The ancient city was once immaculate, its marble streets shining under the sun. But rumors spread that an imminent catastrophe was approachingβone not only destructive but also immutable, impossible to change.
The High Priest stood on the steps, his face impassive, as starving, impecunious peasants begged for bread. To them, hunger was no mere impediment; it was death. Yet the ruler, proud and imperious, dismissed their cries as impertinent noise, as if he were impervious to both suffering and truth.
Then came Prince Kael, young, fiery, and impetuous, who dared to denounce the king. "Your arrogance is impious, your cruelty implacable!" he shouted, determined to implicate the tyrant in every sin. His words carried implicit truth, though his strategy was reckless, even imprudent.
The king's reply was cold and impudent: "I do not fear you. Who dares to impugn my reign will burn."
But destiny itself intervened. By an inadvertent mistake, the royal guards left the gates open. A wandering army slipped inside almost inadvertently. Their entrance seemed inane at firstβjust a few soldiersβbut soon their assault grew incessant, unstoppable.
The battle was inchoate, chaotic, as though still forming, while an incipient rebellion swelled among the people. The city began to incline toward freedom, its citizens no longer willing to live under a ruler so incompatible with justice.
The king fought back with incorrigible rage, but the people's disbelief in his divinity grew. Once revered, he now looked merely incredulous, as if he couldn't believe his power was crumbling.
In desperation, he tried to flee but instead would incur the wrath of his subjects. They were led by an indefatigable fighter, Kael, who never tired, who marched with the poor and indigent at his side.
And so the immaculate city fell, not to an outside force, but to the weight of its own sins.