Huff... huff... huff...
The sound of ragged breathing was the only thing that filled the vacuum of the coliseum. Silence had become a physical weight, draped over the thousands of souls in the stands. They didn't know what had just happened. A mere minute ago, the man in the center of the arena was on the verge of being split in two.
They had been bracing for the sound of his spine snapping, for the sight of his organs sliding out of a mangled corpse to decorate the stone. But now, there he stood.
He was a broken silhouette, but he was standing. He was standing over the body of a god.
In that hollow silence, the minds of the prisoners drifted back—back to the very first martyr. The man who had dared to strike back and failed, but left behind a seed. His dying words echoed in the stone of the stadium, vibrating in the marrow of every human present: "YOU MUST LIVE TO FIGHT! THIS IS NOT THE END! THIS IS THE BEGINNING!"
Every person in those stands had taken those words differently.
They had tried to find their own "beginning." Some had tried to fight, but none could stand against the green tide for more than three seconds. They had watched their friends, their mothers, and their children die without leaving so much as a scratch on the Orcs' hide. They had lived in a world where humans were just meat waiting for the blade.
But now, there was a Light.
Someone had finally done the impossible.
Someone had reached up and dragged a god down into the dirt. And that person was standing right there, his yellow eyes burning through the dust. Abid was a ruin. His leg was twisted at an angle that made the stomach turn; his entire right side was a canvas of deep, wet crimson. His right eye was drowned in blood, and chunks of his own flesh were missing from his arms, torn away in the struggle. But he was the victor. He was the one still drawing breath.
As he panted, he turned his gaze toward the human section, and for a moment, the sun seemed to catch in his eyes.
"Huff... huff... look. Look at them!" he shouted. His voice was raw, but it carried a sudden, terrifying vigor that shook the prisoners to their core. "They are not gods! THEY ARE NOT!"
He pointed a shaking, blood-slicked finger at the green corpse cooling at his feet.
"If they are not gods, then they can die! Look! I just showed you! The mere dirt beneath their feet became quicksand! I made him suffocate in his own arrogance!"
His yellow eyes shone with a manic, piercing intensity that seemed to reach into the darkest corners of the arena.
"HUMANS ARE NOT WEAK! WE ADAPT! SO ADAPT AND FOLLOW ME! WE WILL DIE, YES! BUT SOME OF US WILL LIVE TO FIGHT FOR THE PEOPLE WHO WERE LOST!"
The crowd watched the man who had just declared their salvation. This was the hope they had starved for, the hope they had begged for while being crushed in the dark. The martyr's words erupted in their minds again, harmonizing with Abid's roar: "Humans will not cower between their enemies' feet! Humans will bite off their flesh!"
"FOLLOW ME! FOLLOW MY NAME! FOLLOW ABID!"
The name Abid rippled through the stands like a prayer. It was the first human name that carried weight in this hell. Some people fell to their knees and sobbed into the dirt.
Others stood in catatonic astonishment, their mouths agape. Everyone needed a shoulder to lean on, a pillar to hold up the collapsing sky of their lives, and they had finally found it in this bloody, yellow-eyed warrior.
"We... we will follow you," a voice broke the silence.
Abid looked toward the source. It was a girl, slightly older than Kerium. It was Emma—the girl who had once tried to end Kerium's life . She wasn't alone; she had a group behind her. As she vowed her loyalty, a chain reaction began. It was a biological imperative, like seeing someone yawn and feeling the urge yourself. The need for safety was a virus, and Abid was the cure.
Immediately, the stadium was filled with a rhythmic chant, a prayer to a new deity. "We will follow you! Abid! Abid! ABID!"
But there was one person who didn't join the chorus. One person who didn't want to be seen by the "Light."
Kerium stood like a jagged rock in a surging tide. He clenched his fists, putting his head toward the ground while grinding his teeth together so hard he could taste the copper of his own gums bleeding. His ears picked up everything—the wet sound of people sobbing, the frantic chanting, the sudden, disgusting "unity" of the humans. He was being elbowed and jostled, shoved aside as the prisoners fought to get closer to their savior.
He was being pushed into the shadows, and with every step back, the chant of Abid grew louder and more suffocating.
He was alone again.
He had thought that, in their shared weakness, he wasn't alone. He thought every human was like him—weak, terrified, hoping to be the one watching instead of the one being killed. He thought they were all united in their cowardice. But now, they had abandoned that darkness. They had left him behind in the void he had grown comfortable in. They were moving toward the sun, and he was being trampled in the dirt they left behind.
He didn't know why he was the only one left in the dark. He didn't know why he couldn't just be like the average person—why he couldn't just kneel and believe in a hero. But only one word echoed in his mind, drowning out the thousands of voices:
Disappointment.
It was the very word his father had mouthed to him through the tornado of fire in Chapter 1. The memory came back with the heat of a fresh burn. The smell of the smoke, the sight of his father holding Iris, and that cold, silent mouthed word that had branded Kerium's soul before the fire could even touch his skin.
As he was pushed once more by a man desperate to see Abid, Kerium tripped. He fell hard, his knees hitting the cold stone, his palms scraping against the grit. It was like he was falling away from the Light itself. He was the "stain" his father spoke of. He was the boy born without a spark of greatness.
He looked at Abid, and he didn't see a leader. He saw the "Greatness" his father had mourned. He saw the son his father actually wanted.
Why? Why am I being reminded of those words now? Kerium looked up from the dirt. From his position on the ground, the view was distorted. He saw the humans reaching out, their hands clawing at the air as if trying to get a piece of the light Abid radiated. They were fighting to stand right next to a god.
"Hah... hahaha... haha."
Kerium let out a laugh—a jagged, hollow sound that was instantly swallowed by the roar of the crowd. I wanted that, too. I wanted someone to look at me and see a spark. But my light never came when I needed it. It left me in the fire.
He raised a trembling hand, his fingers reaching out toward the center of the stadium. His whole being wanted to be part of it. He was a twelve-year-old boy in a world of monsters, and his soul was crying out for a protector. He wanted to feel the warmth everyone else was feeling.
He wanted to believe that the darkness was over.
But as his fingers reached for the light, he felt the cold reality of the shadows. He was the disappointment.
He was the one the fire didn't want. He was the one even the "Light" had left behind in the cells. He couldn't follow the light . He had to become it . He had to become the monsters.
In the middle of thousands of humans who had finally found there light. there was just a twelve-year-old boy reaching for a light that was never meant for him. It was a light he would never touch.