The mechanism creaked to life and, with flawless precision, chopped off Claire's head. She immediately got burnt at the stake as the villagers wasted no time. They all jubilated, not knowing the danger that was looming.
"Sir Barcelos, what about the Ozyrks?"
The chattering intensified as the villagers demanded answers. They needed someone to surfeit their fear and concerns.
"The witch's last words haunt me, my liege," a young boy amongst the crowd protested.
" I don't really think she's evil, my Lord. I believe we didn't even give her the chance to explain herself."
"How dare you!"
The villagers, outraged, decided to kill the orphan boy, as he seemed to be supporting the witch.
"Kill the witch supporter!" the villagers protested.
"Don't kill him. I don't want a witch supporter's blood on our land. Exile him," Barcelos commanded.
The boy was exiled immediately with an everlasting label.
"Go away, dirty witch supporter!" they all chanted.
The young boy didn't know that getting exiled from the ill-fated village was a benefit concealed in hidden, unexpected goodness.
"Sir Barcelos, what about the Ozyrks?" The crowd resumed their questioning.
"Go to your families, eat dinner, and rejoice, for the Ozyrks are nothing but a myth. They are nothing," he repeated.
The crowd went home with a false hope of equanimity, murmuring as they dispersed.
It was evening. Everything seemed calm as the villagers dined and wined, placing their faith in Barcelos's assurances that the Ozyrks were nothing but a fable.
Laughter echoed through the village of Ameria, the soft orange hues of the crimson sun casting long, harmless shadows over the revelry. Farmers and hunters swapped tales of the day's labor, and children darted between tables, their giggles rising like songbirds into the amber sky. The air was thick with the scent of roasted meats and freshly baked bread, mingling with the heady tang of spiced wine. For a fleeting moment, the people of Ameria believed they were safe, protected by their prayers and promises.
But as the sun dipped below the horizon, the world itself seemed to shift. The laughter faltered when the ground began to tremble, a low rumbling like the groaning of some ancient, buried behemoth. Goblets spilled, and plates of roasted meats clattered to the ground as the villagers froze in their tracks. It was as though the earth had turned against them, shaking the foundations of their small world.
From the shadowy embrace of the woods, hundreds of hulking abominations emerged, their silhouettes monstrous against the blood-red sunset. The Ozyrks were a nightmare realized: towering creatures with sinewy, twisted frames draped in jagged patches of leathery skin and coarse hair, their faces a grotesque blend of malformed human and bestial features. Their eyes glowed a sickly yellow, like molten sulfur, and their gaping mouths revealed rows of serrated, bone-white teeth. They carried weapons fashioned from bone and stone—barbaric clubs spiked with jagged shards, and axes that glistened with malice in the dying light.
The first to see these devils was old Benric, the bitter geezer who had often grumbled during Madam Claire's execution. He didn't even have time to shout a warning. An Ozyrk leapt forward with a swiftness belying its bulk, bringing a bone club down with such force that Benric's head and shoulders were obliterated in a spray of blood, bone, and viscera. His crumpled body slumped to the ground, twitching pathetically as his lifeblood seeped into the soil.
Panic erupted. Women screamed, men shouted, and children cried as the creatures surged into the village like a black tide of carnage.
One villager, a burly blacksmith named Gorrel, swung his hammer at an approaching Ozyrk, but his defiance was short-lived. The creature caught the weapon mid-swing, its grotesque hand crushing the iron like paper before it wrenched Gorrel's arm from its socket with a sickening pop. The blacksmith's anguished scream was cut short as the Ozyrk bit down on his skull, splitting it like a ripe melon.
The chaos was absolute. Flames erupted as the creatures set fire to thatched roofs, the inferno casting an eerie glow over the massacre. Villagers trampled one another in their desperate attempts to flee, but there was no escaping the Ozyrks.
One woman, clutching her infant to her chest, was caught by a clawed hand and lifted high into the air. The creature's maw opened unnaturally wide, and in a single, horrifying motion, both mother and child were swallowed whole, their muffled screams silenced within its gullet.
Everywhere, the sounds of slaughter filled the air: the wet, meaty thud of clubs on flesh, the brittle snap of bones breaking, and the choking gurgles of those whose throats were torn open.
A young boy, no more than seven, tried to hide beneath a cart piled with barrels, but an Ozyrk sniffed him out with grotesque precision. It reached in with one clawed hand and dragged him into the open, his desperate pleas for mercy ignored. With a horrific crunch, it crushed the boy underfoot, his small frame flattened like parchment.
The elderly were no exception. Barcelos was beyond horrified.
"The Ozyrks! The Ozyrks!" he mumbled.
Many villagers at the far end started running. Barcelos was picked up by one of the devilish Ozyrks and ripped apart limb by limb before being chewed and grated by the soul-disintegrating teeth of the monster.
With deliberate cruelty, the Ozyrks tore more and more villagers limb from limb, scattering their remains across the cobblestones like a macabre offering to the gods of chaos.
The air grew thick with smoke and ash, the acrid stench of burning flesh mingling with the iron tang of blood. The villagers' screams began to fade, replaced by the guttural growls of the Ozyrks as they feasted on the dead and dying. One creature dragged a still-living man into the forest, his shrieks echoing long after his body disappeared into the shadows.
By the time the moon rose, the village of Ameria was no more than a smoking ruin, its streets littered with mangled corpses. These creatures were bent on destroying everything.
They set their feet on the world, shaking it to its core, showing no mercy. Only a few from the neighboring village managed to escape to the mountains, as the first half of the world was left in complete wreckage.