Mad King Vojatu

So yeah, I came down trusting a snake and thankfully I was right — of course I wouldn’t die in the 2nd chapter but I can’t promise you about the future, tho!

Egake wrapped himself around my body. He was so big that half his body was still on the ground and the other half was surrounding me like a drum. If he tightened himself even a little bit, I’d be doomed.

He licked my face with his weird half-split tongue and said, “I like your tashhte, I wonder when I’ll be able to eat you.”

“Umm, sir, you remember your promise, right?” I hesitantly replied.

“Oh yesshh, I do. Don’t worry — I won’t eat you. I just wanted to feel human skin. You know, there aren’t a lot of humanshh here in this world.”

“Can you please take me to him? I just want to talk to him,” I requested Egake with my scared eyes.

“Yesshh I can. But I wonder if he’ll be able to talk to you after dying — heeeheeehehee…” His laugh was scarier than before. I couldn’t understand what he meant, so I asked him to explain.
“Look, kid. I’m going to the king — to kill him and make him pay for all the things he did. If you still wanna follow me you can, or stay here and get eaten by a snake tonight or by an eagle in the morning.”

Of course I was smart enough to follow him, because I highly doubt any other snake would spare my life.

“Sir, can I ask you something?”
“No,” he replied pretty quickly.
“Why do you want to kill the king?”

The moment I asked this, he halted for a few seconds and I could feel his agony in his scary eyes.
“He betrayed usshh. He killed my family — he killed my five-year-old son; my wife. I’ll make him pay for that.” Then he resumed his slithering.

Now I was more interested to hear his story, but I needed to be careful not to piss off this viper — it could be very harmful for me. “But why did he betray you and kill your family?” After saying that I doubted if I actually hesitated a bit.

“A fellow comrade — a snake friend of mine — killed the king’s wife to take revenge for his dead father. And now the king is taking his revenge by killing all the snakes in this world with his huge army of eagles. Two years ago our population was more than that of the eagles. But now, I doubt if there are even a few hundred of usshh left on this planet.”

“So basically, The king has gone mad,” I replied.

“Exactly! I knew you were smart. Vojatu needsshh to pay for all the things he did.” I could see the lava of anger in Egake’s eyes.

“Okay, kid, it’s time for us to go underground. It’s nearly dawn — the eagles must have resumed their deadly hunt.”

Suddenly his full body turned bluish and then Egake used his big body to make a small tunnel for us, in which we both hid. Basically, the eagles sleep at night and hunt in the day. And because of the huge number of sky predators during daylight, we can only travel at night.

We talked for hours in the tunnel, and Egake told me a lot about himself. He was 33 years old and had been a very kind-hearted snake — until two years ago. A group of eagles on the king's order suddenly attacked the Snake King’s palace after poisoning their food. Luckily, Egake wasn’t in the palace at the time, but the moment he saw the eagles approaching, he rushed toward the palace — only to arrive too late. When he entered the main hall, he saw all his comrades’ dead bodies, along with his five-year-old son, who had suffered unimaginable pain and lost his life just before his father’s eyes.

He ran to his wife’s room, his soul-crushing grief tempered by a tiny spark of hope that she might still be alive. But the moment he stepped inside, he saw something that stopped his heart: his best friend’s father, with blood in his beak was standing next to his dead wife.

Egake couldn’t control himself — his grief erupted into rage. He sprang on his friend’s father and crushed his skull with his lethal fangs. He then tore through every eagle in his path, but what good could it do? His wife and son would never return. His eyes were teary as he recounted his past to me. He told me that since then, he has been hiding, training, and killing eagles, all to prepare himself to take down the king. Eventually, he fell asleep.

I was captivated by the sight of a monstrous snake sleeping just a few meters away. He warned me not to even look outside the tunnel — if any eagle saw me, it would mean certain death. And I was quite relaxed after hearing that in this world, there’s an abundance of rats and snake-eating creatures so at least I wouldn’t become Egake’s meal if he ever got hungry. I stopped worrying about my mom because I knew there was nothing I could do except talk to the king and ask him if he knew a way to get back to our planet. So I did what any smart boy would do — I slept beside a ten-foot python whose simple sleep twitch was enough to kill me.

“Are you dead?” he genuinely enquired.

“Aaaaaaaa… get off me!” Of course I was scared by seeing him when I suddenly woke up.

It was dusk, so we advanced on our journey to the Skyrip kingdom where the mad king lived. Then we nearly walked from complete dusk till dawn for three days straight, and even met a few snakes who tried to eat me — but Egake saved me every time. He even showed me the only battle scar he had on his body, which was given to him by the king when he attacked him two years ago, and that was the reason Egake had been training for the past two years — just to get stronger than before and successfully avenge his wife and son this time. From Egake’s description the king must be at least 7 feet tall and 370 pounds. I doubted if he was actually a human.

“What! We snakesshh are even smaller than you in your world and still you people are still afraid of us? You humans sure are weak, haahaa….”

Actually, I didn’t feel like telling him that some of us eat them as snacks every day. Even I had tasted a few snake dishes.

After those three days I spent with Egake, I could feel a one-sided bond of friendship between us. Yeah, it was definitely from my side — I was just emergency food and a source of entertainment for him.

Then after kilometers of walk we were there

“Look kid, there it is!”

Right in front of us was the Skyrip kingdom. The kingdom was based on a tall mountain where the king lived in a castle on the top. We were on a mountain right next to the Skyrip mountain and between us was a very fast-flowing, 40-meter-wide river called ‘Shil’ which completely surrounded the Skyrip mountain.

From our spot we could see the whole mountain — the little cabins where the workers and soldiers lived, and the castle which was our final destination.

“But aren’t there too many cabins, sir? How can we even climb that mountain with all those eagle soldiers present there?” I asked worriedly.

“We will not climb that mountain tonight. We just need to cross this river using the darknessshh of night,” he replied.

“So, will we climb tomorrow night?” I asked again.

“No–you Dumb human, there must be at least a thousand eagles on that mountain at night. One misstep and we’ll be dead!”

“So, what will we do now, sir?”

“We will cross the Shil today — have some rest. And then, at dawn we’ll climb Skyrip, when almost all the eagles would have left for their mission — because I know I can handle a few eagles myself,” he confidently replied.

Egake’s plan was good but it had a few flaws.

Of course, in the morning the number of eagles would be much less compared to night. But that was just his assumption; the reality could be much different and dangerous

He did not have a solid plan to kill the king — his whole plan was just to meet the king somehow; after which what could happen, he didn’t know.

He didn’t have any support. He was planning to attack a full kingdom with a seven-foot-tall king with just a simple boy who doesn't even know how to punch correctly.

And a few more problems, but the biggest was — how the hell would we cross this hyper-speed, 40-meter-wide river?

“We need to find a ride, kid,” he smirked while saying this.

“And how will we get it, sir?” I asked.

I got the answer pretty quickly. He used me as bait and made me sit beside the Shil river for three hours straight until an eagle — who might have come to pee — saw me and came to inquire about me. He was super shocked to see me, but before he could even speak a thing, Egake pounced at him and choked his throat with his tail.

That scene terrified me — not just because of the darkness and the two monsters writhing before me, but also because of Egake’s glowing red eyes burning like that of a devil.

“You’re Eg… Egake,” the eagle said with his struggling voice.

“Sure I am. Now listen. If you want to stay alive and meet your family again — take me and this kid to that side.”

The eagle couldn’t refuse, and actually I wouldn’t have either — Egake’s monstrous, chilling voice could have forced me to do the same, even though I don't have wings.

Then, I was flying for the first time in my life. The eagle took us across the river and I was holding Egake’s tail as hard as I could. The moment we landed on the Skyrip mountain, Egake popped the eagle's skull with his bare tail.

“Why would you do that? You told him you would leave him alive if he dropped us here,” I questioned him.

“Look, kid — never trust an eagle.”

I couldn’t understand if he was joking or being serious. But if he was serious back then — that was pure irony.

Well, I was sad about the eagle, but I was more focused on meeting the king — so I could ask him a way to return home, which I wasn’t sure he could tell me.

I had no idea if I could even go back, what was going to happen to me, or if I would even be alive the day after tomorrow — but I was sure about one thing: my crazy adventure begins now!