The blade slides in slow.
Not because I'm hesitant—but because I want to feel everything.
The pain.
The failure.
The end.
It parts my stomach just below the ribs, a clean horizontal line that opens flesh like paper. My breath catches—not in shock, but in something deeper. Something darker. The punishment I deserve.
The shrine behind me is silent. Even the wind has stopped to watch.
Blood pours out warm, steady, almost peaceful. I expected to scream. To panic. But all I feel is the ache—the one that's been there long before this blade ever touched my skin.
The ache of being forsaken.
My knees slam into the stone. Hard. A cruel echo bounces off the broken tiles. I fall forward, one hand smearing red across the sacred floor.
This was for you.
My fingers tremble as I press them to the ground—this ground consecrated to the sun goddess herself.
AMATERASU.
You promised light. You promised fate. You promised I'd be chosen.
I cough. Blood splatters against the stone, warm on my lips.
"You lied," I whisper. "You saw me kneel, burn incense, offer prayer, sacrifice..."
A bitter laugh tears from my throat.
"I gave you everything."
Not even a breeze stirs in reply. No warmth. No salvation. Just the stink of blood and the cold silence of heaven.
I thought death would mean something. That a life like mine, thrown away at the altar of gods and honor, would at least be acknowledged.
But the sky remains gray.
Unmoved.
Uninterested.
Where were you when they called me worthless? When they spat on my name? When they stripped my cultivation and cast me out?
You were watching.
And you did nothing.
"You never wanted me strong. Just obedient."
My breath comes slower. My vision starts to blur.
This is it.
The end.
My cheek hits the pool of blood. I can't move. I don't want to.
Let it be over.
Let me be forgotten.
Then—
A sound.
Like silk tearing. No wind. No voice. Just pressure.
Something cracks beneath my skin—not bone. Something deeper.
A violent thrum pulses through my dying body, and suddenly the blood around me… glows.
Not gold.
Not sunlight.
Violet. Deep and cursed.
A second martial soul rises from my chest, forged in shadows. It twists upward like a blade, shaped like a sword but alive. Breathing. Watching.
And beneath the silence…
Something laughs.
Not kindly.
Not divine.
Something darker than gods.
Let the Sun Be Damned"
---
I should have cursed her sooner.
Not now, when I'm half-dead in a pool of my own blood.
Not now, when it's too late to take anything back.
I was a fool.
I worshipped her. Bled for her. I gave everything I had to serve her light.
My kingdom fell piece by piece, and still I burned incense in her name. Still I raised my sword in her honor, convinced she would deliver us. That she would see my loyalty, my faith, and give us a future.
But where was she?
Where were you, Amaterasu?
When my people screamed?
When my brother died with arrows in his back?
When my mother's head rolled across temple stones—your temple stones?
You watched.
You watched it all from your gilded throne behind the clouds, and you did nothing.
You let my kingdom be consumed.
You let me survive, only to suffer in shame, wandering the land like a dog with no name.
You promised me we would rise again.
You whispered to me in prayer and fire that I was chosen. That I bore your favor. That the kingdom's bloodline ran through me for a reason.
Liar.
You lied.
You used me until I had nothing left—and then turned away the moment I knelt in failure.
So here.
Take this final prayer, o goddess of light.
Let it carry with my last breath.
May your name be forgotten. May your temples crumble. May your golden sun blacken and fall from the sky.
Let the world remember what I now know:
The gods are cowards draped in praise.
I once feared your wrath.
Now I welcome it.
Strike me down if you dare.
But you won't. You never do.
You just watch.
You always watch.
The blood keeps coming.
Hot. Relentless. Endless.
It stains the earth like ink poured from a broken oath.
My fingers twitch once. Then stop.
My legs are already numb.
The world blurs at the edges—smearing color, smearing light.
Even her name feels heavy now.
Amaterasu.
I spit it one last time like poison from my mouth.
It hits the stone and vanishes in the rain.
I feel cold. But not just in the body.
In the soul.
Like something sacred inside me has been carved out, hollowed, left to rot.
I close my eyes, not in peace—but in surrender.
This is it.
Not a warrior's end.
Not a martyr's glory.
Just a forgotten corpse in a ruined shrine.
So I let go.
Of hate.
Of hope.
Of everything.
And then—
I lay down.
And die.