I once had an actual name, a string of syllables that belonged to a girl who probably worried about the weather or the price of moldy bread.
But that person died a long time ago.
Now, I go by the name of Paus.
And for six years, I have been a shadow bound by contract that requested nothing but servitude.
For the majority of that time, my life was a hollow thing, a series of mechanical actions performed under the heavy, suffocating thumb of a chaotic entity that shouldn't have existed.
Vitriol, that void-faced freak, was a master who demanded everything and gave nothing in return.
Serving her was like living in a monochromatic diary shelved in a dusty drawer—there was no color, no warmth, and certainly no hope.
We, the members of the Precursive Umbra, were merely tools to her—disposable assets used to keep up with the frantic, grinding gears of a Demonic Society that she sought to mess and play around from the hollow of her hand.
