"The stars do not sing — they scream. Their whispers are graves, their chorus ruined; and only the mad dare answer."
### **Part I: Lyric and the Whispers**
The Bard's Guild was supposed to be a sanctuary.
To Lyric, it was more like a coffin. He leaned over his worktable, pen trembling, surrounded by flickering candlelight and clean voices. His fellow apprentices sang scales—clean, human—but he practiced sketched jagged spirals and broken sigils, marks corrupted with something ancient.
He hated their safe songs, their ignorance.
His own harmony was broken.
*"Sing with us… bleed with us… tear it open."*
The voices were there, digging behind his eyes, wrapping around his skull in barbed wire song. Lyric hammered his nails into the wood, splinters picking blood, but it wasn't enough to strangle their laughter.
*Not here. Not now. Don't let them see you.*
A moment's recollection flashed: Lyric a kid, laughing on hills with a brother, pausing to listen as the wind caught the bottom of a lullaby. He held on to that recollection for a moment, warm and safe, before the horror churned back up.
***
A flashback ripped him away.
***
Red-stained battlefield. The titan bulked, molten stone and steam. Its bellow shattered air; men ran. Alone, Lyric breathed in the abyss.
He sang.
Not a song—a sword.
The air twisted. Claws of sound tore the titan's flesh, each note tearing bone from marrow, bending reality until it snapped.
The titan's scream was drowned in Lyric's throat. Blood spewed, bones shattered, and Lyric laughed—the idiotic flush of power overwhelming.
His eyes widened. Friends around him—slaughtered by his song. Their bodies convulsed, their notes ended in red silence.
Regret crushed the elation. Guilt weighed heavier than any burden.
***
He blinked out of the Guild hall. His bleeding hand dripped on parchment, staining wrong sigils.
"Lyric?" someone breathed nervously.
He did not answer. His head throbbed too loudly.
*[System Notice: Sanity Level decreasing — Lyric 61%]
The metallic cold voice sliced through the whispers. Lyric flinched, throat scorched with taboo notes.
He remembered the joke one friend had told him—something foolish, harmless. He tried to smile, for a moment at least, but the emptiness was still ravenous.
***
### **Part II: Kain and the Flameborn Child**
The ashes hissed as Kain dragged the boy out of the rubble. White skin, blackened veins, embers for eyes, fire-seared hair.
When he smiled, his teeth glinted like fangs.
"Who are you?" Kain growled, sword in hand.
The words tumbled from the boy, molten and rasping: *"Krag'thor vash nul."*
(Your flesh will burn for me.)
Kain felt the meaning vibrate in his bones.
The boy laughed, childlike and vicious. A bird landed on the ground beside him; he snapped his fingers. The bird burst into flame, shrieked, plummeted—smoldering cinder.
*[SYSTEM ALERT: Demon Lord Candidate detected]*
Kain's eyes snapped shut. Power radiated from Azrael—not an ordinary boy. Power that was worth the risk.
"What is your name?" Kain asked.
The boy's tone softened. "Vexthar… but Azrael is easier."
Kain gazed at him, torn—wanting to protect, wanting to use, wanting to flee.
He thought back to a day before all this, when he had taken the hand of his infant sister, promising to protect her. He almost laughed at the memory—such a weak, human thing.
Instead, he put his fingers on Azrael's hand. The flames licked at him, but he did not step away.
***
### **Part III: The Mansion Confrontation**
As Kain led Azrael into the mansion, air curled and thickened.
"You're crazy!" a sibling spat.
"Are you determined to doom us?"
"That's no kid. It reeks of the abyss."
Azrael smiled, flames dancing across the carpet. Somebody flung a holy ward; Azrael deflected it from the air, laughed, smashed it, snuffing out light.
"Cute," he said, voice ringing.
Another brother struck. Azrael's hair flared—a blaze of fire engulfed. The attacker disintegrated into bone, ashing.
Shrieks tore the hall.
The clan descended on Kain. Wrist chains struck, signs branded skin. Fists shattered his ribs. Words sliced:
"You're no son of mine!"
"You've cursed everything!"
"Better you die than plague us!"
Blood spread. Azrael stood by, pleased.
A fleeting moment of uncertainty had flashed in his mother's eyes—a recollection of cradling Kain, love pitted against fear. It perished almost immediately, displaced by terror.
***
### **Part IV: Kain's Gambit**
Beaten, shackled, Kain spat blood and laughed.
"Killing him won't save you. He's not a curse. He's a tool."
The family stood transfixed.
"He's power incarnate. Send him away—power's lost. Or take him for ourselves. Utilize him."
Azrael stepped forward, fire licking at his feet.
"Thrag'kun mel vorth."
(Bind me, and I consume your enemies.)
Kain translated, his words grating. "He will battle for us."
The room shifted. Anger, greed, fear struggled. At last, the battering stopped. Chains remained. Azrael lived.
Kain saw his father's eyes, flicking for an instant not for a monster, but for a man afraid of losing all he'd built.
***
### **Part V: The School and Village**
Kain and Lyric escorted Azrael into the village. Whispers trailed behind them.
"Blasted family…"
"Why are they here?"
"Look at his eyes!"
Azrael grinned at their fear. A vendors' cart was incinerated with a snap.
A child was playing too close, laughing and carefree. Azrael's gaze hesitated, and fire erupted. Kain swiftly plucked the child away, giving Azrael a scowl. Azrael pouted, flames spitting.
"Don't," Kain growled.
Lyric trembled as whispers rent—louder voices, villagers' say , blended with cosmic horrors.
He heard the singing of a lullaby at a window—a moment of calm, a moment's memory, a world before the gap.
Despite that, they were outcasts. Never desired.
***
### **Long-Term Stakes Montage**
Elsewhere, all of the siblings gazed at the stars.
Some swore vengeance:
*If ever I return, I will burn the thrones of the gods.*
Some had optimism about family.
Some, in exile, wanted only to survive.
Lyric exhaled into the breeze, praying for a day the voices would stop.
A fleeting hope ignited—a dream, fragile but real.
***
### **Part VI: Under the Stars—Villain Revealed**
Night descended. Kain walked, rage simmering.
"I will not crawl at the feet of some second-rate school. I will not be led by fear, or Azrael. If punishment is all they can offer, let them swallow it whole."
From shadows, a hooded figure emerged—tendrils twisting, shadow churning, ember eyes blazing.
"Your rage—is a blessing, Kain. Flame to ruin. Your pain is a dirge. When the stars fall, your dirge will sound beside mine."
A shiver swept across the land.
Kain's fists unclenched. He remembered laughter, once—short, cutting, before the pain.
The shape vanished. Its voice lingered—promise and menace.
***
**End of Chapter 13.**
***
**Author's Note:**
Who is the hooded figure? A god, a demon, or something stranger still? What will Azrael do next—and can sanity survive the abyss? Leave your theories, likes, and collections in the comments below. Let's see whose rage burns brightest.