Rebirth: Fallen Angel's Ascension

The wind, like a scavenger, persistently tugged at the torn clothes of a pale young child. His dark hair, streaked with silver, ruffled and danced in the soft violence of the night's chill.

He had pale skin, one that seemed to shimmer faintly under the hesitant green of a broken shop sign—like something that didn't quite belong in this world.

He stood on the roof of an abandoned cloth shop, gazing out over the slums of Namek City. His dark hair whipped around his face as though trying to blind him from the truth.

But there was no escape from the truth.

Not anymore.

Below, looted buildings and crumbling gutters stretched endlessly, a graveyard of broken dreams. This place stank of piss, metal, and desperation—no different from the last ten hellholes he'd wandered through.

It was foolish to pursue any kind of honest trade in places like these.

Here, honesty gets you robbed and killed.

'Robbing and killing—now that's profitable work,' he thought.

The boy turned and looked into the distance, where skyscrapers rose toward the foggy sky.

These structures were a consistent black, interrupted only by the stale neon that seemed glued to everything.

It was vastly different from the crumbling buildings and gutters that surrounded him. That was the better part of Namek City. If a business was going to survive, it would be there—uptown. After all, that place was for the richer, the less hungry, and the less desperate.

But in truth, even the ones in those buildings in the clouds were only slightly wealthier peasants—peasants nonetheless. As long as they were citizens of this type-F world, they could never be more than human filth.

And today, this particular human filth had a plan to make some money.

Lucian—though he no longer called himself that—crouched low, eyes narrowing.

He hated how natural it felt. How easy it was to slip into the mindset of a scavenger, a predator. A child. But worst of all was how his once-radiant thoughts now dripped with the same cynical venom as the humans he had once pitied.

A scream snapped him back.

Footsteps. Struggle. A girl.

His gaze tracked the alley. Three men. One girl. She resisted. Poorly.

He crept closer to the edge of the roof and watched.

The height offered a sense of safety from the madness beneath, but what point was being safe if he just died of hunger?

He blinked slowly, trying to ignore the dull ache behind his eyes. The memories were always fractured—like stained glass cracked and jumbled. Golden light, wings, a name spoken in reverence... All of it drowned in this filth, this skin.

He pressed his fingers to his temple.

He was something else… once.

And now, here he was, barefoot and starving, preparing to kill again. Because a child's body still needed food, and he could no longer conjure light or call thunder with a word.

The men turned a corner into the next alley as the girl struggled. He followed silently, crouching on the roof's edge like a hawk.

It was a clear kidnapping, and he was most definitely not the first to see it. But in the slums of Namek, minding one's business was an important trait needed for survival—and most had it.

However, today, the dark-haired boy would act differently. After all, this wasn't just a simple kidnapping. That was rare. Ransoms were never paid. The only reason they could have for taking the girl… was because she was a Chosen.

He could see the faint aura curling around her. He still saw those things, sometimes. Remnants of the Sight clung to him in the way frost did.

Chosen… touched by the divine.

A rare type of human—one picked by the gods to fight against the constant onslaught of demons.

There was a long list of reasons why the world was as broken as it was, but most would say the nightmare began after the Rapture, a thousand years ago.

The words of scripture had manifested, and the gates of hell swung open. From them, demons began to flood the Earth.

At first, humans had no choice but to die—horribly. Families watched their loved ones get slaughtered by all types of beasts, only for their souls to be dragged into hell with them.

It was an inescapable nightmare.

All anyone could do was scramble to shelters, only to prolong an inevitable end. The guns and weapons of that age proved utterly useless against the satanic beasts.

However, just when all of society seemed to have crumbled and died, a spark of hope lit the darkness—a show of pity from the celestials above.

A small number of humans were bestowed abilities by the gods—gifts that let them not just survive, but push back the demonic tide.

From there, humanity picked up the shattered pieces of civilization and has struggled to rebuild ever since.

Normally, thugs like these would be no match for a Chosen. But the girl was completely ignorant of her capabilities.

The pale boy clenched his fist as he watched them turn into another alleyway. He was pissed that these men could take advantage of someone so much more than them—simply because she was naïve.

"What a pity," the boy muttered.

With steps swift but silent, he ran to the other side of the roof, making sure he stood directly above the group.

He drew his pocketknife.

A fallen prince of the heavens… forced to trade in kidnapped prophets for bread.

The irony was so complete it almost made him smile.

Then, with a leap, he dove off the building, his knife gripped tightly in hand as it cut through the air. With a sickening crack, the blade of reinforced steel found purchase in the skull of one of the thugs.

The strike was clean.

The blade sank into bone, and the man dropped like a sack of meat. The others barely had time to react before the boy tumbled, rolled, and killed again.

His body moved cold, precise. He didn't fight like a human child.

He moved like someone who remembered war—not street fights, but battles that cracked the skies and lit up the void.

The last thug ran.

Coward.

Lucian wiped the blade, turned to the girl. She looked up, teary-eyed, hopeful.

"Thank you. You're my hero," she whispered.

He froze.

Something deep in his chest twisted—an ache that had no physical root. Her words echoed something former and painful. A title. Protector. Guardian.

He closed his eyes.

The girl smiled.

"Earlier, when I crawled out of the hole I call home," he murmured, "do you know what I felt?"

"Heroic?" she said, uncertain.

He opened his eyes. Cold again. Shut tight like a vault.

"No. Hungry."

He struck.

"Did you...forget where you are?" He muttered as her unconscious body hit the floor.

---

He hated this building. Hated the stink of smoke and rotten ideals. The Namek Police Force outpost felt like a parody of justice—a structure built to mock the concept of order.

Lucian laid the unconscious girl on the chair.

"She's a Chosen," he said flatly.

A man in a dark uniform stepped forward. He checked the back of the girl's neck—there, the star symbol confirmed her status.

"Good job. I didn't think you'd pull it off, kid."

"Great. Just pay me—I'm in a rush."

The man chuckled dryly. "Of course. But… Kasugu's men are no joke. I'm curious—how'd you get her off their hands?"

The boy clenched his fists. He'd been so focused on getting paid, he forgot the kind of people he was dealing with.

"Why does that matter?" he shot back.

"It doesn't?" The officer raised a brow. "Come to think of it… why is the back of your neck so sharply covered?"

'Shit.'

The boy's eyes darted to the exit—but the doors had already closed, manned by guards with advanced weaponry.

"Don't think of escaping. Did you forget where you are?" the officer grinned.

The boy let out a small laugh—those were his words, moments ago.

How unfortunately ironic.

He pulled off his scarf, revealing the Chosen mark. It lit up.

The concrete cracked under his feet. Energy pooled around him like coiled lightning. For a heartbeat, it was there—that otherness, the celestial weight. The part of him that even now refused to be erased.

"I warned you," he whispered.

He moved. But not fast enough. The beam tore through his chest.

His legs gave out. Blood spilled. Somewhere far away, someone screamed about profit and waste.

But Lucian just lay there.

"Are you crazy? Why'd you kill him? He could've made us a fortune!" one officer shouted.

"This one's skilled. If we let him live, he might end our lives," another replied.

The voices grew distant. The boy's vision blurred, and a bitter cold spread through him.

"Go dump his corpse on the street," an officer ordered.

'Again…'

Every time he tried to climb, he was dragged back down. His punishment was not the fall—it was the living after it.

His last thought before blacking out wasn't fear.

Just hate. Pungent and bitter hate.