Five gods watched the world.
Five of them grasped it, like five fingers of a hand.
Five of them kept it balanced.
When the soul of Solara, the Goddess of the Sun, shattered, Heaven, Earth, Hell, and Limbo mixed.
Mighty Empires fell to the demons.
Countless innocent lost their lives to the wrathful souls stuck in Limbo, now reanimated in their rotten, undead bodies.
And the heavens, which innocent tried to hide under its wings as their last bastion, showed to be cruel as demons in their twisted sense of justice.
*****
A carriage, pulled by four mighty but tired horses, was moving through a dense forest at ridiculous speeds.
Large, winged humanoid figures follow them high above. Those figures had shining red eyes like rubies and skin made from bones and stones.
The driver was sweating like he never did before, as if the scythe of the Grimreaper itself was in its neck, waiting to take his life in one motion. His hands were shaking, barely holding the leashes of the horses.
Inside the carriage was someone of an important figure, the third princess of his kingdom. She was on her way back from a royal mission.
In the beginning, they had an escort of two priests and two dozen armed knights, but demons slaughtered all in an ambush.
"Faster," The driver shouted while whipping the horses. "Please, be faster-!" But an explosion cut the driver's pitiful plea.
The carriage was knocked away and hit the ground sideways.
Two of the four horses pulling the vehicle were heavily injured, and the driver explosion happened right next to him. Shockwave had broken most of his bones and sent him away.
The door of the knocked-down carriage got bashed open, and a man got out. A knight with a swordfish-shaped silver crest on his chest armor and a well-made curved sword in his hand exited the vehicle.
There was blood on his face, but he looked unbothered by it.
The man's face soured down quickly when he finished inspecting the surroundings.
The blue mist had covered the forest ground.
"Undead is close," The knight murmured.
He then looked up and saw a flock of giant crows watching them. Like a hunting dog, those demonic birds stalked any prey they found fitting and gave their location with their loud caws to demons in the proxy. In exchange, demons always left a generous portion of the hunt to their partner.
Thankfully, they weren't aware of their existence yet.
The blue mist was concealing them.
But, from far away, agonizing screams were coming. Some bloodcrows had found the coachman and feasted on him while he was still alive.
They were ripping his flesh apart and making sounds that resembled laughter while the poor man screamed and pleaded to his god for death so his suffering would end.
The knight looked inside the carriage. His master, Princess Lunaria, was still alive, but they had little time.
He reached into the leather pouch hanging on his hip and pulled out two bottles filled with red fluids.
He made Lunaris drink one, and he drank the other.
It was an elixir prepared by Healing Church that helped one to recover their health.
"Those winged bastards probably don't know she is in the carriage. She has her presence hidden since she has a concealing artifact. I only need to draw them away." It was a desperate plan, but best he had.
He jumped outside and drew his sword. "Here you! Come, taste my blade!" He shouted while moving away from the carriage.
Demons seemed to accept the man's challenge. They stopped flying around the carriage and landed near him. Their presence was even more frightening in close look.
They were twice as tall as him, and their stone bodies had scratches and chips, showing they survived battles before. They had heads resembling a three-horned mountain goat.
"Two demons, nothing unmanageable," the knight said while looking at the demons.
Demon on his left charged forward. His left arm, slightly larger than the right, was glowing with an ominous red. The demon struck the man with that hand.
Its claws left a red trail in the air while moving towards its target.
The knight managed to block the attack, but the strength behind it was so great it shook him to the bones and almost made him drop his weapon.
Gritting his teeth, the knight shouted, 'I will not fall so easily!' Despite the bone-rattling impact, he shook off the blow and leaped forward.
Demon showed little effort to dodge man's attack, as if it was mocking him, but was shocked when man's sword radiated a powerful white light when it touched the demon's body and cut one of its horns.
The demon roared with a primal rage and made a payback strike, launching the knight towards the closest tree.
The knight vomited blood when his body collided with the tree. His armor bent, and his ribs shattered, and for a moment, he lost all his senses before gaining only some of them.
'So, this was my end.' He thought. He almost laughed with the last bit of his energy.
'I trained all my life.' He smirked. 'Just to be toyed by these monsters. Oh, the holy irony.'
Demons moved closer and closer toward him, but they stopped only a step away from him.
Their eyes were locked on something else approaching from the forest, something more important than a meal, something dangerous.
From the forest, a man in plate armor with a long sword hanging on his hip emerged. His armor radiated golden light, and that light acted as a field that purified the blue mist around him.
His armor lost its shine, and his cape gathered so much dirt the bright yellow turned into a darkish brown, but a necklace shaped like the sun on his neck remained well polished.
"A paladin of Solara, damn me," The knight's smirk turned into laughter.
The eyes of both demons were open to the fullest, and their bodies trembled in hatred. Cracks in their body were glowing.
Both of them leaped forward and charged toward the man like rabid animals and unleashed a flurry of attacks towards him.
Their vicious strikes cut the trees around them, smashed the rocks on the floor, and destroyed the very earth they stepped on, but Paladin dodged all of them with ease by stepping out of their way.
And when he found an opening, he took a step forward, drew and slashed his sword in a lightning-fast motion, and cleaved one of the demons into two.
The red crystal core, which gave life to the demon, was exposed.
The other demon quickly moved forward and ate the core.
Its body quickly absorbed the power and glowed red. Its body changed. It grew larger, several new horns grew on its head, and its wings divided into two and became four, but before it managed to finish transforming, the Paladin struck again.
His sword tore through the stone skin of the demon and passed through its unholy flesh like a hot knife passing through butter.
Demon's body quickly began regenerating, but every bit of flesh that reappeared was instantly burned and turned into dust by holy flames.
"Just accept your end." Paladin of Solara said to the demon, still trying to fix its body while holy flames consumed it.
He moved forward and pushed the demon's head to the floor. The monster was screaming in agony. "It hurts, isn't it?" Paladin said. "Well, think as your redemption." He watched the flames slowly consume the demon, and when the last bit of flesh of the monster turned into dust, he moved towards the wounded knight and touched him on his shoulders.
Yellow light surged to the wounded knight's body and restored some of his health.
"Thank you," The knight managed to say to his savior. His wounds got treated, but they still hurt like hell.
Paladin of Solara stopped. "You won't die, but that's all I got."
The knight shook his head. "You did plenty for me already, say what-"
"Now, I heard there was a town called WellDeep around here. It should be the only one in the vicinity. Can you show me the direction?"
The knight was dumbfounded. "I think there was a town south of here."
Paladin got up and nodded. "Thank you," And left the scene.
But just before he got away, the knight managed to get up and shout. "Hey! At least tell me your name."
Paladin stopped and turned towards the knight. "It isn't necessary, but if you wonder that much, Lucius Dawnblade, that's my name."
After that, the Paladin of Solara disappeared into the shadows, leaving just as quietly as he had arrived.