As a child, his only reason to live was the war. As a teenager, as a killer, his reason to continue walking the world was simply because the Krazar Kingdom didn't want him to die.

Death was a mercy he didn't deserve.

He'd heard from some other soldiers that his life was a life wasted, for no greater purpose but death and slaughter, and he agreed. It was the only thing he knew. He was a waste of skin and bones, nothing more, nothing less, and even for a war prisoner (or whatever they'd call him in Codia), he had difficulties understanding why he wasn't yet killed. The gazes of terror the healers sent his way, the uneasiness when they approached his bed to perform treatments on his wounded abdomen, could only make things clear. Codia was never going to treat him well, not after killing so many of them; that much was obvious.

Even with a whole lot of herbs to block out the pain from the healing of a ripped stomach wound, a shattered shoulder bone, a leg torn open and muscle tissues exposed, his mind was perfectly lucid. With the fog fading from his consciousness, there was nothing left to distract him, nothing but an eternity of waiting, strapped tight to that fancy bed.

An eternity. And Codia was cruel enough to heal its enemies slowly, surely.

Three days passed, his wounds being attended to each day with precision by the healers who refused to meet his gaze. He could do without it. The healer's face was always astonished when she noticed Eichelberbog's inhuman, rapid and frightening recovery, and there was never sympathy there.

"Are we sure it's safe?"

"Just look at this. A thing like this shouldn't have existed."

They always thought he wasn't listening. That he couldn't grasp the world surrounding him, either because of his abnormal body or because his mind was too primitive.

It wasn't.

"It's half an orc and half other creatures' bodies. It was a freak born out of the laboratory. That's why it never fits in with others."

"No, don't come too near. Remember its bite can split bone apart."

"Krazar keeps this thing and has the guts to say we're the monsters. Who could understand that king?"

There were whispers all the time.

It had to be night again. In this cell, all hours were the same, all hours were meaningless.

He waited again for the inevitable to arrive.

By the next morning, a buzz started at the front doors of the infirmary and gradually exploded among the healers. A quick and discreet discussion, which he shouldn't be paying too much attention to, was held at the entrance. Like meetings where bosses instruct employees not to embarrass themselves in front of a superior, and though he doubted anyone higher in rank would care to visit the ward, he caught a common word being repeated again and again throughout the discussions.

Someone was coming. Someone important, certainly, with so much caution: the Emperor himself.

As the double doors swung open, everything stood in attention.

A tall, slim figure moved along the rows of cots and their restrained occupants, paying no attention to the bowing subordinates on either side. His appearance was one not many had the chance of seeing outside the battlefield or the capitol building in the city's central square; his status required caution and secrecy, making visits like this to common soldiers a rarity. His clothes were pristine. They had to be.

That man seemed to breathe serenity. Even those lying closest to him, hardly keeping consciousness as the anesthetics faded, strained their eyes to witness that glorious creature. He had a regality to his slender form that betrayed him as a man meant for the title he carried. He, the only one who would possess that much grace amidst the filthy smell of war.

The sole sound accompanying him were the ruffles his garments made, moving from side to side with each of his elegant steps. 

Looking closer, he had the same eyes as his father. Eichelberbog remembered him; an older, handsome elf. He didn't remember all of his victims, but he did remember that one. 

It was one of his first.

King Lysandor.

That, however—not the former king Lysandor, but the actual Emperor— was the handsome man from the battlefield; the one who spared Eichelberbog. Eichelberbog never cared for the putridness of his own hideous appearance, but there was something about being close to someone so immaculately beautiful that made him feel unbearably wrong and misplaced.

A subtle, faint smell of soap surrounded him as the handsome man approached.

Eichelberbog tensed. Was the handsome man there to finish him off? He was the Emperor, after all, and just as all the soldiers of Codia knew the zombie Krazari from the war, every Krazari had already heard about the cruelty of the Emperor of Codia, and how his horrendous actions contrasted atrociously with such immaculate beauty, set aflame after his father’s murder.

"So you're him," the Emperor said, his voice low enough not to disturb the other injured soldiers, but not enough to escape a sharp pair of ears. "The zombie. Quite the monster."

Unlike all the other times Eichelberbog had heard that nickname, it wasn't said with disdain or fear. There was no disgust, but a curiosity, a veiled interest. He looked back at his eyes, even bluer at such proximity.

He didn't think he deserved such beauty as last memory.

"How should I call you? If you have a name, that is," he said again, leaning a little closer to listen; the closest anyone from Codia had ever come to Eichelberbog inside that infirmary other than being forced, like the healers who cleaned his bandages.

He didn't smell fear; the Emperor didn't show discomfort.

Eichelberbog thick speech murmured the first words that came to his mind, "I could rip you in half."

Instead of turning his face with disgust, like most of Codia healers would, he remained stoic.

"Oh, I believe you could. If we met in different circumstances, that is." There was no real mockery there, however. The Codian sovereign continued, "But all I see here is a pile of bandages and someone barely able to speak. Why don't we have a civil conversation?"

The Emperor then pulled one of the nearest chairs close to the bed and sat down gracefully, crossing his legs. His impeccable features showed a much more youthful image than one would expect to rule an entire country, almost ethereal.

"You're the one who eliminated almost all our mages. That's impressive," he continued. He didn’t mention his father. "Quite a waste. And now, here we are."

"Kill me," Eichelberbog mumbled, breaking the brief moment of silence between the two of them.

That earned him a strange smile.

"That would be an honor. However, I have other plans for you. Aren't you bored with Krazar and all its shit? How do they treat you?" He continued, "As an ally? Or maybe worse. As a threat to dispose of whenever necessary, perhaps? The monster." The eyes of the sovereign were calm and collected. So fucking composed. "Now, I won't lie to you; I'm not keeping you alive for any sentimental reason. You took a lot from me, in the past. But I believe in efficiency, and I don't intend to let go of such an exceptional ability. Those sided with me here in Codia have a future; a good one. Your past is no longer relevant."

So he was trying to take the former king’s murderer into the Codian armies, so easily? The king, so clean and powerful in his beauty, to the extent it had been deemed unnatural, as if blessed by the gods. Eichelberbog bared his canines instinctively.

"Kill yourself." His growl echoed within his throat.

There was an easy smile, as if his threat meant nothing.

"Well, of course, if you aren't interested in this offer," the Emperor continued, "you're free to return. If you escape this ward alive, that is. It’s a long way from here to Krazar."

Mockery.

At the very least, Eichelberbog ought to have disliked the self-satisfied smile painted over the Emperor's gorgeous features. He did. He had to. It was one of the few things about this Codian that irked him and gave a hint at his darkest nature, the one that lay below all the pretense.

The rest, then, Eichelberbog hated less, he supposed. The Codian Emperor's flawless, sculpted face; his velvety voice; the warm, subtle fragrance that floated him; and, mainly, how he showed himself in person instead of sending a messenger, how he met Eichelberbog face to face and granted a precious audience.

A sign of respect, or, at least, a demonstration of power.

How strange. The taste of rebellion, after what was almost an eternity of dull servitude.

Even so, he looked away. He had a headache.

"I have nothing to offer."

"I will let you kill the one who turned you into... this." The voice of the Emperor, though the same tone of ease, became heavier. For the first time, there it was. Disgust. "Whoever it was, even if the king himself."

Of course he’d be disgusted by Eichelberbog.

"A worthless promise. What makes you think I resent being..."

He couldn't find the word to fit in his sentence.

The Emperor then spoke, "Do you not?"

There was the silence, long and suffocating.

"Think about it. I'll wait."

The white garment swayed slightly in the air as he got up. His hair was braided and had small golden jewels wrapped around some locks, his pointy ears adorned with expensive jewels that tinkled against each other as they swayed.

It took no more than three strides to reach the door, and his hand lay on the bronze handle before a rumble stopped him.

"Eichelberbog."

He arched an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

"My name. Eichelberbog."

The emperor gave him the most beautiful smile he had ever seen.

"Let's make sure it's known in my armies, Eichelberbog," he said, and it was a sin how his name seemed less hateful and premonitory when sung by his voice, the only pure sound his dirty ears have ever heard. "I am Zelith. We'll meet again soon. Rest well."

Then, he left.