-Alpha-
𝛂
Ash sat on a the hill over looking his small hometown village. It had been almost three years since the day he had lost Saria. The pain in his heart was still as fresh as it had been the day she died.
Two years ago, he and his life long friend, Saria, a tall girl with brown hair, had set off on their weekly trip to the next village over to buy supplies for their families. Along the road through the woods, a tall man with yellow eyes appeared in a flash of light. He kidnapped Saria and took her to his dark castle deep in the mountains of Burghdoor. Ash went on a long journey to gather the power needed to slay the Dark Prince, he then went to Burghdoor and to the Prince’s castle. There he found his long lost father, Henry, together they fought their way to the throne room where they found Saria, frozen in a shard of glass, and the Dark Prince. The Prince explained that Saria was the Light Goddess. He had kidnapped her, because, with her in his way he couldn’t achieve his goal, world domination. He and Ash had fought a bloody battle which resulted in Saria being freed from her prison, and her using her powers to seal the Dark Prince in the silent realm forever. However, she had used all of her power to seal him away, she passed away soon after.
I should happy, I have my father back. Even though his family had rejoiced when he and his father had come back, he couldn’t join in.
It was getting dark, the hills were crawling with all sorts of deadly creatures at night. It was time he went home. He started down the hill towards the little village. The village was considerably wealthier since Ash and his father had brought back treasure from the Dark Prince’s castle.
The streets were deserted, everyone was indoors, the village people were extremely superstitious. Always afraid of ghost and monsters. Henry had always taught his children that it was all nonsense. Henry, he’d never called his father anything else.
He arrived at their small house on the eastern side of the village. Inside his mother was preparing dinner, the twins were arguing over something (as usual), and Henry was sitting by the fire place smoking his pipe. He glanced over at the little rocking chair in the corner. His sister used to sit there, but they had lost her to the flu last winter. His mother was still depressed, she cried constantly.
“Hello dear.” said his Mother. “Dinner will be ready soon. Did you shoot anything?”
Crap! I forgot to hunt. It was Ash’s duty in the house to provide meat. Henry used to help him, but he’d broken his leg working on the house last winter and still hadn’t fully recovered.
“N-no, I didn’t find anything.” said Ash.
“No matter, we have plenty of rice and bread.”
He felt bad about forgetting his responsibility so he offered to go back out and see if he could find a squirrel or two, his mother just waved him away without looking at him and said they would be fine. An hour later they ate, and then went to bed.
Ash woke up, he was on a tall cliff. What am I doing here? He turned around and saw a familiar face. Saria. She waved at him and then disappeared into the cave behind her.
“Wait!” he yelled. He chased after her into the cave.
He followed her deep into the heart of the mountain. When he lost sight of her he panicked, he ran down the cave farther, hoping to find her. He came into a large cavern. At the bottom of the cavern was a grave yard, with a tomb in the middle. He found a stair case going to the bottom. He went down and walked into the grave yard. He glanced at a nearby gravestone, he recognized the name on it. Fayor. Wait, that’s a name of one of the ancient gods from the stories mother used to tell! He checked other gravestones and saw that they to had the names of ancient gods on them. Ash concluded it was the legendary Grave Yard of the Gods.
He continued through the graveyard until he came to the tomb in the middle. Inside he saw Saria, frozen in a shard of glass. Suddenly he was outside the gave on the cliff again. He looked down and saw the forest burning, the earth splitting open to reveal lava at the bottom of the chasms. Is this, the end?
Ash woke in his bed. It was just a dream, I wonder what it meant? He got out of bed and went downstairs to the main room of their little home. His mother was feeding the twins and Henry bread and rice again for breakfast. We need meat. He went and sat down for breakfast.
“Morning everyone.” he yawned.
The others greeted him as well. He went over to Henry.
“We need to talk.” he said.
He told Henry all about the dream he had.
“What do you think it means?” asked Ash.
“I-I don’t know.” replied Henry.
“I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“You should go to the village elder. She can interpret dreams.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“Where does she live?”
“On the southern side of the village. In the clock tower.”
“I’ll go see her before I hunt,” replied Ash.
Ash grabbed his bow and dagger, which he kept behind the door, and put on his hunting boots. He went his normal route through the village. This time of day the streets were filled with the local people, selling, buying, and trading their goods. As he approached the entrance to the village he came to the clock tower of which Henry had spoken. He went inside.
Ash came into a long dark hallway. The walls were covered in clocks, the ticking sound was overwhelming, and there was the faint smell of rotten eggs.
“Hello?” he called.
“Come this way., said a raspy voice from further down the hall.
When he got to the end, there was a tall door, when he tried to open it, it barely moved. He had to push it hard for it to open. Looks like it hasn’t been used it a long time.
Inside this room the rotten egg smell was much stronger. At one end there was a bed with a chamberpot next to it. At the other was a hearth with a two rocking chairs in front of it. In one rocking chair, barely visible in the haze, sat a small elderly woman.
“Come young one, sit down, and tell me what’s on your mind.” she said in her raspy voice.
He sat down and asked:
“Are you the village elder?”
“I am her.”
“My father said-”
“Hush.” she cut him off. “I know what it is that you want. You want me to interpret a dream for you. Am I not correct?”
“You are.”
“Then tell me about this dream.”
Ash recounted his strange dream.
“It’s quite simple. We all know that Saria was the Light Goddess, by now. When she died, she went to the graveyard you have seen.” she rasped. “When you saw the forest burning, and the earth splitting open, you were seeing what will happen if you do not rescue Saria. As the Light Goddess it was her duty to maintain balance in the world. Without her, the world will die.”
“I-I-”
“You must go to the Mountain of Mystery,” she cut him off again. “You must go to the cave and bring Saria back from the dead, without her we shall all perish!”
Ash was shocked.
“Wh-why must it be me?’ he stammered.
“Only the one who wields the legendary blade, the Sword of Light, can enter the Cave of the Dead, and you, are the only one who can wield it!”
The Sword of Light, the blade Ash had used when he fought Anthony, the Dark Prince. The Sword had vanished into thin air after he had defeated him.
“But I no longer have it!” he began to panic.
“The sword lies in the Baghuer Forest. You must first travel there and retrieve it!” rasped the elder.
Ash nodded slowly. That’s a long way to go.
“Where is the mountain?” he asked.
“The mountain is to the south, so is Baghuer.”
“Well that’s a bit luck.”
“No, not luck. For it is destiny.”
Part II
-The Journey-
⚔
It had been three days since Ash had met with the village elder. He had gone home and told his father what she had said. He decided to come along and help Ash. They decided to leave the next morning. They gathered supplies and left. Three day laters they’d arrived at the edge of the Baghuer Forest.
As they stood at the edge Henry asked:
“You ready, son?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be.” replied Ash.
They trekked through the gloomy forest until dark, and continued the next morning. The trees were huge. Each one hundreds of years old. The forest seemed to go on forever. How are we ever going to find the sword in this godforsaken place?!
“Seeing trees that are so old, makes me feel like a child,” remarked Henry.
On the fifth day of their journey, Ash heard what sounded like singing.
“Stop, do you hear that?” he asked.
“No I- Wait I do hear it.” replied Henry.
They followed the sound into a clearing. In middle of the clearing was a pedestal. Standing in front of it was a pretty young lady. She was the one singing the tune. When she saw the newcomers she stopped, and said:
“Hello travelers, I am Natalia, guardian of the sacred blade.”
She stepped aside and revealed the Sword of Light stuck into the top of the pedestal.
“We need that sword!” said Ash.
“Only those worthy may wield the sacred blade.” Natalia replied. “And you are not worthy!”
Then she started to change, her skin grew dark, wings grew out of her back and her mouth and nose changed into a beak. She was a monster. The once pretty you lady flew at them claws outstretched.
“Look out!” exclaimed Henry.
The travelers ducked out of the way just in time as the beast flew past slashing her razor sharp fangs and claws. Ash pulled out his bow and sent an arrow flying at the beast, it struck it in the leg. Henry grabbed the sword at his side and began swinging at the beast as it flew by.
“I’ll distract it!” yelled Henry. “You get the sword!”
Ash nodded and sprinted for the sword. He ran up to it, grasped the hilt, gave a mighty pull, and the sword came out. He glanced behind him and saw the beast had Henry pinned down and was about to sink its fangs into his throat. Ash raised the sword and threw it as hard as he could at the beast. The sword sank into its side, the beast began to thrash around screeching in pain. Henry then jumped onto it and sank his sword to into its side. The beast gave one final cry and collapsed onto the ground. They both pulled their swords out of its corpse.
“That was a close one.” Henry said while wiping his word clean on his pants.
“Too close,” Ash replied grimly.
“Well, now we’ve got the sword, we can continue on to the mountain.”
“Let’s go.”
It took Ash and Henry about three days to reach the mountain. Along the way they encountered a few more monsters they had to slay. When they did arrive at the base of the mountain they set up camp for the night. They ate a squirrel Ash shot, and then went to sleep.
Ash awoke with a start, someone was shaking him. Suddenly a hand clasped his mouth. He looked and saw it was his father. Henry put a finger to his lips and said: “Shhh.” He then pointed outside the tent. Standing beside the fire pit was the outline of a great hound, inside the outline was the night sky.
“It’s a shadow hound.” whispered Henry.
The hound was sniffing around, as if it was looking for something… Suddenly it perked its head up, and looked straight into Ash’s eyes. It seemed to be staring straight into his soul. It then growled and leapt forward. Ash pulled out his sword, Henry his spear. It jumped for Ash but he dodged, it instead went toward Henry and landed on him and began trying to bite his neck.
“No!” exclaimed Ash.
But he screamed in vain, for the hound had sunken its teeth into Henry’s neck. Ash lunged for the hound and swung his sword at its back. He left a mighty gash in its back, then it ran away into the forest.
“Father!’ exclaimed Ash.
He went to Henry’s side. The wound was bleeding heavily, it seemed to be burning.
“A-Ash, listen well.” rasped Henry. “You m-must continue the journey. F-find Saria and f-free her. Then the world will be safe. I l-love you, my son.”
Those were the last words Henry ever spoke. Ash wept bitterly, he sat by the fire all night, without a single minute of sleep. He then built a small raft and placed Henry’s body on it. He then placed the raft into a nearby river.
“Goodbye.” he whispered.
Part III
-Omega-
Ω
Almost to the top. Ash had been climbing the Mountain of Mystery for two days now. He had now lost is father and Saria, he had nothing to live for, except for the hope of bringing Saria back to the land of the living. After another day of climbing, the Cave of the Dead was in sight.
As Ash approached the cave he started to hear a whispering, as he got closer to the cave the whispering grew louder. He then started into the cave, all the while the whispering sound continued. He followed the caves from what he could remember from his dream. Finally he reached the giant cavern containing the grave yard. He followed the same path he took in the dream and eventually came to the tomb. Don’t worry Saria, I’m coming. He came up to the giant tomb, rolled away the tomb stone. Then stepped inside and saw the glass shard. Inside was the ghostly figure of Saria. Now, how do I bring her back?
“Do you wish to save her?” said a voice.
Ash turned around and saw a hooded figure.
“Who are you?” asked Ash.
“It is of no importance.” the figure replied. “But, if you wish to save the young goddess here, you must do something for me…”
“What is that?”
“You must give me your life in trade for hers.”
This, came as a shock to Ash. Of course the noble thing would be to say, ”Of course!,” but he hesitated before answering. That old woman didn’t say anything about this. It was hard to fight the human in him saying, “Run, save yourself,” but he pushed it down, closed his eyes, clenched his fist, and spoke the most fateful words of his life:
“Let it be done.”
At that moment he heard a voice in his head, “Break the glass.” He turned around drew his sword and shattered the glass. In a split second, Saria lifted her head, opened glowing eyes, lifted her hand and sent a flash of light toward the hooded figure, who was sent flying back into the wall, and vanished into thin air.
“Saria!” exclaimed Ash.
Saria returned to her normal appearance.
“Ash!” she cried. “You came!”
She leapt to him and hugged his neck.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Never been better!”
They then began the trek out of cave. As the two neared the entrance they heard something behind them.
“Stop!” it was the hooded figure from before. “How dare you take her from me?!”
“Who are you?!” demanded Ash.
“Me?” chuckled the figure. “I am Death.”
“Death?!” Ash and Saria exclaimed together.
“Now, you both shall, die!” screamed Death.
He let the hood and cloak fall to the ground to reveal his true form. He was the figure of a man, made entirely of smoke and ash, his eyes were red flames. He then revealed a black sword and charged at Ash and Saria screaming: “Die!!”
Death swung a blow at Ash’s head but he countered with his sword and swung at the evil one.
“Saria! Take this!” yelled Ash.
He threw his spear to Saria who caught it and thrust the weapon into Death’s back who had Ash pinned to the ground with his sword.
“Argh!!” screeched Death.
“Now!” yelled Ash.
Saria threw her spear while Ash thrust with his sword, stabbing Death at the same time.
“No!!” screeched Death, who fell to the ground, writhing in agony.
Death began backing into the cave, this isn’t the last you’ve seen of me! He then disappeared into the Cave of the Dead forever. Death was never again seen by the eyes of the living after that day.
Ash and Saria went home to the little village after their ordeal with Death. They both lived happily ever after, to the end of their days.
Fin
