Chapter One: The Crucified Child and the Black Wing
The city stood like a fossilized corpse—crumbling towers of stone and bone, its spires twisted as if clawing toward a sky that had long forgotten the sun. Its gates were shattered, its streets drowned in silence. Fungal growth clung to the ruins like scars, glowing faintly in sickly blues and greens, as if mocking what was once life. Wind blew not with air, but with the sighs of things no longer human.
Beyond the broken walls lay a forest that should not have lived. Trees taller than bell towers loomed in silence, their bark black as soot, their branches veined with red, like blood pulsing beneath skin. The leaves never danced. They simply watched. Between the trees, mist clung to the roots, thick and silver, whispering in tongues no man could name.
And there—between forest and ruin—stood a cross.
It was not made of wood, but of iron, rusted and weeping from the joints as though it too were in pain. And nailed to it, arms outstretched, was a boy.
He could not have been older than twelve. His skin, once pale like old porcelain, had darkened under the sun's cruelty, bruised and cracked. His lips were split from thirst. His golden-brown hair had grown long and wild, tangled with dirt and dry blood, hiding most of his face—but not enough to veil the haunting beauty carved into his bones. A beauty he inherited from his mother, now twisted by torment. His lashes, long and blond, still cast shadows over his cheeks even in his suffering. His eyes—one blue, one green—remained open, unfocused, watching a world that did not watch back.
He had been hanging there for what felt like eternity. He had died once, then returned—again and again. The gift of an old man, a curse in disguise. Pain never ended; it only began anew.
Then came the sound.
A flap. Sharp and sudden, slicing through the stillness like a blade.
A crow.
It landed on the arm of the iron cross, its feathers slick and dark as ink, its eye a single mirror reflecting the boy's soul. It tilted its head, as if studying him. The boy did not flinch. He could not.
Silence stretched between them. A breathless moment in a breathless world.
Then the crow cawed—once, loud and harsh—and flew away, its wings shattering the hush of the forsaken land.
The boy's eyes followed it, weakly, but they followed. That small movement—barely a twitch—was his rebellion against death.
He watched the crow disappear into the bruised sky, and for the first time, a thought passed through his fading mind:
"I am still alive."
Before the iron and the screams, before the darkness that devoured his name, the boy lived in a world of light.
The year was 2025.
He was the only child of a woman who the world whispered about in awe and envy. A queen not of kingdoms, but of power. She was wealth woven into silk, grace etched into marble, and beauty so striking it silenced rooms. Her face adorned magazines, but behind the glamor was a mother—gentle, warm, and terrifyingly human in how deeply she loved her son.
Their home was a palace of glass and steel, rising above the clouds of the city like a tower carved from dreams. Inside, the boy was safe. He was loved. He had everything.
Yet still… he felt the darkness.
It began as whispers beneath his skin—soft, wordless shivers in the night. A silence too loud. A heaviness pressing on the edge of sleep, as though something was watching. Not from the corners of the room, but from within.
That night, he stood in the hallway, barefoot, his golden-brown hair falling into his mismatched eyes—one blue like a clear sky, the other green like deep forest. His voice trembled.
"Mama…"
She turned. Still dressed in her evening gown, a diamond at her throat, her features softened when she looked at him. Her beauty, so perfect it seemed unreal, melted into concern.
"What's wrong, my darling?"
"I…" He hesitated. "Sometimes, I feel like I'm in a dark place. Even when I'm awake. It's cold. Empty. I think it wants me."
Her brows furrowed. She knelt before him, brushing his hair from his face with hands softer than velvet. "You probably had a nightmare. It's late, habibi. Tomorrow, we'll figure it out. I promise."
She smiled. Kissed his forehead. Walked him back to bed.
She didn't know those would be the last words she'd ever say to her son.
That night, as the stars blinked beyond the glass walls, the boy closed his eyes—and never opened them again in that world.
He awoke not in warmth, but in fog.
A world of gray. Of silence.
The ground beneath him was wet and cold. The air felt like breathing in ash. And then—
A voice.
It rumbled like a mountain waking.
He turned.
And there it was.
A head—no body—floating in the fog. It was so vast, so monstrous in scale, that the boy looked like an insect by comparison. Its eyes were black voids, each one deeper than space. Its mouth never moved, but its voice echoed inside his bones.
"You do not belong here, child of light. But fate has no mercy."
The boy could not speak. His legs were shaking.
"I pity you. You will go to a place where gods have choked and monsters dream with open eyes. A land where death is mercy, and eternity is hunger."
"W-Why me?" the boy finally whispered.
The head tilted. Its voice lowered, like thunder becoming wind.
"Because someone must remember."
Then the fog spiraled around him, pulling at his body, tearing at his skin. The cold was unbearable. But just before he screamed, the old man—whatever he was—reached forward with a hand made of smoke and light and touched his chest.
A heat spread through the boy's ribs.
"You will not die—not truly. You will suffer, and survive. That is my gift. Or perhaps... my curse."
And then the head vanished.
The boy awoke in the dead city.
His lips were dry. His chest ached.
He staggered to his feet, naked and shivering, surrounded by the ruin and rot of a place that was wrong. He didn't know its name. Not yet.
But it knew his.
It watched him.
And as he took his first step on blackened stone, the crucifixion was already waiting for him.