The freezing cold wind of the southern terrain whistled through the wretched wooden cabins of Gilgal Village, carrying the scent of dried earth and the desolation of mortals.
That night, under a thunderous stormy sky, debating noises rose up.
In one of the most distant collapsing cabins of the village, a lady with short blue hair grabbed the tied bamboo bed with a grim face.
"I can't! Just let me go and save the child," the lady said with tears falling from her eyes. But at that same time, an old woman with white hair stood by the lady's side holding her arm while other women wearing long white dresses rushed out of the room.
She urged the lady to push whenever she felt like giving up. But at last, the lady's grim face changed slightly as a tiny human head pierced through her stretched legs.
The pain in the lady increased when the old lady cut the cord connecting her and the baby. White-hot lightning surged through the sky, followed by a deep rumble when the cord got separated.
Small tears continued to fall from the lady's face as the old lady handed her the baby and walked out as well.
"He's a beautiful boy, that's good. His name will be… Kai. Just as his father would give," the lady said with a gentle smile, but at the same time, small tears continued to fall from her face.
Footsteps moved up and down at the entrance of the room she was in. Though her labor was done with the help of the priestess of the village and some people who called themselves nurses, she felt rejected.
She remained in the sequence of brushing her hands on the curly black and blue hair the child had, trying to let a cry out of the baby when she brought the baby to her chest.
Hearing no cry became the second priority when she saw the baby's eyes shut, as if glued. From the lady's eyes, the tears that had stopped earlier began to fall more than usual.
The baby in her arms moved a hand and grabbed the lady's finger and moved it to its mouth. The baby sucked the finger. But when the lady tried to break her finger free from the baby's grip, she couldn't.
No matter how much she tried to position the grabbed finger, it ended up in the child's disposal.
"My… baby… Kai. Is he blind? No, no. God! Why?" she shouted as a terrible pain rose in her soul. It was total abomination. Silence, guilt, pain.
She saw a flicker of blue and red light erupting slightly underneath the baby's eye skin.
The light erupting from the baby's eyes doubled whenever the sky rumbled with lightning. Rain began to pour down heavily when the baby's eyes finally opened. Streams of colorful lightning tore through the sky, giving the dark night sky a daylike exposure.
Five separate lightning strikes fell from the sky to the ground, hitting the edges of the building they were in.
The baby in the lady's arms looked at her while blinking attentively. The baby's eyes were bright as the moon and sun placed alongside each other. There was nothing—no pupils, no life—only two distinct lights, blue and red.
That immediately made her feel like a terrible mother. She knew how hard life was for those who lived in this region. Crippled children were discarded early because only the strong would survive and be of help to the village in the future.
She felt guilty. Guilty that her son was not born with the health necessary to survive. Though she experienced the strength the child had, she pitied the life he would have to live, the hardship he would have to endure.
"Forgive me… Kai," she said one last time before taking the deepest breath she could and looked at the sky through the holes in the walls.
She closed her eyes and tilted her gaze toward the baby. "It's just you and me. So, no matter what happens, I won't let anything happen to you. Even if I have to die to protect you, I will," she said with a gentle smile as she brushed her hand through the baby's hair. Little by little, the baby's eyes closed, seeming to fall asleep.
…
Two months passed quickly, and the situation in Gilgal Village remained the same. Kai's mother, Ayra, hid her baby at home whenever she wanted to go out and look for food.
Kai's father was the village's pride—the one who stood and made the village not go under slavery and also not be cast out by monsters. And because of that, even after his disappearance, Ayra still had a stock of food piled. Besides, the village's priestess sometimes appeared and delivered some food to her.
All the gifts and food the villagers brought to her began to reduce whenever they came and saw her and not the baby. They were all interested to see the baby, to know whether he'd be like his father or not. But the more she rejected their seeing the child, the more their gifts stopped coming.
If they saw the child's split eyes, nothing good would have happened to either her or the child. Being the only one to have this misfortune, Ayra had no other choice than to put her life at risk and save the child if possible.
More time passed.
…
Today was Kai's birthday.
Ayra woke up suddenly, feeling something touching her face with cold fingers.
"Mommy… wake up, I'm hungry," a cute voice sounded from a baby on Ayra's bed.
She quickly woke up, pulling the baby to her chest, kissing his head, and brushing her hand through his hair.
"Good morning, son!" she said with a bright smile. The bright morning sun's rays tore through the holes in the wall and lightened the room.
In recent months, Ayra's initial worry about her son had completely disappeared.
Kai never cried or complained. While she heard other children in the village screaming for milk or attention, her son always remained quiet, watching everything with those slightly big, pupil-less eyes.
Ayra noticed her son seemed to move through every direction smoothly, without slamming himself against any object or wall. And when things were in the way, she saw him moving over them if they were small and under them if they were huge.
"Kai… my child… you can see, right?" she whispered to him with wailing eyes.
Kai smiled at her as if saying yes, though he didn't understand what she was saying.
She was right. Kai was never blind. Since birth, his vision was completely normal. But there was something different, something no one there would understand—not even the priestess herself.
Everywhere Kai looked since birth, shadows danced in the air, intertwining absolutely everywhere—something no mortal in the remote village they were in would know existed. But Kai could see them perfectly, and whenever he could, he instinctively tried to grab them or call them with his small hands.
When Ayra saw him doing this, she didn't understand but knew her son was different from any other child. Not only did she know, she felt he wasn't just given to her as a child, but was given to her as a treasure no one had ever seen before.
Kai quickly began to walk within a few days. Before he was six months old, he could already speak and converse with his mother. Ayra talked to him every day and every hour. Kai gradually managed to imitate what she said. And little by little, she taught him the meaning of words.
"Mommy… mommy… I can't breathe," the little baby shouted with his head buried between Ayra's breasts while his little hands tried to break himself free from her.
"Oh, sorry. Hehe."
When Ayra let go of Kai, she saw his eyes.
"Kai. Your eyes, your eyes. How? They've changed to one color. Blue," she said, holding him while staring deep into Kai's eyes.
At that moment, Kai was also surprised. Because beside the shadows he had always been seeing, he could now see strange light around his mother and himself.
…
When Kai turned one and a half, a faint ring of a circle appeared in his completely blue eyes—like a sketch of a pupil.
But not only that, Kai could feel the vibration of every object he looked at. He could differentiate between humans and objects without even opening his eyes.
And when his eyes were opened, he saw all lifeless objects having the same glow around them. But for living organisms like humans, birds, and insects, they all had different glows around them when his gaze fell on them. Even rats and cockroaches had one of their own.
After turning one and a half years old, Ayra thought of showing Kai to others, since the main thing that made her hide the child was now gone—the red eye color he had. After all, her son was a genius no one had ever seen in the village.
But Ayra realized she had acted badly. Instead of people thinking Kai was amazing or praising his intelligence, all she heard were murmurs and insults from people.
All their insults surged mainly because as soon as other children saw Kai, they started crying or running to their parents, saying he was a monster.
Moreover, coincidentally, shortly after Ayra tried to introduce Kai to others, including the friends she had in the past, people in the village began disappearing without explanation.
And when all five children of the last friend she visited vanished, a whisper spread through the village.
"It's his fault. Since that cursed child appeared, ten children and five youths have disappeared."
"It's his fault, yes. He is a monster. He must be expelled from the village or be thrown into the ocean where the monsters were buried decades ago."
Ayra heard these words from people who once respected her and treated her like a sister. She felt abandoned when her very sister slapped her and pushed her out of her house when she visited.
From that moment onward, no one helped her with food, work, or anything that could make life worth living.
It was then that Kai, seeing his mother suffer, tied a band around his eyes. Despite the band, he could still see perfectly well.
'Maybe if I hide them… Mommy will suffer less.'
At first, he thought her suffering had reduced, but as time flew by, not even a bird flew by their door.
…
Kai never forgot anything. He remembered the face his mother had when he opened his eyes for the first time. The extremely gentle smile she had on her face was his best memory in his mind.
He remembered the names of all the children in the village who called him a monster. He had the band on, yet no one wanted to get close to him. Not that Kai cared; the only thing that made him happy and feel human was to stay by his mother's side.
One day, when exploring the bushes of the village alone, Kai found two men dressed in war dress. Though he was small, he had heard stories of them, so he knew. He watched them as they trained with swords that seemed to pulse with life while the leaves fell on his head.
He focused his eyes on every movement of the men. For some reason, he found it interesting, and when they stopped, he moved from his hiding place in the bushes and began to walk away.
When he returned home, he showed the movements to his mother using a single strip of broom.
Though he couldn't make the strip of broom shimmer with life, he was able to imitate the moves perfectly.
"Kai, where did you learn that?" Ayra asked, extremely surprised. She remembered her husband's training, and it was so similar and impossible for her son to learn that within just a few minutes or even days.
"I saw the men dressed in metal suits dancing strangely like that. Isn't it fun? I liked it a lot, but what is the dance for?" Kai asked with an innocent smile.
His mother laughed at his joke, but deep down, an extreme happiness arose in her.
"If you're really this genius, I worry less. You will be someone strong. You have to be," Ayra thought while stroking Kai's hair and explained what the men were doing.
Dried leaves fell outside their door as nighttime reached. Every building in the village brightened as tiny fires were placed at the windows despite the wind moving along the streets.
Tree branches shook as shadowy creatures jumped on them, one tree after another. Silence fell on Gilgal Village as the moon's light shone bright over the roofs of both strong and wretched ceilings.