The Legend of Cush

In The Beginning

Chapter 1: In the Beginning

From the verdant valleys of the north like a morning sun radiant in her appearance,. Matella, the sublime kingdom of the Sun god lies to the north-central plateau on the plains of Abyssinia Empire, sloping a few kilometers away from the sacred Lake Tana. Flanked to the west across the lake is the mountainous region of Alonika kingdom of King Lilac, the great-grandson of King Dalaci, once a friendly Kingdom to Matella but now turned a hostile enemy kingdom taken over and ruled with an iron fist by Isasda, an impostor, a wanderer, the destiny of whom cannot be altered by fiat of sudden fate.

 Isasda had by a chance of fate encountered Libi, the Abyssinia god of Strength nursing a grudge against the rulers of Alonika. Libi sold his grand scheme to him and assured him of his invincibility, to ever remain undefeated by any mortal. And for one conquered and humiliated at home, put on the run like a scared rabbit, Libi’s offer played into his dreams for future ambition and vengeance. He never asked why he should destroy a people he has never known or met. He never for once meditate upon the assignment a strange god gave him, but he dived headlong into it because of his nature; a nature of cruelty and greed. All Isasda saw in Libi’s offer was opportunity to become larger than he was in Ato, his nativity.

The ease with which King Isasda invaded and overcame Matella kingdom, butchered her people, ripping pregnant women open, killing young and old despite the gallant and heroic feats of King Ukal 1V, (a descendant of the guardian god of the Seven seas)and his soldiers in wars fought in the past vanquishing his enemies to the north, south, and east, only to be defeated by Alonika, is associated with the sorcery of Aqamasi, who commands the Prince of the Underworld, lord Memuka after hypnotizing and befriending him, and has a measure of control over the hounds of the Underworld, wolves in human appearance.

Under King Uka1 1V, Matella was at peace, having conquered surrounding kingdoms and put them to forced labor, exacting tribute from their kings, enjoying peace on every side not until the appearance on the scene of Isasda and Aqamasi the unpopular and hated sorcerer of Alonika who welcomed with open hands the brutal invader and united with him to obtain her pound of flesh from the citizens who so despised and loathed her for her witchcraft trade.

 He succeeded in his conquest of Alonika only as he is invincible, a mortal possessed by Libi, the god of Strength, and on the day of his invasion, the warriors of Alonika were no match for his superior strength. And after seven years of failure to subdue the territory of Matella by force, an exiled magician of the first order Itamadi, a former acolyte of the guardian god banished from the Seven seas kingdom for the sin of over-ambition, counseled Isasda to take to wife the sorcerer who became Queen Aqamasi. This trio of unpleasant personalities thereafter devours Alonika, the kingdom of ‘fair maidens’.

 When Alonika’s undisputed warrior Adida, refused a humiliating surrender which includes paying obeisance to the impostor even after his capture as the last man standing during the invasion, he was not killed immediately deeming instant death too merciful, therefore had him handed over to lord Memuka, Prince of the Underworld as a guest in his dungeon. Together this diverse cast of characters humiliated, conquered, and enslaved the strong-willed citizens of Alonika. He has since vanquished his perceived enemies within Alonika, crowned himself King, taken the war to hitherto friendly neighbors bordering Alonika on her southern and eastern frontiers without provocation or rationale but to market his pride and take an egotist trip, the common weakness of mortals.  Now he sets his eyes on their western neighbor, Matella, the kingdom never before defeated.

The impregnable fortress of Matella was breached when the son of King Ukal 1V, the de facto heir, who became known as Ukal V, turned seven, with the mother, Queen Ro, nine months pregnant and overdue for delivery but she wasn’t belabored by birth pains until the morning of the attack. The invasion took the kingdom unawares, a real stunt as it were. Out of a hubris induced self-confidence, Matella kingdom let down her guard, trusting whole-heartedly in her invincibility despite the warnings from the god of Death, Soza to King Ukal 1V “to beware of the apocalypse’, a warning that went unheeded, but at the end, the magical powers of Itamadi and Aqamasi combined superseded, neutralized and lifted the magical veil covering Matella weaved around it by the Wizard Harabona, the Priest of the Sun god and Ulele the Priestess, niece to king Ukal 1V.

The brutality, ferocity, and rage of the invasion left Matella bleeding; Ukal 1V refused to surrender, vowing to fight to the death, which he did. Harabona and Ulele, shocked by the impotence of their magical veil, which surrounds the kingdom like strong cords of an invisible net, that each time an enemy or any human with evil intentions dare to enter Matella the cords vibrate in the ears of both the Priest and Priestess of the Sun god alerting them to real and present danger and they in turn passes the signal to prepared warriors who will waste no time in locating and destroying external danger.

On this day, a day like no other in the history of Matella kingdom, the Priest and Priestess of the Sun-god did the needful by smuggling the young Ukal V, the heir apparent across the Seven seas, which gladly received them before debating the cause of the war. Their intention was to take the pregnant queen along but on getting to her official residence within the palace she was nowhere to be found. They had little time to search for her and so they left without the queen.

The kingdom of the seven seas is an uninhabited expanse of land and water, the sacred Late Tana serving as the major body of water issuing out various channels of crisscrossing streams and estuaries making the valley into one beautiful scenery in all of Abyssinia, but which the Sun god of Abyssinia, the guardian of the Seven seas has appropriated and forbidden for man’s trespass. Its waters are aggressively guarded by a seven-headed monster, a dreadful serpent that hears only the voice of its master, the Sun god.

There, in the colony of Priests and Priestesses of various gods of Abyssinia did Ukal 1V take refuge; there he grew to an adult and eventually returned to Matella to take over the throne of his fathers.