Yipion - part 2

“Do you know why the pigs invaded us?” said the voice in uncontained laughter, and completed before an answer came, “Because we let them, ahah, yes we did, we are dumb, we are blind…ih…ih…”

“Shut it!” yelled the prince, “Sick and tired of theory and philosophy. Who the hell are you?”

Silence flooded the space around the fire, as tears rolled down Yipion’s cheeks. A screech became a gag and then a laugh, and then it became deep and rough, an incomprehensible demonic growl. Then silence. Yipion looked around and coughed, then made a series of sounds, from laugh to yells and singing.

“That was because of me, yes me!” the voice sounded softer than before, yet still mad, “I, I made you talk, I!”

The prince laid down in his tent and closed it. The voice said nothing more.

The next morning, Yipion woke up with a strange noise. Outside the tent he felt presences. “Enemies, perhaps,” he thought, but it was different, a presence he had never felt. Something demonic, evil. He silently picked his sword with both hands and prayed. He prayed to Ol-amâ, an ancient spirit he had contracted with to protect him from dark sorcery.

A beam of red-orange light struck him and as the tent was ripped apart he saw a giant beast, winged, in green scales. Its right arm was a mess of eyes, teeth and labia. The bare sight of it terrified Yipion, and rightfully so, but the prince was ready. The creature was draining his life force, but Yipion had been trained by the best masters in the land, and he knew how to break that spell. The voice cried out again and again, but Yipion couldn’t find it. His time was running short, and the monster dashed toward him. Behind it he saw other such monsters. Not the usual enemies, rather devilish creatures the likes of which he had never heard of. With a shout he shook the giant one that was upon him, and the red beam broke. Then he took to the air and grabbed onto its shoulder, stabbing its neck. As he fell with the beast he saw the other monsters rushing to him.

Yipion never thought he would have that fight. It shaped him forever. The creatures were so powerful they resurrected one another, fighting relentlessly. The boy was out of breath and hopeless. He didn’t know what to do, but to fight on. The voice kept crying out, as if far away, resonating inside his head. He couldn’t find it. The vile magic of the enemy was new to him, but his techniques were still far superior. He figured the only way to end it was to kill them all at once.

But the mute prince was now way too tired.

His only option was to try and petrify them, which he did. The enchantment was complex, but he too was a master of the art. The Flux vibrated, shook and swirled. Sound ceased to exist for a moment, time skipped, the earth trembled.

The creatures turned to stone in an instant. Yipion fell to the ground.

It wouldn’t take long for Maratè and the Kingdom army to find him, for the ripples he created were too big to go unnoticed. Upon seeing the young prince on the floor, unconscious, they hasted to aid him, but the voice intervened.

“Get back all of you!” it shouted.

“Who is this?” Maratè, a layman in the arts of the Flux couldn’t comprehend what he heard. The voice was inside his head. He shook it as if to remove the voice from his hears, but it went on.

“The boy is mine! You can’t touch him, you CAN’T!”

Maratè ordered his second-in-command Tomuy to go get the boy. As he lifted him on his shoulders, his legs were ripped off at the knees. He tumbled and screamed in pain.

“You scream too much, pig,” Tomuy’s tongue became incandescent, slowly turning to ash, his teeth rotted and his throat got crushed bit by bit. “You shall not take him. He is mine to do as I please. He will not help you in your quest.”

“Who are you? What do you want?” Maratè sounded desperate.

“Who am I? What do I want?” the voice laughed aloud for a while. “I am nobody, and I want everything. I want the world of men to crumble, I want the lights in the sky to burn and fall upon us. If only I could find Hamut, if only I could SLAY him!”

Maratè slowly walked back. He reached for a bow on his horse. Quickly he ended Tomuy suffering, the poor man still alive and jerking in pain.

“Let’s leave, men,” he finally declared.

Though not without a few protests, the battalion retreated, the officers looking back at the bloody, scorched and pierced body of Tomuy.

When Yipion woke up the next day, he would never be the same.

Yipion - part 1

“Hamut. I knew that name would be famous, but not for these reasons,” the voice went.

And relentlessly it went, year after year, conquering the mind of the young Yipion, the court boy, who wouldn’t even speak.

As sort of divine compensation for the seemingly stupid nature of the boy, he had a bursting intelligence, sharpness and always knew what to do, even at only three years of age.

And so he grew up: mute. And his parents raised him, like any king raises a son, but never without fear for what his future held.

When Yipion was seventeen, he joined the army, but fearful for the little, seemingly defenceless youngling, his father forbade him. After trying to keep him at home, Yipion fled from the palace, never to be seen.

Years went by, and the war with the enemy raged. Yipion had never been seen, until one day, in the midst of a violent battle between the Mountain Kingdoms and the enemy, a horseman astride a black horse rode into the battlefield at full speed. He wore a long black tunic with fine red details. The shaved head and the marks and scars on his skin deemed him a member of an old spirit-worshipping cult.

General Maratè, the commander of the Kingdom’s troops recognised him in the vast green plains, and rallied his officers. But, alien to the battle, the dark figure rode ahead, straight into enemy lines.

A mirage on the battlefield, perhaps, thought Maraté. But upon seeing the enemy’s reaction to the horseman, his eyes widened. What’s more, the enemy was now charging towards him, filled with battle fury and adrenaline in their hearts.

“Tomuy! Is that…”

“Yipion!” answered Tomuy, the general’s second-in-command.

“What the hell is he doing? Going to get himself killed if we don’t make for him,” groaned the general.

Ordering his battalion to follow him, Maratè sought to attempt a risky flank. The allied troops would detour to pass by the enemy’s front line and reach the prince arriving from the West. Soon, a long protective wall of soldiers was in place to shield the flanking movement. The natural reaction from the enemy was to stop the flank, and as such the two armies were again face to face. After a lot of fighting, Maratè managed to get to the prince, which was just then riding into enemy formation. How he evaded the enemy attacks, Maratè knew not.

“Filthy pigs…scum…destroy them, destroy them all…” whispered the voice. A whisper so low and soft Yipion barely heard it amidst the battle, “Poor bastards, they want us back, puppets, play dolls, worthless animals…”

Yipion rode through the dark, dark creatures, darker than black, darkness itself. And through the enemy army he rode, and on the other side he kept going, toward the Black Mountain, no looking back. Stunned, the general and his officers used this distraction to fully flank the enemy and give place to another victory for the Kingdoms.

Night. A bonfire faced Yipion. The thoughtful boy sat, the marks on his skin noted the struggle he’d faced, and his face his fatigue. Tired at life, at this mission. At the foot of the Black Mountain, from within his tent he gazed upwards, pondering, remembering. No one could guess what he thought. And only the voice, seldom revealed, brought meaning to his life. It had taught him everything he knew. The way of the worshipper monks, of the Flux, the sword and the YoPunJi. But the voice was daft, borderline insane. And Yipion knew better than to be infected by that madness, for he dreaded it.