BLITHE  —  Devourer of Worlds
Chapter I.II

Blithe dreamed of nothing when she slept.

In the comfort of her own space inside one of the black holes she made for herself, she laid down and rested after a job well done (according to her father).

She would always close her eyes and drift off to a dreamless sleep but this time was different.

She dreamed of a large dark hand coming towards her face accompanied by background noises consisting of a ticking clock and rain.

And then she woke up.

Too many strange things were happening to her lately and she felt her stomach churning. There was a heaviness in her chest that made it difficult to move.

She desperately tried to push it all away. She kept reminding herself that she had only one job. She just needed to obey her father’s orders. It was useless to think of such things.

But all of it kept coming back.

Burned down houses.

Destroyed buildings.

Lifeless bodies.

Pocket watch ticking.

Rain.

She shook her head and sat up. She needed something to do to avoid thinking of those things again.

But what?

She stopped. What was she supposed to do? All her life, she has done the exact same routine—obey her father's commands, do her job, train, eat and rest.

Blithe was back to square one.

“What exactly do you do to pass time?” Blithe asked herself as she rubbed her forehead.

She thought about the servants in the castle. She thought about the henchmen she commanded. She remembered their smiles and happy chatter as they talked to each other. She remembered their boisterous laughter whenever something pleased them. She remembered them getting drunk on beer after their work. She remembered them gossiping about someone else and snickering at a crude remark.

Blithe could not, for the life of her, understand what made them feel that way. For the first time in her life, she wanted what they had. She wanted to feel the way they felt to be smiling like that. She wanted to do something that could make her...

Happy.

The stone on her bedside table glowed. A voice that transmitted through it started to speak.

“Blithe, my beloved daughter, I have new orders waiting for you.”

Blithe snapped back and pushed all the things she was thinking about away. She focused on the voice coming from the stone and picked it up.

Pressing onto it, she replied promptly.

“Yes, Father.”

—

Blithe stood at the ruins of the star cluster she just destroyed.

It was business as usual but as soon as the job was done, her mind wandered again.

She took a deep breath. It was very tiring.

The thoughts kept coming back.

Instead of staying still, she decided to walk around and check for survivors just like her henchmen. Perhaps this could take things off her mind.

“Uh, Your Highness?” a henchwoman raised her eyebrows as Blithe walked past her, confused and slightly worried about where she was going.

“What?” Blithe asked with a hint of annoyance.

The henchwoman flinched with surprise, even Blithe herself was shocked with her own tone.

She immediately masked her irritation and repeated her question. “What is it?’

“U-Uh, n-nothing! I-I was just wondering where you were going,” the henchwoman stuttered, worried that she might have offended Blithe. Even though she knew Blithe was indifferent and had no emotions to spare, her response earlier made her doubt and afraid of the repercussions of her next words. She was still a high-ranking official after all. You could even say she was the princess of the Dark Empire with her status.

Blithe stared her down. The henchwoman sweated and looked at the ground, no longer able to bear to look at her red eyes. It was extremely unsettling.

“F-Forgive me, Your Highness! P-Please forget what I said!” she bowed.

Blithe looked away from her and fixed her gaze in front. “If you must really have to know, I’ll also be making sure there are no survivors as well.”

“But I don't need to tell you that, do I?” Blithe added to assert her authority.

“O-Of course! I-It won't happen again!” she shouted, trembling and still in a bowing position.

Blithe felt uneasy with what she just did.

Actually, there was no need to even respond to the henchwoman’s inquiry in the first place. Blithe could've just ignored her and she wouldn’t have pried further.

It was as if she was caught doing something she shouldn't be doing.

“You may go,” she ordered as she walked forward.

The henchwoman stood up straight and saluted. She immediately walked away at a hurried pace.

Blithe took a deep breath, cleared her mind and brushed the uneasy feelings away again.

Destroyed buildings.

Burned-down houses.

Lifeless bodies.

She sighed. It was the same sight as always. She knew it was impossible for anyone to survive. Even the henchmen were already gone from this area. It didn't take her mind off of things at all.

“This is useless,” she muttered and started to turn away.

“Uwa~!”

Blithe stopped at the faint sound. She turned her head towards the direction of where it came from.

It came from a destroyed house that still had some structure.

The house’s roof already caved in but the cracked and broken walls were still there. It leaned inward, making it look like a tent. The windows have been smashed, leaving shards of glass on the ground.

The front door had already detached from its hinges, but strangely, it still covered the opening. Physically, it should have already fallen flat to the ground but it covered the hole as if it was deliberately placed there.

She waited to hear if the sound would repeat again.

“Eeeeeeh~!”

Blithe walked towards the remains of the house and removed the door. She let it fall to the ground.

“Ehehehe~”

The sound became clearer. A tiny giggle.

Blithe leaned down to enter through the opening where the door originally was.

As she stood there, she found that even though the roof was already gone, there was still some shade being provided because of it.

Still, the inside was a mess.

“Wa… uwa~!”

She looked at the corner of the house and saw a dirty, white cloth peeking from under an overturned couch.

She walked towards it and used a little bit of gravity to move the couch out of the way.

Her eyes widened at the sight.

It was a baby. She couldn't understand how it was able to survive the attack or how it was safely tucked in the corner.

She approached it and looked down at it. The baby’s eyes locked with hers.

“Hahaha~!” the baby giggled and raised its tiny hands towards her, its fists opening and closing.

It was as if it was asking her to pick it up.

She felt weird. Her heart skipped a beat.

The gesture was so innocent that it probably had no idea that she was the reason its family and village were dead.

Then, there was a pang in her chest.

She squatted down to take a closer look. Her mind then drifted to her dream that day. She started to reach her hand towards the baby.

Then, she heard running footsteps coming her way, accompanied with a sound she recognized.

CLINK! CLINK! CLINK!

“Your Highness!”

Her hand stopped. She turned to look at the henchman that called out to her.

He was sweating and breathing heavily while he leaned on the door frame to support his body. It seemed like he ran to get here as fast as he could.

Blithe stood up and looked at him. The man forced himself to stand straight.

Blithe's eyes went to the necklace with a purple pendant around his neck. She remembered him from before—that time before it rained in that star cluster.

He swallowed before speaking again.

“I… I apologize… I made a mistake when checking for survivors,” he started and gestured at the baby in front of her.

“What made you come back here?” Blithe asked.

“Um… Earlier, I checked around this area and heard a little noise. I thought it was just an animal so I left. But I got worried and decided to check again,” he answered a little shakily.

Blithe looked at him and then at the baby. She knew he was lying. Whether it was an animal or not, a henchman would always check to make sure.

“Please, allow me to correct my mistakes. I will take care of it,” he bowed.

“Why can't I just kill you both now instead?” Blithe asked a question displaying the absurdness of his suggestion.

“I-I…” the henchman stammered.

Blithe squatted once more to get closer to the baby. She hovered her hand in front of the baby’s face, checking for something. She imitated what she saw in her dream, or rather, maybe it was a long-lost memory.

Panic rose in the henchmen when he saw what she was doing. “Your Highness, please forgive me for my negligence! Allow me to take care of the problem!”

Blithe closed her hand and looked at the baby. It was staring at her with awe. It then started to giggle again and smile at her. The baby had no inkling of how much danger it was in. And it made her wonder… Was she also like this when she was a baby?

Of course she had no memories of that time but as far as she could remember, she was already training to do whatever her father wanted her to do.

Back to a time when she felt nothing at all.

Blithe closed her hand and tucked the baby in the blanket it was wrapped in. She stood up and started walking past the henchman.

“Do what you must do,” Blithe said.

The henchman gasped in surprise, not expecting her to let it go.

“Y-Yes, Your Highness!”

Blithe could hear him scrambling to get to the baby and pick it up.

She could hear him run away.

As Blithe walked back, the henchwoman who stopped her before was quietly standing on the side. She was making herself look busy but Blithe could see her glancing at her nervously and then back to the direction she came from.

She could only assume that she was the one who told the other henchman that she was heading in that direction.

Blithe ignored her. She ignored her own unease. She ignored the logical explanation that these two were doing something out of her commands. She ignored the tiny voice in her mind telling her to do her job right.

She closed her eyes and reasoned with it.

“It's just one baby. It's not going to make a difference. It's not like Father would know anyway, as long as I don't mention it in my report.”

She paused, her mind suddenly imagining that she was in the place of that baby. It made her skin crawl at the thought that someone would even dare to harm her — a tiny being who was helpless and had no chance of fighting back.

She covered her mouth and gagged.

C-R-A-C-K.