The escape was a blur.
Asari and Aicha rushed through the narrow, oozing tunnel, its walls turning softer the deeper they went—like flesh, like rot. Every step squelched. The ground was no longer soil, but a bed of corpses mashed into mud.
They emerged into a vast chamber. Pillars made of bones stretched toward the high ceiling, and an altar stood at the center, soaked in black blood. The air was cold. Still.
Aicha's voice broke the silence. "This place... it's not just dead. It's grieving."
She wheeled herself toward a shattered stone tablet, half-buried in dust. Ancient runes lined its surface, smudged by time and decay. Asari walked to the altar. His boots sank slightly into the gore beneath.
There was a small figure lying atop it.
A child.
No, not alive. Mummified. Skin pulled tight over bones, mouth open in a silent cry. Around the altar, dozens of smaller skeletal bodies lay scattered, reaching toward it.
"They starved here," Aicha said, voice trembling. "Worshippers. Sacrifices."
"No..." Asari murmured. "They were the priests."
From the ceiling, a gentle humming began. Like a lullaby, sung by a throat filled with blood. Asari turned slowly. A black orb hovered above the altar, slowly lowering. Whispers crawled into their ears.
"You found the tomb of the Forgotten God. The god of hunger, buried by his own worshippers when he asked for their final meal..."
Asari raised his blade. "Can you feel it?"
Aicha nodded slowly. "The sorrow."
The orb cracked open.
From it, long, wiry limbs spilled—too thin, too many. A faceless figure emerged, tall and emaciated, its ribcage open like a maw. Inside it, hundreds of children's faces screamed in silence.
Aicha couldn't breathe.
"Ghost Walking."
Asari vanished. His blade struck true—cutting the limb clean off. The figure didn't react. It only tilted its head, extending another limb to brush Aicha's cheek. She recoiled, eyes wide.
Images flooded her mind.
A village starving in winter. A father eating his own hands. A mother offering her heart to her child. A god that promised salvation if they only fed him one last time—and they did.
And then they sealed him beneath the altar, feeding him with their own corpses until nothing remained but the whispers.
Aicha screamed.
Asari turned, saw her body twitching—possessed. He moved without hesitation.
"Devil Cry: Step 3 – Silence."
His blade didn't slice—it erased. The limb vanished. The creature screamed. Blood spilled from Aicha's nose as she collapsed, free.
Asari caught her. "Stay with me."
"I... saw it. Asari, it's not just a monster. It's a god that was never meant to be. A god born from grief... not faith."
The creature howled louder. The altar cracked. Bones rose from the ground, forming an army of malformed children, dragging rusted chains behind them.
Asari's grip on his blade tightened.
"Starbound Execution – Phase One."
Blades of crimson light rained from above, impaling the bone-children. The creature roared and lashed out, its chest-maw opening wide.
From within it, the voice of a crying child emerged:
> "I'm still hungry... please... feed me…"
The sadness stopped Asari's hand.
He lowered his sword slightly, eyes dark. "What if this thing never wanted to be a god? What if it was just... a starving soul?"
Aicha wiped her tears. "Then this world is more cruel than we thought."
The ceiling trembled.
Something massive shifted beneath the entire chamber—bones splitting open, a deeper entity moving in the dark below.
This was just one of its pieces.
"We're not meant to win this," Aicha whispered.
"No," Asari replied, lifting her into his arms. "But we can still run."
He activated his final step—his speed ripping through space itself.
They vanished into a tunnel, as the altar behind them collapsed and the god of sorrow cried alone in the dark.
---
> "Not every monster wanted to be born. Some were simply forgotten children, left to starve in the dark."