6kv Chapter 227: Khaos’ Resolve
Chapter 227: Khaos’ Resolve
"You are speaking absolute madness. My son is four years old. He is a toddler. He is not a weapon to be pointed at the Atrai Kingdom."
"I know, chief. But he is a vessel of raw, unsealed ether. You saw the Arcane Vanguard today. You saw how effortlessly they broke your walls. Commander Vane is regrouping his forces on the ridge. Tomorrow morning, they will not charge into your snake pits. They will simply stand back and burn this entire valley to ash. Every single man, woman, and child will die."
Elara stood in the corner of the room, her arms wrapped tightly around her stomach. "And how does giving my baby to a wandering, defecting monk stop the Vanguard?"
Silas answered bluntly,
"It will not stop them from attacking. But it ensures the survival of your bloodline. If Khaos stays here, he will die with you. The Atrai empire actively hunts down unsealed anomalies. They will sense his core eventually. If I take him away tonight, under the cover of the storm clouds, he lives. I will take him to the hidden sanctuaries. I will teach him the mystic arts. I will teach him how to control the chaos inside his veins."
Borum hit the table with his heavy fist. The wooden mugs rattled violently.
"I will not give my son to a stranger!"
"I am offering you a choice between certain death and a difficult life. Your duty as a father is to keep him alive. Your duty as a Chief is to ensure your tribe’s legacy does not end in the mud tomorrow. The boy is your only hope for a better future. When he masters his power, he can avenge you."
"Avenge us?" Elara shrieked, "He is just a little boy! He likes painting pigs and stealing sweet buns from the tavern! He is not a soldier!"
"He is already a monster, My lady," Silas stated coldly. "You simply refuse to see it."
"Get out of my house!" Borum roared, pointing his massive finger toward the door. "Get out before I break your neck!"
Silas bowed his head slightly. The brass rings on his wooden staff jingled softly as he turned around.
"I will wait at the edge of the eastern woods until the first light of dawn. When you realize the absolute truth of your situation, bring the boy to me. If you do not, I will leave alone, and you will all burn."
The blind monk walked out into the cold night, leaving the heavy wooden door wide open. Borum slammed it shut, plunging the main room back into dim, flickering firelight.
Complete silence fell over the hut.
Midnight arrived with a chilling wind that rattled the wooden shutters.
Inside their small bedroom, Borum and Elara sat on the edge of their bed. The silence between them was incredibly heavy, completely saturated with the terrifying reality of their situation.
Elara held a small, knitted blanket in her hands. She was weeping silently.
"We cannot do it, Borum. We cannot give him away. He will be terrified in the dark. He needs his warm milk before bed. He needs his mother."
Borum stared down at his heavily bruised hands.
"Elara,Throm lost his arm today. Old Man Higgins was burned alive. Yara is a widow. We have eighty fighting men left, and half of them cannot even walk. We are dead. The Nameless Valley is dead."
"Do not say that!" Elara sobbed, hitting his broad shoulder with her small fist. "We can run! We can pack our things and run into the mountains!"
"The Atrai hounds will track us down in a matter of hours. We are the Fallen. We have no magic to hide our scent. We have no spells to shield us from the cold. If we run, we die tired and freezing."
Elara buried her face in her hands. "But he is just a baby, husband. My precious son."
Borum reached out and gently pulled his wife into his massive arms. He held her tightly, resting his bearded chin on the top of her head.
"I know he is our baby, wife. But the monk was right about one thing. My absolute duty is to ensure Khaos survives. If he stays here tomorrow, the red mages will incinerate him. I cannot watch my son burn, Elara. I cannot do it."
"The monk called him a monster," Elara argued desperately. "He called him an anomaly. How can we trust a man who speaks of our child like that?"
Borum closed his eyes. "Because Silas sees what we refuse to admit. Khaos is incredibly strange, Elara. He did not cry when he was born. He never shows fear. When the Vanguard was blowing up our walls with fire today, I looked back at the cellar window. Khaos was not crying. He was smiling."
Elara pulled back, looking at her husband with wide, tear-filled eyes.
"He is just a curious child! He does not understand death!"
"No. He understands power. He has an mana core. I do not even know what that means, but I know it makes him a target. Silas is the only person who knows how to hide him from the empire. Silas is the only one who can teach him the magic he wants to learn."
"That also means my precious son will be all alone," Elara cried.
"Yes. But at least he will stay alive. And one day, when he is strong, he will remember the Nameless Valley. He will remember the Atrai Kingdom. And he will make them pay for what they did to his home."
Elara leaned her head against Borum’s chest and wept bitterly into his tunic. Borum simply held her, staring blankly at the dark wooden wall, preparing his heart for the hardest morning of his entire life.
On the other side of that exact wooden wall, Khaos sat cross-legged on his small bed.
He had heard every single word.
The walls of the Chief’s hut were incredibly thin. Khaos possessed hearing that was far sharper than any normal human. He listened to his mother’s terrified weeping. He listened to his father’s broken logic. He processed the entire conversation with absolute clarity.
He did not feel sad. He did not feel afraid.
Khaos looked down at his tiny hands. He remembered the feeling of the heavy, cold darkness that he used against the monk yesterday. He remembered the feeling of absolute power when the wooden staff dissolved into nothingness.
Then, he remembered the red mages. He remembered the brilliant, beautiful spheres of fire raining down from the sky. He remembered the jagged bolts of blue lightning shattering the iron spikes.
"Magic," Khaos whispered to himself in the dark.
The word tasted incredibly sweet on his tongue.
He looked around his small, boring room. He saw his wooden toy sword lying in the corner. He saw the jar of sticky pine sap he used to prank the blacksmith. He saw the stolen sweet bun sitting on his nightstand.
Suddenly, all of his pranks felt incredibly childish. Gluing a hammer to an anvil was nothing compared to summoning a storm of fire. Painting a pig pink was completely useless compared to vaporizing a man with a single thought.
Khaos smiled in the dark. It was not his innocent, pouting smile. It was a wicked, genuinely terrifying grin.
He did not want to stay in the Nameless Valley anymore. The village was too small. The people were too weak. His father was a giant, but he was a giant who fought with a piece of sharpened iron. The Atrai soldiers were much more interesting. They had glowing armor and real power.
If he stayed, he would just die in the mud with the rest of the weak villagers.
But if he went with the blind man, he could learn the beautiful magic. He could learn how to throw the fire. He could learn how to command the sky.
Khaos quietly slipped out of his bed. He did not pack any clothes. He simply picked up his wooden toy sword and tucked it into his small belt. He grabbed the stolen sweet bun and took a large, completely satisfied bite.
He was going to become a mage. And once he learned all of their tricks, he would become the strongest monster in the entire world.
The first light of dawn broke through the heavy storm clouds, casting a pale, grey light over the ruined village.
Borum and Elara slowly emerged from their bedroom. Their faces were incredibly pale. Their eyes were swollen and red from hours of weeping. They held each other’s hands tightly, walking toward Khaos’s door to wake him up and break the terrible news.
Borum reached out to open the bedroom door, but he stopped completely.
Khaos was already standing in the middle of the main room.
The little boy was fully dressed in his muddy tunic and his tiny leather boots. His jet-black hair was completely unkempt. His wooden toy sword was strapped to his waist. He was chewing on the last piece of a sweet bun, looking up at his parents with bright, shining violet eyes.
"Good morning, father. Good morning, mother," Khaos chirped cheerfully.
Elara gasped, immediately dropping to her knees. She pulled Khaos into a desperate, crushing hug.
"Oh, my sweet boy. My perfect little chaos."
Borum walked over and knelt down beside them. His hands trembled as he placed them on Khaos’s small shoulders. He struggled to find the right words. He did not know how to explain to a four-year-old child that he was being sent away into the dangerous wild.
"Khaos, Listen to me very carefully, son. The bad men are coming back today. And father cannot protect you from the fire."
"I know, father," Khaos replied smoothly, his voice entirely devoid of fear.
Borum blinked in surprise. "You know?"
"Yes," Khaos nodded, swallowing the last bite of his sweet bun. "The blind man is waiting by the trees. He is going to take me away so I do not burn."
Elara sobbed loudly, pressing her face against Khaos’s chest.
"You must be so brave, my darling. You must listen to the monk. Do exactly what he says. Eat all your vegetables. Do not play tricks on him."
Khaos patted his mother’s head gently. "I will be a very good boy, mother. I promise."
Borum looked into his son’s bright violet eyes. He searched for any sign of panic or sorrow. He found absolutely none. The boy was completely calm. It unnerved the giant Chief, but it also brought him a sense of much needed relief.
"You are going to learn magic, Khaos," Borum said softly. "You are going to become stronger than all of us. Stronger than the Atrai Kingdom."
Khaos offered his father a bright, beaming smile. "I am going to learn how to throw the fire, father. And when I am big, I will come back and show you."
Borum forced a smile through his tears. He picked Khaos up and placed him gently on his broad shoulders one last time.