Reborn In The World Of The Undead

5. sacred mark

“This is not your world. This is the world of the undead,” he revealed, causing my jaw to drop when I heard him say that. I now understood that this was real, that I really was in the world of the undead.

I saw those tree-like creatures standing around me staring at the mark on my neck and after discovering the truth of where I was, this place seemed even more frightening. I looked up at the moon, whose light had increased even further. It was redder than before, the light of the moon had increased so much that the pouring darkness had turned into light.

I looked at the creatures standing around me who were somehow being affected by the light of the moon. Their skin, which had looked like that of a tree, had now changed in many ways. Their green colored skin had changed to brown and their eyes, hands, and feet all looked normal, as if they were human now.

They did not look very scary as compared to earlier, but their eyes were still focused intently on me. That was when I noticed a small girl standing by my side. She looked like these people, but her eyes were very scary, they were a yellow color. She reached up to hold my hand, but in panic, I tried to pull my hand out of her grasp. I saw that the girl was drawing closer to me again and was speaking something in another language.

"What is she saying? Tell her to get away from me!” I exclaimed to the handsome man.

"First of all, she was not trying to harm you, she was talking to you. The farther you run away from these people the more likely they are to consider you their enemy. So if you don't want these people to eat you raw, stop being afraid of them," he replied. I felt the dryness in his voice. He was so rude!

"And another thing," The handsome man added, taking two steps ahead of me so that I was looking deep into his blue eyes.

"My name is Sebastian and not ‘You’ a human like you doesn't even deserve to stand in front of me, so how dare you raise your voice to me," he reprimanded. But as soon as I heard the word human from his mouth my mind burst with anger.

"I think you consider yourself a God and all should approach you with reverence, but I am sorry I have no desire to worship a God like you!" I snapped, giving him a befitting reply. He looked angry. Suddenly everything became calm again, the man who had been talking to me in another language came forward. He respectfully bowed his head to Sebastian.

"Èske fanm sa a se yon destriktè? Èske istwa a vre?" The man asked Sebastian and then looked at me.

"What is he saying?" I asked as I noticed that the little girl had again come to stand beside me to hold my hand. I was trying to get away from her, but this time I did not push or run away from her. I noticed that she was doing something with her hand.

“Èske ou se yon destriktè? Èske istwa a vre?" The girl said in her native language.

"Are you a destroyer? Is the story true?” The girl asked me in a different language. I had no idea how I understood what she was saying, this was incredibly strange. How the hell was I able to understand what she was saying all of a sudden? But then I saw her hand and realized that she had done something with it, it was due to this that I was able to understand their language.

"What do you mean by story? What are you talking about?" I asked, looking at that weird large man and Sebastian.

"We will tell you everything, but please accept our request. Please give us a chance to be hospitable,” the man offered as he bowed down before me with respect. Not only him, but all the people like him and the little girl next to me were bowing with respect to me. This sudden change in behavior was both strange and humbling, I still had no other choice but to agree.

I nodded and they all looked happy. I noticed that the surrounding trees that they had all come out of were changing their shape. All the surrounding trees had joined together and made a large cover over our heads that made it look like a huge cave. The small shrubs under our feet also changed their shape, taking the form of cushions on which we could sit.

The man turned his hand toward the doorway and soon a firefly started coming from far away and went straight towards his hand. My jaw dropped when I comprehended its size and brightness. He laid the firefly in the center of that cave-like place and the cavern became completely illuminated. I watched all of this in surprise because I could not believe that this was the same place where all these creatures had been trying to eat me raw only a few moments back. This place no longer seemed scary at all, I wasn’t feeling suffocated anymore either.

"Please take your seat?” The man suggested to Sebastian and I. I noticed that both of us were sitting very high up on these cushion-like things, but they were all sitting on the ground as if they were our servants. I didn’t understand why they were giving us so much respect. At the same time I did not understand who this Sebastian was yet?

These people were afraid of him, they were speaking while avoiding eye contact with him, their eyes were focused on the ground the whole time. The girl was still sitting by my side, she had been staring at me the entire time. I noticed that there were not many women here, which I found strange. They were mostly men and other than this little girl there were only four women there.

"Are you a destroyer? Is the story about you true?" The girl asked me again and I looked at everyone. They were all staring at the mark on my neck with surprise.

"Yes, she is a destroyer. I was never one who believed that the stories were true. I used to think that those stories were made up to cheat the people, to give them false hope, but after seeing this woman and the mark on her neck it has proven that the stories are true. The destroyer has come to our world!" The man told his people, they all looked happy.

"What kind of stories are you talking about? And what is this destroyer?” I asked them.

"You are a destroyer!" Sebastian spoke up, attracting my attention towards him.

"Millions of years ago, when this world’s king was deceived by a Draug and captured by his own trusted people. That Draug fulfilled his dream of placing this whole world under his control, under his heel. He killed not just the king, but every person in his clan. He had not even left a newborn child alive. He hid their corpses from the world, burying them in a place that no one would be able to discover.

“He did this because the king was undead and it was impossible for him to die, but using his power and the power of a witch that Draug had made the impossible possible. He hid the corpses of the entire clan because if someone found those bodies and turned those spells against him, it would be possible that the king could be restored to his rightful place. If the corpses of any one of his descendants is discovered, then it is possible but so far no one has been able to locate those bodies.

“From that day onwards he has devastated the world of the undead. He cursed them so that every living being was under his control. Circumstances worsened if someone tried to go against him, the curse would have an immediate effect on them. However, the curse does not only have an effect on one person, but on that individual’s entire clan. The rebellion of one person would lead to the punishment of their entire clan.

“He never appears in front of anyone, but his curse holds a firm grip on everyone. Some tribes accepted the rebellion, but refused to kneel before him. They were all ready to die in the face of the curse refusing to give their powers over to him. No one knew at the time that whenever someone was destroyed by his curse, the powers of each and every person in that clan would be added to the Draug power,” Sebastian paused for a moment in telling the story to take a breath, but all of it made no sense to me. So I let him continue with this story.

“It was no longer considered murder if a person died at the hands of his curse, instead it had become suicide to even consider moving against him. He was becoming more and more powerful. After this secret had been revealed, no one made the mistake of challenging the curse that he had cast on each and every being in this world. The clans were devastated, fear grew among the people. All began to spend their time under a shadow of fear, thinking that if they didn’t challenge the curse and didn’t rebel then they would be saving their clan, but it didn’t happen that way.

“Draug had not been gaining powers at that point as no one had been challenging him or the curse. His greed for power knew no bounds which led him to raise his army, which included the undead who were willing to join him in his greed so that they could free themselves from the curse from that day onward. Instead it changed the very essence of The World of The Undead. The undead who had never died began to perish. The very meaning of the word undead itself had been changed, this world was in danger.

“The small tribes went to the largest tribes of the world of the undead, who at one time ruled this forest for help. They were prospering and used to forecast the future. They had the power to manipulate time. They had the gift of clairvoyance, they could see the past and future. All the tribes followed their leadership. Draug learnt that people were rebelling against him, but in a different way. He was well aware of the special power that the large clan was home to.

“He sent his soldiers to kill every person from the largest clan to the smallest clan, along with anyone who came to offer them aid. There was a big fight that raged for 12 days and 11 nights, but in the end they could not stand against the might of his army. Before they died the chief of the largest clan predicted that a destroyer would be born to save them all,” Sebastian revealed. I looked at the faces of the beings around me to find that they were all looking at me with hope in their eyes.

“He didn’t say where they would be born before he died, but he made a strange mark on a stone with his blood. No one could erase the sign made by the blood on that stone and no one could move it. The sign mentioned in the books is a sacred mark. It does not randomly appear on the destroyer's body, but from birth onward no one knows when it will emerge on their body. This meant that the person who bore this mark on their body would be the destroyer, the same person that would save this world,” Sebastian finished as I touched my mark. That meant that the mark had always been with me, but it had been hidden. The strange figure from my dream had just caused it to appear.

“The day this mark appeared on your body and you appeared in this world, a war took place over your arrival,” Sebastian remarked while I was just confused.

“Why? Why was there a war? Over what?” I asked.

“The war was fought over you, both sides wanted you. They were part of the army of Draug and they wanted to take you to him,” Sebastian answered. I watched as he pulled a knife from his pocket.

“What is this Draug? I have never heard about this.” I asked, still trying to wrap my head around all of this….this nonsense.

“A Draug is an ancient, humanoid, monster, undead creature. Literally translated it means again walker,” he told me as sweat formed on my brow.

“So, what you are saying is that a Draug is ruling over this world and I am a destroyer, whose main purpose is to protect these undead people from a Draug?” I asked him, making sure that I had heard everything correctly.

“Unfortunately yes,” Sebastian confirmed once again, sounding rude.

“What kind of bullshit is this? I will say that I really enjoyed your story, but don’t drag me into this quagmire. I do not even believe it. I am not some destroyer or anything. I am not stupid enough to go to that Draug and had myself over to him. Keep your stories to yourself and tell these people that there is no need to hang their hopes on me,” I asserted as I watched his face change. Suddenly he threw that knife towards me, I yelped in fear. I thought it was going to kill me, but it was stabbed in the wall of trees.

“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!!!” I screamed at him, getting up from the seat as he got up as well.

“I ALREADY KNEW THAT YOU HUMANS WERE USELESS SELFISH PIECES OF s**t! IF THAT MERE KNIFE HAS SCARED YOU TO THIS LEVEL THEN HOW THE f**k CAN YOU SAVE OUR WORLD?! I DON’T KNOW WHY THE f**k YOU’RE A DESTROYER. I SHOULD NEVER HAVE SAVED YOU EARLIER! A USELESS HUMAN WHO IS A BURDEN TO HERSELF, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER IF YOU WERE DEAD!!” Sebastian yelled at me, revealing everything that had been going on in his mind.

I already knew he hated me but this amount of venom he had spewed at me was on another level, his comment that I should have died hurt me. He had not known that I was already dead and reborn, but not into my world but here into The World of the Undead. God had given me a second chance, but had played with me by sending me here. Sebastian was telling me that I should die, but I could not even die. He had said that I was a burden to everyone including myself.

“Yes I am a useless selfish piece of s**t! I was always a burden to everyone including myself. So what? I tried my best to survive alone, but nothing changed in my life, in the end I was hit by a car and I died. I died on the spot, I never thought that I would get a second chance. Nevermind that it was not in my world but here, where people are calling me destroyer and hoping that I would be able to help them. You are saying all of this because I refused to believe whatever you told me. If you were in my place where you had gotten a second chance to live, you would do the same thing that I am doing. You would never dare to lecture others about these huge problems, about saving the world. So keep your bullshit to yourself, and as for saving my life I am sorry that you will forever regret that you saved a useless human! Now I will no longer be a burden to you or anyone else. I will find a way to go back to my world,” I announced as I began to walk away from there.

Everyone heard me and they looked sad as I left. The girl had asked me to stay while holding my hand again, but I shoved her hand away. I was not going to stay among these people. At that moment I felt the ground move, when I looked at others they all had terrified expressions on their faces. Was it an earthquake? I looked at the girl who had been smiling at me because I had stopped, but now she was on the ground.

She screamed loudly as I saw something green had wrapped around her whatever that thing was it was dragging her. She was screaming in fear as that thing dragged her inside a dark place. There were too many things like that. It was like an octopus with all it’s tentacles. These tentacles were attacking people as they tried to escape to save their lives. I noticed that Sebastian had pulled his sword out.

As his sword touched the tentacles they vanished. He had already killed so many, but they were increasing in number. The other males were also fighting, but I noticed that these tentacles were trying to catch the women of the group, the men were trying to save women. They had surrounded the women like a shield, one of the women was going crazy. I thought that maybe she is the mother of that little girl. She was trying to go into the dark cave, but the tentacles were not letting this happen.

“What is going on? Why is that thing only attacking women?” I asked Sebastian, who was not letting any tentacles reach me. He had been killing them mercilessly. The whole forest floor was colored with their green sticky blood. I felt like vomiting.

“These tentacles always attack them, they live under the land. They come out mostly during the day when their s****l desire gets out of control. They only want women for s*x. They are hungry for s*x and women’s scent drives them crazy. It seems that they appeared right now due to your scent,” Sebastian replied. While fighting so many of them were injured protecting the women.

Now I understood why there were only a few women here, but what about the child? She screamed in pain and I shivered as I heard her. He said they had been attacking for s*x. That meant the thing had been plainning to r**e that child. Fury rose in my veins as I walked towards the dark place.

“Where are you going? There are too many of them. It will catch you!” Sebastian shouted as he held my hand tightly.

“Where the f**k do you think you are going? Do you want to get r***d? This is not the human world. This is not a joke like your human mind is thinking!” He snapped in anger as I shoved his hand away.

“I am going to do what I should have from the beginning,” I clarified as I pulled the knife out of the tree wall. Sebastian ran behind me so that he could stop anything coming for my back. I entered the darkness and saw the child held down by the tentacles. It had transformed into a humanoid form, he was over the kid. He had torn her clothes.

“HEY!!!” I shouted at it to attract his attention. He moved away from the child as his eyes fell on me.

“Don’t cry. I am here…” I comforted the child as she got up from the floor. She was naked and still crying in fear. I could not move from my spot as that tentacle was coming towards me.

“Don’t move, he can not hear us but he can feel our heartbeat. I will do something,” Sebastian advised. The tentacle slithered closer to me as one of his hands came towards me. I sensed that he had smelled me. I stared at the child, who had gotten up from the ground. I could tell that she was thinking about running away. Sebastian was still standing behind me, I was breathing hard in fear.

I felt him lifting my top as I clutched the knife in my hand tightly, I watched as the little girl ran out escaping from there. The tentacle's attention had been diverted from me for a moment when he looked at the kid. He left my top, I saw his one hand going to grab the child. Sebastian and I ran to the girl. He cut his hand off when he had been going to attack the kid, but the strange thing was his hand grew back. As he had sliced off his hands and legs they were growing again and again.

I ran to the child as I tried to bring her out of the dark, but he grabbed the girl again, causing her to slip from my grasp. He threw her to the ground and spread her legs. I knew what he was going to do, I looked at Sebastian who was still fighting with all of his tentacles. That thing had holes in his hand, it was getting larger. If Sebastian moved his sword, then the thing would swallow him whole.

I looked at the little girl who was going to lose her innocence. I thought about my past when someone had tried to r**e me when I was only 13. I grabbed the knife from the floor as I ran towards the thing. I noticed that he was using all of his tentacles except for one and it proved that it was his weak spot or his life force was centered there. I held the knife tightly and cut that tenacle off with one solid slice. This knife was not simple. It was shaper than i thought. It cut the tentacles in two pieces. The thing roared and moved away from Sebastian.

It fell to the floor while screaming as it turned into a puddle of goo. Not only that, but all the tentacles that were outside of the dark cavern also turned into the same goo. I watched as it vanished from the floor. I glanced at Sebastian, who was watching me with a shocked expression. The child ran away from there straight to her mother, while Sebastian continued to look at my hand that was covered in green blood.

“You…” he was about to say before I walked over to him and placed the knife in his hand.

“You saved my life and this weak human just saved yours. Now we are even. I do not owe you anything now. I hope we never see each other again!” I walked out of the cave. My only goal was to leave the World of the Undead.