The morning sun had barely breached the horizon, casting long, golden streaks across the red sands of the desert, when the people of the Ruber Clan began their march. A slow, steady caravan of life winding its way across a dead and burning world.
Azaran walked at the head, his boots crunching into the hot grit. His blue hair shimmered like a mirage in the heat, and his crimson eyes glinted with something deeper than fire. He didn't look back often. He didn't need to. They followed. They always did.
The Ruber Clan wasn't nomadic by tradition, but tradition cracked when the Great Stampede tore across the desert two weeks ago. Whole villages swallowed. Cities lost beneath the ever-churning sands. They had no choice. And so, like stubborn roots ripped from the soil, they trudged on, building and rebuilding their homes from the sunbaked stones, bleached bones, and drybrush they could find in each new place. It was survival.
The horizon shimmered with heat as if threatening to melt, and that's when the scream came.
"Glutton Worm!!"
A cry pierced the air like an arrow.
Panic.
A thunderous rumble split the sand apart like an ocean wave. From beneath rose a grotesque monstrosity—its body a pale, shifting mass of muscle and chitin, nearly thirty feet tall. Its mouth was a writhing circle of saw-like teeth, spiraling inward like a tunnel to some abyssal hell.
People screamed. Some dropped their packs and ran. Others fell. Some cursed.
But Azaran stood firm.
The wind tugged at his robes. Dust howled around him. But he didn't flinch.
He raised a single hand.
"Be reduced to cinders, trash."
The moment the words left his mouth, flame bloomed around him in a spiral of raw, unchecked power. A vortex of heat that roared to life. The air shimmered violently. Then—the flame condensed. Like a star being born, it shrunk into a narrow, burning lance.
With a flick of his hand, he released it.
[Helios Beam.]
A crimson-gold ray exploded from his palm, cutting across the desert and striking the Glutton Worm dead center in its gaping maw. There was no scream—only the sound of burning flesh, exploding ichor, and a collapsing corpse. The worm shuddered once, then fell into the sand.
Silence.
Then—
Cheers.
A chorus of awe, admiration, and praise broke out from the villagers. Their savior. Their prodigy. Their pride.
"As expected of the genius of the Ruber Clan!"
"Young master Azaran truly is the best!"
Azaran turned slightly, just enough to catch the adoration. He didn't smile. Not openly. But his eyes gleamed a little brighter.
That night, the camp was alive with quiet murmurs and flickering fires. Children laughed. Adults whispered with cautious optimism. Meat was roasting. Water was rationed. Life, somehow, continued.
Azaran sat by a low fire, chewing slowly on a slab of meat. The flames painted flickering shadows across his features. His blue hair caught the light like riverwater, and his crimson eyes reflected the fire as if they were made of molten ruby.
The mark on his face—an intricate brand curling around his left eye—seemed to pulse softly in the darkness. It wasn't alive. But sometimes it felt like it was.
Everytime he touched it he remembered the pain of that day.
But...not any hatred.
He stared at the fire, lost in thought, chewing without taste.
Footsteps. Small. Hesitant.
Two figures stood at the edge of the firelight—a boy and a girl, both dressed in rags too large for their frail bodies. Dirt smeared their faces. Their eyes, hollow from hunger and cold.
The girl stepped forward, trembling. "C-Can we... have some food, please?"
The boy clung to her leg, hiding behind her.
Azaran stared.
For a second, nothing. Just the crackle of the fire.
He was about to move—about to say something—when footsteps approached.
"Shoo! Get away from him!"
Azaran's father—the village chief—and his mother, the chieftess, stepped in quickly. Their expressions hard and tired.
"You two have had your share already," his mother said sharply. "Let him eat in peace."
The children shrunk away, fear in their eyes.
Azaran said nothing.
He looked down at his food. Then, quietly, he took a bite.
Later that night, when the fires dimmed and the wind turned cold, the two children—Lucine and Albus—huddled behind a red boulder. They had no tent. No blankets. Only each other.
The desert night was cruel.
Lucine wrapped her arms around Albus, teeth chattering. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I tried."
But then—
Warmth.
She blinked. Before them, a small fire crackled to life. A carefully wrapped piece of meat lay beside it.
Lucine gasped. "Albus—wake up!"
The two ate in silence. Tears in their eyes. Smiles, for the first time, on their faces.
They had never ate that much before and had never slept that comfortably before.
Azaran never said it was him.
But...well,it was.
Later, under the waning moon, Azaran entered his parents' tent.
His father sat with crossed arms, his mother beside him, rubbing her temples.
They looked up as he entered. Both wore the expressions of people who had seen too much. Endured too much.
"What is it?" Azaran asked.
His father looked hesitant before speaking.
His father exhaled. "We... have to go to the Human Realm."
Azaran blinked. "What?! The Human Realm? We're demons!"
He couldn't believe the words his father,a proud demon,was speaking.
"Yes," his mother said softly. "But the land we were traveling toward... it's gone. Destroyed."
Azaran stepped past them. On the stone pedestal at the back of the tent sat a glowing Messaging Crystal, dim now from used mana.
It was a handy tool for exchanging information. For the cost of a large pool of mana.
"The Romulus Duchy is impossibly far from the Human Realm," Azaran said, voice tight. "Most of our people will die before we make it."
"Then let them die!" his father snapped.
"Zeron!" his mother gasped, placing a hand on his arm.
He shoved it away and stood. Got in Azaran's face, though he had to look up to meet his son's eyes. Azaran had surpassed his father in height after all.
"We told you not to play with that useless Armin when you were little! He made you soft!"
Azaran said nothing. His face blank. His heart still.
His father grew frustrated and...
Smack.
The slap echoed.
His mother gasped, wrapping her arms around her son. "Enough!"
His father looked away, ashamed but too proud to admit it.
Azaran didn't move. Didn't flinch.
With a quiet, emotionless expression, he turned and left.
The night was colder than before.
He walked to his own tent, lay down beside the embers of his fire, and closed his eyes.
The dream came fast.
No warning. No weight. Just the rush of it swallowing him whole.
He was running.
The ground cracked underfoot, soft and snarling, a blend of mud and something that breathed. Trees loomed around him—twisted things, red as rust, their leaves whispering like hissing mouths. The trunks bled thick sap that smelled like iron and rot.
His feet moved, but he didn't tell them to. His legs pumped forward like puppets on strings, driven by something other than him.
He tried to stop. He couldn't. Maybe he didn't want to?
Branches scraped his skin like fingers trying to catch him. Shadows darted just beyond his vision. They weren't shaped like animals. They weren't shaped like anything that made sense.
Laughter echoed—not from one place, but all of them. Distant, near, inside his skull. It cracked and twisted like a broken music box.
Then the forest blinked.
Eyes opened in the soil. Pale, wet, lidless. Watching him. Judging.
Above, the sky split open and roared—not like thunder, but like a wounded thing.
He burst into a clearing. The silence hit like a slap.
A cottage stood there. Small. Too still. Like it had been waiting.
Two figures stepped from its doorway.
A woman with wild brown hair, tangled with thorns that grew from her scalp like a crown of warning. Her eyes were blue—impossibly blue—like summer sky reflected in deep water.
Next to her stood a small boy.
His eyes matched his. So did his jaw, his stance, even the slight tilt of his head. A mirror, only smaller, softer. The boy smiled and ran toward him.
Arms outstretched.
He slowed. Reached—
---
He woke.
No gasp. No start. Just a quiet breath and the weight of it fading.
He stared at the ceiling.
Then sighed.
"Maybe I really did get soft…"
End of Chapter-013