Devourer of Sins

The next few days passed like a dream he couldn't wake from.

On the surface, everything remained as it always had. His home stood undisturbed. His children's laughter still drifted through the halls each morning, bright and unbothered. His wife greeted him at the door with food and a smile that had warmed him through the worst winters of his life.

But beneath the surface, something subtle had fractured.

That night on the rooftop—the throne of stars, the voices in the void, the surrender he hadn't resisted—it hadn't been a dream. It was a moment of alignment. A quiet admission. The part of him buried beneath centuries of denial had stirred, opened an eye, and blinked into the world. The hunger he'd kept caged no longer whispered from the edges of his thoughts.

It walked beside him now.

Silent. Patient. Ever-watching.

He didn't let it show.

He played with his son in the garden, tossing pebbles with careful flicks of his fingers, suppressing the strength that could have shattered mountains. He carried his daughter on his shoulders through crowded markets, letting her chatter fill the space where silence once reigned. He smiled more. Laughed, even.

But every now and then, the cracks widened.

A drunken merchant yelling at his wife over a copper coin. A group of cultivators mocking a low-stage boy just outside the academy. A street performer—bloody, curled on the ground—while bored nobles laughed and kicked him again.

He never intervened.

But it took every ounce of restraint not to.

Because the voice inside—the hunger—always leaned close during moments like those and murmured with a velvet tenderness:

Just one. No one would notice. No one would miss them. Just one soul...

It was never cruel. Never loud. It sounded like a lullaby, like a mother urging a child to eat what he needed to grow strong.

And every time, he clenched his fists in his pockets and walked away.

But tension layered within him like sediment—quiet, invisible, and inevitable. Even a volcano takes its time before it erupts.

On the fourth day, the world changed again.

The whispers returned—but not from within.

From the shadows.

His phantoms—his 3,000 loyal wraiths—began to stir.

It wasn't a full awakening. Just murmurs. A ripple. But it was enough to make the air feel colder than it should have in the warmth of spring.

He sat beneath the courtyard tree when it came. A breeze, sharp and wrong, slid around his spine like fingers dragged over bare nerves. Then a whisper, disembodied:

"She's searching..."

He opened his eyes slowly. "Who?"

Silence.

Then another voice overlapped the first, deeper and unmistakably ancient:

"The fallen flame... she stirs."

His gaze drifted to the hills beyond the walls.

There was only one being in the worlds who bore that name.

The Red Angel.

He remembered her well.

Not from this life—but the one before. In a war that tore through heaven and left the upper realm scorched and bleeding.

She had once been a seraph—a creature of divine order, revered and radiant. But love had changed her. A mortal man. A doomed affection. When heaven tore him from her arms, she had answered not with grief but with fire.

She tore the gates of her own realm open with her bare hands.

The pantheon labeled her traitor. Heretic. Abomination.

He had called her interesting.

They had crossed paths during his campaign across the upper world. She didn't try to stop him. Not at first. She only watched—her golden eyes burning, wings scorched to cinders.

But in time, she did act.

And the scars of that confrontation still ached in his soul.

If she was stirring now, if she had awakened...

It was no coincidence.

She had felt his presence shift.

They always did.

He exhaled slowly, sent a ripple of intent through the shadow threads that bound his army. In seconds, three forms answered—tall, eyeless, wrapped in drifting black.

His generals.

He didn't need to explain. They kneeled without a word.

"Send ten thousand eyes into the sky," he commanded softly. "Watch for wings of fire. If she crosses into this realm, I want to know before her shadow hits the ground."

They bowed and vanished, melting into the dusk.

That night, he sat beside his wife by the hearth.

She brushed his hair back, eyes searching his face. "You seem distant."

He offered a faint smile. "Just thinking too much."

"About the children?"

"In part."

She didn't blink. Her eyes always saw through half-truths. But she didn't press. Instead, she leaned into him, head resting against his chest.

"Whatever storm is coming... you'll protect them."

He nodded, voice low. "There's no other option."

And then, the next morning, the storm arrived.

Not by messenger.

But by sky.

A pillar of red light erupted from the northern cliffs, slicing through clouds like a spear from the heavens. The sky bled with it—shifting from gold to crimson to amber.

The birds fell silent.

The ground trembled.

People stepped from their homes, shielding their eyes in awe and fear. Most thought it was a divine omen.

But he knew better.

The Red Angel had entered the realm.

And she'd done so loudly—on purpose.

"She wants you to come," the hunger whispered, voice smooth as silk. "She wants to see what you've become."

That evening, he found his wife in the garden, tending her roses. The scent hung sharp in the air.

"I need to leave for a few days," he said.

She didn't look up. "I figured."

"I'll leave watchers. Shadows. They'll guard the children."

Still, she didn't meet his eyes. "Do what you must."

He stepped forward, wrapped his arms around her gently. She tensed for a heartbeat, then relaxed into his warmth.

"I don't want to go back to who I was," he murmured. "But... I'm not sure I can keep running forever."

She turned, cupped his face in her hands.

"I never asked you to run," she said softly. "Only to come back."

He left at midnight.

No farewell. No theatrics.

He simply stepped into the folds of shadow, and vanished.

The northern cliffs greeted him with silence. They stood jagged and wind-carved, crowned with the ruins of a palace where heaven had once tried—and failed—to bridge the realms.

She was already there.

Unchanged.

Wings like torn banners of fire, trailing embers. Hair like strands of molten copper. Eyes like suns held in restraint.

She stood on a broken balcony, watching the horizon with her hands folded behind her back.

"I wondered how long you'd take," she said, still facing away.

He stepped onto the stone beside her. "You didn't exactly knock politely."

She smiled. "You were never the type to answer gentle taps."

They stood in silence for a long moment. Then she turned to face him.

"You've awakened."

He didn't lie.

"Not fully," he said.

"But enough," she replied. "Enough to rattle the seals. Enough for the priest's soul to shatter."

He shrugged. "That was nothing."

"To you," she said. "To the heavens? Catastrophic."

"So what now?" he asked. "You here to kill me again?"

"No," she said quietly. "I came to ask where you stand this time."

He looked at her. Eyes steady. Voice calm.

"I'm not on anyone's side."

"Liar."

He didn't argue.

"I've chosen something else," he said.

"What?"

"Peace."

She laughed. Not cruelly—but with the kind of disbelief that comes from old wounds.

"Peace? You? The man who devoured gods?"

He said nothing.

She stepped closer. "Then why are the seals breaking? Why are your shadows moving? Why is the hunger louder than ever?"

He turned his gaze to the crumbled sky.

Because he didn't know.

Or perhaps... he did.

And couldn't bear to admit it.

"You're merging," she said. "Finally accepting what you are."

He nodded once. "I've stopped running."

She placed a hand over his chest, felt the slow thunder of power beneath his skin.

"Then you'll never be normal again."

"I never was."

They stood there, wrapped in the echoes of too many wars.

She stepped back at last, the fire dimming in her eyes.

"I won't stop you," she said. "But if heaven moves... if the realms march again—"

"I'll end it," he replied. "All of it. This time, for good."

She nodded once.

Then vanished in a gust of flame, leaving behind the scent of ash and roses.

He stood alone on the cliffs, watching the sky bleed into night.

And in his chest, the hunger stirred again.

Not like a monster.

But like an old friend.

And for the first time in centuries… he didn't fear it.