{M}ℝ𝕦𝕟 𝔸𝕨𝕒𝕪 | ✨𝕐𝕖𝕠𝕟𝕘𝕪𝕦 & 𝕊𝕠𝕠𝕜𝕒𝕚✨

Chapter 57

"But the other warriors told me to stay here and help with the preparatives-"

"I'm not asking you, Taehyun. It's an order," Yeonjun cut him off in a deep voice. His hollow eyes darkened, making Taehyun take a small step back at the sudden harshness of his stare. A light feeling of dread began to pool inside Taehyun, making him shift uncomfortably as his own gaze fixed upon Yeonjun's hand where a newly-sharpened arrow was being held.

A shiver ran down Taehyun's back. He suddenly began to feel even tinier upon Yeonjun's presence. His ears immediately flattened, and his back curved slightly as he submissively bowed his head at Yeonjun. "Y-Yes, sir."

After a long moment, Taehyun lifted his gaze to Yeonjun's, trying to figure out what was wrong, but he wasn't able to decipher anything as his eyes met the unfamiliar hostility between Yeonjun's orbs. He wanted to ask him, but the sudden fear inside him kept him quiet, forcing Taehyun to follow Yeonjun's orders about leaving Earth Tribe until the ceremony started.

Everything felt strange, and the sound that the leaves rustling seemed louder than before. . . As if they were whispering warnings into his ears. But instead of listening as he usually would have, Taehyun flattened his ears to the sides of his head and trotted away, wanting to be as far away from Yeonjun's strange behavior as possible.

Of course, he didn't know about the yellow eyes following him or the caws of crows confirming his leave.

~

A headache erupted inside Yeonjun's head, raking his skull harsher than ever before. The pain was yet another fight against himself, a fight that he'd been trying to win ever since Eclipse took full control over him.

The four creatures whose lives rested upon his hands were his friends. . . The four kids Yeonjun grew up with. . . The four kids Yeonjun learned to love due to the many adversities the five of them had survived together. He didn't want to do this to them. . . He didn't want to rob them of their life for an empty promise of power and glory.

But he was growing tired of fighting. His body wouldn't listen, and his mind was asleep, giving control to the entity that had captured him. There was no for him to break away. There was no way to run away. . . At least not alone.

Yeonjun went back to his den. He needed to be quick and gather everything for the massacre. The creature Eclipse had summoned after years of slumber was probably already on its way to ambush and distract the elementals from their actual threat.

His glazed green and blue eyes were fixed on the weapons he had sharpened so carefully. There was still the same hesitation in the way that his finger crooked around the objects, but his mind had already given up the desire to free itself.

Another headache went through Yeonjun's head. His eyes squeezed shut, and a long hiss of pain escaped his mouth. All the arrows he'd been holding plummeted towards the ground, scattering themselves all around Yeonjun as his hands went to the sides of his head, fingers clutching two handfuls of his hair.

The pain increased drastically, blurring his vision into a dark patch. Desperation filled Yeonjun like a storm creating swirls in the vast ocean of the island, so much that his hissing began to turn into little wails as he begged for the agony that was killing him to subside.

Tears built up at the corners of his eyes, the tiny crystals making their way down Yeonjun's plum russet cheeks. He couldn't escape this pain. He couldn't surpass it. He wasn't strong enough to do it. He wasn't going to be able to escape this dream turned into a nightmare. He couldn't. . .