**Damon** stood in the heart of hell, his sword dripping with warm blood, corpses strewn to his left and right like chess pieces swept from the board. Beneath his feet lay another lifeless body, a silent witness to the battle that, for him, had once been a long-cherished dream… a dream that had suddenly twisted into a nightmare—one in which he panted, drenched in sweat, his body trembling, his soul feeling like cattle awaiting its turn on the slaughter block.
But the strange thing was… this was no ordinary battle.
A shroud of fog wrapped the field like a burial cloth, and the soldiers moved in shackled steps, as though fear itself dragged them by the neck. Screams filled the air—not cries of pain, but mad, manic laughter. In the shadows, an unseen crowd clapped and roared with glee, as if watching a comedy show, not a human massacre.
Amid it all, Damon lifted his eyes, asking himself: *Why? Why is this happening?
Then, suddenly, a voice cut through the chaos, coming from above—though he could not see its source.
It was the caw of a black raven, speaking words as sharp as a blade:
"What's wrong with you?… What's wrong with you?"
Damon awoke to the sound of his twin brother Arthur's shout.
"It was just a nightmare," Arthur said.
Far to the south of the Kingdom of **Neval**, where the horizon blurs and the sky melts into the earth, lay a small village called **Elmar**. Nothing set it apart from the countless farming hamlets scattered across the land—except for a single mountain, leaning like a crooked shadow over the fields, as if an ancient eye watched in silence from above.
The villagers called it **the Curse**.
It was more than a pile of stone—it was the keeper of a whispered secret, home to a woman whose face had not been seen in the marketplace for decades.
They called her **the Seer**, and she lived at the summit in a warped, lopsided house no one dared approach—save for those with reason, or those who no longer feared anything.
The mothers of Elmar warned their children:
> "Do not climb that mountain… for whoever walks the Seer's ground returns with a broken heart—or a haunted mind."
But in an age of peace—when swords were melted into ploughshares and old grudges slept beneath golden wheat—the dream of heroism grew wild in the hearts of the young, those who had never tasted war.
It was in this time that the twins, **Arthur** and **Damon**, seven years old, were raised by a gentle mother in a modest home overlooking the fields. They played under the olive trees, raced the birds, and dreamed of a new age of heroes—when names rose like banners in the sky.
One cloudy day, when the sun pierced the grey only as a stray arrow, Damon—the younger brother—broke the silent rule of the village. He wanted to climb the mountain, to meet the Seer.
**He said to Arthur:**
"How can we know our fate if we never ask the one who sees it?"
Arthur, the more cautious of the two, refused at first. But he could not let Damon go alone. Mountains are not for the reckless, and children should not tread them without wisdom.
They climbed together, through dead trees and winds that carried only the scent of ash.
They reached a house that seemed built from shadow—its roof slanting, its walls twisted, the ground around it barren, as though life itself had abandoned the place.
Damon entered with the courage of a child. Arthur followed, hesitant but loyal.
Inside sat an old woman, her back bent as if by centuries, not years. Her eyes were narrow, clouded like a fog-bound sky. Her face was a stone carved by time.
She looked at Damon and spoke in a voice that seemed to rise from the depths of a cavern:
"You must learn your brother's caution… do not throw yourself into ruin like one who dives into a river without knowing how to swim."
Damon's eyes burned with defiance.
"We want to know the future."
The Seer's mouth curved into a cryptic smile.
"Those who know the future may never live the present."
She closed her eyes, murmuring words in a forgotten tongue, before saying:
"Very well… I will tell you something, child. What is your name?"
"Damon," he replied.
Her face darkened, her tone heavier:
"There is **a rope around your neck**… invisible, yet drawn tight. You will spend your life trying to tear it away—but no one can loosen it for you. It is not of fate, but of yourself."
Damon shivered, gripping Arthur's hand.
Then she turned to Arthur:
"And you… you are **the one whose blood will be spilled**. History will be written through you. A new age will come—and its ink will be your blood."
Damon staggered back and fled outside, not daring to look behind him.
Arthur stood his ground and asked:
"What do you mean?"
She spoke as if to the wind:
"All will come in its time… even this meeting—it was always meant to be."
She nodded toward the door, as if to say: *Go.*
Arthur stepped outside. The mountain no longer seemed the same.
He followed his younger brother down the path
but a part of him remained in that crooked house,
a part that would never return the same.