Chapter 1: The Cry
Deep within the Void Mansion, where shadows clung thicker than blood and the air carried the perpetual chill of forgotten graves, a boy lay motionless in his mother's arms.
His features were ethereal, sharp yet youthful, fragile yet imbued with an eerie, divine beauty that seemed to mock the madness that had claimed him. Long spiked hair, black as the abyss, framed a face pale as moonlit porcelain. His closed eyes hid crimson depths that had not opened in sixteen long years.
Damon Rim, the Child of Insanity.
Dora, his mother, cradled him as though he were still the newborn she had birthed beneath a blood-red sky. Her fingers traced his hair with infinite gentleness, stroking strands that felt both silken and cold. Her voice, cracked by endless grief, wove a broken lullaby through the silent chamber, a melody of sorrow and fading hope.
Tears carved shining paths down her cheeks, falling onto his unmoving skin like offerings to a sleeping god.
"Please… call to me, my sweet boy," she whispered, lips trembling. "Just once. Let me hear your voice again."
For a moment longer she lingered, memorising the weight of him, the faint rise and fall of breath that proved he still lived. Then, with a soft sob swallowed behind closed lips, she rose and retreated into the adjoining washroom. The door closed with a quiet click, and her muffled weeping faded into running water.
Silence reclaimed the chamber.
Then, a ripple.
A low, resonant hum threaded through the air, felt more in the bones than heard by the ears. Outside the tall arched windows, the clear Avalonian sky bled into crimson. Clouds boiled and twisted as though the heavens themselves had been wounded. The world below shuddered under the scarlet glow.
Across the continent, beasts threw back their heads and howled in unison. Birds plummeted from the sky, wings clawing at feathers until flesh tore. Men and women of every realm fell to their knees, fingers raking skin as an inexplicable madness surged through their blood.
Within the Void Mansion, servants collapsed in the corridors, clutching their skulls as terror consumed them. The very walls seemed to pulse with burning Void Energy.
On the grand bed of black stone and silken shadow, Damon's eyes opened.
Crimson irises ignited like twin stars born from apocalypse.
A spark, of life and death intertwined, flared within those depths.
Then came the laughter.
Dark. Unrestrained. Ancient.
"Hahaha! I'm alive!"
The sound rolled through the mansion like a curse carved into the air itself, shaking dust from ancient rafters and freezing the hearts of all who heard it.
Before he could rise, slender arms encircled him from behind, pulling him into a desperate embrace.
"My boy! It's Mama! You're awake, truly awake!" Dora's voice broke with joy and disbelief, tears soaking into his robes as she clutched him as though he might dissolve into shadow.
Damon froze for a single heartbeat.
He knew this warmth. He knew this voice.
For sixteen years he had dwelt within this broken vessel, trapped in silence, watching the world through fractured eyes, aware yet powerless. This woman was his mother in this life, flesh of his flesh, blood of his blood.
A faint, genuine smile touched his lips.
"Mother," he said softly, the word tasting both foreign and familiar. "Do not trouble yourself."
Dora gasped. It was the first time he had ever called her Mother. The single syllable shattered what remained of her restraint. She held him tighter, body wracked with silent sobs of relief, feeling clarity return to eyes that had known only vacant madness for so long.
But the warmth could not last.
Damon's gaze drifted across the chamber, settling on a patch of shadow in the far corner that did not quite match the others.
"Why do you still conceal yourself?" he asked quietly, voice shifting from tender to something colder, edged with ancient steel.
Dora tensed instantly, maternal instinct warring with trained battle reflexes. She eased back, adopting a subtle guard stance.
Damon rose from the bed with fluid grace unnatural for a body so long dormant. His smile grew colder.
"Mother," he repeated, tone almost gentle, "why strain yourself over such a rat?"
His hand extended.
On a nearby ebony table, a simple dagger lifted into the air as though plucked by invisible strings. It flew into his palm with a soft whisper of steel.
Before thought could become action, Damon vanished, reappearing beside the shadowed corner in a blur too swift for mortal eyes.
"Do not worry," he murmured to the darkness. "I'll fish you out myself."
From the gloom, a woman emerged, clad in servant's garb, twin daggers gleaming in her hands. Her face was one Dora knew well: Lisa, her personal maid of many years.
But before Lisa could speak or strike, Damon's blade pressed forward, sliding smoothly into her abdomen, halting mere inches from her core.
Veins rose along Damon's neck like black rivers as killing intent flooded the room, thick and suffocating.
"Do you know," he whispered, lips brushing her ear, "how long I have dreamed of killing you?"
"Damon, wait!" Dora cried, horror cracking her voice. "That's Lisa, my maid!"
Damon's smile did not waver. "Do not worry, Mother. She will explain everything… in front of Grandfather."
Lisa's eyes widened in raw terror. Her body trembled, but she dared not shift, if she moved even a fraction, the blade would pierce her core and end her cultivation forever.
"Wait… you can't possibly !"
The great doors slammed open with thunderous force.
An old man stepped across the threshold, his presence alone causing the air to bow. Power rolled from him in invisible waves, of pure Void Energy so refined it warped light and sound. His bones radiated an aura that made the mansion itself tremble in reverence.
If one lacked discernment, they might mistake him for a dragon descended from the heavens.
"Grandfather," Damon murmured, genuine reverence softening his tone for the first time.
Old Man Thomas wasted no words. In a blur of motion, he appeared before Damon.
"My boy," he said, voice deep as the roots of mountains, "why keep this one alive?"
Lisa opened her mouth "Eh !" but her plea died unborn.
Thomas flicked two fingers.
Her head burst soundlessly, like an overripe fruit crushed by unseen pressure. Blood and bone painted the wall in a brief, silent arc.
Thomas turned back to his grandson, expression softening. Despite the terrifying power coiled within him, he knelt and drew Damon into a firm yet gentle embrace, pride and love radiating from ancient eyes.
"You have slumbered far too long, my boy."
Damon returned the gaze steadily. He knew this man, the one who had visited every night without fail, silently pouring pure Void essence into his ruined body, mending what could be mended, preserving what could not.
"Grandfather," he asked quietly, "where is my father?"
The temperature in the chamber plummeted.
Dora's hands trembled. Thomas's eyes darkened like storm clouds gathering over an abyss.
"Your father…" Thomas began, drawing a slow, heavy breath. "When you were born beneath that cursed sky, Gerald challenged King Balarok to protect your life. He was strong, strong enough to nearly claim Balarok's head. But four great powers intervened, striking him down in unison. That was how your talent was stolen, your pathways destroyed."
Damon's crimson eyes hardened, jaw tightening until veins pulsed at his temples.
"But Gerald still lives," Thomas continued, aura flaring briefly and shaking the mansion's foundations. "He is held captive in the Palace of Darkness. If I could tear that place apart with my bare hands !"
"Old man," Damon interrupted softly, voice calm yet carrying undeniable command. "Restrain your anger. We are not yet ready for war."
He turned back to his mother, allowing her to pull him close once more. For a fleeting moment, he rested against her warmth, eyes half-closing.
Thomas watched in silence, heart uneasy. The boy before him felt… different. Beneath that serene surface slept a stillness too vast, a power too deep to fathom.
Is this truly my grandson? the old man wondered.
Yet a faint, excited smile tugged at his lips.
These old bones… they are stirring again.
He turned away, voice low but steady. "Rest now, my boy. When you wake, I will introduce you to someone."
Damon offered no reply. He simply closed his eyes and leaned into his mother's embrace, the barest flicker of a smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
For the first time in sixteen years, silence returned to the Void Mansion.
But beneath that silence, something ancient stirred, something that should have remained sleeping through endless cycles of madness.
And deep within, a voice older than stars whispered with childlike glee:
Oh… this is going to be so much fun.