Captain Shakhar Badhri:

I sat alone in my cell. I still contemplated the fate which I had missed. If this were a conventional war, I am sure I would have been executed like I had expected to be. I did not understand. After committing such sins, I could not understand why they allowed me to continue to draw breath. It was possible there was a backlog and they secretly had a lot of other prisoners and they were just keeping them in a different prison area. I did not want to think. I did not even want to sleep. My dreams were haunted by the screams of the past. The cries of children. The yells of fathers. It all came flooding back. I distinctly remembered what had happened that night.

It was 4 platoons, I was a lieutenant in the 04/7 division. Were sent on a mission to a small fishing village on the east coast. This was back when the crack down began. It had been almost 2 years since that day but I remembered it like it was yesterday. We came to collect taxes. This village had also been hit by the famine. Yet they still made us collect. This was a Kalantaikal village, so they had recently been made to pay double the taxes. We walked to the house of the village chief. When we asked for the money, he pled with my commander. They did not have any money to give. The loss of their fish stocks and the recent crop failure, they had nothing to sell. They barely had enough to eat. My commander was firm. The village chief went and got a precious gold totem. It was a symbolic protector of their village. My commander weighed it and then proceeded to ask for more, the village chief refused. He asserted, they had nothing more to give. My commander then stood up, and with one swift motion of his arm, he cut off the chief's head and gave the order. “Destroy it all.” I protested but my commander said to me, “We must teach the rest of their kind a lesson. They must be punished, in the name of ‘Freedom’. This is an order lieutenant, destroy all of it.”. Those words haunted me. The platoons split up. I couldn't defy the order, unless I wanted to be executed myself. I myself killed some of the Kalantaikal men who came by me. I saw some of the men dig a hole, round up some of the women and children before dumping some liquid fuel ontop of them, before setting them alight. They laughed as they held down the men and made them watch. I remember getting riled up as well. I cut down people as they came to me to plead for us to stop. A couple of the men went into the homes, bound the families with rope before proceeding to do unspeakable things to the women and girls as young as 10 while forcing their families to watch. Then they killed all of them. I did not want to participate in any of this. Some of them locked people in their homes, before setting them alight, burning them alive. I heard nothing, but laughing, screaming, the sound of swords and the crackling of fire. This continued for hours. By the time the blaze settled. There was silence. There were no more screams. Just lines of dead bodies all across the charred remains of the village. I stared into the fire, and looked around. This was done in part by my hands.

I shook my head, as if I could physically shake off the memories of the horrible things I had done. I got up and looked out the window. I saw the houses and town within the fortress. I thought of how many lives I had destroyed. What had happened at the village was not an isolated case. After that I participated in multiple destruction of villages and towns. Sometimes we took slaves and sometimes, we killed them all. Nobody was punished, ever. We were encouraged to commit such actions and ordered to carry out these deeds. I was in fact promoted because of how many I had cut down. I couldn't bear to live with myself. But I couldn't die yet. My family had no other source of income. The army had good benefits for families of officers. I spent what money I had on rivers of alcohol. I still was able to command well, but it wrecked my brain enough to stop it from remembering the deeds of the past. I was given alcohol by the rebels, but only as part of my prison rations. It was too small a quantity and too weak to do anything. My days were filled with fear. As my nights were filled with the horror of the past. I was now afraid of the dark to an extent. 

The snow cover was heavy. It seemed to be around dusk. My cell light was ample at this point but I feared for when they would turn off. I couldn't stay awake forever. I heard a knock on my cell door and turned around. There I saw him. A tall dark figure with glowing red eyes staring at me.

“Captain Badhri. Let us have a little chat.”

Dushtan Khan:

I sat on my throne. It had been so long since the last time I had done so. The throne existed as a mere symbol for ceremonial occasions. But I came here to think. What to do. I had been there absolute ruler for an era of peace. I never oversaw war. I reduced the size of the army slightly in my time. I was not a martial ruler like my father or my son, nor was I as powerful of a magic user as my ancestors. I was known as a powerful magic user, this was indeed true, but the emperors of the past wielded much more power than I ever did. As it appeared, magic seemed to be diluting slowly over time. I knew not why. I sat there and contemplated. Asura was alive, he had not resigned his position as crown prince. He was a boy of martial training. But he had been missing for 2 years, who knew if he wanted to return. I wanted him to return. I wished to be able to leave a peaceful empire in capable hands. He would be able to protect all demon kind and at the very least, he would keep the Narakam empire safe for a generation. I thought long and hard. As I stared at the floor and thought deeply I heard a voice coming from in front of me. “Dushtan, what troubles you? Are you still worried about the young one?” I looked up and saw a tall man with long black and red hair, with striking red, blue and black eyes. I immediately kneeled before him. “Master, you have come back to me, after so many years.” He smiled and put his hand on my head. “I have come back to visit you. I imagine you have indeed had a lot to deal with recently.” I stuttered a bit as I responded, “M-Master, why did you lie to me? You never told me you were the great demonic emperor himself. All you said was you were my ancestral guide.” He chuckled “Well I never lied, I just omitted some information. I am your ancestral Guide, hence why I came back to visit and guide you.” I was shocked but I wanted guidance and this was my opportunity. “Master, where is the boy? What is he doing?” His tone dropped. “I cannot tell you where he is. He is on his own journey. Dushtan, the boy is my successor indeed, but he writes the story. I assure you he has done what he has done for a reason. He believes it is for the greater good and has acted accordingly.” I stood up. “Will he come back? I wish to make sure he is ready to take the reins of the empire.”. He put his hand on my shoulder, “Dushtan, the boy is more than capable, and remember he won’t be alone, he is the other half of the empress just like how she is his other half. He will support her just as she will support him. As I have observed, both are more than capable. You needn't worry, Dushtan. As I am sure you are aware, there is a time of troubles on the horizon. Both of them will make it through, they will be fine. However, if you do want to find him, I will point you in the right direction. But the decision you make may very well seal fate” He swiftly took out his long black and red sabre and pointed. I looked toward where he had pointed, around 35 degrees south east, “He is around eleven thousand or so kilometres in that direction. This is all I can do Dushtan. Be well my child. He then slowly disappeared. I rushed straight to my office. I took the world map I had on the wall and measured. 35 degrees south east over a distance of 11 thousand kilometres. I found it. I called Tolui immediately. We knew roughly where he was and this was urgent. 

Captain Shakhar Badhri:

I was placed on a chair with my feet shackled to the floor. I was in a courtyard, the walkways were slightly elevated from the main courtyard. The yard itself was lined with beautiful bushes. It was composed of grass on a layer of permafrost. There were stone paths that stretched the courtyard. I saw 7 wood planks shaped like T’s inserted into the ground in a circle. Each of the 7 officers in my platoon had been tied to one. I was happy they had not been killed. But I was worried about what would happen to them. The man with the red eyes was the emperor, the leader of the rebellion. He walked to the centre of the courtyard, where there was a large stone with a flat top. He had a large stringed instrument with 2 thick strings. It had a box-like body with F holes shaped like dragons. It was made of what seemed to be made from Narakam Black Wood. It had red and gold lines outlining it. At the top of the head of the instrument there was an ornately carved horsehead. There was a long black bow hanging from the tuning pegs. The emperor put down the instrument carefully. 

He spread his arm out. The sky seemed to darken, and slowly wisps of smoke began to come off my men. The emperor slowly began to bring his arms together in front of him. My men began to writhe and scream in pain. It hurt me deeply inside, I wanted to save them, but I couldn't move. All I could do was sit there and watch. The smoke that came off their bodies began to combine into a sort of sphere.  As the emperor's hands were near the sphere, the amount and intensity of the smoke coming off the men’s bodies increased. They continued to scream in pain until a final flood of black smoke came off of each of them. They all suddenly stopped and all went limp. The emperor turned his hands around the 3 foot diameter sphere of smoke. Then he brought the sphere slowly towards him before it sank and absorbed into his chest. He tapped the tip of his boot on the ground before thrusting his arm out. At that moment a long polearm type weapon appeared in his hand. It had a curved sword type of blade at the top and another smaller curved blade that stuck out of the base of the main blade’s spine. There was one last blade, at the bottom of the weapon, it was relatively small at about half a foot long. The weapon was a deep black and red. At the base of the top blade was a red star painted on. The weapon stood at about 7 feet tall. He spun it around and hit the ground with the bottom of the blade. When it hit the ground, a powerful ring of fire emanated from it. The fire melted the layer of fresh snow that had covered the courtyard. The weapon was now embedded into the ground and stood straight. The emperor let go of it and sat down on the rock. He picked up the instrument and took off the bow. He placed the instrument between his legs and began to play. He started with slow low notes. Then all of a sudden he sped up and started playing quickly with notes. His fingers moved quickly and gracefully up and down the instrument. I was confused, until I saw the bodies of my men begin to twitch. I saw each of them raise their heads. Their eyes had turned pitch black. They began to make horrible growling and groaning noises. They began to struggle more and more. They were like a pack of rabid dogs rather than soldiers. They were men no longer. They seemed to be undead creatures of the night. One by one, their chains and bound snapped. I had a small hope they were still alive and I had my men back, but I realised that was not true. They stumbled and advanced toward the emperor. I thought they were going to attack him. But instead they all knelt before him. The emperor finished his song and placed his instrument down carefully. He got up and picked up the weapon embedded into the ground. He turned it and pointed north and slightly toward the sky. He muttered something unintelligible. The men got up and ran in that direction all the while grunting, groaning and making horrible noises of beasts. The emperor held his weapon downward at an angle with the blade facing in my direction. He stood in front of me, after what I had seen him do to my men, for the first time in years I felt fear penetrate my heart. I saw him swing his weapon, I winced to brace for what I thought would be my death, but instead I heard the clattering of metal and the fall of chains. I looked down to see he had cut my chains with a single swing. He said, “ Captain Badhri, I have a simple proposition for you. I have seen, and you have told me, you have committed grave sins against my people. But we will let you live, but you will stay in the cantonment. You will help around the town and assist us in translation of Kanshai code breaking. Do you agree?” I thought about it, as much as I believed I deserved to die, I had a wife and children. My wife was unable to work due to medical conditions and my children were still in school. If I died they would be left with nothing, they would be forced to the streets. I did not want that, at the very least if I stayed alive, I could return to them after the war. The Kanshai army was still sending them my salary as I should not have been confirmed as dead. Agreeing to the emperor's proposition was what I had to do. For the sake of my family. “I agree with your majesty.”. The emperor put his hand on my shoulder and said “Good. Don’t worry about your family, I assure you we will do no harm to them. We do not seek to hurt innocent peoples, we simply wish to exact justice on those who oppressed us for so long. Now then, you can get moving and seeing what’s there to do around the town. Unlike your men, you seem to have a moral understanding of what is right and wrong.” He let go of my shoulder before tossing his weapon in the air. He clapped and the instrument burst into a shower of sparks and embers. The dark emperor then turned around and walked away. I was in shock, I did not know what to do or say.