Heaven is merciless. We worship, we kneel, we bleed — yet what is given in return? Hunger. Silence. Death.
The village lay in ruins. Fire smouldered, the ground cracked and blackened, corpses strewn across the ashes like discarded husks.
I stumbled through them one by one.
My father lay with his chest torn open, ribs split like kindling, his heart nothing but a burnt hollow. His calloused hands — hands that once held the plough — were gone, ripped away at the wrist.
My mother's body was thinner than death itself. Skin clung to her bones like paper. In her fingers she still clutched the sigil of Aurexiel, her lips stiff in prayer, as if she starved kneeling before the idol to the very end.
My younger sister… even now her face bore the ghost of a song. But her throat was slit ear to ear, and what remained of her body had been stripped of skin, raw red flesh shining bright beneath scorched blood. She had sung her last hymns while being devoured by fire.
Uncles, aunts — some cut in pieces, torsos missing arms, bodies cleaved straight through.
Neighbors — crushed into pulp, faces unrecognizable, children's tiny corpses blackened into charcoal by dragonflame.
Others — missing eyes, missing legs, missing the dignity of being called human.
Everywhere I looked lay ruin. Mangled flesh. Charred bones. Death without dignity.
Flies already swarmed, buzzing hungrily. The stench of roasted meat mingled with the copper scent of blood. It clung to my throat, choked every breath.
My family. My village. Everyone I had ever known. All of them, gone. And at the center — as if Heaven had carved him into existence only to witness — stood the cause.
Aurexiel, the Heavenly Wyrm. His colossal body lay across the broken plain, scales pure white, gleaming with unholy brilliance. His wings, folded at his side, shimmered with wards of thunder. His silver mane drifted, weightless, carrying the beauty of stars to mock the ugliness of his slaughter.
Two golden eyes stared upon the wasteland of corpses. They held no sorrow. No hatred. Nothing resembling the heart of living beings. Only the cold inevitability of Heaven's will.
His stillness was weightier than violence. Even at rest, his presence pressed down like mountains. To breathe in his shadow was to drown. Knights could have come in fleets with sacred steel and flame — and they would have been less than flies before this beast.
Yet the dragon made no move, no strike. He lingered in his ruin, unmoving… like a god in mourning, or a murderer awoken from a dream.
And I stood there, trembling. A single speck of blood-stained life beneath endless wings
My voice was hoarse, dragged raw by fury.
"You… you did this."
Aurexiel, the Heavenly Wyrm, turned. His vast head shifted like the turning of continents, each movement deliberate, crushing, eternal.
"They worshipped you! We all did!" My words cracked, my voice lashing like a dying flame. "You were supposed to protect us!"
My body trembled in rage—yet inside, something heavier coiled.
They are gone. All chains broken. Mother, father, sister—silent forever. A cruel calm twitches in me. Relief? Yes. Their torment ended. Their corpses are still. Stillness is mercy. Yet what of me? I remain. Alone. The last witness of misery.
Alone—heavier than blood. Louder than grief.
I spat, veins splitting with defiance.
"My mother clutched your sigil as she starved. My sister sang hymns while her flesh withered off her bones. We prayed—yet you answered only with fire!"
Aurexiel's golden eyes narrowed. In their abyss, thoughts turned—thoughts too vast for human sanity.
"Mortals," he said, his voice like the grinding of heavens against the earth. "Why do you pray? Why kneel as if gods are salvation? I am the ruin you worship. My flame sustains nothing. My wings scatter only ash. You kneel, you sing—but all I grant is hunger and death.
If you knew me truly, you would curse my name until your throats tore. Yet you worshipped. I received your faith. I accepted your hymns. And I was silent. My silence killed you as surely as my flame… This is my fault."
The weight of his confession pinned me harder than any claw.
I staggered, heart raging. "Then why create this world? Why call yourself divine if not to bear the burden of it? It is your responsibility to hold the oceans, bind the stars, guard the living! You owe the world everything!"
Aurexiel laughed. Not laughter of mirth. It was vast. Hollow. A laughter echoing with the void that comes before creation and after ruin. The sky trembled, the earth groaned.
"Responsibility? Foolish mortal. Worlds are not my burden. They are my theater. A stage for spectacle. You begged, and I answered with storms. You prayed, and I gave shadow. Entire civilizations, blazing bright, exist only to amuse me before I burn them clean.
This misery—your misery—is fun."
The word struck deeper than claws and fire. Fun. Entire lives, lives I loved, reduced to mere amusement.
Before I could even breathe, Aurexiel's eyes sharpened further, his words blade-like:
"And you—are you any different? Do you not kill beasts? Devour animals? Strip monsters of claws and hide to clothe your flesh, feed your hunger, polish your pride? You hunt not only to live, but to celebrate your own cruelty—to laugh, to feast, to boast of your achievements.
Among all creatures, mortals are the most advanced. Is it not your duty to defend the weak beneath you? And yet—your knives carve the skin of lambs, your fire roasts the helpless, your traps bleed the wild. Entire forests starve because of your kind. Tell me—did you not already behave as I do? You simply lacked the scale."
His voice slithered into me, a sermon of black truth. My chest tightened, breath strangled by something deeper than pain.
We kill too. Rats, birds, beasts, monsters. Their wide eyes stared silently as we slit their throats. Their cries were ignored. It was survival, we said. It was glory, we claimed. We, too, made a stage of their suffering. We, too, called their agony necessary. Perhaps… Perhaps we are no less cruel than he? Only smaller, weaker tyrants.
I choked. Words would not come.
Aurexiel's voice returned, merciless in its calm.
"Mortal, your tragedies entertain me. Just as your hunts amuse you. You are prey beneath me, as others are prey beneath you. This… is the balance of existence."
His laughter returned. The sky roared with it. Clouds splintered, the heavens themselves quaked, shadows trembling at the weight of each syllable.
The world tilted. My spirit fractured. I buried nails into the dirt, blood dribbling from clenched teeth, but I could not banish his words.
This world is cruel. Heaven is cruel. The very marrow of existence gnashes and devours. My family's hunger, their deaths, my misery—it was never an accident. It was never a punishment. It was entertainment. For him. For all that sits above.
My stomach lurched. My vision trembled. Yet through the shaking of my soul, hunger awoke.