The sky was bleeding.
Crimson clouds twisted above, churning in the shape of an unholy spiral that stretched across the heavens. Ash rained from above like snow, soft and silent, settling over scorched earth and shattered bones. The world trembled, as if mourning alongside him.
He knelt in the ruins.
Blood dripped from his fingertips. It painted his arms, soaked his chest, and pooled beneath his knees. His breath came in ragged gasps, each one scraping his throat like broken glass. He didn''t blink. He couldn''t. His gaze was locked on the body in front of him.
A scream.
His scream tore through the dead air, shattering the silence like brittle glass. It wasn’t just pain—it was grief, rage, and guilt woven into a sound not meant for mortal throats. It echoed across the ruined field, across the mountains, into the Void itself.
It wasn’t human.
Not anymore.
He stood at the heart of it all. A man—or what remained of one. Barefoot on a field soaked in blood, his trembling body wrapped in blackened muscle and scorched veins pulsing with something unholy. Shadows coiled around him, tendrils of writhing void that pulsed with hatred, madness, and grief.
His mouth was wide open mid-scream, the sound raw, endless. His fists dripped crimson, nails cracked and embedded with bits of flesh. Beneath him, blood rippled outward like an ocean tide. Not a drop of it was his.
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His eyes were hollow.
Empty.
Gone.
Whatever soul once lived behind them had been scorched away—replaced by a roaring void.
Around him, the battlefield was silent. Dozens lay scattered. Mangled. Torn. Their bodies told the story of what had happened here. The massacre. The fury. The madness that was unleashed.
He clenched his fists, hard enough for his nails to dig deep into flesh. Blood poured from his palms, but he didn’t feel it. He didn’t feel anything anymore.
Not grief.
Not pain.
Only rage.
Only fury.
Something inside him snapped. Not like a crack. Not like glass breaking. No. It was the kind of snap that leaves nothing behind. Like a string pulled too tight, shredding into dust.
And in that moment… something else opened.
The air around him convulsed.
The ground split with a sickening crunch, void energy gushing from the cracks like black fire. His scream returned—louder than ever—shaking the ruins, shattering what was left of the shattered world. His shadow twisted into something monstrous, and the sky above him screamed back in answer.
The system echoed.
<blockquote>
[CORRUPTION: UNLEASHED]
[VOID LIMIT EXCEEDED. HUMANITY… NULLIFIED.]
[AWAKENING: ???]
</blockquote>
The Void came to greet its child.
Veins of black lightning split the sky. The ground around him cratered. Mountains in the far distance began to crumble. And from the shadows, creatures began to kneel. Abominations. Wretches. Voidborn horrors that once hungered for his flesh... now bent to his presence.
He was no longer like them.
He was worse.
The light that once flickered behind his eyes was extinguished. In its place—abyss.
He stood slowly. No more tears. No more screams. Just silence. Deafening, absolute silence. Even the world held its breath.
"They took everything," he muttered, voice raw and low. "So I''ll take everything back. And when there''s nothing left to take... I''ll take them."
His shadow stretched unnaturally behind him, twisting into tendrils that devoured the light.
The world would remember this moment.
The man who had once stood there…
He was gone.
What rose in his place wasn’t a man at all.
Not anymore.
Not ever again.
The cycle begins again.