[fic] Enlightenment (3/3)
Title: Enlightenment (3/3)
Prompt: Mythology
Pairing(s): Kris/Tao
Summary: When he comes from the stone face, he will judge your worthiness. He will spread his terrible wings, bare his powerful fangs, while the death rattle in his throat seeks to frighten away the demons at your feet.
So tell me...are you enlightened enough to confess your love to my god?
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Gore, Sexual Content and Kinks, Sacrifices, Violence, etc. (ALL THINGS UNHOLY -mods [ahihi, we kid, but there are a lot of themes in this story])
Word Count: 28, 500
...
“My priest, you are so kind. Is it quite alright that I bring my child in here too?”
“It is perfect, my sweet one. Just rest as I cut your palm.” Zitao smiled as best he could, eyes crinkling at the corners as he guided the young woman down upon the small shrine before the statue. She took a deep breath as soon as she had walked in, just like the others. Withdrawing the knife from beneath his sleeve had become such a regular process to Zitao, he no longer jolted at the sight of their blood upon his knife. “There... excellent... ”
In fact, he could have said he took a rather perverse pleasure out of it. Who wouldn’t? It brought more pleasure than anyone else could have imagined. Especially when he came.
Her blood ran red and pure upon the silver surface; he resisted the temptation to lick the blade clean. “Thank you, Zitao.” Her tone was genuine as he took her fluid and spread it across the winding tail upon the wall. Already, he could feel the rumble. “My son is only young...does he need to draw blood too?”
“No, my dear,” he soothed, his own scarred palm cut open once again and allowed to brush against shivering stone. He couldn’t help but run his tongue across his lips, forked edges catching at the corners of his mouth as she suddenly looked bemused. “...just yours.”
Yifan...are you hungry?
Zitao didn’t even blink as the monster emerged from his stone confines, hissing and snarling and pinning down the young female and her offspring. He openly enjoyed it actually, the sight of red and gold and black filling him with such an unbridled desire that he wondered whether it would be appropriate to peel back his garments and pleasure himself to the sight or not. Perhaps not; he needed to save himself for the best part, after all.
He waited until the dragon had eaten his fill, merely licking at those giant claws, before he too crawled down into the pools of blood and began to pick at the gristle and bone that was left there. It wasn’t much, but he enjoyed it regardless. After all, it would only fuel his strength, it would fuel the monster that he knew lurked within these walls that he called his mind! He needed to feed it, he needed to nurture it.
And it was with a great eagerness that he suckled from the gash in Yifan’s wrist and tasted his blood-soaked tongue.
Once again, a part of Zitao’s former life evaporated, leaving his body in a cloud of smoke that was inhaled through the deity’s blood-dripping mouth. Temperance. The desire for moderation, vacating his soul, it was very liberating. Already, he could feel the bloodlust burning deep in the pit of his belly, burning away behind his eyelids as he felt his forked tongue entwine with that of his master.
But this time, perhaps it wasn’t as pleasurable as before...
For as he prepared to lay down and complete the act for the night, he paused for a heartbeat. If only a heartbeat, he couldn’t be sure; it felt as though the world around him was slow as a dream, as if he were spending a day and a night merely...thinking.
If I am a god...why am I here?
Yes...yes, that was indeed a question. Yifan was here to guide him, that was true, and he was definitely learning from the elder, his claws setting him on a steady path and easily allowing him to unlock his potential. Even now, the scales grew along his back and his arms, half-crescents hardening into swirls of grey and black coal, while his eyes took on a familiar golden hue. He was becoming one of them, one of Yifan’s fabled breed.
But what about when you transcend? What then?
What then, what then? What on Earth would happen when Yifan had been satiated? Perhaps he would go on to reach some kind of secondary form, with Zitao by his side. Maybe we would transcend to another plane, and Zitao could take his place in the wall instead. Frankly, it was rather apparent that he would be getting the lesser deal, having done most of the dirty work, and being the mortal, parasitic when compared to the might of the human-eating deity.
It wasn’t until he felt the creeping of Yifan’s tail curl around his thigh that he realised that the god was awaiting his word, having already slicked his claws with oil and prepared to part Zitao’s legs upon the ground.
“No.” His voice was deeper than he cared to imagine, a throaty purr that rumbled deep in his stomach as he pushed against Yifan’s chest. “Let’s try something different tonight.”
Yifan hadn’t been prepared for the fury that burned through Zitao tonight, if ever at all. Because there was no doubt that he was bemused by the sudden reversal in roles as he was made to lie down upon the ground, spread-eagle upon the ground with his tail lashing from side to side. He hissed in defiance as he watched Zitao crawl up the length of his chest, grinding down against his hips with his eyes hooded and jaw parted. He was intoxicated on it, the sudden passion that burned in his mind from the deepest, darkest thoughts of his now-confused mind. He didn’t even seem to care that he was raking his sharpened nails down the front of Yifan’s chest, collecting skin and blood beneath them and ripping an aggressive moan from the deity’s fanged mouth.
I am powerful, I have worth all my own. In between gasps of delight and ferocity, Zitao plunged down, having brutally prepared himself during the feast. Yifan’s hand shot out and dragged him downward, until their mouths were caught in between heated kisses and erotic bites. I don’t need to be in the service of anyone. Zitao made sure to know that the god was dealing with an equal, going as far as to bite down on his fleshy lower lip. Yifan growled in playful teasing when he was released, flicking out his forked tongue and instead preparing to go for his neck. I have the potential of a god, he said it himself.
Their slow dance came to catch up with the sudden prickles of lightning that dashed across Zitao’s mind, his caution long thrown to the wind as he swirled and swivelled his hips atop Yifan’s length, feeling it plunge and press against his walls in all the right places. The deity’s talons came to seize his waist, allowing him to try and pound up into his tight heat, though Zitao made sure to fight back with equal force, pressing himself down so that their skin met in between loud slaps and the sickening slide of fluids.
I don’t need him. When he is fed, I want to be let go.
Such aggression...Zitao was barely able to contain the grunts and growls of fury as Yifan laughed up at him, struggling to try and draw his orgasm as he rubbed at his erection in frustration. “Look at you. So primal!” With a particularly rough thrust, Zitao’s vision began to fray. The tail sneaking behind his back slithered a path over his scaly skin, against the grain of the crescents and over his spine. “You’ll make a fine deity when the time comes.”
He can’t contain me here.
“And when will that be?” he retorted, deliberately contracting his muscles around Yifan’s cock, watching how the veins of his abdomen seemed to bulge from beneath the human skin he had climbed into. “Once you’ve fucked my brains out?” Yifan’s pupils narrowed to mere slits as he did so, neck arched to bear the Adam’s apple bobbing up and down in his throat. Higher and higher, Yifan’s tail crept over his back, draping against his shoulder and dipping into his collarbones. “Or once you’ve gotten bored and thrown me away?”
I’ve given myself to him eagerly. I want to feed on my own.
He didn’t expect Yifan to suddenly gain a look so feral. “Once you’ve proved yourself worthy in my eyes.”
A choked shriek left him as the tail that had once been so passively draped at his shoulder now sought to constrict the very air in his lungs. It wrapped itself around his neck in coil upon coil, the comfortable scraping of the pendant and scales almost tearing the skin, while Zitao could already feel tears built up in his eyes. Yifan had managed to raise himself up a little higher now, one hand still fixed on the mortal’s hips, and he watched with an air of fascination as he slid in and out of Zitao’s abused hole.
“That’s it...that’s it...” Slippery, wet, sliding in and out with the power of a machine, sweat glistening over every inch of his glorious body. “Does it feel good, Zitao?”
“F...fee...” Perhaps it was unwise to use the last of his breath to try and satisfy the monster currently fucking him raw. But then again, the lack of air was so pleasurable, paradoxically liberating as it sent him skywards within the confines of the temple walls. “G-good...!” The fever that rushed through his veins as he plunged himself up and down atop Yifan’s slick length chilled over into ripples of ice, burning and freezing pulses wracking his body as the constriction around his throat grew ever tighter.
“There you go, there’s a good boy.” A flicker of mercy ran through Yifan, strange as it seemed, for he reached out and shifted Zitao’s hands away from his flared cock, after much futile stimulation. It was the touch of foreign hands that really made Zitao’s muscles grow rigid, stomach tightening to unbearably measures as those vicious took on a relaxed grip around him, stroking him in time with brutal, punishing thrusts. “Are you going to come for me?”
With thighs trembling, Zitao gritted his jaw and left the last few wisps of air leave his lungs. Instead, he was drawn into a haze, rocking his hips and clenching his entrance in equal turn to achieve the perfect depth. They were both in control it seemed, and for the faintest moment, the mortal boy had the power. He could control just how rough Yifan went, even with his air constricted. The rush of power - however stupid it may have seemed - was so heady, and sent fireworks crackling behind his eyelids.
“No...you come...for me. ”
Drawing strength from only the gods knew where, Zitao managed to push himself forward from the hold of the tail around his neck, just enough to encircle his own hands around Yifan’s sweat-slicked throat. The mutual strangulation made Yifan’s eyes bulge for a moment, but he still couldn’t resist the challenge of it; if anything, it only forced his cat-like grin to grow wider, pusher him deeper and deeper into his thrusts, driving his cock further against Zitao’s sweet spot than previous nights.
The energy that Zitao relied on went beyond him, however, with the mortal able to champ down at the bit and equally force himself down, in spite of the pressure building in his veins. He could tell Yifan was close, almost as close as he was, and felt the grip around his throat slack ever so slightly. He took advantage of Yifan’s momentary surprise and gulped in as much as he could.
“I want - you...fuck me...want you to come, Yifan.” he panted, face red and blotchy with exertion, but by no means less determined. “Please, please, come inside me. I want you to f-feel you...fill me up, gods, fill me up.” The fires that burned within them ran deeper than the dragon had imagined, and he perhaps wondered if he should give in to the demands.
I am powerful. “So good, Zitao. So good. ”
I am a god waiting to be born. “Come in me, please, please, please- “
God above...Yifan’s eyes...it was almost like he was pleading...
He can’t throw me away.
The cry that erupted from Yifan’s chest was wrecked and exhausted, a shuddering groan that vibrated through Zitao’s arms and travelled down the plain of his chest, while the feeling of hot fluids and flaring muscles deep inside him soon had him thrown off the precipice as well. The feeling of no air being able to pass through his lungs lengthened his orgasm and drove its pleasure sky-high, cutting through the pain of the friction like a knife. His screams were allowed to grow as the tail slithered down from around his throat, leaving Yifan boneless beneath him as he painted translucent spatter all over the deity’s heaving chest.
With this new exchange, Zitao previous worries of what he was trading, what small shreds of humanity he was losing in the process, faded away to ashes in his mouth and thoughts. Even now, he drank eagerly from the gash that Yifan cut in his wrist, feeling the warmth pour down his gullet and drip from the corners of his mouth. All the while, the dragon god purred into his ear, like the voice of temptation, leading him onward to the promised lands.
“Don’t get too carried away, Zitao...even now, your body is still learning. Bring me my sacrifices, and I will bring you whatever you desire.”
But this time, Zitao resisted the pull of the slumber. Instead, his bared his teeth, licking the sharpened tips with ferocity only seen in wild animals...and those driven insane. “No. I want more, Yifan. Give me more. ” He dived back into the offering of blood, purring at the feeling of claws raking down the scales over his spine.
He can’t throw me away.
I won’t let him.
Because I’ll be the one to beat him!
...
Madness.
Madness took over Zitao in more ways than the townsfolk could count.
They flocked to see the man of a thousand youths, the man whose face never aged, never wrinkled, the man who was living proof that the gods could work miracles. He could live through any injury, miraculously heal his wounds, and draw forth powers that had never been experienced by any other priest or priestess. He was a god among men, they cried, and he was only too willing to agree.
But as the months went by, years even, there came to be those that grew frightened of him and his powers, of the dragon god that they say he prayed before, whose claws were as long as swords and whose mouth desired the flesh of man.
Even Zitao himself...he was no longer the man that he used to be.
Washerwomen whispered of how his skin was covered in darkening scales, like those of a serpent. They say it was a curse, a remnant of offering himself to the god every night, where his screams of pleasure could be heard echoing from beneath veils of red and gold. Whispers said he even tried to subdue the dragon so that he may be the one to control their acts. Slowly and slowly, he got stronger, and their impassioned roars were said to grow louder and louder.
His eyes. Slit like a cat’s, gold as the charms he draped himself in. When he came to select those for enlightenment, many could not afford to stare into such fear-inspiring orbs. They said it was like staring into the soul of a monster, where he would tear your soul apart, delving deep into your darkest secrets, ready to send you as a wreck before his god for true transcendence.
There were no questions about his heart. Everyone knew it was tainted with something far less than holy.
But none cared to doubt him, none cared to disagree with him, for fear of evoking the wrath of Zitao and his dragon god.
That was...until Zitao snatched the first unwilling victim for himself.
...
In smearing the blood of the young boy across the stone tail, alongside his own, it was clear that Zitao could no longer wait.
Even as the fragments of rock fell away from the monstrous form of the dragon, he didn’t seem to care. He was much too intent on trying to silence the screams of the man he had dragged from town into his lair, dagger raised and plunging down, up, down, up, into his vulnerable chest and stomach. His laughter was delightful, his jewels twisted and knotted over his chest, the diadem atop his head long thrown to the ground so that his darkened hair hung over his eyes in matted tatters.
It was much too long to simply wait for Yifan. He needed to do it himself.
When the dragon’s long talons came to finish the job, easily silencing the poor man’s screams, he lunged up with an unbridled fury. “Leave him! He is mine!” he roared, already sinking his long fangs into what was left of the pulped remains of the boy’s arm. Yifan growled right back, taking the lion’s share of the kill and ripping away at the skin with his teeth. Zitao lathered his tongue over whatever he could, hoarding it beneath his belly and curling up around it.
But Yifan was quiet as he plucked at his remains, skin paling as he melted down in a shedding of scales, the crown of horns looking ever more impressive atop his raven hair. He licked at the tips of his claws to catch the last few droplets of blood, making sure to savour every last inch of the pleasurable flavour upon his forked tongue.
Zitao, on the other hand, only briefly acknowledged the taste. It was all about seed, the desire to chew down the flesh as quickly as he could, in order to achieve his next gift, the next level of his transcendence.
When he threw down what remained of the boy’s arm, he lapped hungrily at his fingertips. “Baekhyun...I never thought I’d say this but you...were a most worthy meal...” To be fair, he couldn’t remember anything much from his childhood; even names seemed unfamiliar. But there was something familiar about Baekhyun, in his drunken gait and the friendly way with which he still greeted Zitao, though everyone else shied away from his advances. It was a sign, the voices whispered in his ear. He was your next, he was the one to unlock your next transformation.
Scrambling to his feet, he rushed to where Yifan was pausing for a moment, idly grooming himself with the sandpaper of his tongue. When he barked out the god’s name, all he got was a lazy glare. “Such impatience.” he spat, eyes fluttering closed as his tongue flicked against the bones of his wrist. “Not even waiting for me to feed first.”
“You never said you had to feed first! I want to transcend, Yifan, I want to feel your power now!” His words were no longer submissive, but more demanding than anything else. And they made the spines along Yifan’s tail bristle with fury. Yet Zitao continued, furious at the indignation. “I have brought you your sacrifice, now reward me!”
The dragon raised himself to his full height, seizing the younger beneath the chin and holding him fast. “One must bide their time. It will not be far now.” he cautioned, though there was a malignant edge to his words, as his lips carved a vicious smirk. “Then again, what do you expect? You still have the impatience of a mortal.”
No, he thought as he hissed through newly grown fangs. I’m not a mortal anymore. I’ve gone too far to remain one of them! “I deserve it for what I have done for you! I have waited for years now, offered you dozens upon dozens of people! I deserve your powers, I deserve everything that you offered me!”
“What would it be worth to someone as impatient as you?”
“It would be worth what you owe me!”
He wants to keep me here. He wants me to serve him forever. The voices...their whispers, they were surely right, and Zitao couldn’t help but nod and shake his head to agreed with them. Yifan’s eyes narrowed as he saw how the priest twitched, awkward hand motions and shakes telling that he was not the only one in the temple offering Zitao advice. “I said that transformations would require you to bide your time. That I would have to wait decades in between my own transformations. What makes you think that you are more worthy than I am?”
I am worthy of more! There was nothing to say, nothing but a guttural roar as he launched himself to where Yifan stood, hoping to bowl him over in surprise and forcefully drag out the next transformation. “You can’t hold it away from me, that’s not fair!” Oh, he sounded like a petulant little child crying for attention, but it was so deserved and he was so good and it was just so unfair! Especially when Yifan braced himself with ease and tossed him down to the ground, the jewels scattering against the ground. They sliced his chest, shards of precious gems cutting against his flesh where the scales had not grown through. It wasn’t until he had crawled atop Yifan had the aching subsided, shifting into a needy warmth that he craved with all of his shrivelled heart.
“I want more...” he growled in between gulps of air and frantic breaths, in an effort to try and coax him into further intimacy. But Yifan was stubborn, and bit down hard upon the younger’s forked tongue. It only earned him bitter snarls and an even more urgent press of the hips, as he slipped deeper and deeper into the spiralling insanity that came with the need to grow. It was malignant, a growth that needed to be allowed to grow as it spread through his body and pulsed through his veins. It was too much, too much, eating away at the edges of his fragmented mind as he tried to get something more, something extra. “More! Give me more! ”
It wasn’t until claws had come to seize beneath his neck that he stopped his demanding, mainly because Yifan had never looked so infuriated in all of his life. He grabbed Zitao’s jaw tightly, almost enough to break the skin beneath his talons, but he didn’t dare.
Instead, he granted Zitao’s wish. “Very well. Have it all. ”
And with that final kiss, searing in the inside of his mouth, Zitao awaited the transcendence.
It came, finally, with an almighty punch in the spine.
The ripping of skin was more agonising than anything Zitao had ever felt before, and as he bent double with his back tearing itself apart, he wondered briefly if this would be his end. Yifan hadn’t considered the fact his body may not have been able to handle the final transformation...had he?
“It hurts! It hurts!” But hurt was only tame in describing the pain he was going through. For it felt as though his very bones were fragmenting, splitting apart under the pressure that he was feeling build up inside his torso.
But Yifan did nothing. If anything, he watched Zitao writhe in pain with a look of apathy, not even trying to relieve him. “Stop fighting.” was all that Zitao could hear over his screams, thrumming through his veins as molten lava filled his insides. “Accept it. This is your true destiny.”
There was no consoling Zitao, when he tore at his garments and his new sharpened nails ripped away at the jewels that had lain over his chest. There was nothing but pain, sheer agony, and it only increased as it burrowed closer and closer to the surface.
When it finally burst from the skin, it was almost a relief to feel, the pressure dropping as the flesh in his back ripped open, piercing something
They were smaller than Yifan’s, almost infantile in their appearance, only covered in a thin layer of muscle with a thinner skin decorating its surface in small clusters of ebony scales. They were as soft as snakeskin, damp and frail as those of a freshly formed butterfly, newly emerged from the chrysalis. The tender flesh was hot to the touch, which is more than what could be said for the rest of his body. Zitao hadn’t known such a cold feeling before; his teeth were chattering, yet when he brushed his hair from his eyes, his fingers were coated in a fine film of heated sweat.
But this was it. This was the first step to becoming deified. Zitao needed to make his way from the temple as soon as Yifan had been satiated.
“Beautiful...,” the creature purred, seemingly unfazed by the blood dripping from Zitao’s forehead. If anything, it only enticed him further, pupils dilated to only reveal a thin halo of gold. “your form is splendid.” He marvelled over Zitao’s naked form, fingers coming to run against the new skin of his wings and tail, even admiring the bone of his curling horns. “You’re still so young, but you needn’t worry. They’ll grow in magnificent as time goes on. The more you feed, the larger you will get, until your own form takes hold.”
Zitao couldn’t wait, he couldn’t wait that long. “How long will it take?” He stretched out one of his newly formed appendages, disappointed it only reached his wrists. Yifan’s wings easily took three times his size, easily capable to sweeping him skyward. “I want to fly, I want to feel the true extent! I can’t wait for them to just grow!”
And yet, Yifan only smiled down to the ground, a smirk decorating his face as he gazed upon his talons. “You must be patient. That is what it means to have power, you see. You bide your time, worm your way into everywhere you can reach.”
“I can’t wait! I want to fly, you promised I would fly!”
“And you shall. In Hell, there are many places where you can spread your wings.”
The crackling of the lanterns almost seemed deafening, and yet Zitao was sure that he had heard Yifan wrong. His wings folded neatly against his back, and he couldn’t resist a laugh...though it was apprehensive at best. “Hell...why...why would I be sent there?”
And yet to Yifan, it seemed like the most natural thing to say in the entire world. “Where else would you be sent? You are one of my kindred now, so it is only natural that you return with me to our true hunting grounds. Perfect for a sinner such as yourself, after all.” At the confusion in Zitao’s face, mouth opening and closing mechanically to try and work up the courage to see if it was all a joke, Yifan cooed softly, like a mother pacifying her child. “Oh Zitao...all those years of leading little lambs to the slaughter, and you thought you were doing it for the greater good? How innocent you are...”
Close, close...the air was too close. It was suffocating, and Zitao raked his claws down the length of his throat. “But your powers...you’re a god, there is no other way! And those people...they were just sheep, as you said! Your glory is worth more than their lives were worth-“
“My glory? Or the glory that it would have earned you as a result?”
He knows. He knows what I want...that I lie.
“You think that I would have let you slip away into the night as soon as you had fed me? Let you usurp my powers and leave me to starve?” Yifan’s voice settled into a most dangerous of purrs, claws strumming the ground in rhythmic taps as Zitao backed away. “I know what you were thinking, in those last instances as your power grew. You wanted to leave me behind. You wanted to run away and take everything I have taught you as well.” A devious grin, though it only veiled the sneer that was brewing on Yifan’s face. “What a little treacherous thing you have turned out to be. I should be proud...your heart is more poisoned than I gave it credit for.”
“What are you talking about?! I worship the ground you step on! I killed for you! I fed you! For all these years!”
“You did it for your own gains. First was to sate me so I wouldn’t eat you. Second was for the chance to see if you really could live forever. And finally...was to overthrow me.”
“You don’t know that! I-“
“You underestimate what I know. And I know that you wanted to run away from all of this. As soon as you had tasted the blood of a human, you were trying to escape my grasp and make your own way to enlightenment.”
“Liar!”
As soon as the words had left his mouth, Zitao instantly regretted them. For Yifan was upon him instantly, fingers splayed and ready to gut him for his insolence. But instead, he merely tossed Zitao about, never quite coming close enough to maim him, but enough to beat him into submission. He sank his teeth into the flesh of Zitao’s ankle, easily ripping the skin and forcing the younger to curl inward and whimper.
“You dare to call me a liar...when I am the one who is generous enough to give you this gift?” He bit down harder into the backs of Zitao’s calves, blood welling around his mouth as he tried to cripple the boy enough to drag him away into the darkness. But as Zitao made a move to raise his hand, ready to rake his claws down Yifan’s face, he found his wrist pinned to the ground faster than he could recoil it, Yifan’s talon welled blood from the wounds, and he couldn’t help but shift and squirm in such a tight hold. “Now you wish to strike me? You think your new strength is enough to set you free? You have made a deal with the Devil, Zitao. You offered blood, sweat, tears, human flesh...even your very soul! There is no way that you can wriggle your way out of this!”
Yifan’s claws sank in deep, clenching tighter as Zitao howled in pain until he was sure that they were scraping against the bones of his hips. He tried to swing his upper torso away, his own tiny nails scoring deep grooves in the stone, but it wasn’t enough. He didn’t have the power to escape the dragon’s clutches, even though he was now what could be considered a god. No...he would never be that. He never could, not when Yifan had played him so well. Not when he had fallen so very far from grace.
“But you needn’t worry.” Yifan rumbled, throwing him down to the ground with enough strength to split the rock with shards and cracks. “You’ll keep your powers, you’ll keep your youth. Down where I came from, you’ll fit right in with us.”
Down...down there.... There where the demons lurk. No gods or deities come from there. “This wasn’t part of our deal! You can’t take me away, you can’t!”
“You think you’d be able to survive up here? When the last fragments of your soul belong to me?”
Cold blood pulsed through him, in spite of the fever that had that settled deep into his flesh. “No. No, you haven’t! You said you’d take a part of me, you meant what we do every night! Not my soul!”
“The deal took part of you, yes...but you never said which. Or how much. I took you in the night, as I took your soul every time. Each little scrap let me contort you even more, let me mould you in my image.” No, no, no, he can’t! Zitao heard it over and over again, the times when he was bent double and begging for it. He had wanted this change, but he hadn’t known the true cost. Stupidity had blinded him, it had corrupted his heart, since watching Yifan first enter his life and slowly tease forth the beats that had lurked in the darkest vestiges of his conscious. It had been teased, twisted, allowed to take control and control his actions. And I let it. “It sounds so familiar, doesn’t it? You wanted to be made into this; you wanted me to tear away your old mortal skin. Just a shame that now you want to crawl back into it.”
“But what on Earth will a soulless boy accomplish when he steps out into the open world? You can’t eat mortal food, you can’t sleep. You can’t even feel unless it’s my touch or the bodies you feast upon!”
“I can...I-I can-“
“Your time is up. And now, we must return to the land we truly belong to.”
Zitao wanted to fight back, he truly did...but there was no use going up against the might of the beast in his formidable form. “You can’t take me away!” For as soon as Zitao roared back in defiance, fanged mouth stretched wide to bare newly grown canines, Yifan was almost flaring his wings. “I’m not one of you!” It did nothing to try and intimidate the elder god, not even when his own wings, f thing bone and newly-born skin, stretched as far as they could, the blood running down his face from freshly protruding horns.
If anything had been achieved by his insolence, it served to only antagonise Yifan into his true form. Zitao could only regret his bravado, having never seen the transformation occur the other way around, for it was more terrifying than anything he could have imagine. The way Yifan’s jaw broken itself into two, elongating bones and fang protruding from a human mouth that was much too small. Rivulets of blood rushed down his face and chest as his horns further erupted from his skull, the hair and pink flesh giving way to the millions of scales bursting from beneath them, ready to coat his vulnerable human form in an impenetrable coat of armour. Even now, as Zitao tried to strike out, raking his own bony claws against the monster’s chest, he found himself coming off worse. For as he glanced down to his claws, the pain lancing up his arm, he could see that they were already broken from the impact.
There was no use in fighting. And as Yifan’s true nature bared its narrow snout towards him, blood oozing between each of the dagger-like teeth, Zitao knew that this was a battle he could not win.
Scaled lips formed guttural words, as the demon reared his tail and smashed away at the stone wall from which he had first erupted. Zitao expected to see the cavern of gold, the dragon’s hoard that he had first encountered there. But instead, he was welcomed with only a rush of blistering heat, as an inferno licked the cavern behind the rock, swirling flames sending terrifying shadows dancing across the floor. And Yifan stood in their way, a monstrous countenance forcing Zitao to try and race for the entrance. Gold melted around his feet, scalding metal spilling around him, to which the cry of the beast answered his screams.
You cannot escape your fate, now that your soul is mine!
“No, no, you can’t do this! ” But as the fangs of the beast sank into his legs, Zitao knew that he was done for. His claws scrabbled frantically against the ground as he tried to pull himself forward, away from the burning heat and the fires of Hell that were surely waiting for him. He could pull away! He had to! “Yifan, don’t do this!”
You made your deal, Zitao. Now it is time to pay the price.
An almighty heave shook the great monster’s muscles, and Zitao’s fingers came free from the ground which they had anchored themselves in. A slithering tail seized his torso, while a barely suppressed roar drowned out the screams he emitted, shrieking until his throat was red and raw. There was nobody to answer him, nobody to come and take him safely away from the claws of the beast that had seduced him. He was left alone at its mercy.
So nobody was there to answer his final pleas, before he was dragged down beneath the earth and roots, where fire licked at his skin and blistered his face, embers burning his eyes until that remained was a winged silhouette.
...
“Get him! Get that little whelp!”
Jongin’s chest heaved as he skittered down the side of the gorge, hair fluttering in his eyes as he could already feel the rocks whooshing by his head, their air whistling by his ears. The bullies were approaching too fast though, and there would be no way he could outrun them for too long.
It was an advantage to him though, that he knew the layout of the gorge better than most...which didn’t help as he tumbled through the old greying temple walls as soon as he had tried to jump across them like he thought he could fly across it.
It was painful, to say the least, as his back collided hard with the stone floor and left him panting and winded for a good long while. Above him, the shadows of the bullies lingered overhead, laughing and pointing as they shimmied down to reach him
“What you doing, hiding in here?” The eldest of the group, the clear ringleader, made sure to drag him to his feet, intent on seeing him ‘fight back’. “You big baby!”
Jongin’s nose wrinkled as he spat out a glob of phlegm. “I’m not a baby! Just because I’m not strong like you, it doesn’t mean nothing!”
“God demands the best of his devotees! Did you know that you’re meant to kill the littlest kid in the class when they reach the age of twelve?”
“You’re lying!”
“Well, nobody would care if a weakling like you died anyway!”
A swift punch to the face was enough to send Jongin’s vision spinning, head colliding against something smooth and stained with brown and black. he tried to prop himself up on it, narrowly missing a bloody punch that hit the stone wall instead, though only ending up with his jaw aching when he received a kick right in the mouth as something was looped over his head and pulled tight between the eldest’s hands.
His right hand suddenly jerked violently back, as the rope coiled around the younger’s throat like a serpent, intent upon strangling the very life out of him. A sudden cry of shock died upon his lips as the bully’s thumb pressed down against his Adam’s apple, stretching as far as his arms would reach with the chain of beads cutting deeper into the skin. Jongin’s body, shocked and starving of air, began to tremble fearfully as his eyes desperately searched the crowd for aid, for anyone to come forward and stop this madness.
He tried, he tried as hard as he could. But they were a sea of bodies, masses upon masses falling over each other to try and reach for him to hit and kick. And it was getting to be too hot, too much, the hurt and blood and the heat coiling together as he felt himself dancing on the brink of unconsciousness.
That was until the roaring began, and the laughter of the children turned into screams.
Jongin curled up tightly as he was knocked away by something long and thin, while the sounds of chewing and crunching echoed only inches away. Through the gaps of his fingertips, he saw them. All of the bullies bleated out the beginnings of a distressed yelp, voices failing to come out as more than frightened mewls, as they were seized around the ankles by two sets of ravenous mouths, dragged through the dust and dirt of centuries past. They screamed and screamed, crying out to anyone - holy or not - that would have been able to come to their aid.
In Jongin’s mind, his poor frantic mind, he sang every prayer he knew, running over everything that his pastor had taught because that was what needed to be done, that was the only way-
Even now, as he whimpered the beginnings of a prayer to God, he could tell it was much too late. They were covered in blood and wounds, ripped apart by tooth and claw, but still fighting in vain. His young body was no use against the two monsters tearing apart at his clothes and skin, like the wild hounds of the city that played with rats they caught, so it was perhaps best that he didn’t imitate those who had hounded him. They toyed with them, oh they toyed, snapping and crunching tiny fingers between their strong jaws.
Their voices had settled now, but the tiny mewls still echoed in his ears like the ring of the bell to Sunday mass. I’m only twelve, I’m only twelve..., he begged Him, tears streaming down his face as the smaller creature ripped the skin from the eldest’s chest in violent slashes. I’m still so young, God, please let me live!
He clasped his hands to his mouth as he watched the larger beast rip something red and beating from the body of the eldest bully.
He lay still. Jongin screamed.
The two creatures whirled upon him, their eyes golden and bright, listening to how he screamed and cried out for help. And yet, they refused to act beyond that. They merely stared at him, the tallest’s face neutral, though the smaller looked ready to tear him apart. Jongin cuddled his legs closer and screamed louder, hoping to drown out the demonic whispers before him.
“Please, Master...let me take him. Look at how young and tender he is!”
“No, Zitao, you may not eat him.”
“But my Lord-“
“Enough. There is more to this boy than you think...does he not remind you of someone?”
As Jongin’s shrieks faded into terrified squeaks, throat hoarse and aching, he could see the slithering form of the larger one’s tail creep closer to him. Paralysed by fear, he watched as it crept up beneath his shield of limbs, forcing his head up a little as it shirked away the rope around his neck, so that he could gaze into the monster’s eyes, face to face. The purr made him shiver something fierce, and as the voice of creature made itself apparent, the little boy wondered what on earth he had exactly discovered.
“It would suit you best...if you didn’t try to run.”
PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3
Author’s Note: Back again for the Halloween round, how could I keep away?
I was going to enter another story into this fest but it was just too bloody massive to complete. I know that being said, considering last year, as a piss-poor excuse but heyo. Anyway, that story kinda made me sad, so I’m not entering that, and instead gonna use it for something else. In other words, I needed something a little smuttier to soothe my Taoris feelings~
To the mods: Sorry for being a butt. Again! But seriously, thank you for putting up with me, you’re amazing ^3^~
To the readers: I hope you enjoy! Please don’t be scared of me, I am a good person.
Prompt: Mythology
Pairing(s): Kris/Tao
Summary: When he comes from the stone face, he will judge your worthiness. He will spread his terrible wings, bare his powerful fangs, while the death rattle in his throat seeks to frighten away the demons at your feet.
So tell me...are you enlightened enough to confess your love to my god?
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Gore, Sexual Content and Kinks, Sacrifices, Violence, etc. (ALL THINGS UNHOLY -mods [ahihi, we kid, but there are a lot of themes in this story])
Word Count: 28, 500
...
“My priest, you are so kind. Is it quite alright that I bring my child in here too?”
“It is perfect, my sweet one. Just rest as I cut your palm.” Zitao smiled as best he could, eyes crinkling at the corners as he guided the young woman down upon the small shrine before the statue. She took a deep breath as soon as she had walked in, just like the others. Withdrawing the knife from beneath his sleeve had become such a regular process to Zitao, he no longer jolted at the sight of their blood upon his knife. “There... excellent... ”
In fact, he could have said he took a rather perverse pleasure out of it. Who wouldn’t? It brought more pleasure than anyone else could have imagined. Especially when he came.
Her blood ran red and pure upon the silver surface; he resisted the temptation to lick the blade clean. “Thank you, Zitao.” Her tone was genuine as he took her fluid and spread it across the winding tail upon the wall. Already, he could feel the rumble. “My son is only young...does he need to draw blood too?”
“No, my dear,” he soothed, his own scarred palm cut open once again and allowed to brush against shivering stone. He couldn’t help but run his tongue across his lips, forked edges catching at the corners of his mouth as she suddenly looked bemused. “...just yours.”
Yifan...are you hungry?
Zitao didn’t even blink as the monster emerged from his stone confines, hissing and snarling and pinning down the young female and her offspring. He openly enjoyed it actually, the sight of red and gold and black filling him with such an unbridled desire that he wondered whether it would be appropriate to peel back his garments and pleasure himself to the sight or not. Perhaps not; he needed to save himself for the best part, after all.
He waited until the dragon had eaten his fill, merely licking at those giant claws, before he too crawled down into the pools of blood and began to pick at the gristle and bone that was left there. It wasn’t much, but he enjoyed it regardless. After all, it would only fuel his strength, it would fuel the monster that he knew lurked within these walls that he called his mind! He needed to feed it, he needed to nurture it.
And it was with a great eagerness that he suckled from the gash in Yifan’s wrist and tasted his blood-soaked tongue.
Once again, a part of Zitao’s former life evaporated, leaving his body in a cloud of smoke that was inhaled through the deity’s blood-dripping mouth. Temperance. The desire for moderation, vacating his soul, it was very liberating. Already, he could feel the bloodlust burning deep in the pit of his belly, burning away behind his eyelids as he felt his forked tongue entwine with that of his master.
But this time, perhaps it wasn’t as pleasurable as before...
For as he prepared to lay down and complete the act for the night, he paused for a heartbeat. If only a heartbeat, he couldn’t be sure; it felt as though the world around him was slow as a dream, as if he were spending a day and a night merely...thinking.
If I am a god...why am I here?
Yes...yes, that was indeed a question. Yifan was here to guide him, that was true, and he was definitely learning from the elder, his claws setting him on a steady path and easily allowing him to unlock his potential. Even now, the scales grew along his back and his arms, half-crescents hardening into swirls of grey and black coal, while his eyes took on a familiar golden hue. He was becoming one of them, one of Yifan’s fabled breed.
But what about when you transcend? What then?
What then, what then? What on Earth would happen when Yifan had been satiated? Perhaps he would go on to reach some kind of secondary form, with Zitao by his side. Maybe we would transcend to another plane, and Zitao could take his place in the wall instead. Frankly, it was rather apparent that he would be getting the lesser deal, having done most of the dirty work, and being the mortal, parasitic when compared to the might of the human-eating deity.
It wasn’t until he felt the creeping of Yifan’s tail curl around his thigh that he realised that the god was awaiting his word, having already slicked his claws with oil and prepared to part Zitao’s legs upon the ground.
“No.” His voice was deeper than he cared to imagine, a throaty purr that rumbled deep in his stomach as he pushed against Yifan’s chest. “Let’s try something different tonight.”
Yifan hadn’t been prepared for the fury that burned through Zitao tonight, if ever at all. Because there was no doubt that he was bemused by the sudden reversal in roles as he was made to lie down upon the ground, spread-eagle upon the ground with his tail lashing from side to side. He hissed in defiance as he watched Zitao crawl up the length of his chest, grinding down against his hips with his eyes hooded and jaw parted. He was intoxicated on it, the sudden passion that burned in his mind from the deepest, darkest thoughts of his now-confused mind. He didn’t even seem to care that he was raking his sharpened nails down the front of Yifan’s chest, collecting skin and blood beneath them and ripping an aggressive moan from the deity’s fanged mouth.
I am powerful, I have worth all my own. In between gasps of delight and ferocity, Zitao plunged down, having brutally prepared himself during the feast. Yifan’s hand shot out and dragged him downward, until their mouths were caught in between heated kisses and erotic bites. I don’t need to be in the service of anyone. Zitao made sure to know that the god was dealing with an equal, going as far as to bite down on his fleshy lower lip. Yifan growled in playful teasing when he was released, flicking out his forked tongue and instead preparing to go for his neck. I have the potential of a god, he said it himself.
Their slow dance came to catch up with the sudden prickles of lightning that dashed across Zitao’s mind, his caution long thrown to the wind as he swirled and swivelled his hips atop Yifan’s length, feeling it plunge and press against his walls in all the right places. The deity’s talons came to seize his waist, allowing him to try and pound up into his tight heat, though Zitao made sure to fight back with equal force, pressing himself down so that their skin met in between loud slaps and the sickening slide of fluids.
I don’t need him. When he is fed, I want to be let go.
Such aggression...Zitao was barely able to contain the grunts and growls of fury as Yifan laughed up at him, struggling to try and draw his orgasm as he rubbed at his erection in frustration. “Look at you. So primal!” With a particularly rough thrust, Zitao’s vision began to fray. The tail sneaking behind his back slithered a path over his scaly skin, against the grain of the crescents and over his spine. “You’ll make a fine deity when the time comes.”
He can’t contain me here.
“And when will that be?” he retorted, deliberately contracting his muscles around Yifan’s cock, watching how the veins of his abdomen seemed to bulge from beneath the human skin he had climbed into. “Once you’ve fucked my brains out?” Yifan’s pupils narrowed to mere slits as he did so, neck arched to bear the Adam’s apple bobbing up and down in his throat. Higher and higher, Yifan’s tail crept over his back, draping against his shoulder and dipping into his collarbones. “Or once you’ve gotten bored and thrown me away?”
I’ve given myself to him eagerly. I want to feed on my own.
He didn’t expect Yifan to suddenly gain a look so feral. “Once you’ve proved yourself worthy in my eyes.”
A choked shriek left him as the tail that had once been so passively draped at his shoulder now sought to constrict the very air in his lungs. It wrapped itself around his neck in coil upon coil, the comfortable scraping of the pendant and scales almost tearing the skin, while Zitao could already feel tears built up in his eyes. Yifan had managed to raise himself up a little higher now, one hand still fixed on the mortal’s hips, and he watched with an air of fascination as he slid in and out of Zitao’s abused hole.
“That’s it...that’s it...” Slippery, wet, sliding in and out with the power of a machine, sweat glistening over every inch of his glorious body. “Does it feel good, Zitao?”
“F...fee...” Perhaps it was unwise to use the last of his breath to try and satisfy the monster currently fucking him raw. But then again, the lack of air was so pleasurable, paradoxically liberating as it sent him skywards within the confines of the temple walls. “G-good...!” The fever that rushed through his veins as he plunged himself up and down atop Yifan’s slick length chilled over into ripples of ice, burning and freezing pulses wracking his body as the constriction around his throat grew ever tighter.
“There you go, there’s a good boy.” A flicker of mercy ran through Yifan, strange as it seemed, for he reached out and shifted Zitao’s hands away from his flared cock, after much futile stimulation. It was the touch of foreign hands that really made Zitao’s muscles grow rigid, stomach tightening to unbearably measures as those vicious took on a relaxed grip around him, stroking him in time with brutal, punishing thrusts. “Are you going to come for me?”
With thighs trembling, Zitao gritted his jaw and left the last few wisps of air leave his lungs. Instead, he was drawn into a haze, rocking his hips and clenching his entrance in equal turn to achieve the perfect depth. They were both in control it seemed, and for the faintest moment, the mortal boy had the power. He could control just how rough Yifan went, even with his air constricted. The rush of power - however stupid it may have seemed - was so heady, and sent fireworks crackling behind his eyelids.
“No...you come...for me. ”
Drawing strength from only the gods knew where, Zitao managed to push himself forward from the hold of the tail around his neck, just enough to encircle his own hands around Yifan’s sweat-slicked throat. The mutual strangulation made Yifan’s eyes bulge for a moment, but he still couldn’t resist the challenge of it; if anything, it only forced his cat-like grin to grow wider, pusher him deeper and deeper into his thrusts, driving his cock further against Zitao’s sweet spot than previous nights.
The energy that Zitao relied on went beyond him, however, with the mortal able to champ down at the bit and equally force himself down, in spite of the pressure building in his veins. He could tell Yifan was close, almost as close as he was, and felt the grip around his throat slack ever so slightly. He took advantage of Yifan’s momentary surprise and gulped in as much as he could.
“I want - you...fuck me...want you to come, Yifan.” he panted, face red and blotchy with exertion, but by no means less determined. “Please, please, come inside me. I want you to f-feel you...fill me up, gods, fill me up.” The fires that burned within them ran deeper than the dragon had imagined, and he perhaps wondered if he should give in to the demands.
I am powerful. “So good, Zitao. So good. ”
I am a god waiting to be born. “Come in me, please, please, please- “
God above...Yifan’s eyes...it was almost like he was pleading...
He can’t throw me away.
The cry that erupted from Yifan’s chest was wrecked and exhausted, a shuddering groan that vibrated through Zitao’s arms and travelled down the plain of his chest, while the feeling of hot fluids and flaring muscles deep inside him soon had him thrown off the precipice as well. The feeling of no air being able to pass through his lungs lengthened his orgasm and drove its pleasure sky-high, cutting through the pain of the friction like a knife. His screams were allowed to grow as the tail slithered down from around his throat, leaving Yifan boneless beneath him as he painted translucent spatter all over the deity’s heaving chest.
With this new exchange, Zitao previous worries of what he was trading, what small shreds of humanity he was losing in the process, faded away to ashes in his mouth and thoughts. Even now, he drank eagerly from the gash that Yifan cut in his wrist, feeling the warmth pour down his gullet and drip from the corners of his mouth. All the while, the dragon god purred into his ear, like the voice of temptation, leading him onward to the promised lands.
“Don’t get too carried away, Zitao...even now, your body is still learning. Bring me my sacrifices, and I will bring you whatever you desire.”
But this time, Zitao resisted the pull of the slumber. Instead, his bared his teeth, licking the sharpened tips with ferocity only seen in wild animals...and those driven insane. “No. I want more, Yifan. Give me more. ” He dived back into the offering of blood, purring at the feeling of claws raking down the scales over his spine.
He can’t throw me away.
I won’t let him.
Because I’ll be the one to beat him!
...
Madness.
Madness took over Zitao in more ways than the townsfolk could count.
They flocked to see the man of a thousand youths, the man whose face never aged, never wrinkled, the man who was living proof that the gods could work miracles. He could live through any injury, miraculously heal his wounds, and draw forth powers that had never been experienced by any other priest or priestess. He was a god among men, they cried, and he was only too willing to agree.
But as the months went by, years even, there came to be those that grew frightened of him and his powers, of the dragon god that they say he prayed before, whose claws were as long as swords and whose mouth desired the flesh of man.
Even Zitao himself...he was no longer the man that he used to be.
Washerwomen whispered of how his skin was covered in darkening scales, like those of a serpent. They say it was a curse, a remnant of offering himself to the god every night, where his screams of pleasure could be heard echoing from beneath veils of red and gold. Whispers said he even tried to subdue the dragon so that he may be the one to control their acts. Slowly and slowly, he got stronger, and their impassioned roars were said to grow louder and louder.
His eyes. Slit like a cat’s, gold as the charms he draped himself in. When he came to select those for enlightenment, many could not afford to stare into such fear-inspiring orbs. They said it was like staring into the soul of a monster, where he would tear your soul apart, delving deep into your darkest secrets, ready to send you as a wreck before his god for true transcendence.
There were no questions about his heart. Everyone knew it was tainted with something far less than holy.
But none cared to doubt him, none cared to disagree with him, for fear of evoking the wrath of Zitao and his dragon god.
That was...until Zitao snatched the first unwilling victim for himself.
...
In smearing the blood of the young boy across the stone tail, alongside his own, it was clear that Zitao could no longer wait.
Even as the fragments of rock fell away from the monstrous form of the dragon, he didn’t seem to care. He was much too intent on trying to silence the screams of the man he had dragged from town into his lair, dagger raised and plunging down, up, down, up, into his vulnerable chest and stomach. His laughter was delightful, his jewels twisted and knotted over his chest, the diadem atop his head long thrown to the ground so that his darkened hair hung over his eyes in matted tatters.
It was much too long to simply wait for Yifan. He needed to do it himself.
When the dragon’s long talons came to finish the job, easily silencing the poor man’s screams, he lunged up with an unbridled fury. “Leave him! He is mine!” he roared, already sinking his long fangs into what was left of the pulped remains of the boy’s arm. Yifan growled right back, taking the lion’s share of the kill and ripping away at the skin with his teeth. Zitao lathered his tongue over whatever he could, hoarding it beneath his belly and curling up around it.
But Yifan was quiet as he plucked at his remains, skin paling as he melted down in a shedding of scales, the crown of horns looking ever more impressive atop his raven hair. He licked at the tips of his claws to catch the last few droplets of blood, making sure to savour every last inch of the pleasurable flavour upon his forked tongue.
Zitao, on the other hand, only briefly acknowledged the taste. It was all about seed, the desire to chew down the flesh as quickly as he could, in order to achieve his next gift, the next level of his transcendence.
When he threw down what remained of the boy’s arm, he lapped hungrily at his fingertips. “Baekhyun...I never thought I’d say this but you...were a most worthy meal...” To be fair, he couldn’t remember anything much from his childhood; even names seemed unfamiliar. But there was something familiar about Baekhyun, in his drunken gait and the friendly way with which he still greeted Zitao, though everyone else shied away from his advances. It was a sign, the voices whispered in his ear. He was your next, he was the one to unlock your next transformation.
Scrambling to his feet, he rushed to where Yifan was pausing for a moment, idly grooming himself with the sandpaper of his tongue. When he barked out the god’s name, all he got was a lazy glare. “Such impatience.” he spat, eyes fluttering closed as his tongue flicked against the bones of his wrist. “Not even waiting for me to feed first.”
“You never said you had to feed first! I want to transcend, Yifan, I want to feel your power now!” His words were no longer submissive, but more demanding than anything else. And they made the spines along Yifan’s tail bristle with fury. Yet Zitao continued, furious at the indignation. “I have brought you your sacrifice, now reward me!”
The dragon raised himself to his full height, seizing the younger beneath the chin and holding him fast. “One must bide their time. It will not be far now.” he cautioned, though there was a malignant edge to his words, as his lips carved a vicious smirk. “Then again, what do you expect? You still have the impatience of a mortal.”
No, he thought as he hissed through newly grown fangs. I’m not a mortal anymore. I’ve gone too far to remain one of them! “I deserve it for what I have done for you! I have waited for years now, offered you dozens upon dozens of people! I deserve your powers, I deserve everything that you offered me!”
“What would it be worth to someone as impatient as you?”
“It would be worth what you owe me!”
He wants to keep me here. He wants me to serve him forever. The voices...their whispers, they were surely right, and Zitao couldn’t help but nod and shake his head to agreed with them. Yifan’s eyes narrowed as he saw how the priest twitched, awkward hand motions and shakes telling that he was not the only one in the temple offering Zitao advice. “I said that transformations would require you to bide your time. That I would have to wait decades in between my own transformations. What makes you think that you are more worthy than I am?”
I am worthy of more! There was nothing to say, nothing but a guttural roar as he launched himself to where Yifan stood, hoping to bowl him over in surprise and forcefully drag out the next transformation. “You can’t hold it away from me, that’s not fair!” Oh, he sounded like a petulant little child crying for attention, but it was so deserved and he was so good and it was just so unfair! Especially when Yifan braced himself with ease and tossed him down to the ground, the jewels scattering against the ground. They sliced his chest, shards of precious gems cutting against his flesh where the scales had not grown through. It wasn’t until he had crawled atop Yifan had the aching subsided, shifting into a needy warmth that he craved with all of his shrivelled heart.
“I want more...” he growled in between gulps of air and frantic breaths, in an effort to try and coax him into further intimacy. But Yifan was stubborn, and bit down hard upon the younger’s forked tongue. It only earned him bitter snarls and an even more urgent press of the hips, as he slipped deeper and deeper into the spiralling insanity that came with the need to grow. It was malignant, a growth that needed to be allowed to grow as it spread through his body and pulsed through his veins. It was too much, too much, eating away at the edges of his fragmented mind as he tried to get something more, something extra. “More! Give me more! ”
It wasn’t until claws had come to seize beneath his neck that he stopped his demanding, mainly because Yifan had never looked so infuriated in all of his life. He grabbed Zitao’s jaw tightly, almost enough to break the skin beneath his talons, but he didn’t dare.
Instead, he granted Zitao’s wish. “Very well. Have it all. ”
And with that final kiss, searing in the inside of his mouth, Zitao awaited the transcendence.
It came, finally, with an almighty punch in the spine.
The ripping of skin was more agonising than anything Zitao had ever felt before, and as he bent double with his back tearing itself apart, he wondered briefly if this would be his end. Yifan hadn’t considered the fact his body may not have been able to handle the final transformation...had he?
“It hurts! It hurts!” But hurt was only tame in describing the pain he was going through. For it felt as though his very bones were fragmenting, splitting apart under the pressure that he was feeling build up inside his torso.
But Yifan did nothing. If anything, he watched Zitao writhe in pain with a look of apathy, not even trying to relieve him. “Stop fighting.” was all that Zitao could hear over his screams, thrumming through his veins as molten lava filled his insides. “Accept it. This is your true destiny.”
There was no consoling Zitao, when he tore at his garments and his new sharpened nails ripped away at the jewels that had lain over his chest. There was nothing but pain, sheer agony, and it only increased as it burrowed closer and closer to the surface.
When it finally burst from the skin, it was almost a relief to feel, the pressure dropping as the flesh in his back ripped open, piercing something
They were smaller than Yifan’s, almost infantile in their appearance, only covered in a thin layer of muscle with a thinner skin decorating its surface in small clusters of ebony scales. They were as soft as snakeskin, damp and frail as those of a freshly formed butterfly, newly emerged from the chrysalis. The tender flesh was hot to the touch, which is more than what could be said for the rest of his body. Zitao hadn’t known such a cold feeling before; his teeth were chattering, yet when he brushed his hair from his eyes, his fingers were coated in a fine film of heated sweat.
But this was it. This was the first step to becoming deified. Zitao needed to make his way from the temple as soon as Yifan had been satiated.
“Beautiful...,” the creature purred, seemingly unfazed by the blood dripping from Zitao’s forehead. If anything, it only enticed him further, pupils dilated to only reveal a thin halo of gold. “your form is splendid.” He marvelled over Zitao’s naked form, fingers coming to run against the new skin of his wings and tail, even admiring the bone of his curling horns. “You’re still so young, but you needn’t worry. They’ll grow in magnificent as time goes on. The more you feed, the larger you will get, until your own form takes hold.”
Zitao couldn’t wait, he couldn’t wait that long. “How long will it take?” He stretched out one of his newly formed appendages, disappointed it only reached his wrists. Yifan’s wings easily took three times his size, easily capable to sweeping him skyward. “I want to fly, I want to feel the true extent! I can’t wait for them to just grow!”
And yet, Yifan only smiled down to the ground, a smirk decorating his face as he gazed upon his talons. “You must be patient. That is what it means to have power, you see. You bide your time, worm your way into everywhere you can reach.”
“I can’t wait! I want to fly, you promised I would fly!”
“And you shall. In Hell, there are many places where you can spread your wings.”
The crackling of the lanterns almost seemed deafening, and yet Zitao was sure that he had heard Yifan wrong. His wings folded neatly against his back, and he couldn’t resist a laugh...though it was apprehensive at best. “Hell...why...why would I be sent there?”
And yet to Yifan, it seemed like the most natural thing to say in the entire world. “Where else would you be sent? You are one of my kindred now, so it is only natural that you return with me to our true hunting grounds. Perfect for a sinner such as yourself, after all.” At the confusion in Zitao’s face, mouth opening and closing mechanically to try and work up the courage to see if it was all a joke, Yifan cooed softly, like a mother pacifying her child. “Oh Zitao...all those years of leading little lambs to the slaughter, and you thought you were doing it for the greater good? How innocent you are...”
Close, close...the air was too close. It was suffocating, and Zitao raked his claws down the length of his throat. “But your powers...you’re a god, there is no other way! And those people...they were just sheep, as you said! Your glory is worth more than their lives were worth-“
“My glory? Or the glory that it would have earned you as a result?”
He knows. He knows what I want...that I lie.
“You think that I would have let you slip away into the night as soon as you had fed me? Let you usurp my powers and leave me to starve?” Yifan’s voice settled into a most dangerous of purrs, claws strumming the ground in rhythmic taps as Zitao backed away. “I know what you were thinking, in those last instances as your power grew. You wanted to leave me behind. You wanted to run away and take everything I have taught you as well.” A devious grin, though it only veiled the sneer that was brewing on Yifan’s face. “What a little treacherous thing you have turned out to be. I should be proud...your heart is more poisoned than I gave it credit for.”
“What are you talking about?! I worship the ground you step on! I killed for you! I fed you! For all these years!”
“You did it for your own gains. First was to sate me so I wouldn’t eat you. Second was for the chance to see if you really could live forever. And finally...was to overthrow me.”
“You don’t know that! I-“
“You underestimate what I know. And I know that you wanted to run away from all of this. As soon as you had tasted the blood of a human, you were trying to escape my grasp and make your own way to enlightenment.”
“Liar!”
As soon as the words had left his mouth, Zitao instantly regretted them. For Yifan was upon him instantly, fingers splayed and ready to gut him for his insolence. But instead, he merely tossed Zitao about, never quite coming close enough to maim him, but enough to beat him into submission. He sank his teeth into the flesh of Zitao’s ankle, easily ripping the skin and forcing the younger to curl inward and whimper.
“You dare to call me a liar...when I am the one who is generous enough to give you this gift?” He bit down harder into the backs of Zitao’s calves, blood welling around his mouth as he tried to cripple the boy enough to drag him away into the darkness. But as Zitao made a move to raise his hand, ready to rake his claws down Yifan’s face, he found his wrist pinned to the ground faster than he could recoil it, Yifan’s talon welled blood from the wounds, and he couldn’t help but shift and squirm in such a tight hold. “Now you wish to strike me? You think your new strength is enough to set you free? You have made a deal with the Devil, Zitao. You offered blood, sweat, tears, human flesh...even your very soul! There is no way that you can wriggle your way out of this!”
Yifan’s claws sank in deep, clenching tighter as Zitao howled in pain until he was sure that they were scraping against the bones of his hips. He tried to swing his upper torso away, his own tiny nails scoring deep grooves in the stone, but it wasn’t enough. He didn’t have the power to escape the dragon’s clutches, even though he was now what could be considered a god. No...he would never be that. He never could, not when Yifan had played him so well. Not when he had fallen so very far from grace.
“But you needn’t worry.” Yifan rumbled, throwing him down to the ground with enough strength to split the rock with shards and cracks. “You’ll keep your powers, you’ll keep your youth. Down where I came from, you’ll fit right in with us.”
Down...down there.... There where the demons lurk. No gods or deities come from there. “This wasn’t part of our deal! You can’t take me away, you can’t!”
“You think you’d be able to survive up here? When the last fragments of your soul belong to me?”
Cold blood pulsed through him, in spite of the fever that had that settled deep into his flesh. “No. No, you haven’t! You said you’d take a part of me, you meant what we do every night! Not my soul!”
“The deal took part of you, yes...but you never said which. Or how much. I took you in the night, as I took your soul every time. Each little scrap let me contort you even more, let me mould you in my image.” No, no, no, he can’t! Zitao heard it over and over again, the times when he was bent double and begging for it. He had wanted this change, but he hadn’t known the true cost. Stupidity had blinded him, it had corrupted his heart, since watching Yifan first enter his life and slowly tease forth the beats that had lurked in the darkest vestiges of his conscious. It had been teased, twisted, allowed to take control and control his actions. And I let it. “It sounds so familiar, doesn’t it? You wanted to be made into this; you wanted me to tear away your old mortal skin. Just a shame that now you want to crawl back into it.”
“But what on Earth will a soulless boy accomplish when he steps out into the open world? You can’t eat mortal food, you can’t sleep. You can’t even feel unless it’s my touch or the bodies you feast upon!”
“I can...I-I can-“
“Your time is up. And now, we must return to the land we truly belong to.”
Zitao wanted to fight back, he truly did...but there was no use going up against the might of the beast in his formidable form. “You can’t take me away!” For as soon as Zitao roared back in defiance, fanged mouth stretched wide to bare newly grown canines, Yifan was almost flaring his wings. “I’m not one of you!” It did nothing to try and intimidate the elder god, not even when his own wings, f thing bone and newly-born skin, stretched as far as they could, the blood running down his face from freshly protruding horns.
If anything had been achieved by his insolence, it served to only antagonise Yifan into his true form. Zitao could only regret his bravado, having never seen the transformation occur the other way around, for it was more terrifying than anything he could have imagine. The way Yifan’s jaw broken itself into two, elongating bones and fang protruding from a human mouth that was much too small. Rivulets of blood rushed down his face and chest as his horns further erupted from his skull, the hair and pink flesh giving way to the millions of scales bursting from beneath them, ready to coat his vulnerable human form in an impenetrable coat of armour. Even now, as Zitao tried to strike out, raking his own bony claws against the monster’s chest, he found himself coming off worse. For as he glanced down to his claws, the pain lancing up his arm, he could see that they were already broken from the impact.
There was no use in fighting. And as Yifan’s true nature bared its narrow snout towards him, blood oozing between each of the dagger-like teeth, Zitao knew that this was a battle he could not win.
Scaled lips formed guttural words, as the demon reared his tail and smashed away at the stone wall from which he had first erupted. Zitao expected to see the cavern of gold, the dragon’s hoard that he had first encountered there. But instead, he was welcomed with only a rush of blistering heat, as an inferno licked the cavern behind the rock, swirling flames sending terrifying shadows dancing across the floor. And Yifan stood in their way, a monstrous countenance forcing Zitao to try and race for the entrance. Gold melted around his feet, scalding metal spilling around him, to which the cry of the beast answered his screams.
You cannot escape your fate, now that your soul is mine!
“No, no, you can’t do this! ” But as the fangs of the beast sank into his legs, Zitao knew that he was done for. His claws scrabbled frantically against the ground as he tried to pull himself forward, away from the burning heat and the fires of Hell that were surely waiting for him. He could pull away! He had to! “Yifan, don’t do this!”
You made your deal, Zitao. Now it is time to pay the price.
An almighty heave shook the great monster’s muscles, and Zitao’s fingers came free from the ground which they had anchored themselves in. A slithering tail seized his torso, while a barely suppressed roar drowned out the screams he emitted, shrieking until his throat was red and raw. There was nobody to answer him, nobody to come and take him safely away from the claws of the beast that had seduced him. He was left alone at its mercy.
So nobody was there to answer his final pleas, before he was dragged down beneath the earth and roots, where fire licked at his skin and blistered his face, embers burning his eyes until that remained was a winged silhouette.
...
“Get him! Get that little whelp!”
Jongin’s chest heaved as he skittered down the side of the gorge, hair fluttering in his eyes as he could already feel the rocks whooshing by his head, their air whistling by his ears. The bullies were approaching too fast though, and there would be no way he could outrun them for too long.
It was an advantage to him though, that he knew the layout of the gorge better than most...which didn’t help as he tumbled through the old greying temple walls as soon as he had tried to jump across them like he thought he could fly across it.
It was painful, to say the least, as his back collided hard with the stone floor and left him panting and winded for a good long while. Above him, the shadows of the bullies lingered overhead, laughing and pointing as they shimmied down to reach him
“What you doing, hiding in here?” The eldest of the group, the clear ringleader, made sure to drag him to his feet, intent on seeing him ‘fight back’. “You big baby!”
Jongin’s nose wrinkled as he spat out a glob of phlegm. “I’m not a baby! Just because I’m not strong like you, it doesn’t mean nothing!”
“God demands the best of his devotees! Did you know that you’re meant to kill the littlest kid in the class when they reach the age of twelve?”
“You’re lying!”
“Well, nobody would care if a weakling like you died anyway!”
A swift punch to the face was enough to send Jongin’s vision spinning, head colliding against something smooth and stained with brown and black. he tried to prop himself up on it, narrowly missing a bloody punch that hit the stone wall instead, though only ending up with his jaw aching when he received a kick right in the mouth as something was looped over his head and pulled tight between the eldest’s hands.
His right hand suddenly jerked violently back, as the rope coiled around the younger’s throat like a serpent, intent upon strangling the very life out of him. A sudden cry of shock died upon his lips as the bully’s thumb pressed down against his Adam’s apple, stretching as far as his arms would reach with the chain of beads cutting deeper into the skin. Jongin’s body, shocked and starving of air, began to tremble fearfully as his eyes desperately searched the crowd for aid, for anyone to come forward and stop this madness.
He tried, he tried as hard as he could. But they were a sea of bodies, masses upon masses falling over each other to try and reach for him to hit and kick. And it was getting to be too hot, too much, the hurt and blood and the heat coiling together as he felt himself dancing on the brink of unconsciousness.
That was until the roaring began, and the laughter of the children turned into screams.
Jongin curled up tightly as he was knocked away by something long and thin, while the sounds of chewing and crunching echoed only inches away. Through the gaps of his fingertips, he saw them. All of the bullies bleated out the beginnings of a distressed yelp, voices failing to come out as more than frightened mewls, as they were seized around the ankles by two sets of ravenous mouths, dragged through the dust and dirt of centuries past. They screamed and screamed, crying out to anyone - holy or not - that would have been able to come to their aid.
In Jongin’s mind, his poor frantic mind, he sang every prayer he knew, running over everything that his pastor had taught because that was what needed to be done, that was the only way-
Even now, as he whimpered the beginnings of a prayer to God, he could tell it was much too late. They were covered in blood and wounds, ripped apart by tooth and claw, but still fighting in vain. His young body was no use against the two monsters tearing apart at his clothes and skin, like the wild hounds of the city that played with rats they caught, so it was perhaps best that he didn’t imitate those who had hounded him. They toyed with them, oh they toyed, snapping and crunching tiny fingers between their strong jaws.
Their voices had settled now, but the tiny mewls still echoed in his ears like the ring of the bell to Sunday mass. I’m only twelve, I’m only twelve..., he begged Him, tears streaming down his face as the smaller creature ripped the skin from the eldest’s chest in violent slashes. I’m still so young, God, please let me live!
He clasped his hands to his mouth as he watched the larger beast rip something red and beating from the body of the eldest bully.
He lay still. Jongin screamed.
The two creatures whirled upon him, their eyes golden and bright, listening to how he screamed and cried out for help. And yet, they refused to act beyond that. They merely stared at him, the tallest’s face neutral, though the smaller looked ready to tear him apart. Jongin cuddled his legs closer and screamed louder, hoping to drown out the demonic whispers before him.
“Please, Master...let me take him. Look at how young and tender he is!”
“No, Zitao, you may not eat him.”
“But my Lord-“
“Enough. There is more to this boy than you think...does he not remind you of someone?”
As Jongin’s shrieks faded into terrified squeaks, throat hoarse and aching, he could see the slithering form of the larger one’s tail creep closer to him. Paralysed by fear, he watched as it crept up beneath his shield of limbs, forcing his head up a little as it shirked away the rope around his neck, so that he could gaze into the monster’s eyes, face to face. The purr made him shiver something fierce, and as the voice of creature made itself apparent, the little boy wondered what on earth he had exactly discovered.
“It would suit you best...if you didn’t try to run.”
PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3
Author’s Note: Back again for the Halloween round, how could I keep away?
I was going to enter another story into this fest but it was just too bloody massive to complete. I know that being said, considering last year, as a piss-poor excuse but heyo. Anyway, that story kinda made me sad, so I’m not entering that, and instead gonna use it for something else. In other words, I needed something a little smuttier to soothe my Taoris feelings~
To the mods: Sorry for being a butt. Again! But seriously, thank you for putting up with me, you’re amazing ^3^~
To the readers: I hope you enjoy! Please don’t be scared of me, I am a good person.