Mad Barbarian hung silently above the Northern Plains, scarlet and blazing like an awakened heart, beating slowly and steadily over the coordinates of the northern ice fields. He was neither impatient nor frenzied. It was as if he knew he had nothing left to prove. He had waited far too long, waiting to be awakened, waiting for the day of vengeance that belonged to him. Every one of Mad Barbarian's scales was rugged and gleaming with a devouring light, like a dragon that had slept for a million years slowly stretching its limbs. He had long grown tired of being hunted, of living in hiding. He yearned to tear things apart, to destroy. The shadow that had weighed upon humankind for ten thousand years swallowed everything inch by inch. From below, he heard the whispers, sobs, and cries of the people dressed in plain clothes, their faces etched with bitterness. Their hatred and fury fed Mad Barbarian, spurring him to hone more killing moves and transform into even mightier desolate beasts. And so Mad Barbarian's figure moved slowly along the contours of the Five Regions, like a bloodstained sword swallowing the Northern Plains' snow, sweeping across the Western Desert's sands, snapping the forests of Southern Border, and blocking the East Sea's raging waves. The races whose names had filled human history with humiliation and bloodshed grew pale and helpless beneath Mad Barbarian's radiance, trembling and gasping for breath. Mad Barbarian paid no heed to their terrified eyes, nor did he care to hear their pleas.
