Facing Down Your Demons

The landscape looked like hell. A vast expanse of ash and cooled lava that left strange, bubbling patterns of black land. Above him ash still clouded the sky and the black tower of Mount Volkan rose high above him like the embodiment of everything wicked and sinful. Like some great judge without an ounce of compassion. This was the monster that had taken his father from him, in part thanks to Archon. If Malleus hadn't had to go all the way here to meet that traitor then he would never have been so directly in harms way.

There were no sounds. No birds. There was barely any evidence of the trees that once used to grow here. Maybe a few burnt black spires but most had been consumed by the eruption. Being so close to the base of the volcano it was no surprise they hadn't survived. The proximity also meant that the ground here was buried under several inches, if not feet, of the cooled lava. In his mind the land was never going to truly recover. This would be a wound that would forever mark the tragedy that had occurred here. He felt his spine shiver as he stared up at the volcano. He hated it. If it were possible he'd seek to raise the rest of it to the ground.