PROLOGUE. How It All Ended

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It's dark.

There is nothing but a void, yet the darkness blinds my eyes.

I cannot see where my feet lead me to. I cannot see the hands that are trying to reach out from the abyssal gulf in front of me. I cannot see the stray strands of my hair that used to dance with the winds. I cannot see the trails of my footsteps behind me. And I cannot see what lies beyond the darkness that surrounds me.

I look around, and yet, everything stays the same. Nothing has changed. There is only black everywhere—in every corner of the place—in the void that I'm drowning in.

My heart aches for some reason. I cannot remember why I'm here or where I am.

What is this place?

I wonder: Is it freedom that my pain seeks? Will it stop hurting if I'm free from this place? For freedom, for belonging, for acknowledgment, and for the truth. What is it that I seek?

The darkness is endless. I see no more of the light that I'm used to. I no longer see the world that I grew up in.

My origin—past, present, and future—I have forgotten about them all. But fragments of my memory remain.

I don't want to remember them. They would only hurt me more.

Nightmares terrorize me every time I open my eyes, only to find the absence of light from all the quietness. I cannot tell what time it is. Is it day or night? Those thoughts repeatedly play in my head like a broken record, begging me to convince myself that reality isn't what I make it to be.

They haunt me as I'm drowning deeper into the shadows, swallowed wholly by nothing but the ravenous devil that started the war between worlds.

⠀

My world plunges into chaos.

I remember: There was nothing but fire.

Screams of help, their painful cries,

the children's wails—I can hear them all.

⠀

I remember the azure flames that ate away the ogres that stood before me, protecting me from those wretched demons. Their coarser bodies which once held pride were washed away by the spirit flames that consumed them before they could even get to me.

"Be safe," their last words resounded.

I remember the split beneath my feet growing bigger, cracking the earth in two. The pain I felt when I was flung to the side by the fox spirits, screaming at me to run, was nothing compared to the guilt gnawing me from the inside.

"Run! Run as far as you can, Master!"

I remember how someone cradled me in his arms, slashing through the sky and winds. He cared not if my blood painted his once-clean attire in red. His wide wings flapped sharply, soaring high as we coursed through the crimson sky. And I remember how others flew beside us, protecting the sides and our rear. They looked back at our pursuers, holding themselves back and making sure to uphold the promise we made of not hurting a single soul.

"Please, escape from this place, Master."

"You need to live."

That promise was a mistake.

I should have never made that promise to them.

I should have let them kill those humans as they pleased.

Then, they wouldn't have to die.

Then, they wouldn't have to leave me alone—all alone in this lonely void.

I remember how a sharp blade came into contact with my skin, piercing through the flesh upon order. I looked back and saw the disgusted look humans have always given me. There was fear and distrust in those eyes, stiffness in the way they moved, and how they screamed their lungs out when karma came biting back.

"Be careful, Master."

Someone held my hand and led me away, washing away the illusion of those fearful gazes.

"Let's go," he said.

He ran away with me. He ran beside me.

I remember his soft voice, calming me despite my ragged breathing.

I recall how his hand held mine firmly—so tightly as to not let go as we ran from the humans and ignoring how the devil laughed whilst he watched the horror unfold into the world.

But then, I also remember how he died.

(And how I wish that he didn't.)

How the humans stabbed him from behind. How the fork that human held scrunched his flesh and spewed blood from his body. How that human twisted his weapon just to get more of his pained screams. How they cut his wings off and let time decide his death.

I can still hear his voice, his scream. And I can still see his eyes, begging me to run.

"Hakufuu!!"

His name slipped my mouth as he shoved me harshly to the ground, screaming with a hoarse voice, "Run, Master...!!"

I remember what they did—what those humans spitefully did.

I remember everything.

Despite the darkness that consumed me, I can feel no other emotion in me other than the rage that boiled me to the peak.

Everyone died, my home was burnt, my friends were killed, and everything was in ruin—nothing was left.

Humans, humans, humans, humans—everything—everyone's gone because of them.

The unknown gets tortured while they rule over all others. The weak get betrayed and the kind is trampled. The different ones are shunned and the unseen is feared. They act so high and mighty when they are no more than powerless beings, relying on mana and fearful of what they don't know and understand.

I hate them. I hate them. I hate them.

The memory of how they caught up to me and shattered my soul is etched into the back of my mind. How they used that forbidden spell. They used it once on the elves, and they used it on us as well.

Kill them. Kill them. Kill them.

I want to kill them all.

Oh, how I wish for them to suffer as well.

Curse those royals and nobles. That damned status system of theirs, whatever made their egos fly so high up to cloud nine, and those maledictions they inflicted upon others that were so different from themselves—I'll condemn them all.

And it all happened because of that one promise I made them all do.

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Promise me that you

won't ever hurt anyone.

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And the empty promise that I gave them.

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I pledge, one day shall arrive,

When peace shall in our world revive.

Harmony shall bind us all,

No soul shall face a fatal fall.

No wars, where blood is shed in vain,

No fear between kindred, no disdain.

Imagine, in a dream so grand,

A world united, hand in hand.

⠀

But one day, mark my words: When I return from the dead, I will find them all. I'll track them down, and I'll return the favor. Then, I'll burn the world down, leaving nothing but ashes—just like how they burned us.

That was how it all ended that day, how everything ended.

But... will that fix everything...?

— will I be able to meet you all again?

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