The Creator's Betrayal

Chapter one - How it began

Deep in the dark forest not too far from our little town lies a now crumbling temple. It used to be the town's temple where everyone would go and pray, break bread, sing, add to the carvings on the wall and of course read out parts of the holy scriptures.

Yeah, I know it’s weird to have a temple in the middle of a forest instead of having it in a small part of town, but we believed that to properly show our gratitude to our deity for what he has given is to worship while surrounded by nature.

The temple sat in the middle of a beautiful meadow surrounded by wildflowers of every kind, with trees so tall they stretch out forever with leaves so green they looked like delicate jade jewels vibrant and full of life in the bright sun.

But that all changed when a terrible rainstorm came out of nowhere and darkened the once bright sky.

The animals fled their woodland homes, the trees groaned as they were pushed side to side by the raging winds that whipped past. The clouds grew angry and rumbled up above, they say it sounded like a thousand horses running in the sky.

Then out of the dark came the thunder and lightning, it shook the ground with every strike it made, the townsfolk within the temple tried to escape the temple but the giant doors sealed themselves shut, and no matter what they did nothing would open them, some tried to escape through the windows, but they became unbreakable.

All five hundred townsfolk were trapped within until a piercing wail was all they could hear. The church was struck with a giant bolt of lightning causing blinding light to appear then nothing.

All was silent and the building was empty, all who were inside had disappeared. But the darkness had not lifted, the animals never returned, the grass died and became fog-covered mush while the trees became dark, cold leafless trees that sprung to life by a thick dark red cloud.

Ever since that day, the forest has never seen the sunlight and any that entered the temple doorway met the same fate and disappeared without a trace just like all the others before.

Everyone else that did not attend temple that day watched as the forest became shrouded in thick black fog, they felt the earth shake and could hear the wailing scream from the distance.

Children cried out for their mothers as the moment they heard the sound then many of clans’ hunters ran out into the woods weapons in hand to help those who were trapped inside.

Two hundred went in and only three came out one being extremely wounded the others only a few minor injuries and claw marks.

They told the townsfolk that the forest had come to life and attacked them by wrapping their branches and roots around their fellow hunters and swallowed them whole. The ones that escaped the trees were wither dragged off by the animals that were once gentle now changed demon like beings or were devoured where they stood.

For months, the townsfolk tried to make sense of what happened and tried to get back into the forest to find those who were lost but none ever returned, they mourned the loss of their loved ones as they lost all hope of finding them.

Three years later one of the clan members came running out of the forest screaming and raving like a madman, his skin had paled along with his hair, his body so thin rom lack of food that as soon as he reached the village he collapsed on the ground and passed put. When he came to, he told the story about what had happened. He told his story in pure fear as he explained what had happened and how he managed to escape. He said the only reason he managed to escape is because he was late to temple that day and arrived the very moment the weather had changed, and watched the doors slammed shut. He said he tried to help the others inside but couldn't, once he saw that they had disappeared he ran back towards the town but was trapped by a tree that tried to devour him but escaped and was trying to find a way out of the forest but the paths changed and the trees change location causing him to run around in circles, he survived by living off of the dead creatures that were once our wildlife and drank their blood to keep hydrated, it was by divine luck that he managed to escape.

No one knows exactly why that happened on that day, all we know is that the woods were now cursed, and all the remaining villagers turned their backs on Necalli, out of anger and betrayal.

Many felt that they were wronged by the creator and that he punished those that entered the forest, but no one knew why, when all we did was show our gratitude for the beauty of the life and land that we were given.

 And so as is life we moved on and progressed, we adapted and changed, our technology advanced along with our medication and science. All the ways we used to know where we lived in harmony with nature changed, some for the good some for the bad, but mostly in a way so that no one would worship Necalli.

If anyone were caught trying to continue the old ways of worship they were sent to the cursed woods and never seen again, because if they wanted to worship their maker they could do so in the cursed woods where he betrayed us, or so the story goes.

See over the years what happened on that day became a bad memory, memory became a story that the parents told their children to frighten them, the story became folklore, myth, legend, an old wives’ tale, a fairy tale and eventually ended up with many different versions as the story was passed down through the generations. Nowadays if you practice the old traditions you get sent to the woods, although we do not believe in the stories, but we continue the new traditions. Nobody knows for sure what lies inside the forest because we have all been taught to stay away. 

As for the knowledge of old it became a part of our history that is taught in schools and nothing more, anything to do with our history now sits in a museum, a library or online. It saddens some of us the direct descendants of the ones that never left the motherland and the three surviving hunters that managed to make it out of the woods.

It saddens us because the old ways of living seemed beautiful and peaceful whereas now technology tends to rule us in a way, it’s not all bad but like I said we progressed for the better and for the worse.

There is a saying in my family “balance is a law that cannot be broken should you try to tip the scale in your favour it will not end well” most don’t know how right that saying is, if you’re lucky you can see it unfold and get a laugh out of it sometimes but most of the time it ends in tears, broken bones or lives lost.

“SORREN WE’RE GOING TO BE LATE, STOP READING THAT BOOK AND COME OOOOOOOON!”

“OK I’M COMING!”

Ugh my sister is sooooooo annoying and she is older than me, yet she acts like a little sister, well I say older she is older by two and a half minutes.

She is my twin and the complete opposite which is ironic because my family believes in the whole balance thing. Twins run in my family and I think that’s where the saying about balance comes from, we always have twins always a boy and a girl. The boys tend to be born first every time, it’s rare for the girl to be born first, which in my family means if the girl is born first it’s a sign that something big is gonna happen. Like two hundred years ago my many great grandmother was the firstborn in her set of twins and when she turned eight our motherland was attacked by a neighbouring land across the ruby sea.

We won of course but the war was exceptionally long, it lasted three years and both sides lost so many all because of jealousy.

We made a treaty where we would share our advancements in exchange for trade which everyone was more than happy with. But sadly, most of the neighbouring lands are jealous of us because we’ve advance more than any of them, the first attacked because of our medical advancement, the next because of our technological advancement plus many more reasons.

But most of all the other clans are jealous of us because the Astralights were made and raised by the maker himself whereas the others came to be from evolution but based on our history Necalli did raise the animals and plant life first, he taught them how live, eat, drink, reproduce and so on, but they don’t think that counts.

Apparently Necalli made it so that should any of his creations wish to change the way they live/progress/evolve to be like us in their own way they could, and so the floral people came to be along with the beast men, rubiens ( ru-be-ens) who rule and reside in the ruby sea, and the skylers who live in the cloud.

There are so many lands with evolved beings it is amazing, but the ones that fascinate me the most are the ones that live in the volcanos. Fact that they can live in such heat is extraordinary, but I’ll get into that a bit more later. But now the treaties are in place, we share our knowledge with the neighbouring lands as do they along with trading food, clothing, materials and all sorts of cool things so for the moment the clans are at peace.

So yeah, having the girls first is cool in a way because it’s like a natural warning to be prepared for anything, which is comforting in a way almost like Necalli hasn’t abandoned us as everyone thinks and that that’s his way of warning us that somethings bad is going to happen, which is funny seeing as most think he betrayed his own creations.

I would never say this out loud or say that’s how I feel because I don’t want to get sent to the cursed woods, so I keep these things to myself mostly the only person that knows about my thoughts and feelings is my sister.

Only because we have similar perspectives and we think in a similar way, sometimes we would make a fort out of blankets and the huge pillows from mamma and papa’s room and we will talk about it. We draw what we think he looks like and we would make up stories about what if Necalli reviled himself to us all, it’s fun and nice when we do that, but we make sure to hide whatever we have written so we don’t get ourselves or our parents in trouble.

They don’t send people to the dark woods anymore because nobody practices the old ways of worship anymore if they do it’s probably done secretly but we hide them just in case they do but who knows.

Our mother does not believe it but me, my sister, and our farther dose. We all have the same feeling in our stomach that causes the hairs on the back of our necks to stand up whenever that feeling comes, we’re not sure why but I guess time will tell, for it will soon be exactly one thousand years since the awakening and I have a feeling whatever’s gonna happen has something to do with what happened all those years ago and that Necalli did not betray us.

Sorren shook his head to clear his mind of worrying thoughts and started getting ready for school, he packed his homework and pencil case along with his favourite book ‘The History of Our Ancestors’.

It was one of the many history books that tell how his people were created, how they used to be, how they lived, how they worshipped Necalli, and everything else, right up until the day of awakening today.  

Sorren and Amethyst Moon are eight-year-old twins that are currently attending the Celest primary school of knowledge and strength.

This school is for those who are descendants of the hunters from the old days, the school teaches them to control their abilities as well as giving them a proper education like all schools.

Only this one is specifically for children whose abilities have developed a lot sooner than they should.

The standard age of abilities showing is between twelve to fourteen whereas Sorren and Amethyst showed at age five, which makes them the youngest recorded so far.

The last ones that developed early were between eight and ten, it is not out of the ordinary as some do develop the at that time, but the twins are by far the youngest.

See two years after the hunters had escaped the forest they began to change, they started to show signs of increased strength, stamina, heightened senses, quick reflexes and magical abilities. The powers were passed onto the next generation then the next and the next, but nobody knew why, the following year after the first, three other members started developing the same abilities, they too were passed onto their children and grandchildren.

It was a shock to them at first, but it soon became the norm for some to have powers whereas others did not. In later years any that had developed abilities would train and learn to control their abilities and earn the title warrior.

The warriors were groups of astralights that fought demons that left the forest and attacked the village, they battled the demons for hundreds of years when suddenly, they stopped.

For some unknown reason, the demons had ceased all attempts at attacking the village anymore.

No one knows why they suddenly stopped, but they were grateful to finally be at peace for the years to come.

Although the attacks had stopped people continued developing abilities and passing them onto their children, they thought it strange that they still had those powers when the fighting had stopped but they continued to train, for should the cursed woods begin its assault on them again they would be ready.