Prologue 2: That We All Heeded

He... she... it? What is it? It looked vaguely human, only there was something different about it. His eyes were a bright red. I looked around and to saw people, translucent, see-through. I looked around and then I saw her. I started moving towards her.

"Welcome!" A voice boomed in our heads, "Apologies for the rough entrance. I can't really bring people here any other way. Anyway, sorry to shatter your perspective of the world but you are standing in front of a God. I just called you here because I have a simple request, I have been watching the Earth for decades, or has it been millennia? I lose track of time sometimes, it really doesn't matter though, does it? I have a request and if you fulfill it, you can get a wish per person who finishes the request and then, I'll return you to your normal lives, except for what you wished for. If you wish to join this opportunity may sign the contract. I'll wait," He said with a smile.

A sheet of paper with something written in an unknown language appeared in front of us. Many of the people collected signed, but no ink came out of the quill. A few complained but most just settle for their silent confusion. Then someone stepped up.

His hair looked unruly as if he had just gotten up from his bed when he was taken. He walked with a prominent stagger as if he wasn't able to stand up properly. Was he injured? Was he just drunk? But the look he had in his eyes...

That was the look of someone dying from desperation, his eyes darting wildly in their sockets, looking for something.

"Excuse me, but I'd like to know the contents of the contract. I'm sorry, but I don't think that that I'll be okay with signing a contract in a language I don't underst-*cough*-and." He gripped at his chest as he withered away in front of us, at the same time, changing form, changing into something.

Something unnatural, his limbs were extending... and shrinking at the same time. His body ended up morphing into something else, a monster.

"Oh, dear. It appears that some of you were turned into demons in the process of getting transferred. Fret not, only those that had impure hearts, filled with thoughts of sin, would change into one of those... things. You have nothing to worry about, do you? Anyway, everyone, sign the contract as soon as possible so that we may start this. I'm starting to get bored of waiting." The remaining people hesitated, fidgeting with their feathers, unsure of where to go from there. I was still holding off on signing my soul off.

*If only we had a choice.*

We all ended up signing it, but not by choice. It almost felt like there was a hand forcing us to. Only a child remained without signing the contract.

'Could he even sign. He probably doesn't even have a signature.' I think

*Poor child*

Then, the... "thing" snapped.

The child, no older than 8, began gasping for air as his insides began to swell. His mother was nearby and grabbed him in her arms. She turned to the "God", pleading, "My son, please, save hi-" Her son's body fell into a mound of salt, roughly the volume of the human body, specifically, the volume of a middle-aged woman who was, say, made the mistake of pleading to a "God" to save her son. The same "God" who probably wanted her son dead

"To think ants have the gall to talk back to me," the "God" declared as the child cried over a pile of salt, his insides growing faster and faster, like a cancer that had gone out of control. In a matter of seconds, his mouth opened to a wave of pulsating muscle and tissues gushing out. His eyelids, which were shut tight by the swelling, parted ways to let his eyeballs drop off, shutting again immediately after. With that, I knew sure that the cancer like growth was there throughout the child's insides. He was already dead. All the while we heard a raspy voice cry out, "Mah-mah, Mah-mah."

A little later, he was nothing but a pile of muscles and blood lying over a pile of salt.

At this point in time, everyone either watched out of morbid curiosity or stayed as far away as they possibly could. It's message was clear. Follow it's every command or die. Talk back to him, you die.

In the time I took to think all of that, I searched for Tessa. The crowds were condensing in the corners like droplets of water on a cold glass of water, only to be wiped off or fall off themselves soon. I found her soon enough. She was alone. She was crying again. She saw me and just stared at my face as if she's looking at someone she recognized and at the same time she stared as if I was a stranger, "You saw what just happened!" She yelled out, "How can you just stand there so nonchalantly as if nothing happened? I mean, that kid, he- he-" Despite her best efforts to hold it inside, she puked, after which she resorted to just staring at me, breathing heavily, casting a look of judgment. She isn't meant to be here...

Then I realize, as an after thought for some reason, 'None of us were.'

But she was right. I realized that I had almost no reaction to the death of the child or his mother, as horrible as it was. All I gave it was just cold acceptance. I had just seen two people die horribly and I... felt nothing... It's as if they were just characters used to set up the stakes for the story to come. They just didn't feel real, not to me at least.

"I don't know," was the only reply I could give her. It was better than saying, that it didn't feel like they mattered.

Then I felt a prick in my finger. She felt it too, from the look of it, considering she flinched at almost the same time as me. The others too, everyone who signed felt it. The quill was still in my hand. It's still in everyone's hands. They hadn't let go. We couldn't let go. It was attached to us.

Blood began pouring out of the tip of the quills and flowing in a stream, defying gravity, to our contracts, signing in the same foreign tongue that the contract was in.

His voice boomed in our heads again, "Rejoice, all ye faithful."

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Eventually, everyone settleed down, and the "God" began to intrude into our minds again. "As I have said earlier, there are those among you who have become demons as you arrived here. As you may have assumed, these monsters feed on human meat. As much as I would like to weed them out before the games begin, I'm afraid I cannot touch an individual who has already signed the contract," It smiled.

"You will continue the game while keeping an eye out for these creatures. I recommend incinerating the demons, you know, the way you did the witches all those decades back? Or was it a century?"

His smile widened

"As for the game,"

Wider.

"All you have to do is survive a week and the wish is yours."

W i d e r

"The only ones in the way of your survival and, by extension, your wish, are those that have become demons."

W i d e r

"All you have to do for me,"

W i d e r

"Is kill the heathens. All of them."