joy.

“My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.”

---James 1:2-4---

Snowfall made no sound in the frigid, ghastly night.

No sound resounded from through the obsidian midnight, but not as a silent night should be.

For you see, in this night, the silence was much like entering a mysterious place of unsettling atmosphere, unsure if monsters were lurking in the towering shadows.

A static ring, much like when the eardrum is damaged was the sound reflected in the night’s cutting breeze.

Though the weather was well below the double digits, if you had stood in that snow, a sweat would’ve come upon your brow, for a tense, crippling feeling of bloodcurdling horror was among that starless night.

Oh, that starless night. The raven night flew away, colliding with the tongues of hell flame and the blood of cadaverous victims who once were blessed with breath. Slaughter was the sound the enemy’s footsteps made, and their movements tainting the once innocent snow.

Slaughter.

The innumerable amount of corpses riddles my mind, even in my deepest of sleep. If the souls were specs of sand, the ocean would be only water. If the lives were counted by stars, just as the legends of the Evaithya believed, then constellations would forevermore be incomplete.

Only a few pinpricks in the galaxy’s fabric would be remnant, for what was lost was tragic in calculation.

Five countries had been destroyed, by wickedness only a true demon could possess.

Yes, from that night and onwards, the stars are no more...

I don’t recall what they look like anymore. Those who remember the horrific event believe the stars were eaten by the ravenous flames that surrounded those souls unfortunate to be there.

In my desolate heart, I have started to believe such a tall tale.

I was one of the lamentable, and I viewed every moment in tearful dismay.

I fought in vain. I protected to no avail. I stayed loyal and lost what I had kept devotion to for so long.

I lived past that night, but for what purpose?

I...lived for what?

I...only I lived.