The Ancestral Trail

Richard and his friends hasten into the forest to get away from the Grapfrits, but inside they discover there's no place to hide inside the twisted woods. As the drone of the beasts rises, Richard is about to lose all hope when he notices a crevasse in the bottom of a nearby tree. Thinking it might be a place to hide, he leads his friends towards the tree, and to his surprise finds a small door nestled among the roots.



Knowing it was their only safe haven, Richard tries to open the door with no luck. Then Orkan throws his weight against the door and it creaks open. The trio quickly throw themselves inside, closing the door behind them. Outside, the Grapfrits lose trace of their prey because of their poor eyesight and fly past the tree without a second's thought. Soon, the creatures' drone fades completely away.

Richard suggests they remain inside the tree for a little while in case the Grapfrits return, but a strange glow coming from inside the tree and a stench of rotting meat changes his mind, instead suggesting they read the Book of Prophecies before leaving. In the little light let through the door, Melek reads the new prophecy. Richard has an idea who the "treacherous friend" might be, but he doesn't say anything. Realizing the prophecy is suggesting their haven isn't safe, he suggests it's time to leave.

But the door doesn't open, and in fact it seems to shrink before their eyes until they can no longer open it. Suddenly, a voice from inside calls to them menacingly, and the three turn around to look at the bright light inside. There, inside the glow, they see a monstrous fly wielding a septre, sneering at them.



Richard is mesmerized by the mere sight of the giant fly's eyes, and he tries to tear his gaze away, only to notice another glimmer of light: the sceptre in the fly's hand with jewels that match the creature's eyes. He watches for a moment as flies buzz around the monster, as if relaying him information, before Richard decides to act.



Drawing his sword, Richard orders his friends to cut their way through the door to freedom. But the giant fly intercedes by ordering a giant swarm of flies to descent about the trio. They try to kill the flies, but there are just too many to even deal with. Richard suddenly gets an idea. Remembering Golan's invisibility cloak, he pulls the hood over his head, thinking it would help him. Alas, the flies foil the magic effect by clinging to Richard's body, covering him in a living skin of flies.



The giant fly gives a command and the swarm of flies leads the trio towards the center of the chamber, where the creature sat across a pool of glowing embers. Richard, in defeat, removes his hood and demands who the creature is. The fly introduces himself as Narkum, the Fly King and Spy Master, and identifies Richard as the Chosen One, chosen by Golan to save the Ancestral World. Richard tries to have no idea what Narkum is talking about, but Narkum reveals how his fly spies let him know everything that goes on in the world and that he knows everything.

Richard, in anger, draws his blade again and tries to lunge for the fly king. But Orkan, who had been nervously fingering his amulet, shoots out his foot and trips Richard up, sending the Chosen One sprawling to the ground before the ember. Narkum laughs, but in his glee he neglects to keep an eye on one of the trio, Melek. Melek had circled one edge of the embers, and when Narkum laughs his makes his move. He takes his rope and lassoes it around Narkum's sceptre, pulling it from his grasp.



The sceptre bounces off a far wall before crashing to the ground, shattering the eye-like jewels in its head. Instantly, the swarm of flies falls to the ground, covering the floor in a black living carpet and buzzing helplessly, and the door behind the trio opens. Narkum, stunned by the unexpected maneuver, glares at Richard with a seething hatred.



Narkum gazes at the door and a wooden pole slams shut, and Richard realizes Narkum or his power had to be destroyed. Richard looks at Orkan, who is nearest the sceptre, and tells him to destroy it. But Orkan, in a panic, darts towards the door. Melek cuts Orkan off and grabs the warrior's sword before rushing to the sceptre and using it to flip it into the fiery embers. With a panicked shriek, Narkum races towards his prized sceptre and manages to snatch it just before it falls into the fires.

But as he celebrates, the rod suddenly catches fire, and the flames quickly spread across the sceptre and all over the Fly King's body. As Narkum's body begins to crackle, Richard and his friends head towards the now unlocked exit, with Orkan already halfway through. The swarm of flies, unable to fly, crawl their way after the trio, knowing they would die if they remained. As Richard as his friends exit, Narkum suddenly explodes, causing the tree to scatter shards of bark in every direction. Many of the flies are caught up in the blast and flung against nearby trees, crushed by the shockwaves.

When Richard stands up, he sees a remarkable transformation taking place in the remnants of Narkum's fly arm. The black bodies are splitting open to reveal multi-colored insects, with wings and antennae spreading forth in all directions. Soon, the forest is filled with beautiful flying and crawling insects.



One of the larger insects approaches the Chosen One, but Richard is unafraid. The insect speaks and identifies the new insects as all that remains of the insect race in the Ancestral World, a race enslaved by Narkum to be the Evil One's spies. Richard asks if they have any new information for him, and the insect replies he does not have anything current, though many of the forces freed from the Evil One's power by Richard are now making their way back to the Ancestral City.



The insect says that he and his insect brethen should also get back to the Ancestral City. He salutes Richard before turning to the insects and speaking in insect tongue, forming up squadrons and soon flying out of the forest. Richard watches the insects fly away, feeling a bit depressed as they leave. He reaches for Golan's amulet for comfort, but discovers that it is missing.

When he points out the amulet is missing, Orkan reveals that Narkum has the trinket, and he will never get it back. Shocked, Richard stares at the smoldering remains of Narkum's tree and heads towards it against Melek's pleas. As he treads through the fiery tree, the ground threatens to flare at any moment beneath his feet.


Characters:



Narkum a giant fly who is the self-titled Fly King and Spy Master. He was sent by the Evil One to take care off the insect race of the Ancestral World, and the insects that weren't killed were turned into Narkum's fly slaves. Narkum uses the enslaves insects as his spies and create a network of information for him to relay back to the Evil One's troops. His power comes from a sceptre whose jewels resemble his own eyes.

"Then they saw an enormous fly. It's blue-green body was partially covered with a forest of thick, black hair. Its arms ended in sharp claws. A thin tongue licked horribly from the black funnel of its mouth. Everything about the creature exuded darkness except for its eyes - they were enormous and sparkled with myriad prisms that seemed to reflected light from an uncanny depth. Staring at them, Richard had the impression that they held images not just of the room they were in, but of places very far away."



The Insect Forces are a race of insects that dwell within the Ancestral World under the watch of their guardian Kika. When the Evil One came to the Ancestral World, he sent his minion Narkum to conquer the insect race. Much of the insects were killed, and the survivors became Narkum's brainwashed slaves, mutated into flies. When Narkum was killed by the Chosen One, the insects were free of Narkum's spell and shed their fly shells.


Comments:

As mentioned back in the commentary for issue twelve, the giant scorpions were not the last giant insect to appear in the Ancestral World. In issue thirteen, the heroes meets Narkum, the Fly King and self-proclaimed Spy Master of the Evil One. Narkum is an interesting character in that on his own he is completely useless, but when he commands an army of flies he is more of a threat. Of course, an army of flies can only do so much, so it's befitting that he is the Evil One's spy. If The Ancestral Trail ever went into depth concerning how the Evil One thought and acted during the course of the series, I wonder how the Evil One would've reacted when his main spy was killed by the Chosen One?

This issue also shows Orkan's behavior becoming a hindrance to the quest. When Richard tried to attack Narkum, Orkan tripped him up. The amulet is obviously doing more than make Orkan a coward, and it will be interesting to see how far things go in later issues of the series.

Finally, it's interesting to note that this issue shows an instance when Richard's given magical abilities failed. He tried to use Golan's invisibility cloak to hide himself, but the flies made sure that didn't help him in the slightest. Will something like this backfire in later issues, possibly?


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