Pain had been the first thing he ever understood.
Not the sharp kind that fades after a wound closes, but the slow, suffocating kind that seeps into the bones and stays there. The kind that shapes a person before they even realize they are being shaped.
He had not been born special.
He had not been loved.
His father drank and cursed the day he was born. His mother spoke to him only when necessary, and even then her words carried annoyance rather than warmth. At school, he was an easy target. Too quiet. Too thin. Too alone.
When he tried to defend himself, he was beaten harder.
When he stayed silent, they mocked him.
Eventually, he stopped trying.
Years passed like that.
He grew older, but nothing improved. He left school, found work, lost work. The world had no space for someone without connections, talent, or presence. He existed in the background of life, unseen and unwanted.
But he remembered.
He remembered every face.
Every laugh.
Every shove into the dirt.
Every whispered insult.
Resentment became the only thing he owned.
And resentment does not fade with time.
It ferments.
By the time he was an old man, he no longer felt sadness. Only a cold clarity remained.
He had nothing to lose.
So he began erasing the past.
One by one.
Carefully.
Patiently.
The people who had tormented him in his youth had grown older, softer, complacent. They did not remember him. Why would they? He had been insignificant.
That was their mistake.
When the police finally found him, he did not resist. He had already accomplished what he wanted.
As the gun was raised and aimed at his chest, he looked at the officer without fear.
For the first time in his life, he felt control.
The shot echoed.
And everything went dark.
When awareness returned, it did not come with pain.
There was no hospital ceiling above him. No beeping machines. No smell of antiseptic.
Instead, there was heat.
Thick, suffocating heat.
He opened his eyes slowly.
The sky above him was red.
Not the soft red of sunset, but a deep, bleeding crimson. Black clouds twisted unnaturally, like living things coiling across the heavens.
He tried to breathe—and froze.
The air smelled rotten.
Burned.
Decayed.
His body felt wrong.
He lifted what should have been his hand.
It was not flesh.
It was dark. Glossy. Shifting.
His limb moved like liquid shadow, stretching slightly before retracting back into a distorted shape.
He stared at it in silence.
"I… died."
The memory of the gunshot was clear.
So this was not a hospital.
And this was not Earth.
A distant explosion shook the ground.
His attention snapped toward the source.
Two grotesque beings were fighting across the wasteland. One resembled a towering beast covered in bone-like armor. The other was an unnatural mass of limbs and eyes, shrieking as violent energy surged around it.
The power they released distorted the air itself.
He felt it.
Energy.
Raw and overwhelming.
Something inside him stirred.
Not fear.
Interest.
He forced his strange body forward. It moved without bones, flowing across the cracked terrain like living tar. The sensation was alien, but instinct guided him.
The battle ended quickly.
One of the creatures tore through the other, but it too was heavily wounded.
It staggered.
And that was when he moved.
His body expanded instinctively, stretching outward like a wave of darkness. Before the creature could react, it was engulfed.
There was no resistance.
No struggle.
It simply vanished inside him.
And then the pain came.
His consciousness exploded with foreign memories.
Images not his own flooded his mind—violence, hunger, survival. Instincts layered upon instincts. A new sensation of energy ignited within him, swirling violently through his formless body.
He nearly lost himself in it.
But he endured.
When the pain subsided, he understood something terrifying.
He had consumed it.
Not just its flesh.
Its power.
He could feel it now—an energy coiling within him, waiting to be used.
The second creature, witnessing what had happened, attempted to flee.
He did not hesitate.
He devoured it as well.
More pain.
More memories.
More power.
When it was over, silence returned to the wasteland.
He remained alone beneath the crimson sky.
But he was no longer weak.
He experimented.
Focusing inward, he sensed the energy he had gained. It was chaotic, unstable, yet responsive to his will.
Slowly, he shaped it.
A sphere began forming at the edge of his distorted limb. Black and violet currents spiraled together, crackling with violent force. The ground beneath him fractured from the pressure alone.
He understood instinctively.
If released, it would destroy everything in front of him.
A strange sensation rose within him.
It was not joy.
It was not relief.
It was satisfaction.
In his previous life, he had been powerless.
Here—
Power answered him.
Far above the crimson world, in a realm of blinding light, seven immense presences stirred.
They did not have physical forms in the mortal sense. They were concepts given will, authority given awareness.
One of them shifted slightly.
"Something has awakened."
Another presence focused its perception downward.
"It feels… tainted."
A third spoke, its voice echoing like distant thunder.
"The remnants of Him."
Silence fell among the seven.
They had destroyed the Evil God long ago.
His body had been cast into the forsaken land far from civilization—a place where only abominations survived.
Yet now—
Something was moving there.
Below, in the wasteland of ruin, the creature who had once been a forgotten man gazed toward the horizon.
He felt it.
A presence far greater than the monsters he had consumed.
Ancient.
Overwhelming.
Calling to him.
He did not know what it was.
But he knew one thing.
He would devour it.
Because in this world—
He was no longer prey.
He was hunger.
And hunger does not die.