"I have made it so."
'Its' words shook the man to his very core.
"Are you sure?" he asked skeptically, still not believing the dual voices.
"You will see for yourself very soon," they replied.
The man didn't know what to think. He wanted to believe it but the odds of that happening were abysmally low. Even though in his mind he knew that his son was no longer in this world, his heart did not let him rest.
There was no rational reason for this other than the terrible dreams he had. He saw things that should never come to pass, and his deceased son was often at the forefront of all that evil.
The man slowly raised his hands and pulled back the hood, finally revealing his face. It belonged to a middle-aged man at first glance but the longer one looked at him, the older he seemed because of the excessive wrinkles and patches of white hair all over his head.
He had a sturdy body hidden underneath that tattered robe which was covered in multiple scars of varying sizes. The only thing of note was the odd location of most of the scars. They were mostly on his arms and upper body.
In fact, if a knowledgeable person inspected them closely they would know that the majority of them were self-inflicted.
If Hao Xuan was here he would probably be extremely shocked upon seeing the man's face, recognizing him as 'Jax'.
(Mentioned in CH 555, 567, and CH 786. I will try to summarize his life story but it would be better that if not all three, you at least re-read CH 567 to recall some stuff, it's important to know the backstory).
He looked much older even though it hadn't been that long since they last met. He had aged almost a decade from the looks of it, although the cause for that was as of yet unknown.
Jax let out a hollow sigh, shaking his head helplessly.
"I don't understand how that's possible. No, it shouldn't BE possible. I laid my child to rest with my own hands years ago. How could he be here?"
Jax need only close his eyes for a moment to remember the weight of his son's corpse as he buried him under the old willow tree on his farm. The boy was the only family he had left in this world which he lost to an unnamed disease.
Jax was a good man by any standard, honest and true to his word. He had never brought pain to any being and even stopped hunting when he realized how much pain the animals had to go through just so he could fill his belly.
He scraped together what little savings he had left and bought a farm for them to live off of. Unfortunately, his son's illness kept him far too busy and he ended up selling most of it to pay for shady medicines until there was only a single plot of land left, the same one where he should be buried right now.
And it was on that night, the night of his child's death that he had the first nightmare, first of a great many.
If it were any other person they would have simply committed suicide just to stop themselves from all the heartache every time their eyes closed but Jax looked for meaning in all the pain. He believed there must be a reason for all this, that maybe, just maybe he could somehow change the fate of his people.
And then, just a few days ago a stranger came knocking on his door.
"Your son is coming," he said.
That was the first time in all his life that Jax wanted to truly hurt someone. But the more he listened, the more unsure he became.
Tomas told him things that no one could ever know. Of his late wife, his child, his own self. What he thought, what he felt, and what he saw in his dreams.
Tomas said that his son was very special. That he had been resurrected for a special purpose.
"Just…how? Why? Why me?" Jax mumbled again and again racking his brain for answers that would never come.
The swarm of flies that was Tomas's head peered downwards. Just for an instant, five inhuman pupils became visible within the swarm as they unblinkingly stared at Jax.
They shone with a peculiar greenish hue as if feeding on Jax's pain and confusion. The lower half of the swarm parted to reveal a toothy maw that should have been too big for Tomas's face.
"Why not? You always ask "Why me" but tell me this, why should it not be you? Are you more deserving than your fellow man?"
The voices scrapped against Jax's sanity, like maggots on rotting flesh. Seeing him struggle so much, hanging by a mere thread to some modicum of rationality, he knew all his hard work was going to pay off very soon.
For Ba`al Zebub, Lord of the Fliers and one of the eight God-Kings of hell would soon have his way.
