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The time has come, he said, while disturbing my slumber. Trying to get my bearings, my sword flew across the room deep withing my
clutches. I felt its hunger, the lust for power and destruction, making my heart skip a beat. One last match between us, he gave me an
ultimatum to either defeat him or take his life, or whatever he had left. The sword unsheathed itself, like a rabid hound waiting to feel
the blood of my enemies, I stood my stance. Leaped at him, grazed his face, the anger I have seen in those bloodshot eyes, made me cower
and change to a puppy. But alas, I charged again, he grabbed me by the skull, smashed me through enough walls that it would take years
to repair, but I felt nothing. In those few moments, that I was taken as a puppet, I only thought about a way to keep him at bay. As soon
as he finished dragging me through the façade of the castle, I was thrown in the courtyard and on my back. Got up on my knees, about to
admit defeat, only to hear the whizzing of arrows flying over the moonlit sky. I grasped the change from red to crimson, my blood boiling
inside my veins. I saw only shadows before me, in the thousands or hundreds of thousands, but alas they have all fallen before me. These
attackers have been defeated by me, eviscerated, and mutilated by me, sensed that I started to lose myself, this bloodlust was not who I
was. I opened my eyes, the real ones, and did not know where I was or how I got there. He was standing there with a white cloth in his
hands, rubbing my face and hands. “Use it on your sword, for it had helped you defeat your enemies”, his words echoed in my head, the
hue of my sight changed from red to black, as if it had changed to the ordinary. I started to feel like I would have fallen, but not this time
I gripped my sword, cleaned the blood of it and demanded it to sheath itself.
But now, I stood before him, the full moon over us for light and the stars as audience, the music was the droplets of water that came from
the sky, as if mourning the loss of the purest soul. Neither he nor I would start this duel, but he said it must be done. “Come at me with
all that you have, and do not hold back the strength that I have given you from the beginning”, he said with the most bone breaking and
soul crushing scream, and I obliged. We clashed in swords and fists, with claws and strikes that created new lights before us. The forest
where this dreaded battle took place has turned into a field, as the trees were used for cover and weapons. His cape, as majestic as ever
even in this wretched sight of nature, flew around him and captivated me with ease, but alas, my focus was on him, his cursed face, his
cursed eyes, and his cursed demeanor. I ordered my sword to dance with me, around me, to shield me and attack with me as though we
were one. A killing machine of sort. With the moon nearing its end, his life also came to something poetic. As a final clash with open arms,
I sliced him and pierced his blackened heart. “Your eyes are beautiful just like the maiden I long for”, he has given me another story to
decipher with these final words, as I took his cape and buried him next to that gloomy castle.
I once again open that door, the one with the most beautiful of décor, looking at that maiden painting. Deep within its eyes, I see myself.
The candle was lit, the room anew and more paintings were shown to me. It was him and this fair maiden, with a boy as pale as the
moon, and his hair silver like the blade I control. In the corner stood a temple with him and the maiden, with a book under it. I took it
and read it right there, only to find what I should not have or should have. The pain and ringing were sharp as the tip of a mountain top,
piercing every thought I had, but now I remember. I am his and hers. For he was my father, the man named Dracula, Vlad Tepes, and I
was Alucard, his beloved son. He has lost my mother to this wretched world, and would have destroyed it, if I had not intervened. I have
lost my first endeavor, but he has given me a new life only for me to end his. He got the peace that he wanted, and I am grateful it was me
who provided his final moments. Now I stand in that cursed chair, looking at my bed, only to see the portrait of us as a family looming
over this cursed cradle. For now, I am Alucard, and will always be, the protector of humans and nature alike.
OKTOBER 2023 UNIKUM NR 8 37