What happens when pestilence goes to war? It took my life, my race, my planet and my last hopes. I hope you won't get taken too.
It started with the food plants which those who are frivolous enough to eat began to rot. It spread like wildfire, eventually getting to the farmers and farmhands who transported it to our cities. Prymir soon began coughing almost unceasingly, attributing the coughs to eating some thrown out rotten fruit to get a taste of food. It didn't know it'd be fatal, that the rot comes from inside. As rot rips at you from inside, your shell and skin aren't spared. That is decay's job.
As more people fell ill, the weather became abnormal. Massive dust storms of jet black dust arose. No one knew what it was, what it did, and no one really cared. It was just weird weather. The reports are wrong sometimes, right?
And so the dust began to rip at our buildings and cities, our infrastructure and culture destroyed so slowly and yet swiftly. I was one of the first to realize that crumbling was occurring. We few tried to help people, but they were skeptic until Dhalrak's Tohhidrumasa fell. Crashing, sirens, screaming, and cries of terror were all that was heard for a month. But.. I soon realized it would not last, that our city would die.
Quickly I gathered our clothes and took Tytruni with me. We set out, where to we didn’t know- any place, anywhere that would shield us from the decay. We had to leave Prymir. I still remember their face pleading me not to go while the skin flaked off.
The rot is the colour of the cloth we used for our protection. The decay is dark as the night when all the stars went out. I still remember when the decay made the sky light up- it died down as fast as it happened. The pests come for all and can destroy all without consequences….
As I walk, the black dust nips at my ankles, trying to tear through the clothes which shield me from the onslaught. It tears, trying so desperately to chew through the flesh of my decayed and scarred legs. Rot is in everyone now, slowly eating at their core. We attempt to shield ourselves from it's and its brethren's effects. It's a pointless fight, but our race never did like to go quietly.
The pests came and now haunt every one of us. Our empire, which stood so tall and grand fell so soon. Dhalrak has fallen, Qycran has fallen and everything has been reduced to rubble and waste in the age where the dust kills. Every breath brings rot in our already poisoned lungs. We all know everything is gone, that we don't need nutrients, that we don't need anything, we just exist. And that's when the second pest comes. Our shells have long since broken off, used as clothes which we cling so desperately to. We didn't stockpile clothes when it first happened. We didn't know anything and that's what killed most of us.
I'm getting ahead of myself; I should explain the third pest. It is Slumber. Not only are its siblings constantly attempting to consume those who remain, the third tries to make us stop fighting. Discovered after many of the few of us remaining fell cold inexplicably, their face lifeless and their heartbeat dead. It attempts to seep in, causing us to fall and give in to the dust. I often come across the rubble of cities whose last structures have been spared temporarily with carcasses of other Klandir. The stress and toll of the life that is left on our hellish planet can wear you down and make you want to stop moving but we must not. We can not. I nearly gave in when the Slumber seeped into Tytruni and it stopped moving. Became a stone which I dragged until it woke up. It had lost all of its legs at that point, Tytruni told me "Go, I can no longer aid you and you can no longer aid me. I love you. Goodbye". I didn't answer, I couldn't answer. I stayed until the colour had drained from its spines, then stumbled away into the horizon with the last being I loved left behind me.
I don't know if I can continue fighting the pests so goodbye and farewell. The Klandir have gone, now its just dust.