The Road of Atonement
Acamapichtli, first ruler of the Aztecs, had truly done everything he could.
Since a direct confrontation was hopeless, he had tried poison. He had laid every manner of trap. Nothing worked.
And when the shining ones finally reached the island, he had gathered the remaining warriors to kill captives and hide among the corpses for an ambush.
It had inflicted some damage — but only barely that much. The warriors' weapons were pitifully weak, and they were no match for their enemy at all.
"So this is all we have, after pouring out every last ounce of our strength?"
Had their god abandoned them? Or was the enemy's god simply stronger? He could not bring himself to accept either answer.
"Was all that struggle only ever meant to end in collapse like this…."
It was in his grandfather's generation that their god had revealed this place to them, and they had settled here. At first, everyone had worked tirelessly to build the city, and when he was chosen as its first ruler, it had been growing rapidly.
All the land around them had been their domain.
He had believed all of this was thanks to the god's favor — and so they had offered up so many sacrifices, again and again….
"!#$!#%"
"!@#!"
"So this is the end…."
The figures in gleaming clothing had finally reached the place where he stood. Having made his last resolution, he calmly closed his eyes.
And dragged out before them all, he watched as the people of Tenochtitlan were herded together.
They mean to offer everyone to the altar at once…. Yes, they too must pay tribute to their god.
Just as he had done so many times himself, he waited for his heart to be cut out and his skin to be flayed.
But then, mounting the altar, he saw a figure who could only be described as dazzling.
A being like a jewel….
"!@#!%$!!@"
A shame I can't understand a word of it. I'd like to know what the final words were.
The natives knew nothing of Daehan's language, so no one had any idea what Haneul was saying.
"He says: This is the punishment your god visits upon you for having lived wickedly!"
The Aztecs were stunned. Lived wickedly? They had believed, all this time, that they were living exactly as the god intended.
"It cannot be…."
"What are they saying?"
"Does no one here understand them?"
Amid the murmuring crowd, Haneul soared into the air and rose to the very top of the altar.
"Gah!"
"Th-the god himself has descended!"
"Oh…."
"Is it truly punishment, then!"
They had thought these were mere men — yet they flew through the sky. In that instant, the Aztecs were seized by overwhelming terror.
Because they now believed they had lived wickedly all along, and that this was why the god had come down in person to punish them.
To think the god would come in person like that! Then where is our own god?
Fear crept over the Aztecs bit by bit — the dread that the god who had descended might inflict punishment upon them directly. Might their very souls be made to suffer?
"!#!%!"
"!#!@"
And then the god's army began to withdraw.
The Aztecs fell back far in their wake.
Why are they leaving the altar untouched?
One thing puzzled them: the enemy was retreating, leaving another god's altar standing as it was.
Far off in scattered places, thin wisps of smoke were rising here and there — but there was no way they could have known it was the fuse being lit.
"What will become of us?"
"We will probably be offered as sacrifices…."
"Hoo…."
Every Aztec sensed their end had come. They had fled in hopes of survival, but where could anyone flee within the island? Save for a handful who could swim, all had been dragged back.
Just as they cowered, heads bowed and trembling with fear, a tremendous sound came rolling toward them.
«KWAGWANG!»
"Uwaaagh!"
"What was that?!"
"The wrath of the god!"
A sound greater than the god's fury that rumbled from the heavens on rainy days swallowed the land in every direction.
"Gah!"
"That—!"
"…."
The Aztecs forgot how to speak, staring at the altar.
«KWAGWANG!»
The upper portion of the altar was blown away….
«KUGUGUNG»
The middle section sagged and crumbled entirely….
«KUNG!»
And the lowest tier collapsed as well, until nothing remained of the altar but a heap of stone.
«BANG! KWAGWANG! BANG!»
Even after that, the altar heaved and shuddered beneath muffled, crushing blasts.
The altar is collapsing — so where is our god? What of all the offerings we have given?
The leader of the Aztecs searched for his god in his heart, but no answer came from anywhere. There was only the murmuring of the people around him, filling the air.
"The god's punishment is upon us!"
"We are going to die!"
"And even in death we will find no peace, won't we? Uhheuk…."
"What is happening…."
The Aztecs believed this was the true wrath of their god. This was an altar they had built for him across fifty generations. And now it had vanished in a single stroke.
"!@!@$!"
"!#$!"
Then came the god's language once more.
The god spoke again, as if delivering another message, and the warrior who had relayed their words before stepped forward once more.
"This land now belongs to us. All of you, leave. Go south. If you ever sacrifice human lives again, we will come for you."
"Gah!"
"No!"
"It was because we offered people as sacrifices!"
The Aztecs understood: they were being punished because they had given human beings to their god as offerings.
"Have we lived wrongly, all this time…?"
"We are being punished for doing what the god despises."
"Uhheuk…."
"What good is realizing it now! We're all going to die anyway…."
Leaving them behind, the god's army withdrew.
«Tchak. Tchak. Tchak.»
In perfect order, without so much as a glance backward, they returned the way they had come.
"They are sparing our lives?"
"Ah — of course! They were enraged because we sacrificed human lives! So surely a god like that would never take life carelessly!"
"Heuk…. Thank you…."
Giving thanks for Haneul's mercy, the Aztecs resolved to change their ways.
"Someday, so that we too may be received into his grace, we must live rightly from this moment on."
For now a conviction had taken root: they must live in the exact opposite way from before. A god so merciful as that might one day forgive even their descendants, might he not?
"Then let us go south."
"Yes. Until we are forgiven, we must head south."
The surviving Aztecs moved south. So that they might someday return once the god forgave them, they took nothing with them — they left with only their bodies.
The road they walked with empty hands was harsh beyond measure. Swarms of insects and venomous creatures beset them at every turn, and they bore it all in silence, believing even this to be part of their punishment, as they pressed southward.
"Aztecs! Run!"
"Huh? Something seems off here?"
One tribe they encountered on the way down assumed they had descended to carry off people as tribute, but sensing that something about their bearing was strange, they decided to ask.
"What has happened here?"
"We are the ones punished by the god."
"Punished?"
"Yes. The god came down in person and destroyed our city."
His words were a shock. Tenochtitlan was truly an enormous city — the center of the whole region, where goods were traded, a place even this tribe visited on occasion.
"We must all live cherishing every life."
"Every life?"
"Yes. He told us that his wrath was stirred because we laid lives upon the altar."
"Gah…."
The Aztecs spread out not only here but in every direction — mostly southward.
And everywhere they went, they proclaimed: if you sacrifice human lives, the god's army will come for you; but if you follow the god's army, you will come to a place where food is plentiful and there is no suffering.
"We are sinners, and so we must go south."
And ever onward they went, ever south.
They reached the Mixtec, the lands of Tututepec, and at last Mayapan, spreading the god's message wherever they went.
Entering Mayapan — the largest and most prosperous of the Maya cities — Acamapichtli was granted an audience with the ruler of the Maya.
"Are you the one who led the Aztecs?"
"I am nothing now but a sinner."
"What happened?"
Calmly, he explained how they had worshipped a false god and held human life cheap, and how they had met the god who descended in person — and told of that god's army.
"A man — no, a god — flew through the sky, and your altar collapsed?"
"Yes. It was larger even than this very place where we stand…."
"Gah…."
Besides, others had already passed through this land before him, and with so many people gathering to trade, rumors of the god's army had already spread among the Maya as well.
As ruler of Mayapan, there was something he wished to confirm.
"Tell me precisely — for what offense were you punished?"
"We laid countless lives upon our altar. He said so himself. And that if we did so again, he would come back."
"Gah…."
A chill crept over him. It seemed their city had been larger than his own — and yet, from what he heard, it had vanished as if at a wave of the hand.
And since they had been punished for human sacrifice, a new worry took root.
The Maya practiced it too — not to the extent of the Aztecs, but practiced all the same….
"And — if I may add one small thing — those who once followed the god's army into their city, every last one of them, is said to live warm and well-fed."
It was information he had long known from interrogating captives, but with so much of it beyond belief — talk of silver birds that flew, and weapons that hurled thunder — he had never trusted it. Now, at last, it was certain.
They were truly the servants of a real god.
"I deeply regret that I did not believe those stories."
Tears glimmered in Acamapichtli's eyes as he spoke. His face was so full of genuine remorse that it was impossible to believe he could be lying.
"Then what are we to do?"
"Cast off your greed and follow him, is all. No punishment has fallen upon this place yet."
"I see!"
Truthfully, though he called himself ruler of the city, his was a precarious existence — never knowing on what day a rebellion might erupt, or who might slip poison into his food.
"Where does this god dwell, you said?"
"In the north."
"The north?"
"Yes. Walk north until the seasons turn, and you will find him."
The Maya ruler's jaw dropped. Not a month or two — a full year of walking?
"Is that not terribly far?"
"Could you not simply wait here? Just as he came to us, so he will come to you."
The Aztecs had first met Haneul's army as it was expanding its cities southward — a false first step, and that was how all of this had come to pass.
"Follow his command to cherish life, and wait — and the god's army will come to you, riding in gleaming carriages and clothed in shining garments."
"I… I understand."
Such was the reverence in Acamapichtli's bearing that the ruler of Mayapan could not doubt him.
A ruler who had met countless people and learned to read the hearts beneath their words, he could tell: this man had truly met a god, and was truly walking the pilgrim's path.
"Then would you not stay here, and teach us his will?"
"I am a sinner. I must walk south until he forgives me."
Acamapichtli pleaded his guilt with such force that he seemed ready to march to the very southern tip of the southern lands.
"Should you not wash away your sins by teaching us?"
"Hmm…."
It was that single remark that stopped him in his tracks. He had sinned — so let him teach these people, and plead for forgiveness while awaiting him.
Is this, too, his will?
Thinking it over, he realized: he had set out south, found the way blocked and turned east, and somehow ended up circling back north to arrive here.
I see…. This, too, is his guidance! It falls to me to lead these people down the right path!
Having made up his mind, he resolved to remain in Mayapan.
"Then together we shall follow his will, and set the people on the right path."
"Oh! My thanks to you!"
And so it was that the man who had once ruled the Aztecs came even to the Maya, and became a priest.