(TATB) Ch 32: The Promise Of Vengence, The Onces That Took Everything

The ground was alive with thunder.

Each step reverberated like an earthquake through the soles of their feet, turning the dirt trail beneath them into a trembling path of dread. Abel's hand clamped around his younger brother's wrist, pulling him along with the desperate speed of someone who knew exactly what came next. The tall grass—once their shield, their hiding place—no longer felt like a sanctuary. The towering blades swayed violently from the sheer pressure of each distant, colossal footstep.

"Move, Viral!" Abel barked, his voice low but urgent, every syllable laced with panic. "The grass won't protect us!"

Viral stumbled slightly behind him, nearly losing his footing. He wasn't scared—not really—but confused. Angry. His spear had vanished in a blink of crimson light, and now he was being yanked around like a child.

"Why are we running?!" Viral snapped, breathless, struggling to keep up. "I have a soul weapon now! I can protect us! I can protect the colony!"

Abel didn't look back. "You're living in a fantasy, Viral! You think that red glow makes you invincible?"

"But the stories—"

"The stories are lies!" Abel whirled around for a moment, gripping both of Viral's shoulders. "Even a hundred Geist Élans wouldn't stop a Brob, you hear me? They don't even notice us. They're gods walking through our world like it's a carpet!"

A shiver rolled down Viral's spine. And just then, as if summoned by fate itself, the light around them changed.

A shadow fell over them.

Abel turned slowly. Viral followed his gaze.

Two Brob children.

They were... massive. Towering like twin mountains in the sky, their outlines framed by the glaring sun above. A boy and a girl—maybe six, seven, eight years old—laughing, chasing one another without a care in the world. Their shoes, the size of warships, crashed into the ground as they ran through the grass. Each step left a crater of flattened green behind.

Their footsteps shook the earth again.

BOOM.

The boy darted past first, blond hair tousled by the wind, arms pumping as he weaved through the field.

BOOM.

The girl followed, a wild ponytail bouncing with each step. Her sandals smacked against the dirt trail not far from where Abel and Viral had just been standing.

Neither of them saw the Lilli brothers.

Not even a glance.

Their laughter echoed through the sky like the rolling clap of thunder, and Viral stood frozen in place, his hands trembling at his sides.

"...They're just kids," he muttered.

"Yeah," Abel said, eyes fixed on the giant figures now retreating down the field. His voice was hollow. "And even they could end us without realizing it."

Then his face went pale.

"No... No, no, no..."

"What?" Viral asked, but Abel was already running again. Faster this time.

"They're heading for the colony," Abel said over his shoulder. "We have to warn them—now!"

The wind whipped around them as the titanic children vanished over a rise, and from the other side of the hill, the horizon darkened with their next footfalls. The direction was clear. And the urgency? Unmistakable.

⸻

They ran for what felt like miles—legs aching, lungs burning, the earth rumbling beneath their tiny feet with every distant step of the Brobs.

The sun was beginning to set when the first familiar landmark came into view: the craggy bark base of the great tree—the heart of their colony—loomed ahead like a mountain to them. Abel's heart leapt. Despite the shaking earth and the panic in his chest, a small ember of hope flared. Maybe... maybe they hadn't been noticed. Maybe the tall grass had shielded their home again. Maybe this time, they'd be lucky.

But as they crested the final slope, their worst fear hit them like a freight train.

The grass was gone.

Burnt to a black, ashen crisp—an entire field of green now nothing but smoking ruin. And at the center, where once the mighty tree stood tall and proud, its branches sheltering the intricate network of homes carved into bark and roots... there was only char. Blackened wood, snapped limbs, and collapsed tunnels. The colony was gone.

Both boys skidded to a halt, feet trembling, hearts shattered.

"No..." Abel whispered.

Viral said nothing at first. His breathing grew erratic. His hands clenched at his sides.

Then—with a crimson flash—the red spear formed in his hand.

Abel looked down at his brother. The weapon hummed with energy. Not rage—wrath. Pure, bottomless, burning wrath.

"No," Abel said, placing a hand on Viral's shoulder. "There's nothing we can do now."

"But—" Viral's voice cracked. His lip trembled. "They killed everyone."

Abel didn't have the words. He didn't know what to say to grief like that. So he just stood there, shoulder to shoulder with his brother, gazing at the ruins of their life.

Then, the earth trembled again. Close this time.

Abel turned just in time to see the Brob boy cresting a nearby hill. Even miles away, he looked like a living landscape. His body stretched into the sky, blotting out the sun. He walked with slow, deliberate steps, cupping something small between his palms. His face was scrunched into a mockery of curiosity.

"I knew I saw a bug here the other day," the boy muttered to himself, his voice like rolling thunder. Then he grinned—a wide, toothy grin. Slowly, he raised his cupped hands to his face and tilted them, miming feeding something into his mouth.

Abel didn't have to guess what the sick little bastard was doing.

"You son of a—"

But before he could finish the thought, a shadow fell over them.

Abel's breath hitched.

He looked up.

She was there.

The girl. The other one. How could he have forgotten her?

Her massive face hovered above them, miles up but impossible to miss—eyes squinted in focus, lips curved into a subtle smirk. To her, they must have looked like ants. No—less than ants. Specks. Dust mites.

Her hand lowered.

And she was looking right at them.

"I found another one!" she called out, her voice loud enough to shake the ground beneath them.

Abel swore under his breath. He wanted to punch himself in the face. He'd lost track of the second one. He knew better than that.

The girl's fingers moved in a blur. Before Abel could move, massive pads of soft skin pinched them both up from the ground with terrifying ease. No pressure. No struggle. They were just... plucked from the earth like lint from a shirt.

"Let us go!" Abel shouted, though the words were swallowed by the air before they could reach her.

"Put us down!" Viral screamed, his red spear flaring to life in a desperate flash.

The girl only raised her finger in front of her face, the two Lillies trapped between the tips.

Viral didn't think—he stabbed. The red spear drove into her skin like a glowing needle.

"Ow!" she said in sudden surprise, drawing her hand back. She looked at her finger, with shock the skin was red but no scratch, Her face twisted with childish annoyance. "You little jerks!"

Without hesitation, she opened her mouth.

The hand that held them shot forward.

"No—!"

The world turned hot and humid. The pink cavern of her mouth expanded around them like a vast cave. Tongue, teeth, breath—it was all so big, so wrong. She tilted her head back, ready to swallow.

Viral struggled. The spear blazed in his hand as he shouted in fury. "I won't die like this!"

As the two of them passed over her tongue, just before the walls of her throat closed around them, he hurled the red spear—down her throat.

At first, nothing.

Then—the girl choked.

A terrible cough echoed like a hurricane. Her body convulsed.

Viral felt himself being hurled upward, flung out in a glob of spit and air. He hit the tall grass hard—blades the size of trees surrounding him as he tumbled through dirt and ash.

He groaned, eyes blurry, gasping for air.

Then he smiled.

"We made it..." he panted, wiping bile and sweat from his brow. "We actually made it."

But then he stopped.

Silence.

He looked around.

"Abel?"

There was no reply.

"Abel?!" he shouted again, louder this time, staggering to his feet. "ABEL!"

But it hit him. The truth.

His brother hadn't been thrown free.

His brother was gone.

Swallowed.

Viral's breathing grew ragged as he looked up at the two massive Brobs standing in the distance—the boy laughing, the girl wiping her mouth.

They had taken everything from him.

His home.

His people.

His brother.

And as the crimson spear reappeared in his hand, its glow now darker, more menacing, Viral made a promise to the ash, the sky, and the gods themselves.

"They'll pay," he whispered, voice hollow.

"I swear it... they'll all pay."