Deep in the ruined demon realm—now nothing but a shattered, empty wasteland—the ground was full of holes and cracks, and the smell of death drifted everywhere, carried by a cold wind that felt like it pierced straight into the soul.
The sky was covered in fractures, some huge and some tiny, as if space itself had been smashed apart. The world was pitch black, dim, and lifeless.
There wasn't a single sign of life. Just silence—thick, heavy silence—accompanied only by the cold wind.
The place looked like hell itself.
At what used to be the demon kingdom, now reduced to rubble with corpses everywhere—soldiers and civilians, the old and the young—amid the ruins of a collapsed house, there was a small child lying down with tiny horns on his forehead.
He was still breathing, trapped under the debris.
Night came in an instant.
The child, still pinned down, twitched a finger weakly but didn't wake up until the next morning.
Then his eyes slowly opened, trembling with exhaustion. His gaze was empty—like he'd already walked through the deepest layer of hell.
"Mom… dad… sis…" he whispered weakly.
Thirty minutes passed in a flash.
The kid was trying his best to stand up and crawl out from under the ruins. Bit by bit, he pushed away the broken pieces, even though most of them were way too heavy for a child—especially one already on the brink of collapse.
But he kept fighting with everything he had.
"Eugh… eugh…"
He strained against the weight, sweating, his whole body shaking—but he didn't stop.
His determination was insane. He even bit his own tongue until it bled just to keep himself conscious.
"I can't die!" he shouted weakly, full of rage.
"I HAVE to avenge my family and my homeland, no matter what!"
He screamed at the sky, tears falling down his face.
He kept pushing, fueled only by pure determination and burning anger.
Then, something that felt like rain began to fall—but it didn't feel like normal rain.
It felt like the sky itself was crying after witnessing the world's destruction.
The drops were freezing, cutting through the skin like tiny blades.
The boy kept struggling despite the icy downpour.
His face—handsome but covered in cuts—was a mess of dirt, blood, and rain. His entire body was injured.
Every time the rain touched his wounds, he shivered in pain as the cold seeped into his skin and made the injury throb.
When only his legs were still pinned, he tried lifting the debris—but it was almost impossible.
So instead, he lifted it just enough and pulled his legs out, scraping his skin, ripping it open, leaving them raw and bleeding.
He wiped his drenched face, panting hard after freeing himself, his expression twisting from the pain.
"Ahh… ahh…" he muttered under his breath.
He slowly walked out, dragging his injured, bleeding legs behind him.
His pale flesh showed through the torn skin, washed by the increasingly heavy rain.
His gaze cold, he looked around.
Everywhere he went was destroyed. No intact buildings.
He saw countless corpses of his own people—some just bones, some half-rotten, some still whole but covered in wounds.
Sometimes he even found bodies without a single fatal injury—so he checked, just in case someone was still alive.
He kept walking toward the half-collapsed palace in the distance. No rest, no shelter.
Each step was agony.
His vision grew dim; he'd been fighting for hours without food or rest.
He stayed silent for days.
He was too focused on searching for something.
On the fourth floor of a ruined structure, he finally found something familiar—though broken.
It was his sister's room.
She was a princess, and her room should've been on a higher floor.
No wonder he couldn't find it—only part of it had fallen, the rest probably destroyed completely.
He rushed inside, searching the shattered room desperately.
Then he found a small box.
Inside was a blue pendant, glowing with warm light.
There was also a letter… or so he thought.
When he picked it up, it turned out to be a holographic projection of his sister.
"Hey, little brother," she said with a gentle smile. She looked beautiful, with long, elegant horns.
"If you're seeing this, that means you survived. Or maybe you survived but never found the gift I left for you," she said lovingly.
"I prepared something for you—one last gift. It'll help you deal with the demonic energy backlash when you use your powers," she added, winking playfully.
"Oh, and… don't look for me, okay? I'm probably dead by the time you see this," she said, smiling sadly as tears rolled down her face.
"Princess! The front line has collapsed—we need to go now!" a man's voice shouted from the background.
"Alright, that's all. I hope you live well… and don't get too obsessed with revenge. Goodbye, my dear little brother,"
she said before the hologram cut off.
The boy held the pendant, trembling violently before breaking down into tears.
"No! I WILL have my revenge—whatever it takes! I swear it! I swear!"
He clenched his fists until his nails dug into his skin, rage exploding across his face, his eyes turning bloodshot.
He cried for several minutes, accompanied by the sound of rain dripping from the broken ceiling.
Cold wind blew inside, chilling him even more.
When he finally wiped his tears, his expression changed completely—calm, cold, almost adult-like.
But inside, he held back an ocean of pain and fury.
His eyes now burned with unshakable resolve.
"If I want revenge… I need to get stronger," he muttered, clenching his fist as he stood up.
"First thing's first—I need to look for skills around here that weren't looted."
Since he was only seven and weak, he never trained many abilities—just the basics.
People called him a weak, defective demon, even shunned him.
One of his parents was a pure-blood royal—his father, though not as pure as the inner royal family, who carried the strongest lineage from the Demon God.
Even so, his parents still cared for him in their own way.
And now he was the one who survived the destruction…
while his sister had fought on the frontlines to distract the enemy protecting the royal core.
He had always wondered why his homeland had to suffer such a disaster.
What had they done wrong?
He'd heard rumors that demons were seen as cruel by the outside world—but he didn't believe that.
The demons here weren't cruel.
They were just… oppressive at times, like rulers bossing around the weak.
But inside, most of them were good people with strong solidarity when danger came.
"Good on the inside" meant they acted differently when alone—less arrogant compared to when in groups.
But demons were still demons—they couldn't escape their nature.
And of course, many of them acted like complete trash too.