In the vastness of space, a planet of Ice by the name of Frostia hung sparkling like an ornament within the void with its jewel like snow seemingly swirling beyond its atmosphere, catching the light of the star, Severatine. Severatine, the massive burning furnace, belted by a deep red ring of flame. Its flame washed the ice of Frostia in light as it cycled in its orbit, and in turn Frostia itself was orbited by the glassy blue satellite Ecliptis. Ecliptis would then catch the speckled glow bouncing of the ice crystals of Frostia, lighting itself like a disco ball in the night sky. While these three continued in their pattern of orbit, lit in each other’s glow, one could be certain that this galaxy was continuing its proper function regardless of what surreal happenings may be taking place within its planet’s atmosphere.
Upon this planet a poor civilization of humans waned as it was beset by a race of demonic penguins that gnawed against the edges of their territory like vicious rodents, keeping them confined to a singular small country with only one city and a scattering of villages remaining inhabited within the sprawling continent of Iceveria. For one thousand years this had simply been their way of being, the fluffy bastards had never pushed hard enough to eradicate them yet slowly and surely, they chipped away at both their borders and sanity, the humans unable to rise to the challenge of the powerful ice magics and the frankly surprising martial prowess of these stunted monsters.
This all changed however when a certain man had been discovered unconscious deep within a forest by a then young mage some 20 years ago. Little was known as to who this man was or had been. It wasn't difficult for such a diminished population to keep track of their census yet there were no records of him and neither did he know his own history. What was known was that this man they would come to title simply Hero out of gratitude wielded great fire magic, blades of flame that could for the first time in their known history, not only hold the line against the swarm, but even push back against it.
It was now that said hero confronted the general of the demon penguin army, Raiguin the reaper for what many believed would be the final confrontation. He had made his way into the confines of Raiguin’s camp with a few of his closest companions as the humans laid siege to their army on the outskirts, and now both armies waited with bated breath as Hero and Raiguin continuously dueled each other for 3 days and nights straight. Under the auspicious glow of their glassy moon the fate of these two races would be decided once and for all by their respective champions. Or so it should have been.
They’re all just hanging back so they can rest. Hero thought this to himself bitterly as he recalled his grandmama’s stern words of warning on the dangers of going twenty-four hours without rest. Naturally as someone with the lazy place holder name of “Hero” he had a proper case of amnesia and no recollection of any sort of grandmama. It would seem in his current state of delirium he had forgotten his memory loss and invented his own personal history. But grandmama or no it doesn’t change the fact staying awake for three days and nights straight is incredibly unhealthy for both his mind and body and if the beads of sweat forming on the great general’s forehead and audible heart palpitations were any indication this fact held true for demonic penguins as well. In short, this climatic battle had devolved into more of a sort of dick measuring contest as to who would be the most stubborn. Idly Hero considered that Raiguin would probably just be replaced by one of the other millions of identical penguins even if he did kill him.
Still the little gremlin wobbling in his vision was genuinely their current strongest warrior, else this duel would have already been decided. Like the rest he was covered in icy blue and black fur and wore an odd tightly fitting imperialistic grey uniform adorned in white wind like swirls and snowflakes. Unlike the others he wore a grand cloak of red and white fluffy plumage and wielded a large, crooked scythe seemingly formed of dripping icicles. He was a gnarly and speedy little rodent, but that wasn’t fully apparent at the moment. This lord commander of monsters held his ghastly weapon aloft and let his will be known.
“You will bar my way no longer Hero. It is time for us to reclaim the lost…” He shifted his eyes left and into the air, more lost than whatever it was he wished to reclaim. “Lost…lost empress! The lost empress.” It would seem he was lost in his own delusion. Hero meant to point this out to him with a heavy dose of snark, but he had already forgotten and was too busy spinning a new delusion of his own.
“Enough of this. I know killing you won’t bring back my son, but it will at least let him rest in peace.” The shaggy hair falling out of his headband cast a dark shadow over his stern eyes which was accentuated by the dark marks under his eyes. While these marks seemed appropriate in his current state of sleep deprivation, they were in fact always there and it was difficult to tell whether they were eyebags or face paint.
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It doesn’t need to be reiterated that Hero is missing memories and has absolutely no recollection of any sort of family ties. For that matter he had already repeated this five times over the past few days, changing from brother to mother to uncle to governor and now to son. Nevertheless, he lifted his hand to his side and summoned into his grip a sword of flames that burned like a star’s surface and pulled it back into a ready stance, his eyebrows tense. His trademark scarf drifted behind him stretching back and giving the appearance of three pronged yellow hands to such an extent that one could not help but imagine them holding massive swords of their own. It was an odd one-of-a-kind accessory that would always be noticed by both his allies and enemies so that they would know his presence even without seeing his face. If one were to replicate its appearance the knock off would never be able to match the way it wispily flailed independently of any wind and never fell limp to the ground despite its length.
Hero readied his shoulders to perform a powerful thrust as soon as he would get within range of his enemy. For a short moment he was suddenly overcome with the feeling that his mind and body were operating independently of one another, and he felt the twitching of an unlocatable phantom limb. This only lasted for the most microscopic fraction of a second in his delirium not even interrupting his thoughts or movements and was just as quickly forgotten.
Raiguin looked him dead in the eyes in anticipa…Raiguin looked slightly to the left seemingly at nothing. I only have one shot at this. It wasn’t clear why Hero thought this now since Raiguin was full of openings and he had as many shots as he wanted. “An after image, to think he can reach such speeds.” It seemed Raiguin had convinced himself he was already under attack and not even Hero’s roar as he kicked off the ground would make him believe otherwise. The fierce angle of Hero’s eyes was immediately betrayed by the lackadaisical stumbling launch as he threw himself at Raiguin who only dodged by waddling back and forth and swinging his scythe at nothing.
Had the surrounding armies been watching them at this moment their two greatest warriors would have looked quite pathetic to their onlookers, perhaps disenchanting them from the romance that surrounds such figures. But no one was watching them, and they hadn’t been for some time now. Everyone present was looking directly up with faces frozen in shock.
The air surrounding the twos comedic showdown had a strange lightness to it. Crystal dust clouds erupted from the impact of snow that was thickly sifting around them like cheese through a grater. It poured, in a way that could not be mistaken for weather, through a sky lit with a light blue sunset glow in the center of a dark night, to coalesce upon the ground around them creating a field of ice sand. A tremor shook the ground, but it was somehow clear the force of it came from above, pushing rather than quaking. The water falls of silted snow would shake when this happened forming irregular dunes.
Eventually even the two delirious fighters could no longer ignore the anomaly and slowly raised their eyes above to rest upon the moon. Ecliptis, the only moon of the planet Frostia. Ever a globe of ice, it waxed and waned across their night skies, a constant and comforting presence. Yet had it ever truly been a moon of ice. That ice now cracked and broke and by the time Hero and Raiguin viewed it was well enough along in the breaking to demonstrate the true horror of the situation.
Something was emerging, like an animal breaking out of an egg. It was ghastly yet beautiful, the translucence of its hide not giving off an appearance that one would associate with a living being. Its hooves clawed out of the ice in such an erratic manner that it appeared as if it was pulling itself through a membrane despite the solidity of its shattering shell. And then its visage was before them in all its glory. Its massive serpentine body would make one consider a dragon, but when one took its head into account it was more reminiscent of a rabbit or perhaps a goat. As Hero watched this oddity fall away from the moon in the shattering ice, he had the oddest thought. That this cosmic horror was a part of the moon itself, a part of Ecliptis, and it was being severed away. In the fog of his mind this thought only lasted a moment before he was brought back to the exhaustion of his current predicament and what this event might mean for it.
Raiguin coughed, clearly having the same idea, and began to spin his yarn. “Clearly this means the return of the great lunar beast…this is no time to be fighting among ourselves.” Unabashedly he spoke as if the past 1000 years of attempted genocide was nothing but a squabble to be put aside in the face of a greater threat. Yet Hero easily echoed the sentiment.
“The legend of the lunar beast, to think it would come to fruition in my lifetime.” If there had ever been any legends pertaining to the identity of this creature, they were now most certainly lost in no small part due to the demon penguins themselves. But these two were not currently concerned with reality and neither were they concerned with the logistics of organizing cooperation between two races under a thousand-year blood feud. And thus, hand met flipper, ending the greatest war this planet had ever known through neither mutual understanding nor even necessity, but from sheer exhaustion.
And so, the current two most important figures on this planet collapsed back into the icy snow laughing. They almost immediately puttered off into a deep sleep witnessing not the monster they had named the lunar beast’s advent unto the planet Frostia. Blissfully unaware of how far the coming events it would herald would take them from themselves.
