I remember her before the scars.
Before the sky turned thick with smoke and the soil grew heavy with ash.
The world was alive then — not perfect, but whole.
Oceans rolled in colors that could make your chest ache. Forests whispered in tongues older than our oldest myths. Mountains stood like patient gods, their peaks dusted in snow that never melted. There were mornings when the light seemed to kiss the earth, and evenings when the horizon bled gold into the sea.
I walked her in those days.
I saw the streets of Venice before the waters rose, and the endless savannas of Kenya before the heat withered their grasses. I smelled the cherry blossoms in Kyoto, and heard the prayer calls in Istanbul ripple through the air like the breath of the world itself.
But beauty rarely dies of age.
It is murdered.
North America, the Eater of Stone, buried her skin under towers and highways, devouring the wild for profit.
South America, the Burning Lung, traded her green heart for the flame's hunger.
Europe, the Crown of Ash, wore her history in gold while her politics choked her future.
Africa, the Plundered Heart, bled into the pockets of kings who never called her home.
Asia, the Chained Giant, wrapped herself in glass and iron until her skies turned the color of sorrow.
Oceania, the Drowned Shore, ignored the rising tide until the water lapped at her very throat.
We knew she was dying, but we thought ourselves gods in the making.
We thought we could fix her, shape her, bend her.
We thought we could control the Gates.
They were our masterpiece.
Our sin.
I was there when the first one opened.
It hung in the air like a wound in the fabric of the world — a perfect circle of light, pulsing softly, its edges trembling like the surface of a dream. We stared at it with the same awe our ancestors must have felt staring at the stars for the first time.
The scientists said it was safe. They said they'd tethered it, mapped it, tamed it. The military whispered about resources, weapons, power. Politicians called it a step into the future. The people — all of us — believed.
Then… something stepped through.
At first, it looked human.
A man, tall, graceful, with eyes like polished obsidian. His smile was warm, disarming. But the light from the Gate clung to him too long, dripping from his skin like oil. And when he opened his mouth, the sound was not a voice — it was a low, grinding whisper, like stone on stone. People froze, unsure if they should run or bow.
The second shape was not human.
It dragged itself through — a thing with too many limbs, skin stretched over bone like wet parchment, its head crowned in jagged horns that scraped the Gate's edge. Its eyes burned red, not like fire, but like the glow from deep within a furnace.
By the time the third came, the screaming had started.
They didn't attack all at once. They walked, slow and certain, as if they already owned the ground beneath their feet. And then the man — the one with the smile — turned to the crowd and spoke in a tongue we didn't know, yet every ear understood.
"Your world is open now."
We didn't close the first Gate in time.
We didn't close the second. Or the third.
And then they came in waves — demons draped in human skin, behemoths with hides like living mountains, creatures that should never have existed outside a nightmare. Some wore faces we trusted. Others were grotesque beyond reason — arms like bladed branches, jaws unhinging to swallow men whole, wings so vast they eclipsed the sun.
Now, it is 2025.
Cities I once knew are nothing but bones of steel jutting from oceans of rubble. Streets I once walked are hunting grounds. Humanity hides in scattered enclaves, praying the next knock on the door is a friend, not a demon wearing your brother's smile.
I have seen the world in her glory. I have seen her in her ruin.
And I wonder — was it really the monsters that destroyed us?
Or was it the moment we decided we could open the Gates at all?
I stared deeply into the dark clouds.
It was daytime or at least I guessed it was but the sky looked like it was caught in an eclipse that refused to end. Shadows draped over the ruins like a funeral cloth.
My eyes drifted to my son, crouched on the cracked concrete, playing with the headless stuffed dog I'd scavenged months ago from the husk of a toy store. His small fingers traced its torn seams as if the missing head didn't matter. I told myself it didn't matter either.
I asked myself the same question I'd asked every day since that night:
When will I forgive myself for my wife's death?
And deeper still, a question no one could answer when will the earth forgive us?
The questions circled my mind like vultures, picking at thoughts I'd tried to bury. Minutes passed before I finally broke the silence.
"Come on, boy," I called softly. "Come inside."
He turned his head toward me and smiled the only pure smile I'd seen in years. It was fragile, yet it held something dangerous: hope. He stood, brushing dust from his trousers, and started toward me.
And that's when it happened.
A strange brilliance bled from the heavens not the red glare of firestorms, not the fractured flash of lightning, but something… unnatural. It came from the sun, that ghost we hadn't truly seen for over a decade. Its light wasn't gold. It was green.
In moments, it spread, swallowing the eclipse-dark sky until the world above was washed in a pale emerald glow. My son stopped walking, his small face tilted upward in awe. I couldn't look away either. It was beautiful hauntingly so a color that felt like it had been stolen from another world.
Then it began to fall.
Tiny particles, glowing faintly, drifted from the sky like slow-motion snow. They swayed with the wind, tumbling lazily, weightless and endless. One landed on my hand, and I flinched it was warm and cold at the same time, the way a fever chills you. The instant it touched my skin, it dissolved into nothing, leaving no trace but a strange tingle in my bones.
At first, it felt like a dream.
A good dream. The kind I hadn't dared to have since the Gates opened.
If only I had known.
If only I did know.
I would have grabbed my son and run. I would have sealed the doors, the windows, every crack that could let the world touch us.
But I didn't.
I stood there like a fool, letting him reach out for the falling green. His laughter rang in my ears, sharp and sweet the last sound I would ever remember before everything turned to horror.
I… I… couldn't do anything. One moment, my son was laughing at the green flakes drifting through the air… the next, the world tore itself open. A shape came crashing through the mist, faster than thought, a blur of muscle, fur, and hate.
The werewolf was massive its shoulders nearly as wide as a doorframe, its fur matted with dried blood, its eyes like molten gold gone feral. It moved with the kind of speed that didn't seem possible for something so large. My body froze, but my mind screamed to move, to do something.
It didn't matter.
With a single lunge, it was behind him. I saw its arm rise, claws gleaming wet in the green light and then… they punched through the back of my son's skull. The sound was wrong, a wet, sickening crack that split the air and my soul at the same time.
The claws burst out the front of his head, glistening. His body twitched, lifeless before it even hit the air.
The beast lifted him my boy dangling on those same claws, his small body limp, his eyes glassy and gone. The werewolf stared at him for a moment, head cocked, almost curious. Then it tilted its muzzle, opened its jaws wide enough to unhinge, and bit down.
The crunch was deafening.
It chewed through his legs as though they were nothing, the sound of bones splintering echoing in my skull. Blood sprayed in arcs across the broken ground. When it was done, the beast flicked its wrist and threw the rest of him his other half straight at me.
He hit my chest and slid into my arms.
For a heartbeat, I just stared. His face… it was still the same. Still wearing that smile, oblivious to his own death.
I screamed.
I screamed until my throat tore, until my lungs burned. My voice wasn't even human anymore it was a thing made of agony and hate. My mind shattered. My emotions clawed against each other like animals rage, despair, grief, all tangled into one seething madness.
My vision blurred, but not with tears. My eyes throbbed, the veins swelling until they burst red. The world narrowed to one truth I wanted to die, and if I couldn't, I wanted to kill the killer of my son.
I rushed it. I didn't think, didn't care. I hurled myself at the monster, every muscle screaming for revenge, even if it meant my death.
But who was I kidding? Who was I to believe I could hurt it?
It caught my arm mid-swing. Its claws closed around my wrist like a steel trap, crushing bone. In one fluid motion, it lifted me into the air, its other hand grabbing hold of my torso.
And then… it tore me in two.
The pain was blinding, a shockwave that hollowed me out from the inside. My body ripped apart like paper under its strength, my legs falling away as my own blood rained down.
It didn't stop there. It dragged what was left of me, tearing my limbs from my torso with deliberate, unhurried cruelty dismantling me piece by piece.
And somehow… I stayed conscious.
I couldn't move. I couldn't fight. I couldn't save him. All I could do was drown in the storm of emotions tearing through me, regret so sharp it cut deeper than claws, hatred that felt too big for my body, despair so heavy it was almost calm.
Why hadn't I told him to run? Why hadn't I pulled him inside? Why did I just stand there?
The world dimmed around me, the monster's breathing loud and steady in my ears. My blood pooled beneath me, my vision tunneling.
If one thing was clear… it was this:
I was dead.