THE PROPHECY THAT DESTROYED - Η ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΙΑ ΠΟΥ ΚΑΤΕΣΤΡΕΨΕ

THE PROPHECY THAT DESTROYED

Is it possible that the Legend, the one my ancestors predicted, is real? Or is it just children's stories? He! The God Quetzalcoatl, God of the Air, stands before me in flesh and blood. Is it possible?

He is not like the people of my people. He is different. His skin is as white as the white clouds moved by the wind, his beard imposing on his face, his red hair burning like fire on his head, and his eyes the color none of my people possess, green. He is the same as the image depicted in the legends, as he has been described for generations.

He is not a man, but yes, he is the God of legends. Is it possible? How did he get here? Where did he appear from? There is no other place but only the land of the Aztecs. My country is rich and holy, and there is nothing far away but only the sea. And yet he came from the sea, carried by the wind.

But yes, he is God. It was blowing the day he entered my kingdom, and I felt a gentle, cold breeze whenever I came near him. The wind ruffles his hair, and he seems to enjoy it. It belongs to him. But it can't be a coincidence. This is the God of Air. The legends predicted it, and they can't lie. I am not mistaken. There is no other like him. He is the one.

This Indian woman who follows him, the mistress he has chosen to have, is from a hostile tribe that we rule. She conspires against my people or follows the orders of her God, my God, our God. She whispers softly in my ear, thoughts, and orders. God Quetzalcoatl must go, she says, to meet the other gods. He will return with gifts and riches, untold and beyond imagination from my kingdom itself. I heard her. Why did I listen to her?

Because the followers he left behind to protect us slaughtered the nobles of my people after they went to pray in our temple. They are also Gods who were angered by some insolence or simply demons who follow God's orders. Because he unleashed his wrath on us, he punishes us. I sent him gifts. I thanked him for his appearance. He honored us this time in the legends of the ages. I hosted, fed, and bowed before him as only God deserved. But where did I offend him?

I must have been wrong. I was naive, and he was not God. Before I took my last breath, I betrayed my people. I let them destroy our temples and put up their own images with other faces, deities I don't know. This is what God Quetzalcoatl asked, what he demanded, I thought was the right thing, that I do his will. I dishonored myself as emperor of the Aztecs. I dishonored the people I was meant to protect. I ordered them to obey a barbarian. My people turned against me, stoned me, and reviled me because I let a stranger into our country and declared him God.

Was I wrong, but the legends say so. My eyes and my blind faith deceived me. Was it madness? Why did the God I worshiped betray me? Why did he kill me?

Created by Diana Chemeris

* Reference to the events of the entry of the Spanish Cortes in 1518 in the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan. There, King Montezuma, because of the legends, confused Cortes with a deity. A strange story of how this country was conquered.

Source: "Power and Greed" by Philippe Gigantes

https://dianachem.com/2022/11/11/the-prophecy-that-destroyed/