Even The Gods Fear My Return
Chapter Five: Ash Beneath My Feet
The sky had forgotten how to breathe.
It loomed heavily above the mortal world, a chaotic expanse of bruised gold streaked with scorched black—an immense, aching wound festering across the firmament. The sun, that ever-watchful guardian, had retreated behind a veil of oppressive silence, casting a dim pallor over everything it once illuminated. No birds broke the stillness with their cheerful calls, nor did a whisper of wind dare to stir the air. Even the shadows that should have danced across the ground appeared frozen in time, having forgotten how to exist in a world stripped of its vibrancy.
And at the very heart of that stifling stillness, a solitary figure walked.
Beneath Kazuren's boots, the remnants of The Vault of Unbeing crumbled into a fragmented mosaic—a realm that existed beyond the constraints of time and light. This forgotten cosmos had not been crafted by the gods to merely imprison wayward souls but rather to obliterate their very essence. There were no doors to mark entry nor walls to contain; nothing echoed within its bounds, just an all-consuming silence. Those cast into this exile would find it stripped away any semblance of name, form, and memory, a stark erasure from the tapestry of existence.
And yet, in a paradox that defied all understanding, he walked free.
With every step Kazuren took, molten stone seethed and twisted beneath him, leaving behind glowing sigils etched in an impossible light—symbols that pulsed with a life of their own, born from the very essence of his being. The air around him warped into a shuddering dance, straining against the very fabric of reality, as if the universe itself struggled to reconcile with the unfathomable existence of this formidable entity walking among the remnants of the forsaken.
He was no longer merely a man, but something far grander.
His armor, an obsidian sheen tempered in the divine flames of creation, shimmered with intricate veins of radiant gold woven throughout. The runes carved in the ancient First Tongue pulsed rhythmically, as if echoing the heartbeat of the cosmos. His eyes, molten gold, blazed with the weight of judgment and the sorrow of loss, harnessing the unfathomable power that coiled around him. In his formidable presence, the very world around him did not resist or challenge; it yielded, bowing before his will.
At the shattered heart of The Vault stood the altar that had once anchored his obliteration—crafted from the very breath of dying stars, its surface inscribed with the names of the Twelve, the gods who had pooled their divine might to ensure his undoing. Their indifference, their malice—it now lay forgotten, reduced to mere dust beneath his boot, echoing the futile ambitions of those who sought to erase him.
Kazuren raised a hand, palm open, a motion that spoke of reclaiming what was unjustly taken.
And in that very moment, the sky ripped itself apart.
From the shattering rift descended High Seraph Dazirion, a being forged from the very marrow of divine judgment and heavenly justice. Six resplendent crystal wings unfolded behind him, radiating light that resonated with sacred energy, their sharp edges glinting dangerously in the fractured atmosphere. His form exuded a shimmering brilliance, an embodiment of purity shaped in the crucible of the heavens. When Dazirion spoke, his voice carried the weight of ancient decrees, a blend of command and consequence.
"Kazuren of the Forsaken Flame," Dazirion intoned, his words reverberating through land and mind alike, "by decree of the Pantheon Eternal, you are to be erased. Again. Fully. Without memory, form, or echo."
Kazuren, however, did not respond, for he had long since transcended the need for dialogue.
He simply regarded Dazirion, and at that moment, the clouds behind him ignited into a furious blaze.
Dazirion, undeterred, summoned forth his weapon—a spear known as Final Silence, a weapon that had once extinguished the brilliance of an elder sun, a relic of pure annihilation. With a flick of his divine will, he hurled it with unrelenting force, the light of it screaming across the void, a comet of impending fate.
The earth beneath them trembled in trepidation.
Yet Kazuren raised a single finger, and time itself seemed to shudder.
The spear stopped dead in its tracks.
Suspended in mid-air, it vibrated violently, caught within the grip of a cosmic tension—divine law cracked and split around it, unable to complete the motion set in motion by its celestial master.
Kazuren's voice emerged, low and resonant—like the whisper of a dying star, threading significance into the fabric of silence.
"You wield silence.
But I am what comes after silence."
And then, with a decisive motion, he clenched his hand into a fist.
The spear shattered.
Light fractured into a scattering of radiant chaos. Dazirion found himself recoiling, as confusion rippled through him, his wings faltering, and the holy luminescence within him dimming under the weight of disbelief.
Kazuren advanced with purpose.
One footfall at a time.
Each step reverberated through the very seams of the realm, an unstoppable force demanding recognition.
"You do not belong here," Dazirion rasped, retreating, fear creeping into his voice.
Kazuren paused, allowing the weight of that moment to linger in the air between them.
"Neither do the gods," he replied, each word a cold echo of inevitable truth. "And so I'll take it all back."
With a sweeping motion of his hand, powerful and unfathomable—
Dazirion vanished.
Not slain. Not broken. But erased.
An eerie stillness fell across the divine planes, enveloping everything within. It was not awe that filled the air, nor was it reverence for the magnitude of his actions.
It was fear.
And far above, in the lofty heights of the Celestial Citadel, the gods screamed—not in fury or indignation, but in stark, terrible realization:
The Vault of Unbeing had failed.
Kazuren had returned.
And now… nothing was beyond his reach.
To be continued...