Tagline: Power doesn't corrupt the broken—it completes them.
---
The village at the forest's edge didn't ask questions.
When two children appeared out of the mist—filthy, bruised, bloodless-eyed—no one screamed. No one welcomed them, either.
The people here understood silence. They understood what not to ask. And they knew the old forest sometimes offered up things that shouldn't be refused.
Naomi and Silas were taken in by an old woman called Mira, who lived alone at the edge of the path. She had no family. No teeth. And no reason to fear children who didn't sleep.
They learned fast.
Faster than they should've.
Within weeks, Silas was fluent in the local dialect, reading forbidden grimoires he found in Mira's attic. Naomi, meanwhile, had taken to weaving threads in patterns that seemed... alive.
Mira called them angels.
She was wrong.
---
One night, as the wind howled and the trees scratched against the walls, Silas sat beside the fire with a book older than the village itself. Naomi lay on the floor nearby, her fingers glowing faintly as silver threads danced from her nails.
"Do you ever think about the first time?" she asked.
Silas didn't look up. "Which one?"
"The first time you killed."
He closed the book.
"I was six. His name was Reuben. He broke my fingers because I took a bite of bread he thought was his."
Naomi turned to look at him. "So you killed him?"
"No," Silas said. "I waited. Three weeks. Broke his legs first. Then drowned him in the well."
Silence.
"Did you feel anything?"
"I felt calm."
Naomi nodded.
"I think I was seven," she whispered. "My mother tried to burn my hands for touching my father's knife."
Silas raised an eyebrow. "Did you kill her?"
"No," Naomi said. "But I made sure she burned instead."
Their eyes met.
There was no judgment. No shock.
Only recognition.
"You know what that makes us, right?" Silas asked.
Naomi smiled faintly. "Alive?"
"Correct."
---
Two days later, the system interface returned.
> ❖ [Ability Awakening Protocol – Ritual-Born Priority Access]
❖ [Designating Core Sin: USER—SILAS CREED]
❖ [Unlocked Title: Bearer of Ultimate Sin]
❖ [Primary Traits: Wrath, Envy, Gluttony, Greed, Pride, Lust, Sloth]
❖ [Status: All Sins Unlocked. Growth Tied to Usage.]
Silas grinned. His body trembled—not with fear, but hunger.
The fire behind his eyes was real now.
Naomi stepped back as black and gold lines etched across his arms.
"What does it feel like?" she asked.
"Like I'm full for the first time."
Then her interface blinked open.
> ❖ [Ability Awakening Protocol – Ritual-Born Priority Access]
❖ [Designating Thread Code: USER—NAOMI KISARAGI]
❖ [Unlocked Title: Severer of Fate]
❖ [Primary Traits: Causality Severance, Temporal Threading, Probability Control]
❖ [Status: Partial Thread Activation. Instability: Moderate]
Naomi's threads burst into flame, then cooled.
Her irises flickered silver.
She didn't speak.
Silas stared at her, curious.
"Why threads?"
Naomi shrugged. "Because I want to choose who gets cut off from the future."
He stepped closer. "And what about me?"
She looked up, eyes unreadable. "You don't have a future. Just a path of fire."
Silas laughed. "Then I'll light the way for you."
And for the first time since their rebirth, Naomi didn't flinch from his smile.
---
That night, they walked out into the forest.
They found a deer.
Naomi tested her threads.
Silas tested Gluttony.
The deer didn't die. It unmade.
Its scream echoed in the bones of the trees.
"Do you regret anything?" Naomi asked quietly.
Silas turned his head.
"Yes," he said.
She blinked. "What?"
"I regret not doing this sooner."
She smiled.
It wasn't warm.
But it wasn't fake either.
---