Prologue

The clinking of broken chains echoed faintly through the desolate air, the sound distant and eerie as the man rose to his feet. His movements were slow, deliberate—each one a testament to the weight of the destruction around him. A chain tattoo marked his forehead, the links etched into his skin as if binding him to some forgotten fate. Beneath the tattered remnants of a once-pristine cloak, a flower tattoo bloomed on his neck—its petals darkened and withered, much like the world he now stood in. His right eye was hidden beneath a worn patch, while the other gleamed with a hollow, almost unnatural light, piercing through the blood-soaked air like a shard of broken hope.

His body was battered, his hands drenched in crimson, his clothes torn and smeared with the evidence of the massacre around him.

Bodies. Hundreds. No—thousands. 

They lay scattered like discarded puppets, lifeless, limbs twisted unnaturally. The metallic stench of blood was overwhelming, mingling with the scent of decay. Rivers that once sparkled clear were now rivers of red, flowing sluggishly past the withered remains of once-beautiful, ethereal flowers—flowers that had been revered as the world's salvation, now blackened and lifeless. 

He took a step forward, his boots splashing in the blood-soaked ground, each step precariously avoiding the corpses. There were so many. His gaze lingered on two among them, their faces pale in death. 

A girl with silvery hair and a broken gourd at her side. Her eyes, once vibrant with emotion, were now glassy and empty. The gourd was split, its contents long spilled, mixing with her blood. 

Not far from her, a boy lay surrounded by scattered metallic cards, their edges jagged and smeared with blood. His hands were outstretched as if reaching for salvation that never came. His lean frame was riddled with punctures, wounds too numerous to count. 

The man paused, his breathing ragged. His lone eye flicked to the horizon, where the sun struggled to break through the smog-filled sky. The light barely reached him. He swallowed hard and forced himself to look down again, surveying the field of death around him. 

A flicker of regret crossed his bloodied face. His knees buckled, and he dropped to the ground, his chains rattling faintly against the earth. He clenched his fists, his bloodied nails digging into his palms. 

"I couldn't control it," he whispered hoarsely, his voice breaking under the weight of his words. 

His gaze turned skyward, a silent plea escaping his lips. Then, his eye narrowed with resolve, and his bloodied hand clawed at the ground. 

"We'll go back... I can still fix it." 

The broken chains on his wrists seemed to tighten as if alive, their shattered links pulsing faintly with an unnatural light. The air around him shifted, bending and twisting, as if the very world responded to his will. 

Then, a small whimper broke the suffocating silence.

It was faint but unmistakable—like a dying animal's last breath. The man turned toward the sound, his movements still controlled, but now filled with something far darker. 

He walked slowly, each step deliberate as he followed the sound to its source. 

There, on the ground, was a man—his body mutilated beyond recognition. His upper limbs and lower limbs had been torn from his body, leaving nothing but a mangled torso that struggled to breathe. 

When the injured man saw him approach, his eyes widened with terror. His voice cracked, struggling to form words as the horror of what stood before him sank in.

"You—you're a monster..." the man gasped, fear and horror lacing his voice.

The man with the chain stared down at him, his gaze colder than the void itself. 

With a swift, merciless motion, the man lifted his foot and stomped it onto the injured man's head, grinding it into the dirt with an unsettling finality. The sound of bone cracking was almost drowned out by the sickening squelch of blood as the injured man's life was snuffed out in an instant.

"You're wrong," he said, his voice steady. "I'm a demon."