Chapter 4: The Krat

Trissa and Madeline ran in different directions to split up the enemy, and most of them followed Trissa. Only two followed Madeline as she reached the entrance to the woods. Turning around, the two men jumped towards her; she quickly released longer threads of the whip and caught one of them in mid-air. She pulled the whip towards the other one, so they clashed. Both fell on the ground as she quickly pulled in the whips, merged them into a single one much thicker, casting it with full force and cutting the head of one of the men as the other one got quickly up, swinging a right hook towards her as she easily dodged it. Her fingertips started to shine pink, and the nails became long, so she quickly pierced the other in the throat with an instant kill.

Trissa made a U-turn as several men were running toward her. She cast the whip, pulled one of the men towards herself, and rolled to the right as three men approached her, jumping in the air and clashing with the one she pulled in. She quickly got up, cast the whip onto the legs of another one, and pulled hard so one more fell to the ground as she ran toward Samantha. Wanting to stop her before Madeline could reach her. Suddenly, she stopped only a couple of meters from Samantha. She looked down and saw Samantha’s sword had pierced her from the back. Blood was gushing out from her stomach as the sword pulled itself out from Trissa and floated around back to Samantha’s hand. To be sure, she plunged the sword with force through the stomach as Trissa grabbed her hand hard and refused to release it. Samantha tried to pull the sword out, but Trissa refused to let go of her hand.

“MOM!” Madeline screamed as Trissa shook her head in denial, so she stopped.

Trissa looked to the left, toward the cabin, and then turned her eyes in the other direction toward the stone. Trissa nodded but couldn’t hold back the tears after seeing Madeline cry. Madeline ran towards the cabin, split the whips, and cast them toward the main door. It split in half as she saw her little brother hiding under his bed.

“COME ON, Zark!” She yelled at him, and he quickly got up, hugging her.

Madeline paved the way as she ran with her brother toward the stone. One more portal opened as two Hellhounds entered through it, and Samantha was screaming simultaneously, trying to get loose from Trissas grip. When they reached the stone, Madeline pushed up Zark on it and started to chant the words:

“Shan Tu Rah, Bankim Dra As Ah…” and got interrupted by the hellhounds with several men following suit. She quickly pulled out four thin whips and swung them around her to stop the Hellhounds from attacking.

“Kantan Tuh Rah!” She said. Looking back, still swinging the whip, a blue light shone around the stone. Zark started to float in the air as he tried to reach out to his sister, but the blue light surrounding the stone had a protective wall. Trissa fell to the ground, releasing her grip as Samantha got loose and rushed toward the blue light. When she approached, seeing Madeline swinging around her whips so nobody could come close to them as this was the last moment the siblings would spend with each other, she turned around smiling to her brother and said:

“I love you! You are safe now.” As Zark got swung away in the air, flying above the woods.

Madeline stopped swinging when her brother was no longer visible. The Hellhounds prepared to attack her when Samantha put the sword in front of them, denying their attack. Madeline fell on the ground sobbing, seeing her mother’s lifeless body from a distance and her brother gone with her father’s head on the terrace. She had lost everyone in the blink of an eye.

“Go track down the boy and kill him,” Samantha said to the men and Hellhounds as they scattered into the woods.

20 minutes earlier at the hidden Orphanage:

The blond little girl quickly ate her food and hid bread in her jacket to smuggle it out of the place. She has not told anyone about her mysterious friend, whom she meets daily in the woods. There were only two caretakers and four other children in the Orphanage. It is a hidden place that is not visible to anyone; not even in Paladin Woods was it possible to see it. A shield by Wizards and Witches made it invisible to the eye, and the only way to see the Orphanage was to pass through it. The little girl was 5 years old and had lived at the Orphanage since she was a baby.

She quickly scooped up the soup and hurried outside as one of the caretakers yelled at her because she hadn’t thanked her for the food. She ran into the woods and sat on a wooden log, waiting for something or someone to appear. A shadow closed up to her and moved around her as she started to laugh at the shadow.

“Wat ayu doing?” She asked the shadow.

“I’m looking around to see if someone is following you.” The shadow answered.

She took out the bread from her pocket and used full strength to break it into small bits. She threw it in the shadow, and it moved around, trying to catch all the small bites.

“Tristo! Why yooou not cam wit mehie?” She asked it.

“Sandra, it is not possible. I am a shadow and enter other’s dreams to take over their body.”

Sandra laughed out loud, not fully understanding what Tristo meant.

“Yu come insi my drem.” Sandra said.

“That is not possible. You do not have any human blood in you, and I prefer a man because I am a boy.” Tristo uttered and laughed.

Sandra was happy that her best friend was in a good mood.

“I do, family. Can you be brodr?” Sandra asked.

Tristo continued to laugh and said:

“Yes! Of course. We are like siblings, so I will always protect you.”

Tristo had, for the first time, found someone who was not scared or had immense hate towards him. As a murderer in his other life with his soul burning in Hell for a long time, all the experiments made on him by Samantha made him a hunted Krat.

He was the strongest Krat in Valiant, bringing human souls back to Samantha, even though it was not challenging for him. But one day, he entered the dreams of a man who was a serial killer. His job was to make humans weak on the inside and kill themselves as the souls get sent to Hell afterward. This serial killer, though, had twisted dreams about all the humans he killed. The dreams were repeating themselves in a loop of all of them. Samantha had to send Tristo to save several Krat stuck in that man’s twisted mind. While the mission was successful and Tristo managed to get the other Krats out of the man’s dreams, something inside Tristo died right then and there. The torture in Hell was nothing compared to the suffering the serial killer did to his victims. He did not want to be someone hurting others anymore, haunting humans, and being responsible for other’s deaths. He escaped six months ago and became a wanted shadow. However, he was happy to disappear, as the last four months had been delightful, having met Sandra in the woods. There were no sad moments; only laughter filled the air between them, and they grew accustomed to each other, becoming friends. Every day, Sandra would sneak out bread or fruit and throw it into the shadows to help feed Tristo. However, all the conversations they had with each other made Tristo realize that both of them were lonely, so they trusted each other like siblings. He decided to stay by her side and watch her grow up before moving on. He decided this would drive him forward as a Krat, a shadow born from the experiments of souls in Hell to create chaos, and as redemption for all his sins, he would be by Sandra’s side until she no longer felt alone.

Something in a light blue color flew down at high speed towards the Orphanage. As the hit on the ground sounded like a bomb exploding. Sandra started to run back to the Orphanage, and Tristo followed her, worried that the sound and light in the air could be dangerous for his little sister.

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