Fury and Lamentation

                On the Eastern shores of a dark, warmongering nation on a dark continent on a dark world stood a tall, stone bunker. Although it is stone on the exterior, it has a rather homely interior. However, any and all furniture and just about anything precious to be named has been utterly destroyed and obliterated and smashed to smithereens. It’s jagged, outside faces are only slightly illuminated by the brief flashes of crimson lightning which adds a mere touch of needed contrast against the mighty gloom of the realm.

This abode plays host to only one inhabitant and this inhabitant is a war criminal; to be more specific, rather ironically, a war criminal who is also a war hero. The enraged beast that is now a warped husk of rage went by the name of Lugekai the Unyielding who served as one of seven prime generals for the kingdom of Draykmer. Aside from Lugekai, the names of the other six were Kosh the Wretched, Mar the Bloodchiller, Relun the Malicious, Uzgarn the Unbridled, Brylf the Unholy, and Nezrov the Merciless. This extremely technologically advanced kingdom, prior to world domination in-part thanks to Lugekai, was a ravenous, powerful nation on the smallest continent on the globe. It was due to the nigh immortal High Emperor that Draykmer was so hungry for territory and blood whereas Lugekai, his like, and all beneath him helped to seek and feed that insatiable appetite.

Whenever Lugekai sent his massive legions to the fields of death, he was always at the front lines valiantly and nobly leading his troops to victory. Anytime he was present in a battle, it would always end in triumph at the tips of his towering, double-bladed sword staff and there would never be such a thing as a “prisoner of war” for whoever stood against his Liege, he would personally see to any and all after-battle executions as he believed the newly acquired territory for Draykmer demanded a tribute and blessing of blood. This led to him gaining admiration and fealty from all his underlings and great respect among those who sat in the higher echelons of the nation.

Unfortunately for Lugekai, the vast majority of his prime general peers grew rabidly jealous of his accomplishments and undertakings and sought to destroy him, so to this end, they took to the chambers of the High Emperor and falsely accused him of high treason against the throne. They slandered his name and expertly crafted schemes to successfully frame him in the Court of the Eternal Justicars where the High Emperor also served as Chief Magistrate. There was nothing Lugekai could do as his hearsay could pose nothing to the powerful testimonies of his former colleagues linked with the false evidence they provided. As the High Emperor delivered his verdict, the prime generals laughed with much spite and hatred in their guffaws at the downfall of the one who they once called comrade; it was on their cackles that Lugekai would swear vengeance on their blood.

The High Emperor in his sentencing decided to forgo executing Lugekai as  thanks for the contributions he had made to world domination, much to the dismay of the other generals who sought his head on a stake on the highest peak of the tallest spire of the Imperial Palace. Instead, he was permanently banished from the realm and forced to live in exile in this bunker. It was contracted by the High Emperor himself to be built with specific parameters offering full amenities for Lugekai to comfortably live out the rest of his live in blissful luxury; to enforce that he stays in exile, however, a chip was implanted into his body while under sedation, so that he may not discern the location and rip it out, to make sure he does not venture out too far from his “home.” (If he were successfully able to locate the chip and remove it, the capital of Draykmer would be instantly notified of this and move to take care of this problem.) They permitted him to keep his terrifying sword staff so as to be able to hunt food. However, after only a short period of time, his anger against his former Emperor and his colleagues grew an undying inferno of rage and fury that would never quench even upon their deaths or even at the collapse of Draykmer itself. His previously hot blood in his angst grew so boiling hot that it eventually began to influence the environment in that it became more arid and brutal. In his anger, he would destroy virtually everything in his entire residence save for a few items his sanity had somehow convinced him were necessities. Day in and day out for decades, whenever he isn’t seeking something to eat (where he mercilessly slaughters animals as prey), he would incessantly scream and roar and swing his sword staff as if he were still fighting battles as he had sought with every fiber of his being to murder swathes of flesh and blood that was anything nearly the same as his.

Unbeknownst to Lugekai, he was not alone in the all-consuming pit of perpetual insanity. At the same time of Lugekai’s ousting, a second conspiracy was unfolding by the hands of the same prime generals who seemingly extinguished Lugekai. On a plateau far out on the Western coast was a decrepit outpost built onto and into a cliff side overlooking the evil, wretched waters that surrounded the entirety of the small fatherland. Anything that may seem like a piece of furniture or decoration or appliance has rusted, corroded, or rotted into oblivion. This forsaken alcove played home to the desolate shell of a being that had previously gone by the name of Xykarr the Callous. In the elite ranks of Draykmer’s commanding military heads, he played as liaison to the prime generals from the High Emperor as Xykarr was one of His Majesty’s chief advisors.

“Why would the prime generals seek to depose one of the High Emperor's chief advisors?” one might wonder. Well the answer is a very simple one: they did not agree with Xykarr’s politics. Xykarr was a very cold and calculating individual who only thought for the best of His Majesty and the empire that was under his feet; he was only interested about iron-clad maintenance of the realm and not so much the expansion of the empire. As for why the High Emperor would choose Xykarr as liaison to the prime generals is because His Majesty believed that Xykarr would prove to be a sort of “leash” for the generals so as to manage their continued conquest for global submission. Almost anything that the generals sought to accomplish or do had to go through Xykarr and this led to rather powerful strain between himself and all of the seven.

Just only half of all proposed plans of attack and spoils of war treatment and distribution were approved by Xykarr. This led to some considerably serious butting heads, especially so between Lugekai and Xykarr. Xykarr heavily detested of Lugekai’s indiscriminate, destructive slash-and-burn and take-no-prisoners methods so much so that he, during earlier campaigns, approached the High Emperor about his disapproval of Lugekai’s tactics. Obviously the reason that Xykarr was antagonistic to Lugekai was due to his clear thinking that the latter was barbaric and wasteful of potential resources such as agriculture and indentured workforces. In response to this, the High Emperor summoned Lugekai to his chambers to contract with Xykarr specific parameters and requirements that would permit his allowance to dispense of the enemy as he so pleased. Lugekai, as expected, grew incredibly furious with  Xykarr, but had to become compliant with his demands due to the latter’s ties to His Majesty and the other six prime generals learning of the meeting and the contents of the discourse. The High Emperor gave Xykarr a weapon of his own for self-defense should any prime general or any other assailant seek his life: a wicked, double-bladed scythe that joins together at the center that could be broken in two and reassembled at will.

How Xykarr fell from grace with the High Emperor was a nefarious scheme concocted by every prime general with the exception of Lugekai, who was away from the capital on an extended conquest campaign. Xykarr was regal, but he actually had a soft spot for the impoverished in his city. He fell in love with and married a slave girl for whom, upon marrying, bought her independence. In this process, he also bought and freed her brother along with his wife and children. Xykarr had three children with this woman: two boys and a girl. The problem arises from Draykmer’s law stating slaves may only be bought and sold for labor, commodity, or as a concubine and are to never be freed. Xykarr broke this law for he had love for this woman and her family, while by contrast being cold and unforgiving towards others. The prime generals congregated in secret to scheme against him, and they did so by hiring a bounty hunter to dig up dirt on and capture anyone of interest to His Majesty’s advisor. That this person did and more: he captured them, bound them, tortured them, and surrendered them to the generals per his orders. The prime generals then set up a trap for the advisor by luring him to a location to confront them, as they had someone leak this information to him so as to be bait. However, unbeknownst to the advisor, they also indulged to the High Emperor about someone in his cabinet that has broken Imperial law and lied to His Majesty’s face on such matters. In this scheme, they had His Majesty wait in the shadows, hidden from the advisor’s sight, so that they may catch him in vice and the High Emperor may see and hear his confession. The prime generals brought the nearly ten individuals, bound, gagged, and needing medical attention, to the confrontation obviously to shut the jaws of the trap. They demanded that he’d pay them a large sum for their release; Xykarr did indeed pay the price. As he surrendered the money, Imperial guards per the orders of the High Emperor, whose presence was made known as the trap sprang shut, assembled and arrested the advisor and his family.

Xykarr and his family were both tried in the Court of the Eternal Justicars with the High Emperor himself acted as presiding judge. His Majesty passed the same verdict that he had on to Lugekai: permanent banishment from the realm. Upon the family, the High Emperor sentenced them to death for high treason against the kingdom of Draykmer by participating in the breaking of its laws. To add insult to the infinitely deep injury in Xykarr’s forlorn heart, His Majesty ordered them to be beheaded live in court for all to see with the former advisor having a front row seat to the event. This broke Xykarr’s heart for all eternity. There was no anger towards the High Emperor, but he could hear the deep, bellowing howls and laughter of the prime generals; these jeers he would never forget and only moved to cement his hatred for them and embed his sorrow. There was only remorse and regret for his endangering and damning of the precious ones whom he had held so dearly. He hated himself for condemning them in his supposed sin against Draykmer. Immediately after the dissolution of the trial, Xykarr was sedated and implanted with a chip similar to that of Lugekai’s. Also, just as Lugekai before him, he was held in prison in the capital while the contractors hired by His Majesty added in the furnishings to the outpost that was to play home to Xykarr for the rest of his days. Same as Lugekai before him, he was permitted to keep the weapon that His Majesty had previously bestowed upon him for the purpose of seeking out and hunting prey to consume.

As time passed, he would wither and grow thin due to his agony suppressing his desire to eat. He decayed into a desolate, derelict vessel that was so far gone that only sorrow and hatred for himself and those who brought about his banishment kept him alive. The depression that overwhelmed the forecast of Xykarr’s heart grew deeper than the Abyss of Gehenna. His howls of pure agony filled the canyons and valleys for miles around as his wounded heart grieved permanently scarred, as he had seen, by the sin he forced onto others. In his unending screams and weeping, tears poured as a deluge from his face. Just the same as Lugekai, his emotional state began to influence the environment around him: the atmosphere became saturated with water in the air, on, and in the ground. As the seasons would pass, the water would either evaporate to create thick water vapor, condense back to liquid, or freeze into jagged, solid ice. This proved to be torturous for the décor of his prison as the water, ice, and gaseous water would move to rot, corrode, and rust all in his abode apart from the stone; however, this does not mean that the stone was safe from his sorrows. The water in the ground moved to soften the stone and lead to erosion that would in turn lead to the falling away of the alcove home as the centuries passed.

Strangely enough one day, both Lugekai and Xykarr simultaneously, but separately of one other, decided they’ve had enough of imprisonment and they want to seek their revenge: one for regaining his pride and the other for atonement. They both get up from where they were sitting in their respective locations, Lugekai in the East and Xykarr in the West, with their respective weapons in hand and leave with  seemingly superbeing-like speed; one fueled by undying rage and the other bottomless anguish. Of course, Draykmer had been notified of their escapes and mobilized a capture fleet to intercept each former allegiant. For days, they would run at hypersonic speeds across the continent in each other’s direction as if somehow instinctively attracted to one another as they both traversed the continent, never stopping to rest or eat or drink for their minds were clear and honed on a single goal. This goal was the annihilation of the very symbol that oppresses them.

On the dusk of the fifth day since they had broken away, they finally neared each other and turned their incomprehensible dashing into mere walking. Two miles separated them, but they saw each other and recognized immediately who the other  was. At once, they barred their weapons and made a mad dash at one another. Their weapons clashed and clanged as they viciously and brutally laid siege upon the other’s person. Though their spirits were destroyed asunder and their souls gone, their logic resurfaced by the power of their hatred for one another and those who forsook them. The dusk, overcast sky became thick with dark clouds and red lightning crashed as their conflict erupted. The weather was controlled by emotions as it began to rain fire and ice from the morose heavens, but this occurrence did not dampen the dire causes of the two combatants. “Why did you seek my destruction?!” shouts Xykarr to Lugekai as they exchange blows. “I did not!” he roars back, “but I’m pleased such a roach as you has been shown his place!” “Lies! Surely you conspired with the other six to ruin my life!” insists Xykarr as their weapons are locked together. “As much as I would’ve loved to, I did not for I was at war doing what I wanted that you had not!” yells Lugekai in retort. “How can YOU come at me with such an amusing accusation when you yourself are also responsible for my downfall?!” says Lugekai. “I know not what you’re talking about! No matter how much I hate you, I never would want you ousted for you were a powerful asset for the throne!” replies Xykarr. “A likely story…” replies Lugekai as he breaks away from Xykarr.

They proceed to not say a word again to each other for several hours as they continue to clash blades all the while as fire, ice, and lightning fill the air. After fighting for around eight hours, the Draykmer capture vessels sink from the heavens in between the clouds into view and hover a kilometer or so above the surface. They both momentarily stop their in-fighting to turn their attention to the new challengers. Every ship was as dark as night with purple color tones in appearance accompanied by sleek jagged features that dot the cylindrical hulls. Each ship carried a squad of infantrymen dedicated to apprehending a specific target. Each fleet carried four individual ships, both designed to handle one specific prisoner based on their attributes and abilities. Lugekai and Xykarr then turn their attentions back onto one another and they both signal to the other that they’re going to rout the recent apparition of their greater enemy. They began to clash blades with the enemy soldiers who move to overwhelm and surround the two combatants. However, the two forsaken warriors are able to discern the enemy’s agenda and motives and they move to intercept the other person’s pursuers. They succeed in eliminating the five thousand strong garrison sent to arrest them both. They then turned to the prison ships themselves who are beginning to turn around and re-ascend in retreat. Xykarr and Lugekai, with their superbeing prowess, leap into the air and dash to each ship. With just one fell stroke from either weapon, entire ships are cut into pieces and fall to the ground as wreckage, killing all crew inside.

After decimating the enemy, the two look to one another. “Perhaps you are not my primary enemy, Xykarr,” says Lugekai, “it seems to truly get what I want, I will now turn to eradicate those who deposed me in the first place. Although, given my knowledge of the circumstances surrounding my trial and charges, I was told that all of the other prime generals and the military liaison signed documents and presented evidence to a situation that was most incriminating. I was falsely sentenced to this hell! Are you truly responsible for this, former dog of the Emperor?!” “No! Certainly not!” Xykarr asserts. “You say the prime generals did this to you?! How very perplexing as they are directly responsible for my ousting as well! Here’s what happened to me…” Xykarr then moves to explain to Lugekai the circumstances that lead to their as-of-that-time two centuries long banishment. “When did these accusations befall you, Lugekai?” inquires Xykarr. Xykarr swears as everything becomes clear to him when Lugekai responds with his answer. “Our disgraceful oppressors have taken us and the High Emperor for fools!” exclaims Xykarr. “How do you mean?” presses Lugekai. “When did your accusations arise?” he asks of Xykarr. He replies in kind and as soon as Xykarr finishes telling his answer, Lugekai too sees the light. “So you’re telling me that the prime generals saw us both as threats and conspired against us simultaneously also hoping to turn us against one another in full knowledge of the contempt we held for one another?! RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGHH!! The bastards! The fiends! Oh, I never knew they had such gall and guile,” vents Lugekai. “In their false evidence against me, they must’ve gotten a master scribe to forge and counterfeit your signature on the documents used to frame me!” he continues. “Exactly,” says Xykarr, “now that we both know the timetables, understanding the concurrence and coincidence of events, and the nature of our opponents, I now also understand that you most likely never knew what was going on in the halls of the Imperial city since you were out on a campaign.” “That is correct,” replies Lugekai, “surely you see that we are no longer enemies, but comrades in arms against a common foe. I swear on the honor I had that I shall fight you no more, Xykarr. I will not rest until the heads of Kosh, Mar, Nezrov, Uzgarn, Brylf, and Relun are broken open under our feet.” “I concur,” concedes Xykarr.

To their relief, they needed not to wait long. In the perspective of the prime generals, word that their prison fleets were immediately destroyed was obtained instantaneously. Given that global domination had been achieved, in the time since Lugekai’s and Xykarr’s banishments, the High Emperor and the generals concluded that it’s time to search out to the stars and conquer their worlds. To this end, the High Emperor commissioned for the creation of six extremely large capital ships for each of the six generals. Each ship measured twenty miles in length, eight miles in width, four miles in height, is armed to the teeth with cannons, legions of soldiers, hundreds of armored divisions, bombers, fighters, and a couple docking ports for frigates. Their appearance, much like the prison ships before them, are near pitch black with purple tones in coloration, but their shape was more so akin to ginormous, isosceles triangles. Upon first hearing word that they escaped from their banishment and the dispatching of the prison fleets, the six generals returned with haste to their dark home world to personally see to the recapture of the two; however, hearing of the destruction of the capture vessels only made matters more pressing.

The six dreadnaughts descend from the clouds and become an overwhelming sight to behold. Lugekai and Xykarr need not wonder who were at the helms of those ships for they helped to design those flying mega-fortresses prior to their depositions. Even as these events unfolded, lightning, fire, and ice continued to pour, but more so now with even greater ferocity as Lugekai’s blood boiled hotter than even before and Xykarr’s blood ran colder than the poles. Just beholding these monstrosities made their skin crawl in a way that made them want nothing but to utterly ravage and destroy the threats that stand before them. Just as soon as the six ships began to open fire with their cannons and deploy their fighters, Lugekai and Xykarr dashed through the air at nigh supersonic speeds and they moved to eradicate the closest ship to them. They hacked and slashed through enormous chunks of the first capital ship and made simultaneous moves for the bridge which was now in free fall. Xykarr slashed the chunk in half, while coincidentally decapitating prime general Mar; Lugekai proceeds to grab the head of Mar and crush it asunder. He felt a second wind feeling the hot sticky mess that was formerly the head of an enemy. He vacates the free falling metal just before it makes impact with the ground. They then proceed to fall the rest of the ships in nearly the same fashion with each taking turns crushing the heads of their archenemies. As the final head pops and the last bit of wreckage crashes to the ground, they behold their macabre masterpiece and believe it to be a work of beauty. With this, they turn their attention north-northwest and resume using their superbeing speed to make haste for the capital of Draykmer. They will ascend through the capital to the High Emperor’s chambers and right the wrongs that were so incorrectly doled out to them. They move on with purpose in their hearts with nothing else to live for; nothing else rather apart from rage and suffering, hatred and anguish, anger and sorrow, fury and lamentation.

Musical Inspiration: “The Infection” - Disturbed