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The Rise Of The God Of Death
*Chapter 4: Searching*
A still silence filled the wasteland.
The black-wrapped figure who had awakened — *Daimon*, the forgotten god — sat alone among the ruins, eyes distant, breath calm. Slowly, fragments of his past began returning. Flashes of war. Of betrayal. Of power. Of the one called *Izanami*. And of the sealing.
His fists clenched.
"How long have I been gone…?"
As the fragments pieced together, Daimon stood up. His body felt strange — heavier, slower. Still powerful, yes, but not what it once was.
He walked through the dead earth. The sky above was choked in red clouds. After two hours, he reached a place where light returned — the edge of a living region.
He glanced at his hand.
"Let's see…"
He summoned a skill from his old arsenal — a blast of cursed energy meant to tear through mountains.
It came out weak. Dull. Flickering.
Not even enough to harm a trained soldier.
Daimon stood still. Calculating. Then nodded to himself.
*Two conclusions:*
*First*, the seals had worked.
Each seal contained a portion of his power — and currently, he was nowhere near his former self. What remained… felt around the *Lord* level. A fraction.
*Second*, only the *first seal* — his celestial body — had awakened. And it made sense: the key to that seal had been *time*. The 800 years he'd spent training under the Supreme Being… had finally triggered it.
He smirked.
"So… that's how it is."
He kept walking.
Eventually, he arrived at a *small village* — humble, built from stone and wood. The people there were weak. Mortals. Farmers. Children.
He could have wiped them all out with a single breath…
But he didn't. Daimon was no mindless monster. He watched them with tired, distant eyes.
He asked around — about the state of the world, the names of those in power, what had changed… but no one gave him useful answers.
They just stared at him — confused, or cautious.
He sat on the ground at the village square. Quiet. Thinking.
Some villagers thought he was a *beggar* — perhaps a traveler or a cursed veteran. They placed a few coins beside him, some even offering him food.
He didn't react.
He was thinking about his next step.
Suddenly, he noticed a *child* crying nearby — a little girl, maybe five or six years old, standing alone near a market stall.
He stood up, calmly walked to her, and crouched.
*Daimon:* "Where are your parents?"
*Kid (crying):* "I... I don't know… they left… and didn't come back…"
He stared at her for a moment, then reached into a pouch where he'd kept one of the offerings.
*Daimon:* "Want a snack to cheer up?"
The girl wiped her tears and looked up at him, blinking.
*Kid:* "...Yes, please."
He smiled faintly. Not because of joy — but because, in that moment, he remembered.
*What he once protected. What he once lost. What he must reclaim.*