Anima, Ch.59: Fallen Kingdom

--01-- [Scene: Port Ceann] <BGM: Whisper of Wind>
I can't go about Uladh looking like a devil out of hell.
Using the ability Shamala taught me, I took my dreamcatcher in hand, shapeshifted into a fox,
then trotted up the road to an unknown future.


--02-- [Scene: Morva Aisle] <BGM: The End of the Saga>
Morva Aisle...where my friendships had ended...
The Moongate here had been destroyed, smashed to
a pile of rubble, and it didn't seem like
it had been an accident, or collateral damage.

--03-- [Scene: Bangor] <BGM: Desolation>
Bangor...had been burnt to the ground.
Everything wooden had been reduced to ashes.
The forges, anvils, and furnaces had been toppled, and there were no signs of life...
Only death.

--04-- <BGM: Desolation>
In fact, the dead still lay unburied where they fell, now bleached bones...
I couldn't stomach to guess who the fallen were...some were only children.
Whatever had happened, it had been years ago...


--05-- [Scene: Gairech Hills] <BGM: Desolation>
With a heavy heart, I left Bangor and went north...
The dragon statue was...a lot more excavated than I remembered it.
Seumas was gone though...it seems it will never be restored to its past glory.


--06-- [Scene: Sen Mag] <BGM: Nameless Tombstone>
The roads were wild and overgrown, as if they hadn't been traveled for years...
The grass had been burned, then grown back twice as thick.
The moongates I'd seen so far had all been destroyed. Why?


--07-- <BGM: Nameless Tombstone>
The bridge to Emain Macha over the lake was out.
It seemed to have been deliberately collapsed...
The cathedral's windows were broken.
Much of the city had been burned to the ground as well.

--08-- <BGM: Nameless Tombstone>
My hearing may be amazing, but my vision is only average.
Still, I think I see movement across the lake...
Like glints of sunlight off suits of armor, moving around...
A sign of life? I hope so...

--09-- [Scene: Dunbarton] <BGM: The Locked Door>
Osna Sail was blocked by a rockslide that seemed to have been deliberately set off.
The moongates around Dunbarton and the nearby dungeons had all been destroyed as well.
A disturbing trend...



--10-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
What I found in Dunbarton...was heartbreaking.
The city had been sieged for some time...ballistas and siege engines lay abandoned
and decaying around the perimeter of the city's walls.


--11-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
The fields were fallow, and the farms had been burned...
The gates had been barricaded at one point, then broken down again...
The remnants of a smashed wooden barrier lay by each entrance.


--12-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
The decaying corpses of soldiers lay upon the ramparts of the city walls...
Tara soldiers, it seems...
They had fought to the last to hold the town...but still lost in the end, their deaths in vain.


--13-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
A pile of bodies lay in the church...where they had put to the sword...at least a dozen of them.
They were too decayed to put names to them...but...they had probably been the townspeople...



--14-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
These were people I'd known, had dealt with often...though they were natives, and we were outsiders,
they had welcomed us into their world with open hearts...

They didn't deserve this...

--15-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
The interiors of the structures had been burnt out.
The attackers hadn't been interested in plunder, only destruction.
They'd only wanted the people dead and the buildings ruined...
Barbaric.

--16-- <BGM: The Locked Door>
If it was the Dark Knights that did this to Erinn...
then I hope they got what they deserved, and worse.
If I had been here...could I have made any difference?


--17-- [Scene: Dugald Aisle] <BGM: Dreaming Moon and Star>
I continued north though Dugald Aisle, recalling the first time I traveled this road.
The logging camp was long abandoned.
Rotted, rusting tools left behind told of workers dropping them and fleeing.


--18-- <BGM: Dreaming Moon and Star>
I couldn't resist looking into the housing district...but all of the houses were gone!
My old home was now a bare plot.
Only partial ruins of the sturdier stone homes remained, slowly eroding away.


--19-- <BGM: Dreaming Moon and Star>
I can never go home again...in more than one way, now...
It's hard to tell if this scene of ruin came about by violence, or by decay...
In the end, I suppose it doesn't matter. It's all gone now...


--20-- <BGM: Dreaming Moon and Star>
The path west to Taillteann and Tara was also blocked off by another controlled rockslide...
I wonder if they've managed to hold out over there?
I sure hope so... What else of the kingdom is left?


--21-- [Scene: Tir Chonaill] <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
Tir Chonaill was...little better off.
It too had been abandoned, with some of the homes burned.
The moongates here were also destroyed...
Destroyed moongates everywhere. Why?
There must be a reason!
--22-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
Perhaps they felt these lands were lost to the Dark Knights, so the people destroyed the gates
to stop their enemies from using them to reach more secure areas?
I have no way to confirm it, though...


--23-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
Most of the remaining buildings had been boarded up, and everything of value had been taken away.
It reminded me eerily of that abandoned Tir Chonaill in the parallel world I went to once...



--24-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
The fields lay fallow, and the paths were starting to become overgrown.
Perhaps this is how that other Tir Chonaill had once looked before the decay set in.
Maybe that world had been a future Erinn?


--25-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
There were new graves in the graveyard.
So, at least they'd had time to bury and mourn their dead.
I read the names.
Duncan. Dilys. Trefor. Ferghus. Deian.
All dead, at about the same time...
--26-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
The people here clearly hadn't been in a hurry to leave, given their preparations,
and they probably expected to be able to return someday...
If I have anything to say about it, that day will come.


--27-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
I sat before the inn for some time, still in fox form...
It was sad to see this place now an empty shell.
I had a lot of fond memories of this little inn.
It had been something like a home...

--28-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
How many nights had I spent in this place?
How many mornings did I wake up here?
It was all so long ago...
Those days will never come again. Not for me.
But maybe I can bring them back for others.
--29-- <BGM: Place Where Starlight Gathers>
I hadn't seen a single living thing up close in all the areas I'd covered today...
No animals, no people, just overgrown plants...
It's very strange...an unnatural stillness.


--30-- <BGM: Tears of Memories>
It's growing dark. I'd spend the whole day looking around and had found nothing other than a
confirmation of what Merlin had told me; of the fate that had befallen Uladh.



--31-- <BGM: Tears of Memories>
I went into the empty inn. All the furniture was gone.
Mentally exhausted from holding a transformation so long,
I let it go and risked showing my true shape...


--32-- <BGM: Tears of Memories> {SFX: slam}
For old time's sake, I went up to my old room, now empty.
I shut the door, lay down in a corner, made myself as comfortable as I could,
and let myself slowly fall asleep.


--33--
I woke from a disturbed sleep, haunted by nightmares of my past misdeeds, to the sound of voices outside.
People. Three of them, it sounds like.
...I can't let myself be seen like this!


--34-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
I opened the door, shifted back into fox form reluctantly, and sprinted down the stairs...
only to run right into the three people I'd heard, standing on the bridge across Adelia Stream.



--35-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
(Altam)
What do we have here? A thieving fox?!




--36-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
(Talvish)
This fox is certainly a bold one, isn't it?




--37-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
(Avelin)
Wild animals have no place in human towns, even if they're abandoned.
It's either rabid or corrupted.



--38-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
(Altam)
Then we'd better get rid of it, huh?




--39-- <BGM: The Knights of God>
The boy cast an odd spell I didn't recognize...a chill went up my spine, an instinctual reaction, a feeling...
This was dangerous. This could harm me.
...This couldn't be avoided.


--40-- {SFX: explosion}
I think I'm in for a world of hurt.




[end of chapter]