The child screamed in terror when he saw the mangled remains of his friends. His voice cracked the silence, echoing through the forest like a dying wind and then he saw him the cause of it all.
Towering nearly two meters tall, the man stood naked in the pale moonlight. His white hair hung loosely over a body covered in burns and scars, a grotesque map of pain. When the man heard the boy’s cry, he slowly turned his head. Their eyes met.
The child’s knees buckled beneath him as if the weight of fear itself had crushed his will. He fell to the ground, trembling, paralyzed his eyes darting between the mutilated corpses of his friends and the soulless gaze of the monster before him.
The man approached slowly, his heavy steps deliberate, unhurried. He crouched in front of the child and asked, "What’s your name?"
The child couldn’t answer. He could only sob, his body convulsing with terror.
The man watched him cry for a while. As though he enjoyed it. His eyes were void of life, but the corners of his lips twisted into a sick smile.
“God... please help me!” the child cried out.
The man’s grin widened.
“What god will save you now?” he asked, his voice like a whisper from the grave.
The boy, drowning in tears, remained silent.
This time, the man’s smile reached his eyes, which slowly widened with perverse delight. He stepped forward, placing a hand no, a claw-like grip on the child’s shoulder.
“Then why do your gods not help you?”
The boy screamed. The man’s fingers pressed down, bones cracking beneath his grip. The boy writhed in agony, his screams piercing the night.
“If even an innocent child like you can’t be saved by your gods... then doesn’t that make them worse than demons?” the man said, his voice unnervingly calm. “If someone watches you suffer and does nothing can they still call themselves divine?”
He leaned in closer, his breath cold against the boy’s ear.
“If your fate lies in my hands... then I am your god. My name is Pegwalsge. The only one you can beg for mercy. I am your god, your destiny.”
With a single motion, Pegwalsge tore open the boy’s chest.
The child died in agony, his final breath lost in the wind. As Pegwalsge purified and consumed the boy’s Xhu, flashes of his former life flickered in his mind echoes of memories buried long ago. The feeling of touching another soul, of taking life again, filled him with an almost childlike thrill. For a moment, he felt reborn.
He held the boy’s skull in one hand, walking toward the edge of the cliff. Lifting it toward the moon, he whispered:
“No god you believed in could’ve taken you to heaven. But I... I ended your pure little fate and delivered you to eternal peace.”
He let the skull fall into the abyss.
Wiping the blood from his hands and legs, he casually slipped on the undergarments of one of the other children.
And walked away.
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