Kalen's pov
I stood in front of it, a 6 foot hole perfectly sized to fit a man and in it lay him, a huge part of me felt I shouldn't be doing this, a feeling that had been growing ever since I started digging but I didn't stop after the 10th plod of dirt, the 20th the 30th and certainly not now
'Oh Allfather,
by your grace we breathe,
we live and we love,
by your mercy we laugh we lie and we cry,
we think we sing we dance and we move forward,
whether gracefully or while stumbling,
with smiles or with tears,
with pain or with pleasure our feet carry us our heads lead us and our brains guide us,
all towards the end the pitch black darkness that is your embrace'
he could have taken my hand and never left it, he could have tried to overcome it all the years of suffering he had been through but he refused, instead he slit his own throat and died just because he couldn't bear the sin of living while having harmed me, bullshit!!!, I forgave you, there was no need to go that far, you could have still found happiness even with the weight of your crimes, the majority of my mind was consumed with that thought but the parts that weren't, well maybe they knew the truth, I had looked into his eyes as he died, he wouldn't have found peace with what he had done he would have let his actions torture him for life and there was nothing I could do to stop him, this gave him peace I'm just gripping because its too painful to admit
'today your filial son has left us for your arms as such we ask of you recognise his crimes and admonish him for them and recognise his achievements and praise him the same way, for no man woman or child no king queen or emperor holds the right as you do, as we pray to the one who was there when men learned to stand walk and run on their own,
the one who held all the power in the universe yet learned compassion and comredire from humanity and believed it was worth treasuring, by your name we lay this one who's heart was shrouded in darkness and eyes had finally seen the light,
Jurad Beltharix a man a warrior and a Don has finally found you'
typically at the end of those words a crowd consisting of the deceased friends family and loved ones would answer with
'lahel'
but I was the only one there and I was the only one who could claim to have had a connection with him so I was the only one who said it.
He would have been happy being buried like this, with the ancient rites. I wasn't a certified priest but my grandfather was, the one on my mother's side so I knew the words in and out and I could perform the ceremony in my sleep one had to be unfeeling during these things especially of the deceased had lived a long life this was supposed to be a good thing, rather than death we were celebrating the fact that the man or woman had lived long in a world where death was behind every corner but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't, he was dead, he didn't die peacefully in his sleep like an old man should have, he killed himself in a bid to seek redemption for harming me even as his life ebbed away he did not regret that instead he transferred to me information pertaining to what caused the fall of the empire, information that the world still didn't know about 200 years later as if trying to send me on the revenge filled quest he once embarked on, he had hurt me, his actions filled me with guilt rage and despair and yet he was still asking favours, I wanted to curse him, but instead all I could say was
'you were a good man Don Jurad, a good man who was deceived, whether or not I'll take on your grudges remains to be seen but if I do I'll do it my way, and I won't fail'
and with a wave of my hand the earth shifted and covered the dead man's body and with another the air gave off heat as the soil turned blisteringly hot, compressive forces bombarded the grave from all angles soon turning it into a marble box that gleamed, I stretched my index finger out channeling mana to it and wrote
'here lies Jurad Beltharix, a man of true conviction'.
Before he passed he gifted me all of his possessions and I mean all of them, from the highly valuable magical artifacts that were on his person to the numerous safe houses that contained weapons money and priceless treasures, even his beloved spear, the one he had cast away at the beginning of the fight was now mine but all it did was make my mouth taste bitter, I tightly grasp the spacial artifact he used to transport us here and spread my senses out, doubtless anyone with sharp senses living on the continent would tell what I was doing but I didn't care as I tried to trace the mana signature of someone I desperately needed to talk to
'Felix'
I muttered, and in a flash, I found him. I kept my eyes open and with my perception running millions of times faster than an untrained eye could follow I saw it all, the fading out of the world that was ment to represent my movement, the sudden appearance of my destination and in between it all an infinite darkness, within black even my Arcanum couldn't currently match I could feel them, the gaze of Jurad my father my mother uncle Varius and every one else who chose to die so that I could live yet even with what was likely their silent fury bearing down on me all I could think off was how I could never catch a break.
I landed in the midst of a fight, or more accurately an execution turning once I saw the face of the man whom I barely knew but was thankful for his existence and like a younger brother forced on a trip with his senior I spoke in a small voice
'can we go home now'
he smiled and said
"sure little bro, sure"