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The Bell Tolls
December 17, 2022
The applause was deafening, surrounded by a crescendo of cheers. The people cheered their name for the truth and valor they uphold. They would give their lives for the cause, a warden of the valiant dead.
Although, they bore an unspeakable darkness inside of them. They had blinded their own vision in pursuit of their own oath, lacking sockets for eyes. They beared silence for they could not speak the truth. In a way, they couldn’t see the truth. However, they could see something others could not. Perhaps that, in itself, was the truth they saw.
However, a resounding chime sounds out and a blinding light flashes down onto the earth with a terrifying shriek and hissing sound through the air. The bell tolls.
Underneath their feet, the very people who hailed their name have fallen. As a blanket of grief and madness falls over and paints the skies black with a gloomy aura, everything that mattered in the realm disappeared. In this moment of void, the only thing that had the right to remain were their comrades and themselves. Tragedy befalls the land as the short-lived happiness was crippled and turned into ashes, like a flower field trampled, silencing the birds with baleful unease.
Overhead, the being that intervened with its judgment loomed, peering over the skies, silent as death and its gaze of the tragedy had caught its attention. The Gods above watched on as the warden writhed to escape from the layers of deceit on them.
Though, this is a scene the Gods have seen many times before and nothing about it shall be played differently each time. The fiends were the playthings of the Gods and their lives were snuff and little to the holy being, raising its imperial hammer skyward, and a low hum continued to sing throughout the realm. In that moment, the warden blindly stared into the maws of death and once more saw the same divine light shining down before them. It would be mere seconds before another flash and ponderous thunderclap would sound.
For then, they could not understand why but watch onwards and befall the same fate they saw before. They could not strive to keep their beliefs alive. Something would part in their following moments that would soon fade and disappear to time, their name would surface once more as memories associated with it flooded their consciousness. Kri’zhara, the bell tolls for thee.