The protagonist of this story is one of the main characters of my main novel. This is like 'Journals of Maynard Ray: Origins of Reverend Charles Augustus'. I shall also occasionally submit short origin stories of other characters.
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Screams of grief and terror pervaded the halls. The ululations tore through my soul like a sharp scythe. The grimy walls stained with the blood of innocents, added to the intense melancholy that was already able to fill one's heart with years worth of trauma. If my mind were weak, it is definite that I would have fallen into unconsciousness at that instant.
As I walked down the path, past the cells which were inhabited by either corpses, or living people; people whose only feature which distinguished them from the cadavers was their heartbeats.
Wounds of unimaginable depth and width flashed across their tortured bodies. Some of their faces had been slashed beyond recognition. Eyes veiled by the swollen flesh above and beneath them; lips torn to almost resemble an origami; breasts of women bearing scratches and scars of recent torture. Scars upon scars until the whole body had become one single scar.
I tried hard to avert my attention from the inhumanity that surrounded me. But alas, the emotions of man do not allow one to simply ignore pitiable reality. My brain demanded inattention, but my soul wanted the opposite. I turned my head left, and beheld a little boy who seemed, from his height and facial features, to be of age six or seven. His complete nakedness revealed a body which was covered in protruding signatures left by whips and canes. No part of his body was left without a mark for him to remember the stories which they narrated.
The young lad was asleep - or at least he seemed to be. Perhaps it was merely my hope that incited the illusion of functional lungs causing the slow protrusion and constriction of his small chest.
I walked past.
Another scene struck me as my eyes turned to gaze at another cell. A woman held a baby in her arms. She was breast-feeding the child from the motherly protrusion of her chest. I wondered how her mammary gland was still able to produce the life-giving liquid which the infant sucked without restraint. I pitied the woman. Her bony figure, lacking of flesh, was being further depleted for the sustenance of the infant. There was no replenishment for her. She would continue to dispense her life until there was no more life left to give. Yet, there she was, still giving life, when she was aware of the future outcome. Such is the intensity of a mother's love for her child.
I walked past.
I had finally arrived at my destination. The ritual ground of the priests. A large concrete alter stood in the middle of the place; a representation of the countless lives that have been taken within the confines of the temple. The hieroglyphs engraved upon the walls portrayed the ancientness of the temple. The ceiling above was embellished with frescoes of symbols, astrological representations, and devilish depictions. The entire temple was drenched in Mephistophelian ambiance.
It is a belief that animals are blessed with a sixth sense; the ability to sense dangers of supernatural ilk. I suppose that it was due to this gift that I had observed the complete absenteeism of animal life within the temple's vicinity.
The priest walked out from a door-less entrance which led to the inner sanctum of the temple. Until then I thought the opening was merely a rectangular dark painting. It was as dark as the shadows of the night time.
The priest himself wore a dark garment held at the waist by a crudely made rope. Until he came closer to me, my myopia did not permit me to observe his face clearly.
"Reverend, I see your admiration of the temple is still ongoing." A pang of anger flushed through my bones. Admiration for such a horrible place? A person would be completely insane to consider such a place as that to be an object of positive commentary.
I kept silent.
"High priest Mijah has been preoccupied by more important matters. It is for this reason that he cannot see you at this moment." I expected such a response from the priests of Jdaimin. They had a history of not revealing their high priest to anyone of extraneous origin. I was not leaving that temple without delivering my message to the high priest.
"Yes of course. But before I take my leave, please send my regards to the high priest on behalf of the Lucem."
The priest instantly raised his head. It was then that I saw his face. Scratches and blemishes laid out like the satellite view of China's road network. His eyes were as dark as his garment. I could see that the priest had a lot of demons inside of him.
From my experience with demons, it had become a fact that they do not like threats.
"You dare threaten the high priest?"
"I do not threaten the high priest. I only come bearing a message from the Lucem."
"You Lucem reverends think you possess a superiority over us. But you deceive yourselves." The statement was more from the demons than from the priest.
"That's not what our victories of 423 battles this century alone has to say."
That statement infuriated the priest beyond retention. He sprang with incredible speed at me. I quickly drew my ever-prepared weapon from my coat and sprinkled some holy oil on the priest's face; all the while being airborne from a front flip. One of the lucem's golden rules from the bible was 'tu non pugnabit', meaning 'thou shall not fight'. It was believed that one who attacks another or stops another from slapping his cheek has fought, and thereby sinned. But it was believed that one who avoids attacking another has not fought. Therefore, all lucem reverends were trained in the defensive art of vitatio, which strictly involves the avoidance of attacks. It was because people possessed by powerful demons can often get physically aggressive; thus, a reverend has to be physically evasive to complete an exorcism unhurt.
The priest groaned in pain as he fell to the floor. The eloh element within the holy oil had burned the demons within him; and according to the law of spiritual possession, a possessed person physically feels pain along with the inhabiting demon when an anti-daimin eloh element such as holy water, interacts with the possessed.
While the priest held his face and writhed, I helped myself into the inner sanctum.
"I am sorry for the terrible reception you received from my subordinate reverend. His blood can occassionally heat up beyond his ability to curb it." The voice of the high priest was startlingly soft and warm; although unusuallly loud.
He emanated from his chambers wearing a long red cloak, held tight at the waist with the usual locally made rope. The man's face was hidden with a metal mask, which was the amplifier of his voice. His hair excluded even a single strand of dark hair. The wrinkles on his neck also bore light to his old age.
"High priest Mijah, I have been sent to you by the lucem."
"Nonsense, reverend. One does not simply waive pleasantries for a discussion of disheartening significance." The unusually polite high priest hovered over to a platform on which sat a metal tray. Wooden Jugs, and cups laid atop the tray. "Would you like some wine reverend?"
"No thank you," I replied. I watched him pour a red substance from one of the jugs into a cup. I wondered if it was truly wine he offered, or just a trick to get me to drink blood.
"Ah! You reverends and your abhorrence of wine. I cannot imagine how lack-luster your social events are without the scintillating stimulation of some wine." The high priest sipped from the cup as he hovered to his throne.
"Reverends do not live on luxuries such as wine." I said.
"But you know, reverend, you only live once. And why live in misery."
"Not everyone is meant to enjoy the physical provisions of life. Some people have to forfeit them in order to keep those provisions unadulterated."
"Wise philosophy; but do you think you can handle the weighty costs of undertaking such a task?" The high priest's tone abruptly descended from cordiality to a slightly hostile seriousness.
"I am only one grain compared to the weight of the heap of sand balancing the success of the task. Before me there were many, and after me there shall be many."
"You are right; before you there were many. But don't be so certain that there will be many after you. You have seen it. You have seen the world. You have seen the children. The daimin force has taken over. Your victory is only visible as unnoticeable patches upon the large cloth of war."
I had not planned to stay at the temple that long. Now it was obvious that the atmosphere was getting tense. I had to deliver my message and return.
"High priest, I did not come here for a confrontation. My presence here is merely to tell you, from the lucem, that your temple is the next target in the war. So, be prepared."
"You know, there is only one thing I admire in the lucem's modus operandi. It is that you are honourable enemies. You announce your intentions before you strike. But that does not seem like an efficient tactic now does it?"
"It isn't a battle tactic. It's just a law which we must uphold."
"You reverends and your benign laws."
"I bid you goodbye high priest."
"Farewell to you too. And I hope that someday we shall meet again."
I exited the inner sanctum and found the priest sitting in a circle drawn on the floor, and reciting incantations. I still thought it funny how Jdaimin recite spells to manipulate a certain power while reverends just rebuke in the name of Elohim to neutralize all forms of attacks. It is similar to a scene from a movie I watched as a child, in which a martial arts henchman showed off his martial art skills by back flipping and doing stances. The protagonist waited for him to finish his nonsense and then he pulled out a gun and shot him.
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