S1C01: The God

⚠️ Trigger Warning (TW):

This story contains themes that may be disturbing to some readers, including emotional instability, obsession, manipulation, psychological distress, violence, death, identity issues, and morally gray characters. Characters may exhibit unhealthy attachments, extreme behavior, or emotional volatility. Please proceed with care.

This is a dark comedy and psychological fantasy—nothing is simple, and no one is safe (especially not the emotionally repressed S-Ranks).

Read at your own risk.

...----------------...

Her steps were light.

Too light.

Like her body had already started letting go. She climbed up on the chair, quiet, almost graceful. Almost like she wasn't really there.

The rope dangled in front of her, just close enough to brush her cheek. It was waiting. And she knew—once the chair went, that was it.

No do-overs. No second thoughts.

She took her time.

Slipped her head through the loop like it was part of some ritual. Some final, silent goodbye.

Across from her, on the cracked wall, hung the portrait—her mom and dad. Smiling like everything had been okay. Like they hadn't left her in this mess.

That smile... God, it made her skin crawl.

It felt like they were mocking her. Like the whole damn world was in on the joke.

Her hands curled into fists. She clenched her teeth, trembling.

"You useless..." she muttered under her breath, eyes glassy, voice shaking. Tears welled up, clinging to her lashes.

Useless.

The word echoed inside her, bouncing off old wounds. Was she talking to them... or herself?

The rope sat loose around her neck, like it was waiting for her to decide. Her tears started falling. Heavy. Relentless.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, wiping her face with the back of her hand.

"I'm sorry!" she yelled—not to the portraits. To herself. Like maybe there was still something in her worth apologizing to.

And then... she laughed.

Or maybe she smiled. It was hard to tell. It was the kind of smile you give yourself in the mirror when you're lying through your teeth.

What did it matter? They were gone. Everyone was gone.

She was alone.

Powerless.

That's what she believed.

But this world... this broken, burning, rotting world?

It doesn't care what you believe.

When it's dying, it doesn't beg.

When it's in a desperate need for saving, it doesn't wait for a savior. 

It builds one.

And you don't get to have a say in it.

Then—

The chair went.

The rope snapped tight.

And everything went dark.

...----------------...

Her feet were soaked, yet somehow, impossibly, she didn't sink into the ocean beneath her—a mirror-flat abyss that stretched into forever.

She wandered, dazed, across the endless void, drawn toward nothing but the yawning dark. No stars, no landmarks. Just her own reflection rippling back at her, as if the water were a portal to something she wasn't meant to see.

Trailing behind her, like the aftermath of a choice she didn't remember making, was the snapped rope—her anchor, severed but still clinging.

Then it happened.

A weight pressed down on it.

She stopped.

But more than that—she froze, breath hitching sharp in her throat.

The air turned razor-cold. Her blood iced over.

Who—what—was that?

Death?

"Who are you?" she asked, her voice gentle—

—The one who answered wasn't.

He didn't speak. Not yet. He only reached down, fingers curling around the leash she'd forgotten, and pulled—not a tug, not a warning.

A command.

It snapped her body backward, dragging her across the water like a marionette.

"Aren't you being just a bit disrespectful... to your god?"

She lifted her eyes—and met his.

Twin suns. Blinding. Merciless. Beautiful in the way a wildfire is beautiful—only from a distance, and only if it doesn't want you dead.

She couldn't move.

Couldn't breathe.

Her entire body screamed one thing: run.

So she did.

She ran like her soul was on fire.

Bare feet pounding the water's surface, splashes echoing into the void, she sprinted with no direction—only desperation. Her heart slammed inside her chest like a prisoner begging for release.

The leash dragged behind her, useless now, an afterthought.

Behind her, he laughed.

Low. Cruel. Almost amused.

"Trusting your instincts," he mused, voice curling around her spine like smoke, like silk, like steel.

"So very... human of you."

She ran harder, faster.

But the dark was endless.

And his voice?

It followed.

Smooth. Unhurried. Slicing into her thoughts like a scalpel made of starlight.

"No wonder your world ended the way it did."

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