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He did not remember a beginning. Not in the way living beings recalled first breaths or first sights. All he remembered was death, again and again, given to him millions of times by a person he could not seem to remember, until his consciousness drifted from the world of the living — was he even alive to begin with?
The next thing he remembers is a touch. Cold as stone, placing him gently —too gently— upon a throne, leaving him there to exist. The scenario felt so familiar, yet unfamiliar all the same.
Then, he woke up again, this time as a doll. Unable to live, yet not dead.
Small. Still. A little thing carved in the shape of a child’s toy. And although he could not move, he could see—
First, he saw the emptiness around him, a dim expanse of nothing, lit only by gold brush strokes leaking from his creator’s fingertips— as if the man used his own life to paint. It dusted the air like dying starlight, burning below the throne he was sitting upon. Then, he recognized the Strife’s sigil’s reflection on one of the embers—the long, vertical spear etched in the back of the throne— and the mark pulsed faintly behind him in response, like a dying heartbeat of something he once was.
It is only when the last drop of gold fell into the canvas of nothingness that he allowed himself to look at the painter again, the sigil behind him pulsing with warmth he could not understand.
The man, the golden painter, stood with his back to the doll. His shoulders were broad, his bare back carved with spiraling golden scars that glowed in the darkness of the world they were in. Bands of metal clung to his wrists, not as an ornament but as shackles long forgotten, like a prisoner.
His first memory is destruction, everywhere, in every life he had.
The second is his name: Mydeimos. Mydei. The demigod of strife.
So that’s what he was. A god, a god who died an infinity of times before for the sake of a land, people, something important enough to die for countless times. Until he was saved by this sad painter, who kept brushing gold into the emptiness in front of them, until a world took place beneath the golden blood.
Mountains rose and collapsed. Seas churned. Skies were carved. Cities sparked into existence for a single heartbeat before being wiped away by a sweep of his palm.
And with every new canvas, Mydei could feel heaviness. As though creation was not an act of power for the golden painter, but an act of atonement for his sins.
Mydei watched his back every day from his unmoving seat, for what could have been both a mere week and centuries alike. He learned the rhythm of the man’s breath. The way he sometimes wiped the canvas so violently he clutched at his heart, as if the act hurt him physically. He learned the sound of his voice—hoarse, quiet, tired.
“Those who are tainted by the golden blood,” the man once whispered, lifting his palm to stroke a field of wheat, molten gold dripping from his fingertips, “must paint the world.”
He said it with no pride. Only acceptance, defeat. Like the eternal suffering was the only destiny for him.
And with time came also memories— a white-haired man. A smile as bright as the sun, boyish and charming. The looks of panic in his blue eyes. Tears streaming down his cheeks. A cry of his name. Warmth as he yet again perished in the same man’s arms.
Every memory was different, yet the same. As if he remembered all his past lives one by one, without being able to remember the person’s name.
More time passes, another decade? Day? Eternity? And the little doll remembered how to feel.
It’s small at first: He remembers that the feeling in his chest when he sees the blue-eyed man crying— the same pain he feels for the golden painter when he clutches his chest in pain at another erased world. He also remembers the feeling of happiness, or nostalgia —Mydei isn’t sure about it— whenever he looks at the painter, and the man looks back at him, a flicker or something akin to hope in his golden eyes…
And Mydei found himself wishing that he could reach out, touch him, tell him he was not alone in this cold, dying expanse. Perhaps he could ease the man’s pain if only he could wipe those golden tears away.
But reality was lonely, just like the life of the painter.
Lonely and cruel.
Mydei could not move. Could not comfort. Could do nothing but sit trapped in the body of a little doll and watch someone crumble beneath a divine burden he never asked for.
Pieces of Strife were not meant to care.
Yet he did.
He cared so deeply it hurt.
Especially when the painter would falter. His knees would buckle. His palm would smear across the vast canvas in a broken line of gold as he sank forward, chest heaving. Mydei wished then more than ever for a voice, for a body, for a single moment of movement— something, anything— to stand beside him.
Instead, he remained a tiny ornament on a stone throne, watching the man’s suffering pool like molten gold at his feet.
And it was in those moments, as the painter allowed a single tear to drop down the floor and whispered, “I haven’t forgotten that, Mydeimos,” that Mydei realized the man knows him, or at least knew him in his past life.
With the realization comes change. As if the memory re-awakened the powers of strife in him, or perhaps the power of the golden blood.
Because the next time Mydei opened his eyes, he was no longer a doll. He was human again, dressed in the same gown his porcelain self wore, but with the ability to move, to speak, to comfort…
The world we woke up in is a beautiful one: vast fields, blue skies, a small town stretching between two mountains in the distance. The only thing missing in such a beautiful world was the people. It’s as empty as it is full, beautiful and sad at the same time.
Mydei spent —who knows how long— travelling the world, passing through a field scattered with swords and spears, a beautiful beach, a vast land full of small blue flowers. It is only when he reaches a city, as empty as any other he passed through that he sees him, the painter.
Or someone who resembled him at the very least. The first thing Mydei notices is the familiar white hair, everything else is different: black robes, porcelain skin, a mask hiding the man’s eyes.
Yet, when the man says his name, calls him “Mydeimos” so tenderly, he has no doubt the person in front of him is the same painter he had come to love.
“Welcome to this world my dearest one” He extended a hand, cold fingers touching Mydei’s cheek with a careful gentleness that made warmth bloom through Mydei’s chest. He felt the weight behind that touch: the lifetimes of solitude, the burden of creation, the grief that had carved itself into the painter’s bones.
He didn’t want to see that suffering continue.
He didn’t want to watch this man bleed gold into endless worlds until he had nothing left.
“Why did you create this world?” Mydei ends up asking, hesitant.
“I was yearning…” Looking away, the painter stares at the clear skies, as if unbelieving that he was capable of creating such beauty. “I promised to devote myself to him, to you, forever.” He paused, thinking of his next words.
They stand like that for a long while, looking one at the other, the world narrowing to just the two of them.
When the painter finally spoke again, his voice stretched thin with fear and hope, “Now, since I created a world suitable enough for you, what do you wish for, Mydeimos? A day filled with gifts and whimsy? Perhaps a feast? Full of the sweets you love.” He paused again, dropping his arm from Mydei’s face to his hand, bringing it to his face, and placing a kiss on it. “As your eternal deliverer I would mold this world to your wishes, my dear strife.”
“I wish for a world where you no longer suffer,” Mydei found the answer rising to his lips with startling clarity.
The painter’s breath stuttered. Mydei stepped closer, placing his hand over the golden scar on the man’s cheek, warm against cold. “I wish for a world where you don’t have to fight and bleed for its imperfections. A world that doesn’t demand pieces of you just so it can exist. A world where you can be free.”
A quiet gasp escaped the painter’s lips, shaking his head in disbelief, “You would wish such a thing?” He asked, “For a man who has failed you a millions of times? For someone who could not protect the world he held so dear?”
“Yes,” Mydei answered, suddenly remembering everything— Deliverer, Khaslana, Phainon— It felt like a movie playing in front of his eyes. Of what he was, what they were, how every cursed cycle ended in death until his beloved chose to sacrifice himself, one last time, to grant the world they loved so much a flicker of hope.
Finally, being able to put a name to the man in his memories, the man in front of him, filled Mydei’s heart with impossible warmth. “Yes,” he repeated, “because in the end, it is still you whom I love so dearly.”
The painter pressed a hand against his own chest, like he was trying to contain the sudden trembling of his own heart. He lowered his gaze, unsure, afraid. Mydei let him, waiting in silence for what felt like another eternity.
Then he spoke again, quieter, as if naming something sacred. “My eternal deliverer… Phainon. This is what I truly wish for.”
The painter —Phainon— shuddered at the sound of his name, like he hadn’t heard the words for millennia and yearned for this exact moment. It was small, reserved, but Mydei noticed it. The reaction felt like a lifetime’s worth of vulnerability laid bare in front of him.
For a moment, he simply looked at Mydei, golden eyes no longer hidden behind a mask, his look returning to the old self Mydei had known in his past life. Lives.
“Farewell then, Mydeimos” Phainon murmured, lifting his gold-stained hand and pressing it gently over Mydei’s heart. “If it is really what you wish for,”
Light rippled outward from his touch. The sky began to change, soft hues unfolding like dawn breaking over a world that was frozen in time for too long. The air warmed, the ground beneath their feet bloomed with crystal-like flowers, no longer shackled by destruction but full of love’s creation. “I will grant it for you, for us.”
Just like that, everything shattered. Mydei found himself still human, still holding Phainon’s arms, back in the vast darkness— surrounded by a myriad of canvases; worlds Phainon had created for him, in hopes he’d visit one of them one day.
How long had his beloved been creating those worlds before Mydei gained consciousness inside the little doll? How long did he suffer?
Mydei shook his head. It did not matter. They were together again, despite everything. Nothing else mattered anymore.
“A quiet, gentle place,” Phainon whispered between them. “A home fit for our inseparable souls. A place where neither of us must suffer again.”
“Yes.” Mydei smiled, leaning closer, pressing a gentle kiss to his beloved’s lips.
“A home for us both.”