Blaze's eyes snapped open, but there was no light. No sound. Only the taste of rot in the air.
His breathing quickened. His fingers twitched. His heartbeat thundered in his chest like a war drum.
"...Hello…?" His voice cracked, brittle as old bones.
Silence.
Then — behind him — the whisper.
"...Blaze…"
A sharp ice-cold jolt slammed through his veins.
Blaze spun around — but there was only the void. Staring. Watching.
"Serena? Jasper?!" His voice trembled, his throat tightening. "ANYONE!?"
Nothing.
Then the void moved. Or something within it did. The sound of wet flesh dragging against itself filled his ears. Something hungry was watching.
The Forest of Butchered Innocence
The void ripped apart — and Blaze stumbled into a lush forest.
The air smelled of rain, wet soil, and rot. Birds chirped in the distance, but their calls sounded wrong — like something mimicking them.
Ahead, he saw them.
His mother. His sister. His younger self.
Seated in the grass, they laughed — like porcelain dolls oblivious to the monster looming behind them.
"...Mom?" Blaze's throat ached. "...Sis?"
Tears welled up. His legs felt like lead as he stumbled forward.
"I'm here! I'm right here!" His voice cracked, desperate.
They didn't hear him.
His mother smiled, brushing his sister's hair. His younger self laughed. But Blaze felt the air shift — thickening like coagulated blood.
Then the sky turned blood-red.
The Forest Turns to Slaughter
The birds stopped. The forest fell into deafening silence.
And then the ground exploded. Cracks of molten red split the earth, magma vomiting from beneath.
Blaze froze.
His mother's smile turned into sheer terror.
"RUN!!" she shrieked, clutching his sister's arm.
Blaze lunged forward. "NO!! I'M COMING!!"
The ground devoured itself. Flames erupted, clawing skyward. His mother's skin started melting — her flesh boiling off her bones.
His sister screamed as her hair turned to ash, her flesh peeling like burnt paper.
And his younger self…
…just stared.
Empty, hollow eyes. And then —
BOOM!
His younger self exploded. Chunks of flesh, bone, and viscera splattered across Blaze's face, the taste of blood burning his tongue.
Blaze howled in anguish, falling to his knees. His mother's body crumpled, her skull cracking open as her brain slid out like rotting meat.
And somewhere — something laughed.
A blink — and Blaze now stood in his childhood home.
The air stank of rotting meat. His mother stood in the kitchen, humming a soft tune. His sister sat on the floor, brushing her doll's hair. Their faces were peaceful — oblivious to the horror about to tear them apart.
"No… no no no no…" Blaze whispered, clutching his head. "Please, not again."
The front door didn't just open. It exploded. The frame splintered. The walls cracked. And then they came — Twelve men, faceless, wearing human skin stitched to their masks. The skin twitched, as if the faces were still alive.
"RUN!!!" Blaze bellowed, his voice shredded with desperation.
But his body did not move. His legs were cemented.
The first man grabbed his mother by the hair — and ripped her scalp clean off. Blood gushed, exposing her raw skull. She didn't even have time to scream before another man jammed his fingers into her mouth, dislocating her jaw, and ripping her tongue out like tearing the root from a flower.
"MOOOOOM!!" Blaze screamed, but it was too late.
One of the men laughed — a sound like shattered glass scraping metal. "Let's make music out of her screams."
They dragged her body to the dining table. One man grabbed a hammer — and smashed her kneecaps to powder. Her bones erupted through the skin, her wail was a sound that could never be replicated. Pure, agonizing human suffering.
Then — they pulled out rusted fishing hooks.
"NO!! PLEASE DON'T!!" Blaze bellowed.
The hooks were driven into her back. The men didn't just pull — they ripped her skin off in sheets. Chunks of flesh peeled like wet paper, exposing raw, pulsating muscle underneath.
"STOP!! GOD, PLEASE!!" Blaze sobbed, clawing his face.
The men didn't stop. One man reached into her stomach, gripping her intestines, and slowly pulled them out. The organ was still attached, slithering from her body like a snake.
"Play jump rope," one of the men hissed.
And they did — using her intestines like rope, laughing maniacally as her body convulsed. Blaze's mother howled, her vocal cords shredding as blood frothed from her mouth.
And then — one man bit into her exposed heart.
Not metaphorically. Literally. He ripped out her heart with his teeth, chewing it while her body spasmed.
Blaze's sister was paralyzed with fear. Tears streamed down her face. "B-brother… please help…"
Blaze couldn't move.
One man crouched beside her, dragging a rusted nail along her cheek, splitting the skin open. "You're such a pretty little thing…" the man hissed.
Then — he pulled out pliers.
"NOOO!!" Blaze roared.
The man ripped off her fingernails. One by one. Blood gushed from the exposed flesh, and her screams became unholy. The man then bit her fingers off entirely — chewing them while she watched.
Another man climbed on top of her and whispered, "You'll wish we killed you fast."
And they didn't.
They shoved shards of glass into her eyes, blinding her instantly. Blood poured from her sockets, her screams piercing the walls. They bent her fingers backward until they snapped off. Her bones jutted out of her skin.
But it got worse.
One man grabbed her by the legs, forced them apart, and began carving symbols into her thighs with a scalpel. Blaze vomited on himself, his screams turning into guttural wails. "STOP IT!! STOP IT!!"
The men pulled out a metal branding iron. Heated it.
Then — they shoved it inside her mouth. The smell of burning flesh filled the room as her tongue melted. She could no longer scream. Only gurgle.
Then, with the final stroke of inhuman brutality — one man produced barbed wire.
He wrapped the barbed wire around her neck and began twisting it. Her throat was sawn open as the wire sliced her skin into bloody ribbons. Her neck eventually popped.
Her head flopped sideways. Dead.
And they laughed.
One man grabbed Blaze's mother's corpse and stuffed her severed heart into his sister's mouth. The dead body still twitched, as if refusing to die. Another man picked up Blaze's sister's decapitated head and forced it onto Blaze's lap.
"Kiss her, Blaze," the man whispered. "She's still warm…"
"YOU F*ING MONSTERS!!" Blaze screeched, ripping at his own scalp, his mind completely fracturing.
The men laughed again.
Then — they began dismembering both bodies.
Limbs were hacked off. Guts were hung from the ceiling. Blaze's sister's skull was nailed to the wall, and her brain was scooped out and force-fed to Blaze's mother's corpse.
"Make her eat her daughter…" one man chuckled.
And she did. They shoved her daughter's brain into her mouth. The corpse — somehow still moving — chewed.
Blaze screamed, his vocal cords snapping. "NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!"
And then — one man turned to Blaze and whispered:
"You'll dream of this forever."
The man pulled off his mask… and it was Blaze's own face.
"You let them die, Blaze," his own voice laughed. "You could have stopped it… but you didn't."
Blaze's mind shattered. He vomited. His bladder emptied. His nails tore through his own face. "KILL ME!! PLEASE KILL ME!!"
"No…" his clone smiled. "You get to live… with the memory of this forever."
But then — his younger self stepped forward.
Faceless. Only a hollow void where his mouth and eyes should've been.
"You let us die…" the young Blaze whispered. "You watched them rip us apart…"
"I TRIED!!" Blaze sobbed. "I SWEAR I TRIED!!"
The younger Blaze grinned. "No… you are weak…"
And then — from the void of his younger self —
Venom Devolos crawled out.
The creature was no longer just a dragon. It was a colossus of living rot. Its body was stitched from human skin. Faces still screamed from its flesh. Its ribcage held hundreds of still-beating hearts — all from Blaze's family.
"YOU… ARE… WEAK!!" Devolos howled, its mouth splitting open unnaturally wide, like a maw from Hell itself.
"NOOOOOOOOO!!" Blaze tried to back away, but his own younger self grabbed his arms.
"You belong to me now…" his younger self whispered — and then FORCED Blaze's mouth open.
Devolos slammed its hand down Blaze's throat. Its rotting fingers tore through his esophagus, forcing themselves deeper. Blaze's jaw dislocated. His ribs snapped. Blood erupted from his mouth, drowning his throat.
"GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" Blaze's spine fractured. His veins bulged. Blood poured from his eyes, nose, and ears.
And then —
Devolos CRAWLED OUT OF HIM.
The creature ripped through Blaze's spine, splitting his flesh apart like a butcher carving meat. Blaze's skin peeled like wet paper. His organs spilled out, steaming in the cold air.
"YOU ARE WEAK!!!" Devolos roared, tearing Blaze's head off from the inside. His skull popped, his jaw snapping as the monster finally ripped free.
Blaze's flayed body collapsed — empty, hollowed-out like a skin sack. His eyes still blinked, despite his body now being lifeless.
Devolos turned to the still-breathing head of Blaze and whispered:
"I will wear your body now…"
And then — the creature slid into Blaze's skin.
The Monster Is Born
Blaze's body stood up — despite being completely hollowed. His organs, ribs, and spine still lay on the floor, but his flesh moved.
His mouth split unnaturally wide. His vocal cords — shredded and useless — still screamed.
"I AM DEVOLOS NOW…" the monster roared from inside Blaze's body. "AND YOUR FAMILY'S DEATH… WAS YOUR FAULT."
Blaze — still conscious, despite being just a severed head — watched in horror.
And then — the creature began skinning Blaze's sister's corpse and sewing it onto its body.
"I will wear her too…" Devolos hissed. "Your family will live forever inside me…"
"NOOOOOOOO!!!" Blaze's soul fractured, completely descending into eternal madness.
And the worst part?
He didn't die.
His consciousness was trapped inside Devolos. Forever. Forced to watch through the creature's eyes as it slaughtered city after city — consuming more families, more children — while Blaze's mind was locked in eternal torment.
His mother's voice still echoed in his head.
"Help me, Blaze…"
"Help me…"
"Why didn't you save us…?"
And as Devolos consumed its next victim, Blaze's voice screamed from inside it:
"PLEASE JUST KILL ME!!!"
But Devolos never did.
Because now, Blaze…
Was the monster.
Blaze's body jerked upright, his breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps. His lungs burned, his throat raw from screaming—though he couldn't remember if the screams had been real or trapped inside his mind. Sweat poured down his face, soaking the sheets beneath him. His heart thundered, slamming against his ribs like it was trying to tear its way out.
The room was shrouded in darkness, but something felt off—terribly, irreversibly off. The air was thick, choked with a suffocating weight that pressed down on him like an invisible force. His skin crawled as if something was still watching him, its unseen eyes digging into his flesh, carving their presence into his very bones.
His hands trembled as he gripped the damp fabric of his sheets, trying to ground himself. His body was ice-cold, despite the sweat pooling against his bare skin. Each breath felt like a struggle, as though the very atmosphere around him had grown thicker, heavier—wrong.
Serena lay beside him, undisturbed, her delicate hand resting lightly on his chest. The slow, rhythmic rise and fall of her breathing should have been reassuring, should have reminded him that he was home, safe—alive.
But Blaze didn't feel alive.
His mind was still drowning in echoes—the feeling of flesh being torn apart, the sound of bones snapping, the scent of burning skin still thick in his nostrils. The images wouldn't stop flashing behind his eyelids—his mother's headless corpse convulsing, his sister's hollowed-out flesh twitching like a puppet, the men's laughter carving into his soul like rusted blades.
His body shook violently, his breaths coming in sharp, erratic bursts.
"It was a dream… it was just a dream…"
His lips moved, but his voice didn't come out.
Blaze swallowed hard, forcing himself to breathe, to move, to shake off the horror that still clung to his skin like dried blood. He dragged his fingers through his sweat-soaked hair, his body aching as if he had been physically beaten in his sleep. His mind screamed at him to stay still, to stay right where he was.
But something called to him.
A faint hum. Dark energy pulsing in the air.
His breath hitched. He didn't want to turn his head. He didn't want to look.
But his body moved on its own.
His gaze fell upon the broken fragments of his sword, scattered across the floor just beyond the edge of the bed.
Venom Devolos.
The shattered weapon pulsed, glowing with an unnatural violet radiance, the fractured steel radiating something wrong. The light wasn't comforting. It wasn't warm. It was alive, throbbing like a heartbeat, oozing darkness into the air around it.
Blaze's breath came out shallow, uneven. His muscles tensed, screaming at him not to move, not to touch it. But his fingers were already reaching out, drawn toward the shards like a man walking toward his own execution.
His hand hovered above the largest fragment, shaking as if his body already knew what was about to happen. The moment his fingertips brushed the cold steel, a violent shock surged through him, icy tendrils of energy coiling around his veins, digging into his skin like parasites.
His vision blurred—and then the world lurched.
The darkness in the room deepened, thickening, twisting into something inhuman. The air rippled, and suddenly—
A figure stood in the mirror.
Blaze's breath caught in his throat.
At first, it looked like his reflection.
Same face. Same body. Same sweat-drenched skin.
But then—its head tilted, too slowly, too deliberately, like a predator sizing up its prey.
Blaze didn't move.
His reflection grinned.
The skin around its mouth split open, stretching impossibly wide, exposing jagged, uneven teeth—not human teeth, but something monstrous, something ancient and starving. The eyes in the mirror were no longer his.
They were cold, empty voids—a black abyss swallowing all light.
And then—
It spoke.
"It's time, Blaze…"
The voice wasn't his. It wasn't human. It was deep, guttural, layered—like a chorus of a thousand voices, whispering from the depths of the abyss.
Blaze's body locked in place.
A slow, suffocating dread crawled up his spine, seeping into every nerve, freezing him from the inside out. His heart pounded, his pulse a frantic drumbeat in his ears.
Then—the reflection moved.
Not as a mirror image.
It stepped forward.
Straight out of the glass.
Blaze tried to scream, tried to move, but his body betrayed him. His breath stilled.
And then—Devolos reached out.
A single, clawed hand stretched toward Blaze's chest.
The fingers sank inside him, passing through skin, muscle, and bone like liquid shadow. It wasn't just touching him. It was inside him, slithering through his very essence, wrapping itself around his soul.
Blaze's body convulsed violently, his back arching off the bed, his mouth finally tearing open in a scream so raw, so agonized, it sounded inhuman.
Serena didn't wake up.
She never would.
Because at that moment—
Blaze was no longer himself.
He was Venom Devolos now.
Blaze didn't think.
He grabbed his outfit.
He grabbed the broken pieces.
And he walked out.
The automatic door hissed shut behind him.
He didn't look back
Rose and Bolt See Him Leave
Rose and Bolt were walking down the hallway, carrying snacks and food, laughing about something stupid.
Then—they saw him.
"Blaze!!" Rose called, running toward him. "You're awake! Are you okay?!"
Bolt smiled. "We brought food! Jasper and the others are waiting—"
Blaze didn't respond.
He grabbed their wrists.
And without a single word—dragged them toward the spacecraft hangar.
They struggled, calling for him to stop.
Telling him about Serena. About their friends.
But Blaze didn't listen.
With a swift motion—the spacecraft lifted off.
Blaze left ExoHorizon.
And behind him—Serena still lay sleeping.
Unaware.