A Tale of Two Princes - By Marilyn Manson -

[TzenToku]

Long ago, in a land in the middle earth, lived the most powerful king. His name was King Ansher. He lived in his kingdom called Ru with his fourteen children and two wives. The elder wife was Queen Lith and the younger was Princess Mia. He married his first wife who was a half sister in obedience to the wished of his father, to preserve the royal lineage of the dynasty of King Ar. From Queen Lith, King Ansher was blessed with four sons and three daughters.

He met Princess Mia from one of his hunting trips which he frequented during the hunting season in the royal hunting grounds called Ed. Princess Mia was the daughter of King Est of the neighbouring kingdom of Sur who was a guest of King Anser. He brought his daughter to the hunting trip because his wife was unable to accompany him. King Anser was so besotted by the beauty of the young princess that he would not leave the hunting grounds of Ed until King Est consented to let his daughter, Princess Mia, marry him.

King Ansher really loved his young wife and built a magnificent castle of white marble for her and her children. Princess Mia had six sons and one daughter from her marriage to King Ansher.

His elder wife, Queen Lith stayed in the royal castle of Neu, quite far from the White Castle of Princess Mia for she could not stand the sight of Princess Mia and her children. King Ansher’s wives have never really spoken to each other but Queen Lith was well aware of the King’s love and devotion to the beautiful princess.

The oldest son of King Ansher was Prince Lil and was the heir apparent. However, in the view of the vastness of his kingdom, he divided his kingdom and gave part of it to Princess Mia’s eldest son, Prince Lot. This was when the squabbling between the two half brothers began.

Prince Lil was given the upper kingdom of Rhu which was the best part of the kingdom, rich in gold and minerals. “You, Lil, my eldest son shall preside over the upper kingdom, I will give you domain over the wealth of the kingdom and rule with wisdom and good judgement,” said King Ansher.

Prince Lot was given the domain of the lower kingdom where the land was sparse and covered two-third with water. “You, Lot, most brilliant and wise, I will give you the lower kingdom because you know exactly what to do with it,” said King Ansher. Prince Lot being a brilliant person, managed to develop the lower kingdom, turning it into a rich trading ground where traders from all the kingdoms of the world would congregate to trade gold, minerals, oil, textile, spices and goods.

Despite the apparent wealth of the upper kingdom, Prince Lil was not making much progress in mining the gold and mineral because the work was laborious and he did not have sufficient workers. “I will import slaves from the southern neighbouring Kingdom of Mod,” boasted Prince Lil to his father. However, the workers were not treated well and one day they mutinied under the brutal leadership of Prince Lil. King Ansher was a bit worried about Prince Lil’s progress but he wanted him to learn how to rule a kingdom and also to earn the respect of the people. King Ansher was well loved by his subjects because he took care of their interests. He has an audience with his subjects every Monday at his official residence in Castle Edin to listen to their problems and to give them valuable assistance.

There was actually plenty of brotherly love between Prince Lil and Prince Lot, after all, Prince Lil had no reason to be jealous of Prince Lot. Princess Mia made sure that Prince Lot regarded his elder brother with respect and honour. She told prince Lot, “You have nothing to lose but everything to gain by loving your brother as yourself”.

When Prince Lil and Prince Lot were still children, Prince Lil used to torment Prince Lot by saying “Do you really think father would let you rule the kingdom?” King Ansher would always intervene in their petty squabbles by saying, “Now, now my sons; why isn’t my kingdom for the whole world?” The other sons and daughters of King Ansher were oblivious to quarrels of their two siblings, after all, why choose to work when you have everything you want, except power, of course. Even thought the two wives of King Ansher were not warm towards each other, surprisingly their children got along well, except Prince Lil and Prince Lot, of course. Everyone in the kingdom knew that this was all due to Queen Lith’s corrupting influence on Prince Lil.

When King Ansher divided his kingdom between the two sons, Prince Lot was not surprised at all with his father’s decision. Prince Lot had only love and admiration from his father for his wisdom. Prince Lil was a little disappointed because he thought that his father would give him the whole kingdom.

When trouble struck Prince Lil, he remembered his brother Prince Lot. He wondered how Prince Lot was doing in the lower kingdom. He got a brilliant idea; he would pay him a visit and maybe seek his help. Prince Lil had always acknowledged that Prince Lot was the smarter of the two. When Prince Lil reached the lower kingdom, he was shocked to find that his brother’s kingdom was so far advanced from his and that the people were living in luxury. Since most of the kingdom was water, Prince Lot had developed a very good canal system to support bid ship liners and water transport for his flourishing ports.

Prince Lot welcomes his brother with open arms when he visited the lower kingdom. He brought him around the city and let him stay in his floating castle built on the waters of the capital city called Heavens Portal, so named because of the shimmering beauty of the city being reflected.

Prince Lil felt a tinge of jealousy for his brother but he should not have any regrets for his father, King Asher had given him the better portion of the huge kingdom. After staying one week with Prince Lot and many nights of useful discussions, Prince Lil was ready to go home. Prince Lot was willing to lend him one hundred of his finest and most brilliant workers to help Prince Lil mine his gold and minerals.

Prince Lil ordered his workers to extract more gold as he became more absorbed in his vanity and ambition. However, his workers became very exhausted in their hard labour and many died as a result. News reached King Ansher and he gave a very stern warning to prince Lil to take it easy on the mining activity in the upper kingdom. The one hundred experts provided by Prince Lot also returned to the lower kingdom because Prince Lil no longer took their expert advice on the mining activities. As a consequence, Prince Lil did not have enough manpower to mine the gold and minerals.

Gagil, a mentally dull but faithful servant to Prince Lil suggested using a powerful energy to blast the mining site. He told Prince Lil that with this method they did not need so many workers. Prince Lil bought the ‘brilliant’ idea of Gagil and asked him to go to the neighbouring Kingdom of Est to get assistance.

Gagil came back bringing with him experts from the Kingdom of Est. In less than a year, their power plant was ready. On one fine June afternoon, when the sun was at it’s hottest, Prince Lil was ready to test the powerful energy stemming from the newly built power plant to blast their prime mining site in the upper kingdom. He told Gagil to pull the lever. But before that, he wanted to go to the hills to see the impact of the blast. It took him about fifteen minutes to reach the top. It was far from the city so he ordered a few men to come with him and take their position to signal to Gagil. He was very excited about it and without a moment’s hesitation, he raised his hands to signal. A few men commanded the other and Gagil pulled the lever. Nothing happened.

Suddenly a flash brighter than the sun struck the middle of the mining site sending ripples of energy deep into the earth. The whole city of the upper kingdom was annihilated, nuked into non-existance. Prince Lot felt the trembling of the earth in his lower kingdom but since his kingdom was two-third water, it was not affected. As a result of the nuclear blast, the whole upper kingdom was turned into an ocean. However, Prince Lil managed to survive the blast but he was badly wounded. Prince Lot heard about the news and hurried to find his brother. He found him lying half dead, bleeding.

“Don’t give up! I won’t let you die!” Prince Lot said trying to encourage his brother. “Why would father let me build such a kingdom?” Prince Lil’s voice was weak. “Brother, I was jealous of you. If my hatred persisted, I would have killed you and taken that kingdom.” Prince Lot could see how badly injured his brother was and his kind heart overwhelmed him. Right there and then, he decided to give his brother half of his kingdom.

Prince Lil was treated by the finest doctors and in no time at all, he recovered fully from his injuries. He accepted his brother’s offer of half his kingdom. The structure of the kingdom changed; the kingdom of Ru was divided again into two and this time it was blocked by a twelve-foot concrete wall. Prince Lot’s kingdom faced the sunrise, while Prince Lil’s kingdom faced the sunset.

The wall will always remind the people about the tale of the love and hatred of the teo princes and how love triumphed. Despite the glaring separation of the two kingdoms, both kingdoms prospered. The other neighbouring kingdoms have, on numerous occasions, declared war on the Kingdom of Ru but the two brothers would pool their strength and might to put down their enemies. As their kingdoms grew, it resulted in many places to continents. Their descendants continued the development until now. The hunger of their hearts grew and would compete to be the best. Somehow, the family of the two had conflicts which resulted in broken family to wars. They would hate and kill each other.

Until now, peace has not reached them yet. Although the two princes never hated each other, somehow the human nature changed their descendants’ mindset. Prince Lot’s kingdom was not well developed as Prince Lil’s, but he trained his descendants to keep their virtues. Prince Lil’s upbringing was different. He brought up his descendants to be intellectuals which resulted in the better development of his kingdom. Both sides whom had different mindset caused war. Will the war ever end? No one could answer but only speculate. Somehow, it is up to us as we decide the fate of the world. As long we remain broken, war will continue again and again. Indirectly, I could say it would be endless lifetime for eternity until we truly wake up from our slumber. Our fathers would feel disappointed, won’t they? We must realize that supreme happiness could be attained by our reunion. Our fathers await the reunion as the future beckons.