Have Some Faith

Are you a believer? Regardless of the answer, what I’m about to share with you today might be a hard pill to swallow. Promise me this, however, promise me you’ll have some faith.

It does not matter if you are an atheist or a person of religious faith, just have some faith in what I’m about to tell you. Faith is the strongest weapon; we humans have.

There’s a reason the saying states that the pen is mightier than the sword because the pen conjures what we imagine, what we believe in.

I fully know that I might appear some raving lunatic, and believe me, until a few weeks ago I would’ve said the same thing about anyone who would tell me what I’m about to share here.

We’re about to face a war unlike any other before, no, we are in fact in the middle of that war by now. It’s a war of a nuclear holocaust proportion if you will. Lucky us, we still haven’t reached that stage of the conflict, yet.

Before you jump to conclusions, I’m not talking about some huge conflict between fundamentalist regimes or a cold war part two, what I’m talking about is way bigger than that. Sadly, every one of us is at fault here, well, as a collective that is, as a species we are. Individually, not so much. There’s only one rule that applies to this whole thing; belief creates reality.

Remember what I said about having faith? We all have that; currency holds no value without our belief in it. Relationships, status, precious objects and so on and so forth. None of these have any value without our faith in said value. Faith shapes reality, now apply that to basically any deity the human species has ever imagined, and yes, willed into existence.

You read right, gods exist and we’re their creators.

With that being said, I have to mention that we gave them a hell of a lot of power, so don’t piss them off. And they are at war, with each other, a long violent war. I know, it’s unbelievable, one might say this is ridiculous and that I’m some cultist that needs to be locked up.

If I’m being honest here, I would’ve said that just a few short weeks ago.

Something flipped my world view upside down that one night.

I was walking home from the club I bounce at, not to toot my own horn or anything, but I guess I have that “Don’t fuck around with him” look. That’s why I think most of my shifts end quietly.

That night, it was no different. The weather sucked however, it was uncharacteristically cold for the middle of April and it was really humid. In fact, it was so humid I could almost feel the surrounding air liquefying. It was this disgusting cold, wet and stifling feeling one might get in the middle of a storm at the middle of the ocean. It didn’t seem like it would rain, however, it was damp but the clouds did not hang low.

So that one particular night I’ve decided to hike to the club and back, rather than use the car. I don’t live too far from the place, so I do that sometimes.

Not to mention how walking is a great exercise.

Now, I was making my way home in the early morning hours, so the city around me was fast asleep, never mind that it’s Saturday morning. People were done clubbing, and there wasn’t as much as a soul outside.

Usually, that wouldn’t bother me. I’m not the most social creature out there, nor I expect people to be out all the time. What struck me as odd that night was the continuous feeling of being watched. It’s like someone was laser-focused on the back of my neck.

I could almost feel a hand touching me from behind.

It was this piercing feeling you get when someone stares at you and you catch them by accident in the corner of your vision. That irritating feeling you get when that happens, urging you to find whoever is staring at you to give them that “I know what you’re doing!” look back, that’s what I kept on feeling.

So almost instinctively, I looked behind me every now and again.

Each time I looked behind me, there was nothing there.

Absolutely nothing, just an empty street.

However, with each passing turn of my head, the feeling got more intense and each time I was more convinced that there was someone, perhaps even something, following me.

After about twenty minutes of this back and forth with myself I’ve turned around to confront whoever.

I was sure was following me. I stopped myself at the entrance to an alley and turned around sharply before I called out, “Hey, whoever you are, come out if you want to talk I’m all ears!” I was sure some sort of burglar or some sick maniac would jump at me and swing a knife or a bat in my face, none of that happened, however. So, I shrugged the feeling off, mostly because it was gone.

I felt like I was once more alone.

“Should’ve taken the car… this weather doesn’t bode well with me…” I murmured to myself as I turned my body.

Not a moment passed and all I could see was two bright lights flying in my direction.

Before I could even process their appearance, I felt the lights burning my skin. They were so bright and hot I covered myself up or tried to, at least. My heart raced, and I felt a light touch on my chest. The lights became so bright and hot I couldn’t feel anything else; I wanted to scream but I couldn’t; the lights were too much.

Everything was pure white.

My pulse had risen so much all I could feel was the searing sensation on my face and arms and the intense beating in my chest. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t even think, everything; from my surroundings to my body, to my most private thoughts. All of it was engulfed in this light.

Suddenly I heard something distant call me, at first it was jumbled as if I was listening to someone speaking to me while I’m submerged under water. Then it became clearer and clearer until I finally realized it was the raspy voice of an eastern European sounding man. His accent was thickly obvious. Without even noticing, the light wasn’t even that bright or hot anymore.

With my thoughts still disorganized, I thought I was dead. I suppose I said something about being dead because the old man chuckled and responded with, “No you’re not, but you can be if you want me to let you die.”

I immediately jolted myself back into awareness denying any sort of death wish. “No, no, no… No dying… please…”

“Is good”, the man responded chuckling again. Then suddenly the light was fading away while a loud booming sound exploded in my ears.

“Fuck…” I muttered before the smell of something smoking hit my nostrils. In my confused state, I idly looked around me before my eyes landed on the sight of a car wreck. Someone had slammed their black sedan into the wall behind me. The impact compressed the front side of the car against the wall beyond any recognition.

“Shit…” I blurted as I walked towards the car, almost instinctively, I knew that whoever was inside must be a goner but I wanted to make sure for whatever reason. By the time I was close enough to make out the details a small yet agonized moan escaped from where the driver seat used to be.

I watched in terror as a broken humanoid shape shook violently inside the crammed while emitting terrible gurgling sounds. Whoever this was, death couldn’t come soon enough for them. The image of the compressed mess of muscle mass and crushed protruding pieces of calcium has burned itself firmly into my psyche as a sickening reminder of the lengths that humans will go to achieve their desired goals.

“We must help em’” I exclaimed as I stood there in utter awe of the carnage before me, unable to move my eyes away from that gory pile of bile and metal scraps.

“No, he was a dead man…” said the elderly man from behind me

“Wha… what?” I responded

“You hear right, he was a dead man the moment he set in this car.” He retorted.

“What the fuck are you on about?” I said as I finally tore my eyes away from the wreckage and towards the elderly man.

The figure that met my eyes looked slightly taller than me, in relatively decent physical shape, his eyes gray and fierce, almost shining in the darkness of the night.

The figure pointed its cane at the wreckage before saying, “This piece of shit, he tried to run into you…”  “Huh, why he would do that” I looked at the figure dumbfounded as he readjusted the fur coat that was hanging over his shoulders.

“Because, you are important… I’ll give you all the answers you need but first, promise me you’ll have some faith… OK,” the figure said, smiling at me like a mischievous child.

“Have faith in what?” I questioned the elderly man, still shaken by the surrounding events.

“None of this makes sense, someone almost ran over with their car, ended up in a horrendous collision with a wall and now some weird old man tells me to let them just let them die!” I bickered, “What do I need to have faith in, exactly, huh?”

The elderly man chuckled at me again, “so impatient… why? Why you impatient? What’s the hurry with you, young people, tell me this!” he croaked back at me with sizzling displeasure in his tone.

“No, you tell me!” I felt myself shout, “What is going on here and who are you?”

“Oh, now you are asking the good questions.” The man said as a wide grin began spreading across his face. “Tell me this, do you believe it could rain here?”

“Well no, but it’s possible given the weather, don’t you change the subject on me!” I responded.

“Do you think a hail storm could happen here, right now? He questioned me, with a kind of a sinister sneer.

“Uhh… no, but what does it have to do with anything?”

“No, close your eyes and envision hail falling from the sky… do it, son.”

“Why would I do that?”

“You don’t want me to hit you with my cane; willow is painful wood.” The elderly man said, he was dead serious about beating me with his cane judging by his expression.

I saw him moving up to me with that thing held firmly in the palm of his hand. He did not even use it to support himself. He was walking just fine without leaning on it.

“Fine, fine. Alright, but I swear if you as much as touch me I’ll beat you with your own willow cane.” I retorted back at him in a mock accent.

“Right, now close your eyes, boy.”

He stopped walking, lowered his cane, and I closed my eyes.

“Is good, now think about hail. Think about hail falling down from the sky.” I could hear his voice soothing me into thinking about hail. I envisioned hail coming down from the sky, but it

felt so ridiculous to me so I kept on imagining these huge ice balls for hail, falling down all around me.

“What do you see?” the elderly man croaked.

“So, the Lord rained hail on the land of Egypt; hail fell and lightning flashed back and forth. It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.” I mocked.

“And what do you hear, boy?” the elderly man asked me. Oddly enough, I could hear a thumping sound, one that got increasingly loud. It sounded almost violent. It sounded a little too real to be inside my head. I could hear heavy objects colliding with the concrete street around me.

“Loud banging noises…” I responded, with a confused tone.

“Very good.” The elderly man said, “Now open your eyes.” I opened my eyes to see gigantic pieces of ice falling down from the sky all around me. They weren’t as big as a baseball like I had envisioned in my head but they were about an inch or two. You don’t see a hail of these proportions regularly, if ever.

The occurrence stunned me.

“Odd…” I muttered to myself looking around me in amazement as the chunks of heavenly ice crashed all around me.

“Seems unnatural, eh?” the elderly man croaked.

“Yeah… kind of…” I answered.

“Well, you made this. You believed this into existence, with my presence as your aide but you know. Your idea, your reality.” He boasted to me.

“Wha… what are you saying?” I questioned.

“Faith, not science, creates reality, my boy” he retorted calmly.

“What are you talking about, old man, are you some a mystic or something?”

The elderly man snapped his fingers, and the hailstorm stopped, “I am, a god…”

“A god?” I chuckled, “you have to be kidding me.”

“Not at all, I am a god, and like all gods, your kind has willed me into existence. You see in the beginning you needed us as a sort of psychological safety net, but now, now we need you. No believers - no us.” He said, with a serious tone. One, unlike I haven’t heard him speak in before.

“Hah… so what God are you then? Jesus, Allah, Buddha?” I asked, intrigued.

“My name is, Blaise Kuznetsov, and I am a god of your ancestors back in Russia.”

“Never heard of a god with that name, sorry, man.” I was about to turn and walk away, dismissing the elderly man as some kind of looney lonely old guy.

“That is because you don’t worship at the temples of the gray monks, boy,” he said.

“Gray monks?” he piqued my interest again.

“You call them Jews, Christians, Muslims, followers of Abraham's faith… they are the followers of the children of El” he explained not making too much sense.

“El, so like God with a capital G?” I asked, trying to make sense of his ramblings.

“Yes, but he is dead… sort of…”

“God, with a capital G, is dead? Man, you must be insane… It’s kind of cool though that you guessed where my grandparents came from,” I said as I started walking away from the elderly man.

“Over two thousand years ago, El’s worshipers made him into a perfect being so to speak, that more or less turned him into a vegetable of a god.”

“Wha…”

He interrupted me, “unbeknownst to them, his followers now worship his children, the so-called Archangels who have since attained godhood through the veneration of the masses.”

“Seriously, this isn’t making any sense; God is dead, and the archangels are some pagan deities? No way you’re serious, man, you must be trying to prank me.” I lowered my head, “What a joke.”

As I raised my head again to walk away from the elderly man, I saw him standing in front of me. My heart skipped a beat. Before I could react, his cane touched my forehead.

The next thing I saw was a flash of bright light and then I found myself in a desert. battlefield; two armies stood not far away from me, at the head of one of them stood a tall horned man with a bronze shield and sword. He was barking words in a tongue I couldn’t comprehend.

Then the elderly man’s voice boomed all around me, “In the beginning, Yahweh Sabbaoth was the god of war for the Israelites.”

The two armies clashed, and I was forced to watch the ensuing carnage unfold. It was like I was being forced to watch a movie I did not want to. I tried speaking, but I couldn’t. I wanted to panic, but I couldn’t even do that. All I could do is watch.

“Then, they shifted their focus towards El, in times of prosperity” the elderly man’s voice boomed all around me again.

The picture shifted to the scenery of a village where children played, people baked bread, traded goods and lived in prosperity. They were smiling; they were happy. That’s when I saw another horned figure standing at the edge of the village. He was a much older man with a long wide beard and gray hairs on his head.

“Some even conflated between the two and the Israelite worship was completely turned towards El, and El alone. That’s when tragedy struck their nation, and the Babylonians overran them.” The elderly man’s voice roared again all around me as the scenery shifted once more.

Now I was watching as the first temple was being sacked. Women and children were being dragged by craving soldiers, men were getting slaughtered like cattle, and a fire was engulfing everything in sight.

“That’s when the extremists took hold on their faith, and their whole nation believed in what would lead to El’s current fate,” a familiar voice echoed as the scenery changed once more.

Now I was in some ancient study where men spoke in a tongue, I could not understand but somehow the words made sense, “Our God is everywhere, he is perfect and good, unparalleled, he is ultimate, he is everything. He is omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. He is the alpha and the omega.”

Then I saw myself rise into the air, I kept rising and rising until I was out of the atmosphere and a tribal music was filling my ears from every direction. I couldn’t move my body. I couldn’t do anything.

I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t.

I expected to drown in fear, but I didn’t.

I felt almost like some kind of robot; numb but fully aware.

Devoid of all feeling.

I’d get sick with myself, if only I could.

The surrounding image became pitched black except for this one spot which was a ball of light. I felt myself move closer and closer to the ball of light with each passing moment but it still felt like an eternity had gone by me.

Once I made contact with the ball of light, I found myself inside a flashy mass resembling a room. I could my feet standing on pulsating squishy surface. The walls of this thing looked like torn muscle tissue. They were almost bloated and dark purple in color.

They were pulsating.

With each beat, I could see yellow and green lines running across the whole cavity.

I took a few moments to notice but I putrid smell of rotten meat had made its way into my nostrils. I winced in disgust once I processed the vile odor.

Then I noticed at the center of the space a flashy sphere pulsating in tandem with the surrounding walls.

I walked towards it, out of morbid curiosity.

The stench got worse as I was getting closer to the spherical mass, when I was close enough to notice the details on that thing, I had to cover my face up with my sleeve. It was like something had died right in front of me, and then some sick fuck took a shit inside the corpse, slipped on his own fecal matter and died in it too.

Now, here’s a funny little detail; I forgot all about the awful smell once I realized that there were tormented faces etched all over the perimeter of the spherical thing.

The agony on these faces was so clear I could feel the fear crawling its way up my skin.

“What the actual…”

I blinked, and I was standing in the street in front of the elderly man again.

“was that…” I murmured.

“That is what El looks like now. A giant comatose cosmic pile of meat. You humans can be scary. No wonder my brethren cast me away when I gave some of you some of our fire. You scare them to death.”

I had no idea what to think, this whole thing seemed still too crazy to be real.

“Uhh, so what god are you again?” I questioned awkwardly, not being able to come up with anything better to say.

“Will tell later, once the gray monks stop following us.” The elderly man said as he turned his back. “You noticed them, didn’t you, boy?” he chuckled. “Now come along, I need to make a new believer.”

The realization sank in, someone was following me, that’s when it hit me, he wasn’t fucking around.

That car-crash, it wasn’t an accident; I was a target.

Stress weighed down on me as if a cinder block was placed on my chest, I asked with no confidence in my tone, “Why - why are they following me?”

The old man started walking forward, with his back turned to me he simply said, “Follow, I’ll explain only if you come along.”

I could feel myself beginning to shake with worry. Something about the way he spoke, something about what I’ve just experienced made me fearful of him more than anything else. To me, I had to act like I was still in control of the situation so I mustered up as much courage as I could. Then I asked him with my pretend bravado; “What if I don’t?”

He kept on walking, as he called out to me, “Tahah… then you might die.”

I tried to maintain composure, but I guess the whole situation just broke my defensive walls down, without even noticing I blurted out an F-Bomb at which the old man just chuckled before mocking my fake bravado.

“So, you are scared? Good, you want to stay alive.”

“I’m not.”

“Just come along, boy, if I wanted to hurt you, I would have done it a while ago.”

I watched the man slip out of the line of my sight as he scrapped his fingers against a wall of one of the buildings surrounding us.

“Coming, boy?” he called out to me, from the distance.

I paused for a moment to consider my options; I needed to know what the hell was going on, so after a few moments of internal conflict I’ve opted to follow the old man which by that point was invisible to me. I still could hear his humming from the distance, and I called out to him as I was trying to close the distance between us. When I passed the wall that the old man touched as he was going, I saw something that made me freeze in my tracks; claw marks etched on the concrete walls.

“What the actual fuck?” I almost felt myself yell.

He didn’t leave me too much to ponder or process, as I heard him calling out with his voice breaking, “Kid, don’t make me wait much longer.”

I jogged my way back to him; a whirlwind of confusion and fear swirled its way around in the mazes of my mind. Once I made my way to him, I could hear him humming something with a wide grin splayed all over his face again.

I slowed my pace to match his and tried to steady my breath. The old man just kept humming to himself joyfully. The atmosphere for me was tense, my whole body was tense, hell I think I’ve never been this tense before. Never.

Trying to break the ice, I asked, “Did you see the cut marks on the wall there?” immediately, I felt like an idiot after the question escaped my lips.

“I did it.” He retorted between his hums.

“Great idea, dumbass,” I thought about myself, “Why?” I asked him before thinking once again, “Wow… you’re quite the icebreaker.”

“To prove to you what you refuse to believe in,” he responded.

“Uhh… Let’s say I believe you about you being a God and all that, why am I someone’s target?” I asked, at this point, I kind of believed him already but I still wanted further confirmation of his claims.

“Important to them, important to us,” he hummed at me.

“Why am I important?”

He stopped for a moment, making me feel even tenser than I felt up to this point. Believe me, I didn’t think it was even possible, but he did it, he made me even tenser. He turned to me, with that sly smile still smeared on his wrinkled face.

“You know tradition, you know the old gods of your motherland.” He said with what sounded like joy in his voice.

“What tradition?” I asked him, “I have no idea about the old tradition… I mean I do, but nothing too old. Basic conservative Eastern European stuff…” I began rambling on and on about my supposed lack of knowledge. To be honest, at that moment, I wasn’t really sure what he was talking about really but then, he sang to me with his cracking voice;

''“When the light of the sun was faded and done. "Our flock of sheep escaped the fences and made a run. "Lost and confused, we searched in the dark. "Not a single piece of wool or hooved mark.“''

I knew that poem, my grandmother used to sing it to me whenever I was a kid. I had no clue how he knew it; I thought it was some traditional song from the old country.

''“Then a hairy man came bearing a spark. "A hero who every shepherd in sight. "A savior who came the darkness to spite. "And with his help, we’ve found our flock. "And thanks to him, the wool and milk were secured back under the lock.”''

The man finished the poem and looked at me with a toothy grin, almost chuckling to himself.

“How did you know that poem?”

“It’s about me, boy… your grandmother, your family kept the tradition alive for generations.”

“What? She always told me it was about an abbot that came during a bad storm and helped the people of a small town find their lost sheep.” I remarked in surprise.

“Yes, an abbot, a gray monk back when Voten was a small-time god. Ok.” He laughed wholeheartedly at my remark.

“Voten?” I asked.

His face suddenly turned serious, and he pointed his right with his cane.

“What is it?” I asked due to his sudden change in demeanor.

He just stood there, and I looked at the direction at which he was pointing.

I saw a few shadowy figures turn and slowly disappear into the darkness of the night. I was about to scream at them, but he turned his cane towards me, shaking his head before he lowered his cane and smiled again.

“Voten is the one eye god of the men in the west. Odin. Harbard, Asagrim, the so-called Wise one.” He said.

“What the hell was that just now?” I demanded to know, “and why do you behave so casually suddenly again, just a moment ago you were dead serious… what the hell?”

“Listen, just follow my lead, all will be clear. Now, did anyone tell you humans that Voten was basically a corruption of me? Many might associate me with Loki but no, I am the origin of Voten. Originally the men in the west worshiped Tivaz but then they saw me and thought, “Good god… interesting abilities… probably strong.” “What are you talking about again, old man?” I asked him.

“The ancestors of the Western Europeans drank shit alcohol, saw me, and thought I’m some suicidal volkh, that’s how Voten or Odin was born.”

His confusing speech made me forget the shadowy figures. I rubbed my hands on my forehead trying to make sense of what he was saying. “So, you’re saying you were there before Odin, and what does Volkh even mean?”

“Yes, but I’m not much older. Also, Volkh is like a druid, or a shaman, you know Vseslav who could turn into a wolf was a Volkh”

“Uhh… That is really hard to swallow, you know?” I asked him.

“No… now, let me tell you something important.” He said.

“Ok…”

The tone of his voice changed again to a serious one, “You see, the monks in gray; those who follow the children of El. They want us gone at the behest of their masters. El was a good god, he was fine with us. His winged abominations, they went mad with power and made this stupid war. Some of us are gone because of them. Do you know Baki of the Lydians? Or Any Gods from old Prussia? No? that’s their fault. They want all the worship to themselves… so they do this…”

“Do what exactly?”

They waged crusades on us, in the past, intellectual and then military. Went to war. Killed our believers, killed our belief. Killed the worship…"

I wasn’t too surprised by this, I mean, the old and new testaments are full of demonization of the old gods. It wasn’t anything new to me. Though what he said next was somewhat shocking.

“It wasn’t the people or El that did this, it came from Babylon, when his children, the so-called messengers got control. When El died… Michael and his brothers, they did this.”

“What are you saying then?” I inquired.

“All the gray monks, they are trying to erase us.” He said.

“How?” I asked.

“First, they made us into not gods; me and my brethren became saints. The settlers of Ireland became dead folk and small folk descendant from Ham, because Utnapishtim apparently spoke to El!" He yelled out passionately. "Then they made the gods of Arabia into sentient fire! Ha! They did us all no good." He continued, I could hear the melancholy in his speech. "Then they started pretending to fight each other in order to squander the tradition we implanted in their bullshit religion,” he barked at me replacing the melancholy in his voice with pride once more.

“What do you mean?” I was lost in his words again.

“You know how Muslims fight the Jews, Jews fight the everyone in belief and Christians fight the Muslims?

“Yes, like the crusades and shit?”

“No no, Crusades were stupid humans acting drunk for pieces of gold and sand, at least the ones in the middle east.”  “Then what?”

“All terrorism, all religious conflicts of the last two hundred years or so. All fake. To hide their real rot under the rug.” He sneered with disgust at his own words.

“What are you saying?” I questioned as I could feel something bubbling up inside me, I felt like I’m going to explode with anticipation. “Are you telling me people are dying for nothing just so someone could promote their religion, is that what you’re saying?”

“Yes.”

That was enough to send me past the boiling point, I didn’t mind religion as a private thing; I despised organized religion because it was forced upon people many times. Not always, but in many cases it was. I hated when indoctrination was involved. It seems to have been running in our blood as the reason my family moved here in the first place was just how rough Communism had been with the common folk and Stalin’s cult of personality.

“Fucking bullshit! Whoever is doing that must be held accountable.” I was throwing my hands in the air in frustration.

“That’s where you come in, preserve our tradition, spread the word of our existence… and we’ll keep the children of El at bay.” He sneered at me once more.

“And how is that different to what they’re doing? I’m not going to indoctrinate anyone to believe in you or anything else?” I barked at him.

“No need, son, just tell them we exist. Tell them why they spill wine at weddings over the birch roots. Tell them they’re doing it for me.”

An unfamiliar voice interrupted our conversation all of a sudden, followed by what sounded like the marching of feet. “Don’t listen to him. He’s a very wanted conman.”

I didn’t even notice the distance we had covered during our conversation. The sudden intervention surprised me, and I turned to my left to see a group of hooded men standing not far from us.

Something felt wrong about these men, “And who might you be?”

One of the hooded men calmly answered with an Arabic accent, “We’re the federal agents.”

“Right, feds looking like the wizard friends of the KKK’s Grandmaster.” I sarcastically remarked.

They slowly made our way to us; I tensed up and felt like I was about to get in a big fight. The old man lowered his head and began laughing uncontrollably.

“What’s so funny, old man?” I asked him quietly.

“Oh, I am about to dedicate these deaths to you, my new believer, and it makes me so happy…” His voice rasped.

“Deaths?” my eyes widening with concern. The images from before flashed before my eyes; the visions, the carvings in the concrete. A bolt of lightning flashed above us and the cracking of thunder shook the whole area.

I looked at the old man, and I could see a vibrant old man wearing a huge brown pelt on his back with horns sticking out of his head standing on a flaming chariot tied to two screeching horses made of flames.

"Careful, fellow, you better step away from the dangerous old man, we just want what's best for civilians like you," one of the hooded figures called out.

I swallowed my saliva, the sight to my side was both beautiful and terrifying all at once.

“What are you?” I asked as another flash of thunder roared through the sky.

“To them, my son, I am the patron saint of Cancer.”, the old man responded.

I stood there in utter awe as the old man looked unimposing once more. I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know what to make of it all. This all had seemed so weird, so unrealistic. I was thinking someone might have doped my drink. I thought I might be hallucinating the whole thing.

I wasn’t this lucky; as everything else went blurry and jumbled I could clearly hear the old man speak. His voice sounded so melodic as if somewhat was playing traditional instruments all around me in tandem with his speech. He went on to say, “They might call me the devil… They already made Voten into their supposed Holy Trinity. They made me and my brother who stands on our side tonight to be the So-called god of light and the god of darkness. They claim that people on Rugen called me Diabol when they could’ve never known this Greek word.

"These gray monks call me the dragon…”

Suddenly a surge of familiarity ran through my body. I felt like I knew who this old man suddenly. I remembered the tales my grandparents used to tell me about various legendary figures from the distant past.

The old man went on further, “To you, my son, I am the Chimeric Sorcerer, I am the father of music, I come from below, I am husband of death. I hold the wheel of life in my arms. I am divine calf. I am the one who brings the springs, I am the scourge of Perun’s wrath. My name is of mountains and cities. The bear is my likeness in the mortal world. I am…”

I felt a flame burn inside me and I called out a name I’ve not heard since my childhood, “Veles!”

Suddenly, a gust of wind woke me from my trance. The group of hooded men was standing all around us. They held daggers in their hands, pointing them at us. Their intentions were clear.

The old man shoved his cane at me and roared, “Take my spear, son.”

I hesitated, not saying a word.

“Take it!” he commanded again.

“O…” one of the hooded men jumped at me, my body acted on its own and my hands wrapped themselves up around the cane. I blocked the man’s blow with the cane. His dagger was a mere inch from my face.

“You’ve sided with the wrong gods, false prophet.” The man barked at me sending his spit all over my face as he tried to overpower me.

“I don’t even fucking know what’s going on here!” I screamed back at him as I kicked him off me.

“Your execution in the lord's name is about to commence, surrender and we’ll make it painless,” all the hooded men called out in unison in response.

“Raphael’s madness looms over them, son, do not listen. Show them your true colors, boy.” I heard a voice roaring from beside me, it sounded almost inhuman.

I turned to see what was going on with the old man only to find a giant bear pouncing on a few hooded figures pinning them two them at once before tearing at their bodies with its claws and teeth.

“What the hell?” I yelled out as a hooded man charged at me again, I dodged him before holding the old man’s cane as if it was a bet. A heat wave ran across the cane and before I could even notice it; I was holding a flaming spear with blood running down its shaft in my arms.

Everything happened so fast I couldn’t tell one thing from the next.

It all became so blurred and foggy, I felt like I was having some sort of an out-of-body experience. One thing had led to the next, and I don’t even know the details but when everything was said and done, I found myself holding a flaming spear that was lodged inside the body of one of the hooded men. I didn’t even have time to let it sink in before I noticed a giant bearlike thing with a human’s torso attached to it tearing apart three human beings.

My eyes were ringing, my eyes were registering information my brain couldn’t fathom, and when I finally came to. The realization of me killing a man sunk in and I let go of the flaming spear and dropped on my ass, begging the man for forgiveness. I was so out of it; I was asking for forgiveness from some mad fuck who had tried to kill me.

I tried looking away but carnage met my eyes wherever I turned.

Dismembered corpses lay in every direction around me. There was one man who was bisected in half and smoke was coming out of his torn guts. Another one was on his knees, riddled in holes. I could see a bit of his brain sticking out of the hole in his head.

On my other side was what looked like a cross between a broken statue and a shredded human body; the exterior was stone, but the inside was flesh and blood.

Not to mention the sight of a bear-monsters meal isn’t something I’d ever like to see again.

I had stared for a moment in disbelief before I rubbed my eyes, hoping it was some fucked up hallucination or maybe just a dream. No, it was real. When I stopped rubbing my eyes, the old man stood before me once again with that same sly grin on his face.

“Now you know who I am. For sure.” He chuckled.

I felt like I was hungover, and the smell of bile made me nauseous, “Yeah, fuck… I just killed a person…”

Veles laughed like a madman, “a person? You slaughtered half of them. No matter, they would’ve died from brain molting, anyway. Raphael turned them into this… They didn’t feel pain or anything, so no worries. All good. Human sacrifice this time did good.”

“Uhh… yeah… what do I do about all of that, though?” Everything felt as if I was spinning around.

“I take care of that, you, take this - take care of it.” He reached out his hand.

“What’s that?” I asked groggily.

“Take it, you ask too many questions, son, you? Just take it.” He responded with annoyance.

I stretched out my hand to his, and he gave me something small and light and somewhat hairy.

I looked into my hand and realized it was a willow seed.

“You son of a…” I chuckled as I looked back up, Veles was gone and so were the corpses all around us.

“Bitch…”

I set there, in that same spot for the rest of the night, pondering and thinking about what I should do next. When morning came with the rise of the sun, I went back home and I planted the willow seeds. I hope they will grow into a fine tree. Veles’ tree.

Now, why am I telling you this? Well, seems like the world has lost its mind. Be it the will of some gods or not, our future does not look bright the way it is now, we need to work on that. We need to fix what we broke, and by the gods, we’ve broken a lot.

Firstly, I suggest you have some faith, if not in any gods, have then in me. However, if you don’t want to believe me and my story, if you think I have lost my mind, that's fine.

Please, promise this, however, promise me you’ll believe in the good will of good people.

As a wise old man told me once; just have some faith, will ya?