I told you it was coming back.
Only in Death Does Duty End
Chapter One
The Siege of Heaven
Cedric stood among the carnage, his gaze tracing the horizon where Heaven's once-impenetrable gates now lay breached.
His senses, keen beyond mortal measure, could pick out every detail of the destruction that spanned before him. What was once a bastion of purity had become pure desolation, and he could not help but feel the weight of each life extinguished—a burden that pressed heavily upon his ancient soul.
His armor, once a slick onyx sheen, was now dulled by the grime of blood and the ash of obliteration. It clung to him, every drop a testament to the lives snuffed out in the pursuit of a war that now seemed senseless in its conclusion. The metallic tang of iron filled his nostrils, a sharp contrast to the usual sulfurous brimstone of the Infernal Empire from whence he came.
Cedric's hands, clad in gauntlets that had deflected a thousand blows, trembled with the fury of helplessness. He clenched them, trying to quell the shaking, only to find the action ground the gritty remnants of conflict deeper into his weathered skin, embedding the tragedy into his very being.
The ground, once known for its sanctity, now squelched under Cedric's heavy boots with a sickening sound. With each step, he trod on the shattered remnants of wings and dreams, the blood-soaked soil a graveyard for aspirations as heavenly light dimmed from the bodies of the celestial.
He remembered the thrill of being one of Heaven's cherished, the unwavering faith and comradery of the Seraphim. Now, those memories were stained like the very earth beneath him. The hallowed fields of Elysia, where he once basked in the glow of divine grace, lay in ruin, anointed with the entrails of a war that knew no victor.
Elysia's survivors wailed in anguish, their cries piercing through the heavy silence left in the wake of relentless savagery. Cedric's ears rang with the lamentations of the dying, the symphony of sorrow resonating within the hollow chambers of his war-weary heart.
Bodies of the once mighty lay strewn across the battlefield, a distorted mosaic of devastation. Lords and soldiers, brilliant minds and valiant hearts, all reduced to mere husks, eyes vacant and staring into nothingness.
Some were cleaved in half, others disemboweled, their innards creating a macabre artwork upon the ground.
The blood—it was everywhere, seeping like a tide into every crevice and pit. It painted the shattered gates in horrific splendor, rivulets flowing as if trying to escape the scene of their owners' ultimate sacrifice.
Cedric's reflection, caught in a stray piece of polished shield debris, showed a warrior draped in gore and sorrow. His once piercing crimson eyes, which had burned with conviction, now flickered with the shadows of doubt and despair.
Around him, the smoldering remnants of angelic armor glinted in the feeble light, their once magnificent halos dimmed and broken. The dead warriors' faces were locked in expressions of shock and agony, their final moments spent in the realization that they were not impervious to mortality.
No divine intervention had saved them from the feral clashes of blade and claw. The Fallen, those whom Cedric stood alongside beneath Heaven's banner in the Aether War, had become harbingers of their own doom, their own kind's obliteration.
Blades and spears lay discarded, no longer held by valiant hands instead clutched by the cold fingers of death. Pooling vitae from countless beings anointed the weapons, granting them an unintentional consecration through their united sacrament of sacrifice.
Among the mangled corpses, the Fallen's vestiges of winged glory lay in tatters. Their plumage, once a testament to their stature, was now muddied and rent, mingled with the feathers of true angels, indistinguishable in their shared desecration.
He passed by a young devil, scarcely more than a boy whose face was frozen in a grimace of eternal anguish. His entrails spilled like a bizarre bloom from his torn abdomen, a vivid reminder of just how fragile life could be, even for those who thought themselves immortal.
Heavy with exhaustion, Cedric observed an angel impaled upon a spear, their once radiant aura sputtering like a dying star. The purity of their being had been corrupted by the stygian weapon that now held them aloft—a grotesque monument to the war's utter futility.
Cedric closed his eyes for a moment, hoping to escape the visceral tapestry of death. Yet the darkness behind his lids provided no refuge, instead bombarding him with the haunting faces of those lost. It was a private hell for which there was no reprieve, a mental torture chamber of grief and regret.
The sky, shrouded in a funereal veil, reflected the somber mood of the battlefield. Even the heavens seemed to mourn, their bright expanse stained by the dark smoke rising from the charred remains of siege engines and funeral pyres.
Cedric's heart, an organ long thought impervious to ache, now throbbed with the pain of realization. This tragedy, this colossal devastation, had been the result of one being's pride and wrath—an unfathomable cost for an unfathomably high price paid in the currency of souls.
He thought of Lucifer, the Morning Star, whose brilliance had once inspired awe and devotion. How had such radiance dimmed to the point where it led to this grim dusk? Cedric's loyalty, once unshakeable, had become a shroud of doubts and recriminations.
His ears picked up the soft footfalls of survivors amidst the threnody of the crows. They were gathering their dead, murmuring prayers for souls that would find no solace in the heavens from which they had been cast out or the hell that they had fought for.
Cedric lifted his gaze to the sky once more, now speckled with the first signs of stars. He knew the cosmos bore witness to their deeds, chronicling the sorrow of a battle that had raged beneath the gaze of indifferent constellations.
He stumbled upon a tableau of unity in death: an angel and devil locked in an eternal embrace, their final act one of desperate humanity amidst the madness. Their intertwined fingers were a silent plea for forgiveness, for an end to the vendetta that had consumed them both.
"Cedric?"
The call was faint, almost lost amidst the cacophony of the aftermath. Cedric, his senses dulled by the relentless assault on his spirit, paused mid-step, his head turning slightly, his gaze piercing through the devastation.
"Hello?" The sound seemed distant. A whisper carried on a breeze reeking of iron and fire.
"Cedric."
It was clear now, insistent yet strained, a voice he knew as intimately as his own. His searching eyes caught movement, slight and pale against the crimson-drenched ground.
Cedric's heart skipped as he spotted the ethereal glow beneath the grisly heap. A hand, delicate and unmarred, protruded from the slain—a beacon amidst the sea of desolation.
With a newfound urgency, he wove through the carnage, his steps hastening until he was at the pile's edge. Grasping the hand, he felt its warmth, a stark contrast to the cold, lifeless grip of death surrounding them.
It was Gabriel, an archangel of Heaven, her wings now dirtied and limp, yet she clung to life. Cedric remembered her laughter, the way it used to fill the halls of the celestial domain—a sibling in all but blood.
With care born from a time he thought forgotten, he drew her free from the tangled mass of bodies, each movement a silent apology for the fall that had come to pass.
Cedric carried her with ease born of his infernal strength, laying her gently upon the untouched grass of a nearby clearing that the shadows of death had not yet reached.
He knelt beside her, eyes scanning over the once-pristine Seraphim Armor that mirrored his past. He looked for wounds, for the telltale signs of fatal injury amidst the divine metalwork.
"Are you alright, sister?" His voice was rough with unshed emotion, a spectral pain echoing from the depths of his devastated heart.
Gabriel laughed, though it was a sound marred by the phlegm of blood. "How I've longed to hear that word from you, brother." Her smile was weak but genuine, as if, in this ruin, they had recaptured a glimpse of what was.
Cedric felt a lump form in his throat, the remains of a wall he had built when he chose to fall with the Morning Star. "Gabriel, I—" He struggled to find the words, the apology, the plea for forgiveness.
"Oh, Cedric," Gabriel murmured, reaching a trembling hand to touch the helm that obscured his face, her fingers tracing the contours as if remembering the face beneath. "You need not say it. This war... has taken more from us than we could ever have imagined."
"Taken from us?" Cedric echoed bitterly. "No, we surrendered it willingly when we followed him into the abyss. When we thought our cause greater than His grace."
Gabriel coughed, a splatter of blood staining her pale lips. "Perhaps we did. But even in our misguided fervor, there was love, Cedric. Love for our kin, for what we believed was right."
Cedric looked away, his eyes catching on a scene not far off—a pair of fallen angels, their hands clasped in a final, desperate plea for mercy that never came. "Love... It seems a cruel jest now, sister. To whisper of love in a graveyard of our making."
She reached for him again, her grip surprisingly strong. "Not a jest, brother. A reminder—a reminder that even in the darkest of nights, the possibility of dawn remains."
"How can you speak of dawn?" He gestured to the battlefield. "Look around you, Gabriel. See the price of this 'possibility.'"
"I do see it, Cedric," she replied softly. "I see the lives given in fervor, the sacrifices made in the name of pride. But I also see you here, beside me, when you could have left me to the vultures."
A pained smile twisted Cedric's lips as he gently wiped the blood from her mouth. "I could never leave you thus, regardless of the chasm that stands between our allegiances."
"Then let that be the spark," Gabriel insisted. "Let our refusal to abandon each other, even now, be the ember that kindles a new path."
Cedric lowered his head, the helm hiding the conflict that danced within his eyes. "Is there a path left for us, sister? A way forward from this abyss into which we've fallen?"
"There must be," she whispered fervently. "For if there is not, then all this"—she gestured weakly to the surrounding devastation—"is truly for naught."
Cedric held her gaze, finding in her eyes a sliver of the faith that had once been his guiding star.
"I wish I could believe your words, sister," Cedric replied, his voice a whispered echo of defeat. "But you and I have lost everything. Lucifer is but dust and our Father is dead. Slain."
Gabriel, though weakened, summoned the remains of her celestial resolve, her fingers tightening around his. "Is it not in the very depths of loss that faith finds its true test? We are still here, Cedric. We breathe, we speak—hope is not yet extinguished."
Hope, is a concept so fragile in the midst of such despair. Cedric contemplated her words, the battlefield around them offering a silent reproach.
"Hope?" He glanced at the ruin, the bodies of comrades and kin mangled in monstrous repose, their spilled blood mingling into rivers of crimson sorrow. "Dare we hope amidst this apocalypse of our own making?"
She coughed again, a splattering of blood painting her once radiant face. "Dare we not?" she rasped. "To surrender to despair is to dishonor those who fell for what they believed. Their sacrifices must kindle a fire within us—a fire for redemption, for change."
Cedric's gaze fell upon an angel, scarcely more than a child, whose lifeless hand still clutched the hilt of a sword that had pierced the heart of a demon. Both lay silent, a testament to the futility of a war where neither side could claim victory.
"Redemption," he mused bitterly. "Can there be such a thing for us? The living may yet seek it, but what of the dead? What redemption can we offer them?"
Gabriel's eyes flickered with the vestiges of her divine light. "We honor them by living, by making certain their ends are not in vain. We owe them a future where this..." she gestured weakly to the horror around them, "never comes to pass again."
Cedric turned his gaze skyward, where the smoke from funeral pyres twisted against the dimming light. "And how do we build such a future, sister? With what strength do we defy the legacy left to us by the very architect of our rebellion?"
"With the strength that remains in our hearts," she insisted, her voice growing fainter. "With the purity of our intent and with allies who share our vision for a new order."
"Allies?" Cedric's eyes narrowed as he considered the survivors among the ranks, those whose loyalty had been to a cause now buried beneath the weight of their lost leaders. "The very fabric of our allegiance is torn, Gabriel. Trust is but a memory."
"Then we must weave a new tapestry," she whispered, her breaths shallow but determined. "Trust can be rebuilt, brother. There will be others who share our yearning for peace—a peace bought dearly with the blood of our brothers and sisters."
Cedric lowered his gaze to meet hers, the embers of conviction in her eyes stirring something within him—something he had believed scorched from his being. "And if we fail, sister? If the tides of vengeance and pride rise once more to drown us?"
Gabriel gave a small, serene smile despite the agony she no doubt felt.
"Then we stand against the tide together."
The words, spoken with a rough authority, slice through the thick air, but they do not come from Cedric or Gabriel. The timbre of the voice is too laden with the resonance of the earth, too grounded in the tumult of mortal combat.
Cedric's head snaps toward the source, his crimson eyes widening marginally in recognition. "Azazel," he acknowledges, the name heavy with a tangle of history and conflict.
The figure approaching them is worn yet imposing, the embodiment of the Fallen's struggles and survival. Azazel, once a beacon of Heaven's might, now carries the scars of his rebellion etched into his flesh, his visage a mosaic of what had been and what had come to pass.
Cyrus studies the Grigori patriarch, noting how the wreckage of war has not spared him. Azazel's proud wings are tattered, feathers amiss and stained with the blood of comrades and foes alike. His armor, dented and scorched, tells of fierce battles that survived, of defiance beyond measure.
"Cedric, you look..." Azazel's voice trails, his eyes scanning the tableau of destruction before them—a landscape of ruination where the remains of celestial and infernal beings lie intermingled in death's final embrace. "...Well, I'm sure you know."
Azazel comes to a knee across from Cedric, his movements deliberate, respectful of the devastation surrounding them. He reaches out, a hand weathered by the millennia, and gently brushes it across Gabriel's pallid cheek. The blood there, now drying, smears further under his touch.
"Are you alright, sister?" His voice is gruff with concern, his gaze searching hers for the vitality he hopes has not yet fled.
Gabriel's laugh is weak but imbued with the lightness of nostalgia. "I feel as though we are back home, and you two are fussing over me after a spar with Metatron."
Cedric allows a terse smile, though his heart aches at the memory. "Those were simpler times before our divisions ripped the cosmos."
Azazel's eyes darken, the memories stark against the present. "Simpler, perhaps, but we were naive. The heavens were not without their strife, even then."
Gabriel's breathing is shallow, her time running short, yet her spirit remains unyielding. "The heaven we knew is lost to us now. We must build a new sanctuary, not just for us but for all."
Azazel nods, his gaze lingering on the bodies of the Grigori strewn about, their limbs interlocked with the angels they once called kin. "A sanctuary for the weary souls, for those tarnished by the war of the self-righteous."
Cedric's eyes stray to a young demon whose chest has been caved in, a celestial spear still embedded within. "And what of them, Azazel? The young ones who knew only the rhetoric of supremacy and retribution?"
"We teach them," Azazel asserts firmly. "We teach them of our failures, of the cost of arrogance and the price of defiance."
Gabriel's hand reaches out to each of them, her grip trembling with the effort. "Then let us be the architects of a new age. May our hands, stained though they are, lay the foundation for a future where none shall endure this fate."
A silence falls, the words hanging amidst the cries of the wounded and the somber cawing of carrion birds above. In the distance, a hellhound drags a body, its teeth sunk deep into the flesh of what once was an adversary.
"Not everyone will listen," Cedric said, the stark truth of his words cutting through the tentative truce like a blade. Azazel's eyes, once fierce with the fire of rebellion, dimmed as the hope seemed to seep away. Cedric was right—too many generations had been nursed on the bitter milk of war, raised to see the other as nothing more than an enemy to be crushed.
A fourth voice, robust and commanding, pierced the heavy air. "Then we shall make them listen."
Cedric's instinct drew his gaze upward, where the figure of Michael descended, flanked by a vanguard of Seraph guards. Their armor gleamed despite the hellish landscape below, though it could not hide the signs of the war they had borne—the nicks and tarnishes telling of brutal combat.
For the first time, Cedric's attention broadened past his immediate surroundings. He noticed beyond the crumpled forms of the fallen, behind Azazel stood a trio of Fallen Angels. They were gaunt, faces etched with fatigue, and clutched their weapons with a grim resolve. Among them, the dignified presence of Shemhazai was unmistakable, his once splendid wings now a tattered banner of endurance.
As Cedric's eyes shifted back to his kind, he saw several Devils forging through the battlefield to join their assembly. The regal stride of Archduke Zekram Bael was at the forefront, followed by Duke Zargath Phenex, each accompanied by nobles from the coterie of the 72 pillars.
Every eye told stories of loss and uncertainty, for they were now a congregation without leaders, a hierarchy in disarray.
Michael's arrival marked a silence, save for the groans of the wounded and the mournful dirge of the wind as it carried the ashes of the dead. "The time for division is past," he announced, his voice resonant with an authority that had once commanded legions across the skies.
Azazel rose to his full height, his gaze meeting Michael's with the weariness of one who has seen too much death. "And who will lead us in this new era, Michael? We who have been adversaries for so long—the very thought breeds skepticism."
Cedric nodded, his armored hands clenched at his sides. "Azazel speaks truly. The animosity runs deep, and blood has been spilled too freely. To quench the thirst for vengeance will take more than words."
Michael surveyed the desolate fields, his eyes pausing on the forms of angels and demons entwined in death's final dance. "It begins with us," he said, gesturing to those around him. "If we, the mightiest among our kind, cannot lay down our arms, what hope is there for the rest?"
Zekram Bael stepped forward, the weight of his noble lineage clear in his bearing. "Our kin look to us for guidance. The pillars of Hell have crumbled, and from their ashes, we must find the strength to rebuild."
Zargath Phenex, his cloak fluttering like a phoenix's fiery plume, added his voice to the chorus. "Not as devils, angels, or fallen, but as beings united against the ravages of war which have scourged our realms."
Gabriel, her voice but a whisper, spoke with a fervor that belied her waning form. "Let this desecration be the last. Let the memory of this horror fuel our resolve."
Azazel, shifting his gaze over the noble devils and the angelic host, let out a measured breath. "Easier said than done. Trust is a fragile thing, easily shattered, and we stand on a foundation of broken glass."
Shemhazai, stepping forth from the trio of guardians, his voice hoarse from shouting commands and incantations, spoke up. "Then let us tread carefully, but let us tread forward nonetheless. We owe it to those whose voices have been silenced forever."
Cedric's eyes swept back to the fallen, their bodies contorted in the agony of their last moments, the ground beneath them saturated with blood that would never dry. "Every step will be drenched in their memory. We walk a path paved with the shards of paradise and the embers of hell."
Michael nodded solemnly, his wings reflecting the dying light. "So be it. Let us walk together until trust is forged anew in the heart of every angel, every devil, every fallen. This bloodied soil will bear witness to our covenant."
Azazel's gaze met Cedric's, a silent query passing between them. They had been through the crucible, and now they stood at the precipice of an uncertain future—one that held as much promise as peril.
Could it truly be as straightforward as speaking a vow, clasping hands, and looking each other in the eye? Cedric, his heart shadowed by decades of conflict, harbored his doubts. Yet as he surveyed the faces of those he once called brethren—those who had shared the same celestial light—he understood with crystalline clarity: they had to make it work. It wasn't merely a choice; it was a necessity carved from the loss that surrounded them.
Cedric extended a hand toward Gabriel, his gesture one of solidarity—as much an offer of support as it was an acknowledgment of their joint purpose. The Seraphim's eyes lingered on his gauntleted palm, reflecting the vestiges of war and division. Yet, without hesitation, she reached out, her own hand frail in comparison, and clasped his with a resolve that belied her weakened state.
Gently, Cedric lifted her, her body light as though her spirit carried the essence of her weight. There was a shared strength in the action, an unspoken pact that transcended their past animosities—a silent oath to bridge the chasm that had grown between their kind.
"Then let this be our vow," Cedric's voice began, solemn and clear, rising above the chilling silence of the battlefield.
He felt the eyes of every surviving angel, devil, and fallen upon them, witnesses to the consecration of their future.
"On the blood of our fathers and the blood of our sons," Gabriel continued, her voice steady despite her languor, "we swear to uphold this promise and stand against the tide."
Each word was a stone laid upon the foundation of a new future, a future they would forge from the shattered remnants of their war-torn realms. It was a vow made amidst the stark reality of their losses, amidst the still, blood-drenched bodies of their kin.
"For all that we are and for all we have yet to become," they concluded together, the surrounding throng of celestial and infernal beings echoing the sentiment—a chorus of many, united at last.
The vow hung in the air, a binding force, a beacon of hope.
And at that moment, with the cool wind carrying the promise to the stars and the blood-soaked earth, the seeds of peace were sown by warriors born of strife.
It would take time, and it would require the mending of countless wounds, but for the first time in a long age, there existed the possibility of a world without the shadow of war.
And yet a question beckoned the minds of all who stood upon that field.
Were it so easy.