Tsuki

The room reeked of iron and smoke, the candlelight trembling against the walls like it feared to exist. A man with long, unkempt black hair stood alone, his fingers wrapped around a blood-soaked rope. His voice cracked through the silence, soft but seething.

“Why have I gone wrong?” he whispered, staring at his own reflection in the darkened glass.

His lips curled into a desperate smile, one that looked more like a wound than joy. The rope slipped in his hand, wet and heavy, dripping with the weight of what had been done.

“Was my sacrifice not enough?” His eyes flicked toward the rafters as if God Himself might peer down. “I took the innocent, the young… the ones You called pure. I gave them back to You, carved their cries into hymns, bled their prayers across the floor. And still…” He laughed, hollow, broken. “…still You are silent.”

He pressed the rope to his chest like a relic, trembling. “I killed in Your name, as Abraham once raised the knife. But where was my angel? Where was my hand to be stopped? Were their deaths nothing? Was I nothing?”

The man raised his face to the ceiling, to the empty heavens, his voice swelling to a scream that rattled the candle’s flame.

“If You are God, then speak! If You are righteous, then strike me down! Or must I keep killing for You to finally listen?”

The shadows offered no reply. Only silence—the kind that feels like mockery. Shame, he thought he was enough.. He thought all he did was enough. To get a blessing. A place where he alone gets praise. Was God really that cruel?

No! Why would he think of that? It's his wrong. His fault! He hasn't given everything to Him! Everything.. "Why was such a fool?" He laughed to himself. "My Lord, oh savior, forgive me.. I did not notice it sooner."

He picked up the rope that was once wrapped around a little soul's neck that was only playing at the age of 8. Quite a joyful one indeed. Nevertheless, his positive that the child is smiling more in the heavens above.

The stool beneath his feet creaked. He lifted his gaze upward, eyes wide, as though searching for heaven’s light. But the ceiling was only dark, silent wood.

“For You, God,” he whispered, bitter and trembling, “for the God who has watched over me.”

The rope tightened. The stool toppled. His body swung, heavy, the same rope that had stolen a child’s breath now claiming his own.

The candle burned low, flickering against the lifeless figure. And in the silence that followed, there was still no answer.

"Father?” a curious child called out, his small voice breaking the stillness. “Yes, dear child?” The man with long hair lowered his gaze, his soft blue eyes glimmering like fading glass.

“What happened to the man?”

The priest’s pale lips curved gently, and the white-haired male smiled. “He was given a second chance by God… and became one of His angels, one of His saints.” The child’s face lit up, a wide, innocent grin spreading across it. “Then I’ll be like him one day, Father! I want to be one of God’s angels too!”

For a moment, silence lingered. Father Lucivah only smiled back, but it was not a smile of warmth—it was a hollow, vacant curve of the mouth, a mask worn too long.

“Father Lucivah!” a nun’s voice rang out as she hurried inside, breaking his stillness.

He blinked, as if returning from some faraway place. “Ah? Yes?” The nun steadied her breath, composed now. “The people are waiting for your daily preaching.”

Lucivah rose slowly, his robes whispering against the stone floor. “Oh dear, I almost forgot.” He turned to the boy, that empty smile fixed once more. “Forgive me dear child but it seems our story time has to end for now." The boy clasped his hands, still beaming. “That’s okay, Father Lucivah! I'm looking forward to a new story!” The priest, nodded with a smile as the child took his hand.

With that, the priest, the child, and the nun walked together toward the grand doors of the church. The heavy wooden doors groaned open, and the dim candlelight from within swallowed their figures whole as they stepped inside.

And when the doors closed, only silence remained. As the priest walked toward the chapel, the echo of the child’s words clung to him like a curse. “I want to be one of God’s angels too.” He prays that God will never answer such prayer.