In the place where it all began, joy once lived. Now, only ruin remains — a hollow echo of the happiness that was lost. The ground, scarred by fire and grief, stands as a memorial to those who died here… and those who died fighting for it. Before five gravestones, each crowned with a single almost withered flower, stood a man — silent, remembering. Kayden was holding a new batch of flowers in his hand. In his hand was a piece of paper cup, inside was five flowers made out of paper. He placed the paper cup on the ground and picked one flower and placed on top of the gravestone, and did the same for the rest. It has been a year since the tragic events that occurred in this place. Kayden was wearing a white polo shirt and a pair of black pants, both were raggedy and partially torn.
He looks... Almost broken.
He decided to come back to his home and visit his now deceased family. He made paper flowers instead of real ones because real flowers die so fast and paper could last much longer. He stood before his family's graves and tears began shedding from his face. Sudden happy memories of his family flashed in his mind, he deeply missed them and regret living to see their deaths happen.
One year earlier, after Kayden slammed on the ground and passing out, he caught a glimpse of his family's deaths. After that he should've died, his life flashed before him, all good and bad. But he heard a voice echoing and he suddenly woke up. Before him stood a man wearing a helmet attached with a flashlight, on his face was a gas mask, and on his body was a military uniform. He couldn't hear clearly what he was saying or shouting at him. Everything was blurry and all he could hear is ringing in his ear.
'The military...? What? What took them so long?' Kayden took a second to look away from the shouting soldier and shifted his head to his left. There he saw his family's mangled corpses getting eaten by a demon. His heart stopped beating for a second, his eyes widened and his blood runs cold. His vision was slowly getting back to normal as well as his hearing. This time he could now hear the soldier shouting at him.
"Sir! You have to get out of hear it is not safe!" The kind soldier held out his hand to Kayden. "Grab my hand and I will bring you to safety!" Kayden slowly turned his face towards the soldier with his face still in full shock. Noticing how Kayden is unable to move and in a state of shock, the kind soldier quickly grabbed him to carry him on his back. The eating demon however, didn't took long to notice the kind soldier and was already in a stance to attack. The soldier curses and pulled out his assault rifle and begin shooting the demon. The loud noise from the assault rifle was loud enough to bring Kayden back to his senses.
He looked at the soldier and then his family's corpses where the demon stood. He tried to stand up but he felt a painful sensation on his side. He looked over only to see the stainless knife was piercing his body, to his luck the knife wasn't as deep as he thought but it was still deep regardless. He tried getting the knife out but a single touch from the knife brings a huge wave of pain throughout his body. The kind soldier successfully killed the demon in front of them and noticed Kayden back to his senses, he then crouched to lend Kayden a hand but when he did, the same demon lunged at him and tore his head off in a single strike.
Blood sprayed out from his neck where the head was supposed to be attached and his body dropped dead. Kayden frozen from the sudden surprise attack his whole body shivered. The demon approached the dead body of the soldier to enjoy a brand new fresh meat but couldn't help but notice Kayden shaking intensely near the corpse. The demon felt lucky to be feasting on two humans in one hunt. The demon bared its sharp claws and teeth, it spreads its wings and lunged at Kayden but, the demon stopped.
Right before the demon's mouth reach Kayden, he had removed the stainless knife and aimed the demons chest to wear he thought the heart might be. When the demon lunged, he was struck at the chest with the knife and dropped dead, or so Kayden thought. A demon has no heart thus striking it at the chest doesn't kill it but temporary slows them down, but Kayden wasn't aware of this information and knowledge and so is anyone. Shortly after being struck at the chest, the demon slowly raised its head upward and flapped its wings making him fly for a short distance. Kayden held firmly on the knife and removed it when the demon flew away from Kayden. It flicked its head to Kayden, ready to strike yet another attack. But the demon was acting strange, as if almost its gasping for air, its breathing was rough and its flight was unstable. Soon the demon finally made its attack by flying towards Kayden and attempting to sweep his head clean with its sharp claws.
Due to demon seems to be having trouble breathing, the attempted attack was slow which Kayden barely managed to avoid. The demon crashed into the debris right beside Kayden and did not move, it was gasping for air. This was an opportunity to attack and kill the hideous bastard, he couldn't let his chance pass. Enduring the pain from his broken legs and bleeding from his side, Kayden stood up and stabbed the demon multiple times at the chest even more. He noticed that the first attack he did was slowly regenerating so he kept stabbing the demon. It was like a scene from a horror movie but the roles were switched. Kayden was screaming and cursing at the demon and laughed like a crazy person.
The demon attempted a pathetic attack and swung its claws to Kayden but it failed. Kayden stabbed the demon's shoulders and legs making the demon unable to move. He then grabbed the demon by the neck and slowly sliced it like a butcher to a pig. He kept slicing the neck of the demon faster in each second until its head came right off along with its bones.
"...Red blood? You bastards don't deserve to be bleeding the same color as we are."
He spat on the demons decapitated body and threw its head. He then walked over to the kind soldier that had tried to help him, and begged for forgiveness.
"I'm sorry, I-I'm sorry. If only I recovered more faster you wouldn't be like this. I'm sorry sir"
Kayden saw the soldier's surname stitched on the left chest of his uniform written "Cruz". It was the surname of the soldier that saved his life. All of a sudden, a surge of pain, traveled through his entire body, the pain that never felt because of the adrenaline is now taking effect. Because of the shock and the blood loss, Kayden passed out holding Cruz's body.
***
Kayden picked up the piece of paper cup from the floor and looked around him. All of the houses, his neighbors, all of them have gravestones inside. Just like him, there were survivors from the attack and there were some who fought off the monsters and died. Those who survived had placed gravestones inside their former home to bury their deceased families. Some houses doesn't have gravestones either because no one from it survived or all of them got away and died somewhere else.
'...I would've been really dead if It wasn't for the military. When i woke up, I was inside a military camp a couple of miles away from our home.'
While in his thoughts, a female voice came from behind Kayden calling him.