The Hero did not hesitate.
Steel flashed.
Arin's mother's head struck the wooden floor with a dull, final sound.
For a moment, there was no scream. No breath. No world.
Only the Hero's voice — calm, unwavering.
"She would slow us down."
Arin's hands were still reaching for her when the blood touched his fingers.
Outside, demons howled. The village burned. The sky was red.
The Hero turned away first.
"More are coming," he said, already walking toward the flames. "If the boy survives, he may yet be useful."
And just like that, he was gone.
The sky had burned gold only hours earlier.
Arin had been laughing then — chasing his sister through the tall grass, swinging a wooden sword too heavy for his small arms.
"Fear me, demon!" he had shouted before tripping into the dirt.
His father's laughter had thundered behind him.
"A fierce hero indeed!"
His mother had smiled — though her eyes lingered too long on the black forest at the edge of the world.
That was where the Death God slept.
They all knew it.
Every child did.
Every three hundred years, he rose again.
And every three hundred years, Heroes answered.
That night, the earth trembled.
A red glow swallowed the horizon.
His father had drawn a sword that had not tasted air in years.
"Stay inside," he had ordered.
He never returned whole.
The demon came first.
The Hero came second.
Only one of them saved him.
Only one of them destroyed what remained.
Arin did not remember running.
He remembered fire.
He remembered the weight of silence after his mother fell.
He remembered the Hero's eyes.
Not cruel.
Not angry.
Just resolved.
Far beyond the border, beneath black stone and forgotten prayers, something ancient stirred.
And somewhere in the ashes of a broken village, a boy made a promise no god had asked for.