There was a scream. That’s how it always starts isn’t it? That’s because an attack in the night is the most effective, as the poor girl who just died found out.
These were my thoughts as the recently murdered soul flitted up to me. A feather falling in reverse. I dimly wondered what she was experiencing, being between death and me. Though I knew I would never know.
The spirit drew near and I prepared myself. The newly dead could be… unsettling. The orb like essence stretched and morphed, becoming a human shape. Almost.
Coal skin, spindly limbs, blank face. A walking nightmare. She had done terrible things in her life and it shows in death. I knew, I had known her since she was born. Hell, I knew when her parent’s parents were born.
I knew it was coming, the revelation of her transgressions, yet I was still taken aback. It hurt to look at her, knowing what I must do. I knew what I’d have to do with her when she came into this world. I knew I’d be sending this soul back to Hell, but that didn’t make it any easier.
People think Hell is some fiery pit of slavery and evil specially made for the world’s scum. No. Hell is where they’re born, Hell is where they live, Hell is where they breed, and Hell is where they die. Hell is their home, and it’s overflowing again. World wars, nuclear bombs, earthquakes, tsunamis, none of it could deter humanity’s numbers. Temporary solutions to a permanent problem.
They had one rule, the original two.
“Don’t eat the fruit.”
They hadn’t known it, but that fruit was what kept their world so perfect. All worlds have evil, it was just concentrated into an apple tree within this one. Like the myth of Pandora, when the apple’s seal was broken it unleashed every problem humanity would have until the end of its days.
It had been many many centuries since then and I can no longer watch my once beloved creation kill itself. There was one solution, but it was absolute and there would be no coming back. That wasn’t important to me, I had long-lost the will to fight a losing battle, and I had tired of watching it spiral into chaos.
I closed all of my senses, it would take much focus to leave, and I didn’t plan on ever coming back. I would go and another half would take charge, the stronger half, the more willful half.
I had no idea how long I had stayed like that, it was impossible to know. All I knew was power. I felt… free. Released from a prison I never knew. I knew what I looked like without having to gaze upon myself once. Dark red, bubbling and flowing skin over thick cords of muscle, like a statue of blood. Goat horns protruding from my head, branches on a tree. Coarse goat legs to counter the smooth pointed tail flicking behind me. The dark red skin of my chiseled body writhed and bubbled, boiling blood.
My appearance hadn’t worried me, however the movement below me did. A sprawling canvas under me, writhing with beings resembling me in the most basic of ways.
Utter contempt filled me. Blind with inexplicable rage, I willed every single one of them to bulge and burst. I commanded their pathetic hovels to implode and burn. I caused a rain of molten metal and blood.
The rivers of red pleased me. The screams comforted me. The scent of copper soothed me. Yet I felt unease. Screams? After all had practically exploded?
Then I saw it. Millions upon millions of souls, black as sin, flying towards me. I hadn’t realized until the first volley pierced my skin, I did this to myself.
Every single being down on that rock was a small piece of me and in my last bout of anger I had corrupted the little good left in my world.
Grief consumed me. I collapsed under the barrage of my mistakes.
My fault… My fault… I did this… My fault.. My fault. My fault my fault my fault mine mine minemineminemine…… OURS
I wasn’t alone. I never was. I had myself, many many tiny pieces of myself. Even then I had them pouring from me, tears of new life, of new sin, streaming down my face. New souls to inhabit the true Hell, a reflection of our nature as a whole.
I never had to feel alone again. I willed myself into as many souls as I could, destroying my omnipotence, destroying my will to control, destroying my will to create. I will be one of you, I will squabble in the dirt for dominance, I will reproduce and teach my offspring the same evil ways I now embrace. I will be one of you, corrupt and unjust, but beautifully free. Just like I am now, you are my children. I am the origin. This is my end. This is our beginning.