Five winters had passed.
Lucen was thirteen now—old enough to train with the monks, young enough to still dream with open eyes.
The temple was home. But the mountains... they were his world.
And in that world, he had one true companion.
Raa.
A snow-colored ram with a broken horn and one blind eye.
Lucen had found him during a storm, just a lamb then—trapped in thorns, crying beneath the wind. He carried him home. Fed him herbs. Sang to him in the quiet. Everyone else saw a sick, dying animal.
Lucen saw a brother.
They were both born in snow. Both raised by monks.
Both a little broken.
—
The Quiet Morning
Raa followed Lucen everywhere—up rocky trails, through echoing temple halls, into the silent places where Lucen would lie on the roof and stare at the sky.
That was where he asked the questions he couldn't ask out loud.
"If I was made for good… why is it so easy to imagine the bad?"
The monks smiled when they saw him talking to the ram.
Eshun once said, "A soul that loves an animal is a soul still growing."
Lucen believed him.
Until the morning Raa didn't come.
He called for him. Waited. Then searched.
Through trees. Over cliffs. Across snow paths.
The sun was bleeding into the clouds when Lucen saw it—
Blood.
Dark red, drying on stone near the cliffside.
And near it… Raa.
Lifeless. Torn.
The blind eye still open.
—
The Devil in Him Woke
Lucen couldn't breathe. His fists clenched so hard, the stone beneath him cracked.
He felt it.
The fire.
Not outside—inside. In his chest. His spine. His bones.
Something ancient stirred. Something that didn't want peace.
He turned.
Far down the slope, he saw three hunters. Laughing. One of them held Raa's horn.
Lucen's eyes burned silver.
The snow at his feet turned to steam.
He didn't think.
He moved.
—
The Moment Before the Monster
He reached them before they even knew he was coming.
His fist pulled back, flames dancing along his knuckles.
One of them screamed.
Another reached for a knife.
Lucen didn't care.
When he spoke, his voice didn't sound like his own.
"You took the only thing that made me feel human."
He was going to kill them.
All three.
But then—
A hand gripped his wrist.
Eshun.
The old monk stood between Lucen and murder, unshaken. His eyes didn't blink. His voice was calm as stone.
"If you kill with rage, the beast will learn to love the taste."
Lucen's teeth clenched.
"They deserve it."
"Maybe they do. But do you want to become what they already believe you are?"
Silence.
The fire in Lucen's hands faded.
He stepped back.
Then fell to his knees in the snow beside Raa's broken body.
—
The Lie and the Seed
That night, the monks gathered around him.
They burned incense. Spoke of grief. Of letting go.
Lucen didn't say much.
When Eshun asked, "Do you understand why we stopped you?"
Lucen smiled.
Forced.
"Yeah… sure. I get it. Be better. Don't kill. Inner peace. Got it. Can I go now?"
He left before anyone answered.
Behind the stone walls of his room, he sat beneath the window, staring through the frost at the moon.
He didn't cry.
But he didn't feel strong either.
And somewhere in the quiet, a small voice inside him whispered a truth he didn't dare speak:
"They don't know how much I wanted to kill them."
But he didn't.
And that was the beginning.
—
END OF CHAPTER 2
Next Chapter:- CHAPTER 3: THE FIRE BENEATH CALM 🔥