Legacy of the Destroyer: Ragnarök

Chapter III: Saved

CHAPTER III: SAVED

HE WAS IN A room, completely enveloped in darkness. At first he wondered why there was no light, but then as his eyes adjusted to the pitch-blackness, he found himself content in it. He needed nothing else.

He thought of nothing; not that he didn’t try. The more he tried to think of why he was there, where he was, or how he had gotten there, the more his confusion escalated. When he realized that he couldn’t even recall his own name, tears began falling from his eyes. It hadn’t been voluntary. When he felt the wetness and his face heating up, he reached up and touched his eyes, a child-like wonder filling his conscience. What was this substance and why had it appeared?

He slowly crouched down and wrapped his arms around his knees, trying to rid himself of the clinging wretchedness of the dark.

Though initially he had been content within the darkness, he found that desperation found him: he needed companionship. He wondered if this was how Novus had felt—and then he wondered who Novus was, and how he had thought of him. The name embodied a distant warmth similar to the sun.

Then…

The sun? What was the sun?

Thoughts continued to arise, in effect, arousing more thoughts. What frightened him most was that he kept thinking these thoughts but had no idea where it had come from.

He felt wetness again, but not from his eyes this time. It was colder, heavier. Looking up, he saw that millions of droplets of water fell from what seemed to be nothing. The water trickled into his eyes, mixing with his tears.

“What if the world was like this?”

A voice sounded from the silent world in which he was entrapped. His eyes roamed the room once more, trying to figure out where it had come from. Just like the rain, he couldn’t figure out its origin.

“What if you knew nothing, about nothing?”

He yelled in defiance, a feral roar that scared even him. He felt like an animal, taught by instinct, acting on its fears.

“The world is dark. You are no one. You have no one.” The voice drifted off, allowing him a chance to brood on his words. “The world I created was formed out of where you are now. I have gifted the humans with so much… yet they know no gratitude. If all else fails, I plan to return the world to its original state.”

Although he could not understand much of the man’s words, he felt fear, engraved into his bones, into the very soul of his existence.

“I have placed my trust in you. You are the last chance for humanity. The war between the Rulers will be great. Humanity will be reduced to almost nothing. You, who were named after my sister, Demetra—after peace itself—are the last. You are Ragnarök… you will bring about the destruction of three kingdoms, but if you fail in this duty, you will also bring about the destruction of mankind.”

With these final words, the scene began to dissolve; as suddenly as he had appeared in the room, like mist rising from the ocean, the room was no more.

With a jerk, Demetri was pulled out of the dream, momentarily confused. The dream, like all dreams, had made no sense. Within his semi-conscious state, he had not even known his name. He hadn’t known the tears that had fallen from his eyes, nor had he known what the sun had been. The absence of knowledge was terrifying. The darkness of the room, so normal, so natural, hadn’t shaken him at all.