The fate of a Chosen is, inevitably, to die. Whether that is by the hands of the gods, a foe, a friend, or little more than time, it must happen.

  Thus is one of many rules of the Chosen One- not just in narrative, or entertainment, but in all things. All that is created must end. All that is not created and simply is? That us another matter- one for a theologian, not a narrator such as myself.

  To be is to, despite all efforts, end. But in this case a Chosen is not simply fated to die, as things must, but to be given, sacrificed. In this case, the Chosen I am going to tell you of is Chosen by little more than chance, and Chosen to be given to a god. The process of giving to said god is... damaging... to the point that they... The Chosen gets ritually killed.

  However, before we can learn the story of this particular sacrificial lamb, we must have context.

  In a great sea of cosmic waters- the only known condition of the universe, believed to be magic made physical- go the tap-tap of eight great legs. Perhaps "tap-tap" is not the correct description, but I cannot properly describe the sound of legs the diameter of continents and length of planets striking an unseen sand and stone- the very crust of universes- with the weight of solar systems. There is the great crunch of bones made of stardust as a small (relatively speaking) fish-moon annoys Great Cancrorum and it slices the fish-moon in half with it's planet-sized pincers. Upon the back of the world-crab was a... well, world. The world was a great mountain, the peak as high up as the crab's width. Around this sloping world was a thin (again, relatively speaking) membrane- this world was not on the crab, it was within it- the crab itself protected the fragile and vulnerable world from the unadulterated power of the cosmic sea. Upon the outside of Great Cancrorum's world membrane crawled a pair of lobsters. One shone a bright blue light underneath itself, bestowing warmth; while the other glowed a faint red, giving off nothing more but a slight ominous feeling.

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  These two beings acted- respectively- as the sun and the moon. Both lobsters shone brighter and dimmer at certain times- the solar one did not shine once a year and shone such that the whole world was engulfed in light at the middle of a year; the lunar one did not shine one night a month, and bathed the world in a sight red glow at the middle of the month. These two created the illusion of day and night due to the solar lobster's light being stopped by the great mountain, and the two always walking in the same direction at the same speed, directly opposite each other.

  As we approach this spectacle of a world, we see that at the base of the mountain, contained by the membrane, there is a great ocean. Legends say that the reason that water still flows into the ocean and yet it never rises is that the water is Great Cancrorum's blood (not that they really have blood, it's more like hydraulic fluid with oxygen in it) and it is pumped back up the the top of the world once ot has gone through it's body.

  To understand the position of an area, I am going to use north to describe the direction directly between Great Cancrorum's eye stalks from the centre of the world, with the other cardinal directions following. I am also going to use "seawards" to describe away from the center of the world (and consequently it's peak) and towards the sea that rings the world mountain, and "mountwards" to describe the opposite.

  About a quarter of the way from seawards to mountwards, in the north to north-northwest, is a land, known to many as the "wild lands"- unimaginative, I know.

  Within these wild lands was a tribe of people, uncontacted by civilisation (at least by anyone alive in civilisation) and with a cruel ritual. Once every thirteen years, a child due to become an adult (in this case fifteen years of age) within that year would be sacrificed in a burning pit, with a ceremonial dagger embedded in their chest, so as to appease their god of fire and war, and bless them with continued martial prowess. This year- of course- was the year for the child to be chosen.