Blood Shadow: The Beginning

The first of a three part short story written in 2007.

The sky grew dark as the eclipse bgean.  Jakob drew in a deep breath, his breast plate rising and falling slowly.  He peered up at the sky in fear.  Something terrible is about to happen, he thought.  He turned to his army behind him, ten thousand strong.  They all felt the same fear as he did.  What was to happen in this darkness they did not know.  A man dressed in a silver-colored armor with a gold sword in his hand approaced Jakob.  "Lord, The battle is close at hand.  What shall I order my troops to do?" he asked.

 

"Hold your position for now, General.  The battle hasn't started yet.  And hopefully if the old mage was wrong, there will not have to be a battle here on this day," Jakob answered, resting his hand on his generals shoulder.  "Erik, wait for further orders."  He turned to look back at the sky. As he did the Earth began to shake violently.

 

From behind, he heard his men making the sounds men make when stricken with fear.  "They fear an earthquake.  Fools," he muttered under his breath.  As the earth shook, Jakob looked up at the eclipse.  The sky now grew darker than that of night.  Jakob felt a lump in his throat as he drew his jewel encrusted blade.  The eclipse then turned the sun blood red.  Another circular shape of the same color appeared close to the sun.  Is that the moon, he thought.

 

A sick laughter was heard, spreading over the plains the vast army stood in.  The sound drowned out that of his fearful troops.  A gaping hole ripped open the sky, showing what looked like teeth covered in blood.  Jakob, at first filled with fear, turned to his men.  They all fell to their knees in the horror that was taking place before them.  This sight filled Jakob with the most powerful feeling of rage he had ever felt.

 

"Are you that much of cowards that you would kneel before your enemy before he Truely appears?  You all disappoint me!" he screamed.  With his blade he ran through his ranks, making clean kills on his own troops.  He killed about a hundred or so of his men before he came to Erik.  He was kneeling on the ground starring mindlessly as the sky above.  "Erik, snap out of it my old friend."

 

"The old mage was right.  We're all going to die!" he said silently.

 

"Do not talk like that.  You have faced demon after demon, enemy after enemy.  I have never once seen you even near defeat.  Together, we can win this!"

 

"Do you not see, Jakob!  This is not like any other Enemy!"

 

"But it is-"

 

"NO!" he yelled, cutting Jakob off.  "This is the one who will destroy the world.  The one known to history as the Blood Shadow!  We are powerless!"

 

"You do not really feel that way."

 

" I do, and you know it to be truth too!" Erik screamed in fear.

 

"If that his the way you feel my old friend."  Jakob raised his sword over his head.  "This is an act of treason your  comitting.  Rest in peace, general"  Jakob brought his sword down hard into Erik's head, spiltting open his helm and skull.  His friends blood pooled at his feet.  Jakob looked to the sky.  "You see what you made me do?  Because of you, I killed my best friend!"

 

The face in the dark of the sky laughed.  "You did that on your own, Lord Jakob.  I merely instilled a fear in them so dark, that they felt powerless to my might."

 

Jakob shook violently with a rage he had never felt before.  "Quit acting cowardly and come here now!  Face your fate, Beast of Shadows!"  he demanded at the top of his lungs.  The mouth of blood closed.  The circular pools of blood narrowed as if eyes showing anger.  The earth began shaking again.  The black sky seemd to funnel to the ground as a large creature was formed.  The sky stayed dark, but both the sky and moon were gone.  All that was left were the stars of the night sky.  Jakob watched in horror as the Blood Shadow demon now stood in front of him, blood dripping from his fangs.

 

"As you wish, Lord."  The demon charged Jakob.  He was able to roll out of the way just before he would have been tackled.  He got back to his feet and stared back at the remainder of his army.  The demon was unleashing a total massacare upon the men.  The Blood Shadow was slaughtering the entire force quicker then anything Jakob had ever seen.  his jaw dropped.  five mintues after the beginning of the slaughter, the demon had killed them all.  He turned back to face jakob.  "Now, you see the kind of power it is that I have.  Do you still wish to challenge me or will you surrender and suffer a painless death?"

 

Jakob barred his teeth.  "I'd rather die fighting unlike those cowards I had once called my army!"  Jakob charged the demon in a blind rage.  The demon smiled as the man drew closer to him.  The beast tilted its head.  Its jaws unlocked and opened up around the man.  They then violently slammed shut.  As they trapped the man inside, a massive explosion of blood burst from the beasts mouth.  He then swallowed the man.  The demon began laughing.

 

A day later the Beast was traversing the land, swallowing entire towns.  The quest to destroy the Earth and bring an age of Shadow was being fulfilled.  As the demon was preparing to attack his third town of the day,  he felt a sharp pain in it's stomach.  It looked up to the sky as if it had just been stricken with fear.  A blade ripped open through the beats chest, blood pouring out.

 

From the gaping wound, Lord Jakob appeared.  The man took his blade and drove it into the demons neck.  Without any time to act, the beast fell dead.  Jakob crawled out from under the massive creature.  He then slowly turned and began limping away.  the earth began to shake as it opened up to swallow the demon.

 

As the demon was slowly being swallowed, its eyes opened wide.  A large blade shot from the beast and penetrated the man's back.  It then pulled the man to the demon.  They were both swallowed by the earth.

 

Slowly, the moon reappeared in the sky.  The sun rose once more the next day...