The bell tolled. Signaling his awakening; an invitation to break through his cocoon of flesh and bone. The shrill ringing reverberated through his freezing body laid upon the marble slab. He could feel every distinct undertone with whatever inch of skin that touched it. High above those who adored him, those that could never reach this enlightened state, nothing but thin sheets and curtains separated them.

Caius sat up, sluggishly as he listened to their hymns, as if his body was just a puppet on a string. He looked down at the crowd. “Benedicat messis nostra,” they chanted. He listened to his fellow people one last time before settling back down.

“Benedicite itinera nostra,” He rested his hands on his chest.

“Benedic dies nostros et benedic noctes nostras,” He suddenly became aware of the flakiness of the caked blood beneath him. So many souls had gone through this with no avail.

“Benedic animabus nostris,”

His soon to be killers stood above him, seeing him as nothing more than a sacrificial lamb, a means to an end, just another disgrace that society saw as unfit. They held him down though he didn’t struggle. This was meant to be. There wasn’t much he could do to change his outcome. If this was for the greater good for his people then he would do it.

The executioners raised their weapons above their hidden faces, masked and cloaked to hide the shame all murderers share, to seem more ruthless in Caius’ final moments, to instill as much fear as they could into him. The two of them joined in with the rest of the gathering. The last words he’d ever hear. “Et eos qui nobis nocent remove.”

Weeks went by and he was long forgotten, nothing but a mass of rotting meat for the flies  alongside the molding fruit they landed on. The nights had grown colder with each passing day. No one would dare to come here at such a frigid hour. No one would see him fulfill his purpose.

The moonlight filtered through the cloth and clouds to reach him. The night invited him to show them his true blessing, to rise with a new focus, to heal them all. “Awake, Caius.” The wind called. “Don your new role. Become the savior they have longed for.”

The man sat up with no travail. He paid no mind to the stab wounds in his neck in chest nor the foul state of his skin. There was no need to. He had transcended into something more. He was no longer human, no longer tied down, no longer sane. He had been killed to get to this point. That kind of anger and pain doesn’t just go away.

“I am Caius!” He yelled from atop the altar. “Your offering has brought me peace and for you nothing but suffering!” As he spoke, bits and pieces of him fell away, nothing but a pile of tissue and bone surrounded his feet. He had changed. He was nothing more than starlight embodied. He needed not the shell that had held him back any longer. He was here. He was free. He was powerful.

“No one shall be spared by my wrath! I have died in vain so you shall do the same!”