**Chapter 54
THE CHILD FROM THE ABYSS**
LIBERTY CITY — BEFORE THE FALL
Liberty City had learned how to forget fear.
On balconies, people laughed softly under warm night air. Late trains rattled through elevated rails, carrying tired workers home. Street vendors packed up, humming old songs. Even patrol officers leaned back against their cars, relaxed, talking about trivial things—sports, marriages, food.
The moon hung high and full, bathing the city in silver.
For the first time in years, no one looked at the sky expecting punishment.
That was when the stars began to twitch.
Not fade. Not fall.
Twitch — like eyes disturbed in their sleep.
A woman on the 33rd floor of Halcyon Tower paused mid-sip of water, uneasy. Somewhere below, a child woke crying without reason. Clock hands across the district skipped one second forward… then back.
The wind died as if unplugged.
Flags froze.
The silence that followed was wrong.
Too complete.
Then a sound rolled through the heavens.
Not thunder.
Not an explosion.
It was a howl, stretched thin, echoing from somewhere impossibly far away—like the universe itself being dragged open.
Red lightning tore across the clouds in spirals, not striking down but twisting reality inward, shredding the night sky layer by layer.
People screamed.
Windows burst outward.
Alarms wailed and died mid-note.
And something fell.
---
IMPACT
The object did not land.
It arrived.
The force folded streets inward, swallowing asphalt and steel like paper pulled into a void. Buildings nearest the impact leaned—not collapsing, but bowing as if in submission.
The shockwave did not sound.
It felt.
Bones rattled. Hearts skipped. Consciousness blurred.
When the dust settled, a vast crater yawned where a neighborhood had been.
Smoke rose slowly.
From within it — movement.
---
THE BOY
Military units arrived fast. Too fast.
As if something had already warned them.
Floodlights snapped on, beams cutting through ash and drifting embers. Soldiers formed a perimeter, fingers tight on triggers. Orders were barked, repeated, contradicted.
"Energy readings are unstable."
"Visual unclear."
"Command, requesting permission to engage—"
"Hold fire."
At the center of the crater, a small figure crawled forward.
A child.
Barefoot.
Wrapped in dark, ancient cloth stitched with unknown symbols faded beyond recognition. His skin shimmered faintly, not with light but pressure—as if space leaned toward him.
He collapsed to his knees.
And cried.
The sound carried.
Raw. Broken. Human.
One soldier swallowed hard. "Sir… he's just a kid."
The boy trembled, clutching his own chest, red hair falling over eyes glowing like dying embers. He looked around in confusion, terror, pain.
His sobs echoed inside helmets, pounding against trained minds.
Someone lowered their weapon.
Then—
The crying stopped.
The boy inhaled slowly.
And smiled.
It was not wide.
Not cruel.
It was… curious.
Reality warped.
Every soldier felt it simultaneously — pressure crushing inward, breath pulled from lungs, thoughts fragmenting. Radios screamed static before dissolving into silence. Weapons tore free from human grip as gravity fractured.
There were no screams.
Sound ceased to exist.
Seventy-two soldiers became nothing.
Not dead.
Erased.
The crater stilled.
The boy stood alone, red eyes reflecting the broken moon.
Later, no database would find their bodies.
No soul would trace where they went.
---
KAROS
The boy tilted his head.
Confusion flickered across his face.
Then wonder.
Then stillness.
A name pulsed somewhere beyond thought.
Karos.
He did not know it yet.
But the abyss inside him recognized itself.
---
EASTERN EGYPT — THE DEVIL TREMBLES
H.I.M stopped mid-step.
Sand rippled outward in a perfect circle.
The Devil inside him recoiled violently, screaming without voice, curling inward like a wounded animal.
> "This… this presence…"
H.I.M clenched his fists. "Speak."
The Devil hesitated. Fear bled into its tone.
> "He is not forged by hell. Not born of sin. Not chained by law."
H.I.M felt it then — a cold beyond death.
"What is he?"
> "A flaw in creation."
H.I.M turned back toward the small tent behind him.
Riya slept peacefully, breathing softly, unaware that the world had shifted. Her fingers wrapped around his cloak as if instinctively anchoring him.
Something ancient stirred inside H.I.M.
Not rage.
Not malice.
Protection.
"I won't lose her," he said.
The Devil had no answer.
---
LIBERTY CITY — INVESTIGATION
John Stellman arrived at dawn.
The crater defied physics.
No debris pattern. No thermal residue. No energy decay. The air itself felt bruised.
John knelt, touching fractured stone.
"This isn't H.I.M," he said quietly.
Gina joined him. "Then what are we dealing with?"
John stood slowly.
"Something worse."
Reports flooded in globally — ancient alarms triggering, sealed ruins cracking, realms stirring. Scholars panicked. Old cult symbols ignited without flame.
The balance was tilting.
---
THE CHILD LOOKS AT THE WORLD
As night fell again, the boy sat alone in the crater.
Karos stared at the stars.
For the first time, he felt hunger.
Not for food.
For meaning.
For connection.
For destruction he didn't yet understand.
The abyss answered him.
And far away, H.I.M lifted his head.
The world had entered a new age.
---