… mortals— wait, they can see me? He sits up, and when he sees the mortal child still sleeping next to him, he gets up on his feet, head clearer.
A man’s voice rings next to him. “What did you do? What did you do to the girl?” His voice is filled with anger, and Alatus can see that his fists are clenched.
He frowns. “What do you mean?” Alatus does not want to reveal that he is the dream-eater mortals tell legends about, but then again, it doesn’t seem like an appropriate answer to the angry man anyways.
“Don’t play stupid,” a villager sneers from the opposite direction. Alatus whirls around. “We found you lying next to her, and there was nobody else around. You are the only one who could’ve killed her.”
Alatus feels a fire spread in his heart at the accusation. “Kill? I would not kill a—”
“Look at her!” another person screams. Alatus turns around to see a weeping woman, face a contorted mask of raw pain. “Look at my daughter.”
It is only now that all the words fully register. Alatus looks down at the girl that is presently in her arms, and horror dawns on him, so instantaneous that he swears the entire world turns upside down for a moment. The child had not been sleeping when he woke up; she was dead.
Someone throws a sharp stone at his left arm and he flinches but doesn’t notice the wound, too panicked.
Alatus shakes his head in denial. “No, no, I didn’t do this,” he says to the mother, tone turning frantic. His words falter when he sees the woman’s eyes.
There is nothing in the world that can compare with a mother’s anger. Her eyes encapsulate rage and grief too well. The way her brows are furrowed, tears spilling out of her eyes, broken sobs interrupting her words.
All is quiet. Alatus is quiet, the girl’s mother is quiet, and even the villagers previously shouting are quiet.
Alatus shakes his head once more. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. There is nothing more for him to say, nothing for him to do. He doesn’t even know if he truly killed the girl, but either way he apologizes.
The dream-eater teleports away to the mountaintop, mind numb.
Alatus sits in the place he always does, but this time he does not look at the setting sun, no matter how beautiful it is. He is too dazed to think of anything besides what happened earlier. With his right hand, he touches the wound on his left arm, warm blood seeping onto his fingertips.
Did I really kill her?
He hears footsteps behind him— the same cadence. He does not turn around.
“Alatus,” a sweet voice calls.
He does not budge.
“Alatus, you killed her.”
He turns around at this, eyes wide when he hears the words fall from the woman’s lips. The woman wears the same robes, the same raven sitting on her right shoulder.
His denial and sorrow turns to fury. “You,” he seethes. “It is you who told me to eat her dream. Look what you’ve done.”
The woman does not respond right away. She takes time to adjust her robes and crouch down in front of him. “I said no such thing, Alatus. I merely asked if her dream was a self-imposed nightmare, and I asked how you define what a nightmare is. It is you who chose to eat her dreams.”
Alatus wants to argue, but he feels deep inside that the woman is being truthful. The vermillion sun sinks slowly behind them.
“It is also you, Alatus, who succumbed to whatever desire lies within. You did not simply eat her dreams. You ate her hopes, her aspirations, everything. You devoured her entire mind until there was nothing left. You are a killer.”
Alatus does not respond. He is too stunned from hearing his actions put into words.
“But you can atone.”
At this, he snaps out of his trance. “How?” he asks. “I’ll do anything, please.”
The woman smiles, and if one looks closely, they’d see that her smile is anything but genuine.
Alatus sees no such thing, for he is too eager to make amends.
“Anything?” she asks.
“Anything.”
“I’ll help you.” She stands up and reaches out a hand.
Alatus is naive, and he extends his hand. “Are you… are you a dream-eater as well?”
The woman nods. She takes his hand, and Alatus thinks that her hand is much too cold to be natural.
A shock runs through his veins. He gasps, eyes meeting her soulless ones for a split second. This time, the world really does turn upside down as he falls to the ground, the woman’s maniacal expression imprinted in his mind’s eye as his vision turns black.
There, high on the mountain with wind as the sole witness, Alatus’s freedom is taken.
She is not a dream-eater. She is a god, and she is a liar.
When Alatus next wakes up, he finds himself in unfamiliar surroundings. Dark stone envelopes him like an unwanted embrace, and he can hear some foul liquid dripping in the distance. He is instinctively aware that he is underground.
It takes him a while to recollect his thoughts and figure out how he got here. When he remembers fully, anger fills his heart and he tries to stand up, only to find he is bound by chains.
Two connect his feet to the ground and two connect his wrists to the wall. He can move no more than a few feet.
“Ah. You are awake.”
Alatus jumps at the voice that comes from nowhere. A figure emerges from the shadowy corners of what he now recognizes is a prison cell. The man that comes out is unfamiliar to the dream-eater. He has black hair and wears dark clothes that blend too well with the dim cell.
“Who are you?” Alatus asks.
“I was stripped of my name when I joined our master, but most call me Raven,” the man replies.
Alatus’s eyes narrow in recognition. “You. You’re the bird that sits on that bitch— ”
“Alatus,” the man interrupts. “Do not address our master using such crude terms.”
“Our master?” Alatus spits. “I do not remember agreeing to serve her. I do not remember agreeing to even come here. She offered to help me atone for what I did, and yet she threw me in an underground prison.”
Raven sighs and does not answer him. “Sleep.”
Alatus is infuriated and wants to argue, but does not even have time to wonder how Raven can command him before his head falls to the side and he succumbs to unconsciousness once more.
When Alatus awakes again, Raven is waiting for him. His chains rattle as he tries to move, glaring at the bird-human that waits patiently in front of his cell door. “I have been commanded to retrieve you. Our master wants to see you.”
Retrieve? Like a dog?
“No,” Alatus responds. “I refuse.”
The black-haired, black-eyed man scoffs, unlocks the door, and steps in. “I am afraid your opinion will not change things.” With little regard, he unlocks the multiple chains that secure Alatus. The dream-eater, upon realizing that his chains are gone, is surprised. Despite having almost no experience in combat, he could try to escape from here—
“Do not think of escaping,” Raven says, as if he read his thoughts. “You may be unchained, but it is impossible to leave this place alive. All the guards have been instructed to kill you should I command it, and I carry the will of our master.”
Alatus does not respond.
Raven takes them down many twisted tunnels that are dimly lit, so dark that Alatus could not mentally keep track even if he tried. His thoughts are occupied by two things; one, the fact that he is now a murderer, and two, how to get out of this prison. He does not have time to ponder over these two things for long. Raven stops in front of what looks like a stone wall.
“We are here. Open the doors.”
At first, Alatus is confused as to whom the man is talking to. That is, until torches light up on either side of them, and he finally realizes that they are not standing in front of a wall. Rather, it is two enormous doors made out of inky stone and reinforced with metal. The fire illuminates the passage they took to get here, and Alatus only now notices the people that stood at the sides of the tunnel. He did not notice a single person when he walked here with Raven— how is that possible?
His attention returns to the doors when he hears a low creaking noise, and suddenly it is open, revealing the inside.
Alatus’s breath catches in his throat. The sight before him is unparalleled.
Juxtaposing sharply with the damp, dimly lit tunnels that led to the prisons, this enormous cavern looks like it came straight out of a dream, impossibly beautiful. Alatus has never seen something so breathtaking.
The cavern is carved out by sharp, jagged stone that seems endlessly high, as if they were in a race to reach higher than each other. He can barely see the top, but he can tell that it is not completely covered; warm, golden light filters in from a hole at the top, the midday sun casting an ethereal glow on the cavern.
Perhaps cavern is not the right word; this place is more akin to a chasm.
Alatus can hear the sound of a waterfall to his right. The water plunges into a shallow pool surrounded by rocks, and growing between the boulders everywhere are plants of all kinds; some with large, broad leaves, some with leaves not unlike grass, and more. Soft green moss covers numerous stones, and an occasional crystal can be found tucked in the walls, glittering from the sunlight.
In the middle is a throne carved from rock sporting the most intricate designs possible and adorned with the clearest quartz. And atop it sits the liar.
Raven leads Alatus to the front of the throne where a carpet weaved of flowing silver lies atop the stone ground. One end leads to the throne and the other leads to an even grander set of doors that seems to be the main entrance. The one they came out of is from the left side of the cavern. Their footsteps echo loudly, and there is no other sound in the chasm save for the flow of water— not even a whisper.
Raven kneels on both legs, bowing deeply. “Lady Mengqin,” he greets.
“Return,” comes the responding croon. With a swirl of black feathers, the man that stood next to Alatus is no more, and when the feathers dissipate, they reveal a bird that flies to Mengqin’s shoulder.
“Dream-eater,” she says, greeting Alatus. “Will you not bow before your master?”
Alatus spits on the ground in front of him, and he can feel rather than hear the horror that passes through everyone in the room besides Mengqin. “You are not my master. You are a liar, and you manipulated me into coming here. Set me free.”
Mengqin laughs, and it is not a pleasant sound. “I rescue you and you dare spit in front of me,” she muses. “I will forgive such a grievance this first time, but do not expect me to do the same later on.”
Alatus does not like the implication of her statement; she speaks as if Alatus is to stay with her for longer. “You have no authority over me, thus I am free to do what I want,” he retorted.
“Ah, but do I?”
Mengqin uncrosses her legs and Raven flies off her shoulder, through the heavy doors at the end of the carpet. “Alatus, my little fool. You swore an oath of blood to me on that mountaintop above the village. Do you not remember?”
He casts his mind back, and his heart leaps impossibly high when he does indeed recall what happened. The last thing he felt before he fell unconscious was a mysterious pulse through his body. His hand was in Mengqin’s—
He had touched his wound earlier, the blood from it all over his fingertips. And when they shook hands, Alatus had thought her hand to be unnaturally cold.
It was not cold, it was blood. She cut her own hand. True terror chills him to the bone.
“From your expression, you seem to have remembered,” Mengqin beams at that, and Alatus wishes to never see her smile again. “I may be your master now, but worry not. I shall not force you to do anything… yet.”
Alatus stays completely frozen. The notion that his freedom is completely stripped from him is not fully processed.
Mengqin remains sprawled on her throne of jewels. “Well, Alatus?” she asks. “Will you bow in front of your new master?”
Alatus does not move.
Raven returns, an ear-splitting screech echoing in the silent cavern as he glides back to Mengqin’s shoulder. Behind him, two guards drag a gagged boy no older than the age of six. The boy is dumped next to Alatus, and his muffled screams make the dream-eater’s heart break.
“If you do not bow, I will kill this boy.”
Alatus drops to one knee.
“Further, my little bird.”
Alatus kneels on both knees, hands placed in front of him, and touches his head to the cold stone floor.
“Good. Rise, Alatus.”
Alatus stands up, amber eyes meeting soulless black ones.
“Now, eat the boy’s dreams,” Mengqin commands.
“No, ” he argues. “I will do no such thing. You promised the boy will not be harmed if I bowed. Let him go.”
The god laughs, patronizing and condescending. “You truly are a fool. I told you I would not kill him if you bowed. I said nothing about you.”
Horror wracks his body. He shakes his head, taking steps backwards.
“Alatus. Eat the boy’s dreams and do not stop.” Mengqin’s voice takes on a different quality, no longer light and playful. This time, it is cruel and cunning, fitting for a god.
It’s as if Alatus is a puppet, his limbs tied with string and controlled by some unknown entity— no, controlled by his master. He tries so hard to resist, clawing desperately against the command, but does not find the strength to do so.
Alatus cannot wash away the image of a corpse that is sunken and gray, as if their blood had been sucked out. He cannot wash away the sounds of their horrified screams as he had eaten their minds and souls so thoroughly that nothing was left. And he cannot wash away his master’s soft touch against his cheek, praising him for what he had done.
So little time passes, yet he goes from being a protector to a murderer, a wanderer to a slave.
He does not live in the prison anymore; instead, he has been moved to an aboveground castle where his master’s other adepti are. Yes, an adeptus— he only recently learned that he himself was one. Funnily enough, it seems that his master’s slaves are all bird shifters of some sort, stuck in her menagerie of false promises.
He is in a spacious room with a massive bed and expensive-looking furniture. He takes a look at his room that has become familiar over the last few weeks, the silk sheets white and the walls painted a silvery sage. He does not want to touch anything, lest he taint it with the blood on his hands.
After the first time he ate a victim’s dream at her feet, Alatus was escorted to these rooms and was told that this is where he would stay, and that he had free reign to go anywhere in Mengqin’s palace as long as he returned to her side when commanded to do so.
He feels repulsive, disgusted at himself. It is his hands that tear at their limbs, his mouth that devours their dreams, his mind that is lost in a euphoric haze as he feasts. At the end of the day, it is him who is responsible for those he kills.
It has only been a few weeks since he was first enslaved, yet he already is starting to lose count of the people he’s killed. It isn’t just eating dreams now; Mengqin forces him to train with Raven and the others in the art of combat, and he, much to his own horror, excels is violence.
Alatus walks out to the balcony in an attempt to observe the sky while the sun sinks below the horizon and promptly walks back in, wanting to gag. His favorite time of day is no longer sunset, as the scarlet hues painted across heaven’s canvas remind him just a little too much of bloodshed.
Time weaves an interesting tapestry. With her slender fingers that know no mistake, she weaves at whatever pace she fancies. And her divine irony is cruel, for Alatus thinks that she weaves slowest when he yearns for the time to pass.
The days trickle into months, which turn into years, and before he knows it, centuries have gone by. His perception of time is distorted, for he does not count in days. Instead, he counts using two intervals; the time in which he kills, and the time in which he does not. It pains him to concede that the former interval only grows as this war continues.
Yes, war.
A few years after Mengqin enslaved Alatus, dissension arose further and eventually spilled into a brutal war, in which all the gods of the land battled for the seven seats in Celestia. Mengqin was no exception; she too decides to engage in the conflict, for who can truly resist the temptation of power?
Alatus can taste it on the wind; this war is coming to an end. Rumors drift over the lands, murmuring of a golden dragon in the north who has never tasted defeat on his tongue. His master is one of the last gods standing, so it is not a question of if but rather when this dragon will march to Mengqin’s territory.
Every weapon in Mengqin’s arsenal is gathered through slavery, and of them all, Alatus is still the strongest. He is also the only one who retains a shred of humanity, which is only another of fate’s ironies, as he is not human to begin with.
When Alatus looks down at his hands, he cannot see the ones that gently touched a human’s soul and ate their dream. He cannot see the ones that left a qingxin flower wherever he went. He can only see the blood that has caked and dried under his fingernails, the cuts and scars on his palms, and the dirty callouses from holding his spear— all telltale marks of a killer.
Alatus wishes his heart could break in sorrow when he sees this monstrous version of himself, but it doesn’t. His heart vanished long ago, getting weaker with every throat he ripped and every dream he ate and every child he slaughtered and every village he burned, until one day, it altogether disappeared.
He gets up from where he sits, feeling his master’s summons. He hopes that when the golden dragon comes, he will kill them all. Every last one of them.
Alatus chokes on fine dust, opening his eyes to meet darkness. His body feels weak. He is slumped against jagged rocks in a once dreamlike-cavern that is now nothing but fallen stones and dull sunlight. He can feel a pool of blood gathering underneath him, soaking his clothes. He notes that it is coming from his own abdomen but pays it no heed.
His attention snags on the throne in the middle. It used to be so majestic, so intimidating. Now it is broken, covered in a thin layer of dust, and adorned by nothing save for a severed head on the seat, a lifeless look in its soulless eyes and its mouth open in an eternal scream. As Alatus bleeds out, he hopes that the crown sits heavy atop her head.
Someone comes towards him, unsullied as he makes his way to Alatus. He wears simple white robes with little embellishment save for a few designs etched in gold. His arms seem to be glowing, and his eyes hold a cold warmth he has never seen before. It is quite the image— a figure glowing gold in a cavern harboring the dark carnage of war; one deserving of the title god.
A pang of recognition shoots through him. This is Morax, the golden dragon.
Alatus moves from his slumped position into that of a kneeling one, bowing before the god. He bears the back of his neck, waiting to meet the same fate his master did, the fate that he deserves.
“Your name is Alatus, is it not?”
Alatus does not move. “My name is of little importance,” he replies automatically.
There is a rustle of fabric, and he sees that Morax has kneeled in front of him, the edges of his robes spilling to the side. “Your master is dead,” he says. “You are free to do whatever you desire yet you choose to bow before me, awaiting death?”
Alatus summons what courage left in him and looks up to meet Morax’s golden eyes. “I am a weapon that is now unused. Without orders, I am left with no purpose,” he explains. He tries to keep his words short, fearing this god’s wrath. Mengqin had executed countless who spoke half as much as he just did.
Morax thinks for a moment, gazing thoughtfully at the flightless bird in front of him before answering. “Despite not being of your own volition, you have killed thousands, and that sin weighs heavily on your soul. I propose a contract. There are numerous other adepti under my command who help protect my people. By joining them, you can find purpose and heal.”
Alatus nods shallowly. “I’d like that,” he answers without hesitation. He doesn’t know what type of lie this is, but he has no authority to deny it.
“In the fables of another world, the name Xiao is that of a spirit who encountered great hardship. He endured much suffering, as you have. Use this name from now on.”
The hand of a savior reaches out towards him— and be reminded once more that Xiao is no fool— of course he takes it, consequences be damned. The heavy weight of a contract settles deep within his soul. What he does not realize is that lying on those hands are the very same shackles, only instead disguised as threads of a golden promise.
Perhaps not seeing through this façade was his undoing.