Damian stepped down from the rooftop like a king descending his throne, his coat sweeping behind him.
The armored vehicles halted, engines growling low.
Fifty SWAT operatives poured out, rifles raised and eyes locked on the lone figure standing calm in the moonlight.
He smiled.
Slow. Cruel.
From beneath his coat, Damian pretended to pull out a gun.
The air shifted.
For a heartbeat, silence.
Then—
The SWAT opened fire.
A relentless storm of bullets tore through the night—hundreds of rounds, enough to empty magazines for a week—ripping into the space where Damian had stood.
Smoke and sparks filled the air.
When the deafening salvo ended, the silence returned.
The acrid smell of gunpowder hung heavy.
Damian stood unscathed.
Between him and the SWAT, a shimmering wall of bullets hovered—motionless—each glowing faintly, suspended in perfect formation.
The soldiers stared, mouths agape, their weapons useless.
With a casual flick of his wrist, Damian lowered the wall.
Then his hand swept through the air, sharp as a blade.
In an instant, every one of the fifty operatives was cleaved cleanly in half .
Blood erupted like a fountain, flooding the street with a crimson river pooling beneath their lifeless forms.
From above, helicopters screamed to life, rotor blades chopping the night air.
Guns blazed, tracers streaking toward Damian.
He didn't flinch.
Instead, he raised both hands.
The closest helicopter groaned, its metal skin buckling inward as invisible pressure crushed it into a tight sphere.
The crew inside screamed—then silence.
One by one, each helicopter met the same fate—twisted, compressed, and silenced before they could land a single shot.
Below, the remaining armored vehicles rose silently, lifted by unseen forces.
They ascended higher and higher—piercing clouds, becoming specks against the sky.
When they reached the apex, Damian let go.
Explosions bloomed like fireworks as the vehicles crashed, scattering shards of flame and metal across the earth.
The street was quiet again, save for the sizzling remains and the faint drip of blood from Damian's forearm.
He exhaled slowly, a faint smirk curling his lips.
"Foolish enough to shoot first," he said.
"Now, you pay."
"Let this be a lesson."
The city had learned fear.
Damian vanished from the ruined battlefield in a thundercrack of wind and force—flying at the speed of a fighter jet, a blur streaking across the sky.
Within seconds, he reached the nearest city—skyscrapers rising in glass and steel, streets choked with traffic, people sipping coffee, crossing sidewalks, lost in daily routine.
He hovered above the central district—just high enough to be seen but not believed.
At first, people stared.
Phones came out.
Children pointed.
Some laughed.
Others asked if it was for a superhero movie.
Damian floated motionless, suit spotless, hands at his sides, wind tousling his hair.
Then he raised one hand.
A finger twitched.
The nearest apartment building groaned—and then split cleanly in half as if sliced by an invisible sword.
Floors collapsed like cards. Screams echoed through the street.
Phones kept recording. Shock hadn't given way to terror yet.
Then Damian waved his arms outward like a conductor summoning a crescendo.
Psychic blades lanced through the air—carving into hotels, shearing off the tops of office towers, gutting shopping malls in mid-morning rush.
The sound wasn't explosions—it was worse. It was tearing. Like the world being unzipped.
Cars began to rise.
Dozens of them.
Taxis. Sedans. Delivery trucks.
They hovered for a second—then rocketed down like missiles.
One crushed a mother and stroller on the sidewalk.
Another ripped through a packed bus stop, leaving limbs and blood splattered across glass walls.
He didn't stop.
Cars slammed into cafes, stores, playgrounds.
People screamed, ran, scattered.
It didn't matter.
He walked calmly through the sky as if down an invisible stairway—raining death with every gesture.
Skyscraper windows exploded outward.
Glass rained down in sheets.
Entire streets cracked and folded as if the earth itself bent to avoid him.
Tens of thousands died within minutes.
The city center, once bustling and loud, became a graveyard of twisted steel and smoke.
Through it all, Damian floated—untouched, unhurried.
He paused only once, hovering above a woman in her thirties—bloodied, barefoot, still in office clothes torn from the chaos. She stared up at him, phone trembling in her hands, mouth half-open as if trying to ask why.
Damian raised two fingers and dragged them through the air with surgical precision.
The woman's body convulsed—then burst apart as if sliced a thousand times in a single heartbeat.
Skin peeled away in thin, curling strips.
Muscle shredded into ribbons.
Bones cracked, split, and scattered like splintered porcelain.
Her eyes liquefied in midair.
Her jaw unhinged before disintegrating into meaty slush.
What remained of her collapsed into a steaming pile of flesh strands and torn organs—veins still twitching, lungs still heaving out blood in wet bubbles, as if her body hadn't realized it was already dead.
Her phone landed screen-first in the gore, still recording.
Above it all, Damian hovered—expressionless, fingers still raised—like a conductor finishing a symphony of death.
For one moment, the city went completely silent.
Then people started screaming.
Phones fell. People ran.
Some pushed others to the ground just to escape.
Cars crashed into each other as drivers tried to flee.
A woman was crushed underfoot.
Children cried as strangers pulled them away. It was chaos.
And above it all, Damian hovered in the sky, watching like a god.
Ten minutes later, the military arrived.
Helicopters flew in fast from the horizon.
Fighter jets circled overhead.
Tanks rolled into the streets.
Soldiers jumped from trucks, shouting orders, pointing guns at Damian.
A loud voice came through a megaphone:
"THIS IS THE UNITED STATES MILITARY. PUT YOUR HANDS UP OR WE WILL OPEN FIRE."
Damian didn't move.
He just smiled.
Then he said one word:
"Try."
The sky exploded.
The fighter jets fired missiles. They flew straight at Damian.
But with a small wave of his hand, the missiles stopped in mid-air.
They twisted around and flew back—hitting the jets that fired them.
The sky lit up with flames as the jets exploded one by one.
The helicopters started shooting.
Hundreds of bullets flew toward Damian.
He didn't move.
He held up his hand—and every bullet stopped, hanging in the air like a cloud of metal.
Then he sent them back.
The bullets flew through buildings, tore through walls, and ripped the soldiers apart. Blood sprayed across the streets as bodies dropped in pieces.
People screamed louder.
Some tried to hide in cars, but the cars rose into the air.
Damian lifted them with a thought—ten, twenty, thirty cars floating high into the clouds.
Then he dropped them.
They hit the ground like bombs.
Explosions shook the city.
The sky was black with smoke.
Damian floated above it all, calm, untouched, surrounded by death.
Above the smoke-choked skyline, Damian rose higher—through the clouds, past the jets, into open sky.
Below him, the city trembled.
Fires raged. Sirens wailed.
The streets were broken veins of concrete and flame.
But he wasn't done.
Far below, the tallest skyscrapers began to shake.
Steel screamed.
Glass shattered in massive waves.
Then, as if answering his silent command, four of the city's biggest towers ripped themselves from the ground.
Foundations snapped like bones.
Support beams twisted and groaned.
The buildings rose—tilted, broken, yet still intact—floating up into the heavens beside Damian.
People below could only watch in horror as their skyline—the pride of their city—was stolen by a man who never touched the ground.
And then he dropped them.
But not straight down.
Damian held out both hands.
The skyscrapers spun mid-air, building momentum, wrapped in glowing psychic energy.
The wind howled.
Thunder cracked.
Clouds split apart.
With a snap of his fingers, they launched downward—not falling, but crashing like divine spears, shot from heaven.
The impact came seconds later.
Each tower struck like a meteor.
A flash.
A roar.
A shockwave that tore through miles.
One hit the business district.
Another leveled the stadium.
The rest slammed into residential zones and the city center.
The earth quaked. Glass exploded from every surviving window.
Roads cracked like paper.
And then, silence.
Nothing remained but fire and dust.
A crater where life once moved.
A ghost of a city.
And in the clouds above it all, Damian floated, arms crossed, eyes closed.
Not in triumph.
Not in hate.
But as if he had simply cleared a space.
The small apartment smelled faintly of fried onions and old perfume.
The worn curtains let in soft light, dust particles dancing like ghosts.
She was there, standing at the stove, humming a cracked lullaby as she flipped the food.
Damian sat at the kitchen table, the weight of the past days settling like a stone in his chest.
His clothes were neatly folded on the chair—ironed, as she had promised.
For a moment, he allowed himself to forget the blood, the terror, the destruction.
He closed his eyes and breathed in the simple, fragile peace.
She turned, wiping her hands on her apron.
"Eat before it gets cold," she said softly.
He smiled, weak but genuine.
"I forgot how this feels."
She came closer, reaching out with trembling hands.
"You're still my son," she whispered, voice cracking.
He opened his mouth to speak—
But then the knife came, piercing deep into his chest.
The world stopped.
Blood spilled from his mouth, hot and thick.
His eyes snapped open—red with fury and pain.
"Why?" he rasped, voice breaking.
She looked at him, tears streaming down her worn face, a sad smile breaking through the sorrow.
"I couldn't watch you die alone," she said.
She pulled a small pistol from her coat and pressed it to her temple.
"Better we end this nightmare together."
The shot echoed, a final shattering sound.
Her brains spilled across the floor—red, terrible, final.
Damian's last breath was a whisper of grief and rage.
And then—darkness.
.....
He woke to cold dirt pressing into his cheek.
His breath came ragged, lungs burning with weakness.
A sharp ache throbbed in his skull — a pounding, relentless drum of pain.
He tried to move but his limbs felt strange, foreign — smaller, weaker.
He blinked against the harsh sun, and the world looked faded, rough, like a painting left out in the rain.
His clothes were coarse and torn—linen stained with mud and sweat.
No shoes on his feet.
Calloused, scraped, raw from hard work in the fields.
A voice nearby muttered, sharp and weary — "The boy's dead. Killed by a blow to the head."
They spoke of him as if he were nothing.