Darkness Incarnate

My fist continues to slam into flesh, the sound of the blood pooling on the floor.

The smash occurs again, and again, and again. It seemed almost endless.

It was my fist.

My lip begins to quiver as I shoot back to reality.

My entire body is shaking in a resistance to the atrocity I had just committed. Not only had I killed someone. I brutalised him. In front of the masses. The image still lingers in my brain as I sit surrounded by the proctors of the trials. 

"What are you?" They repeat once more, in case I didn't hear the first time.

"I don't know..." That was all that I could muster, I was terrified, I was scared of what I had just done. I hate it. I don't want this.

I didn't mean for Indri to die, not like that...

That was pure cruelty, pure malice... I feel the lingering heartbeat that I extinguished within myself, as if he were still here, deep inside of me. And, the monster that had taken away his life.

It was me, and yet... it felt so foreign, so far from what I really was. 

"It wasn't me, I didn't do that..." my chest tightens as I continue to speak, my diaphragm clutching as it continues to attempt to conjure some sort of excuse for what I had done, "I didn't want to kill him, oh Indri..."

The proctors do not seem bemused, they stare blankly at me as I continue to be surrounded by them in the middle of this room as their chairs sit high above me, as if I was on trial.

A woman with auburn hair leans forward from her seated position, "You are an anomaly, what has transpired further fuels the fire of those uncertainties. Are you truly clanless?"

Her question caught me off guard, I remember what Morgana had said never reveal your true identity, that I was from the Nevere clan. That she had sired me into this world.

"Yes, I am clanless, what does that have to do with anything? I want to know what's happening to me!" I snap towards the end of my sentence, I genuinely want to know what happened. "During the fight, I heard a voice, it was so full of rage and malice, it was a figure of pure darkness, the only light that shone from it were the deep red of its eyes." I continue on, clutching onto the chance that I possibly could get an answer.

The woman with auburn hair continues, "You are beyond dangerous, a liability to us. You should be by all rights, be extinguished right here and now."

The proctor who was in the first trial with me, who dragged me here from the arena began to speak. "We're just gonna give it to you straight kid, we believe you harbour something profound inside of you, something dark, dangerous. We brought you here not to berate you, not to put you on trial. Death happens, although that was messy business. You are being placed under watch. We will kill you the next time this power is used without control. Consider it an honour."

The other proctors continue to glare at me whilst they mumble amongst each other, some are not happy with this decision at all, but all they can do is bite their tongue and pray that I die somewhere down the line -- it won't happen.

The proctor who had broke the news to me picks me up by my collar once more. His face comes near my ear. "Name's Drin, by the way. Remember it, because it might just be the name of the person who kills you. Although, I don't really want that to happen."

Drin then begins to drag me away from the council of proctors that had gathered to witness the verdict of my fate. I had narrowly escaped this time, but it was no time to get complacent. I could die at any moment. I had to keep this thing in check, lest it consume me whole.

I hear a dark menacing laughter, it didn't resonate from Drin, but deeper down within my psyche.

So, they didn't kill you? Perfect.

They do not know what I am.

What we are.

They will soon find out, boy.

Once I take control of you forever, you will bare witness to the catastrophe I will wring upon them.

Get out of my head.

Drin throws me into a room, like the one I was in before the Trial of Strength. "Play nice now, no more holes in my bloody floor."

The screen began to play the current match, it had just begun after a long intermission from the previous battle. My battle.

It was Cayus, he was gliding across the arena, reminiscent of a swan. His grace and fluidity in battle was in no doubt brought about by years of practice, diligent trials by expert sword masters.

Back home, we had people like this too, they were regaled as heroes, stalwart defenders of our realm. The descriptions of those deeds pale in comparison to the evidence in front of me.

Cayus swings his sword, followed by a flurry of an extra two, all within the same step. The Resan he incorporated within this dance only served as an incredible boost to his physical power. Then it happened. Sparks flew off his blade, a large explosion of embers and ash spewed forth and seared into the flesh of his opponent. It was a younger girl, her technique, her use of Resan. It was no match.

She would die if she does not yield.

That is the folly of humans, the ability of perseverance, even at the cost of life. 

The embers had spread across her arm, debilitating her, Cayus only grew hungrier to defeat her, he swings his sword in thrusts this time, each thrust digging into the flesh of this girl. I sit up and continue to watch, I loathe seeing another innocent die, and yet in the back of my mind it did not allow me to avert my eyes.

I knew it was coming.

She falls to the floor, pleading for mercy, alas Cayus was beyond reason. Her head was taken clean off and cauterised within the same swing due to the fire that lit up his blade.

Her head rolled around, the cheers from the crowd grew louder. They loved that Cayus had won. They didn't even care about this poor girl that had lost her life.

Cayus had passed.