I write obituaries for the gods

"Someone's here! They want to see you bunch of cripples! Get moving right now! Say another word and I'll break your legs!"

"..."

The prisoners began to pour out, and Zvyagintsev glared fiercely at the boy before leaving the room as well.

The boy leaned against the wall, coughing violently, his expression pained.

The shadow covered him, and the boy looked up to see Velemeremir standing in front of him.

"You let him...kill me?" The boy's hands trembled.

"Are you afraid?" Velemir asked calmly.

The boy hesitated for a moment, then nodded vigorously:

"I'm afraid."

His lips twitched violently a few times, then he said viciously:

"I'll definitely kill him next time!"

"..."

Velemer stared at the boy for a while, then turned around and followed the jailer into the cold outside.

In the central hall of the Gulag, the prisoners were lined up according to their assigned areas, and guards patrolled among them.

Velemer stood at the back of the line, with his fellow prisoners from the same prison.

The gates opened, and a group of soldiers wearing black skull masks walked in, followed by a priest dressed in a black robe of Dararis.

Upon seeing the soldiers, the jailers immediately retreated to both sides of the hall, seemingly quite wary of them.

But the prisoners reacted quite differently.

When they saw the priest, their faces lit up with joy.

"Amen!" someone shouted.

Amen! Amen! Amen!

The crowd joined in the shouting, with Zvyagintsev shouting the loudest, as if he wanted to vent all the grievances he had suffered.

For the first time ever, the Gulag guards did not reprimand the prisoners, but instead allowed them to immerse themselves in this frenzied atmosphere.

"..."

The priest did not begin to speak until they stopped making noise.

“During my absence, the glory of the Lord seems to have been shining on the Gulag and on your sins.”

The priest looked around, a smile playing on his lips.

“You all understand that no one here can save you. The frozen ground will devour your flesh and blood, and the cold wind will freeze your fingers.”

“You worship the one Lord, you worship the light, you worship the great God.”

“Even so… my informants tell me that there is an impure person among you…”

Upon hearing this, the atmosphere in the hall immediately froze.

"In this age rife with heresy, God has been asleep for a long time, and the cancer of our time is growing ever stronger," the priest said, spreading his arms wide. "But the good news is that God will soon return, and the glory of the Lord will shine upon the world, and of course, it will also completely purify your sins!"

"Christians, will you follow the scepter or the serpent?"

"Amen!" Zvyagintsev shouted, raising his fist as the first to do so.

Amen! Amen! Amen!

Are you willing to give everything to accomplish God's great work?

Amen! Amen! Amen!

Are you willing to follow the Lord's glory until the end of time?

Amen! Amen! Amen!

“Father! I will rid you of the unclean!” Zvyagintsev roared.

The priest seemed to have heard him and turned his gaze over.

He stretched out his hand, and the line of prisoners parted like the sea, forming a straight line.

The priest walked through the crowd, his hands behind his back, and stood in front of Zvyagintsev, meeting his gaze.

"Are you willing to contribute your strength?"

"I do! I've had enough of the blasphemy of the unclean!"

Zvyagintsev said, pointing to Velemil behind him.

“That heretic, who today openly proclaimed that God is dead and even presumptuously called himself a god! He has reduced us, the most devout believers, to worthless mortals.”

The surrounding prisoners immediately echoed his sentiments, all staring at Velemir with venomous eyes, like poisonous snakes.

Standing in the center of the swarm of venomous snakes, Velemir closed his eyes and gently shook his head.

In the end, they are still nothing more than appendages of the order; even killing is done in a way that relies on the power of the order.

His eyes were clearly a deep blue, and he could take a life with the flick of his finger.

What bound him, making him as insignificant as an insect?

"..."

Velemer turned his head and looked directly at the priest.

After staring at Velemeremir for a moment, the priest walked over to him and said softly:

"You're saying God is dead?"

Velemir nodded slightly:

“I have already foreseen His death.”

The priest's facial muscles twitched visibly, and his body trembled slightly, which made Zvyagintsev's smile even more pronounced.

“He’s a heretic! Do you see that?” Zvyagintsev shouted.

"Burn him! Burn him! Burn him!" the prisoners shouted.

The priest raised a hand, silencing the crowd's shouts.

He stared at Velemer, and said somewhat urgently:

"Will we find God when the Black Star rises?"

Once again, Velemil nodded calmly.

“You will, but not tonight,” he said. “Tonight, another god will die.”

The prisoners were puzzled by their conversation, and Zvyagintsev's expression became somewhat strange.

He also thought that after Velemil blasphemed God to his face, the priest would order him to be burned at the stake.

The priest burned countless prisoners, most of whom were pagans who did not want to believe in God.

More than their faith in God, most prisoners converted because they feared the priest.

But the priest, feared throughout the Gulag, was now somewhat out of sorts as he faced Velemir—that insignificant old immortal.

"Will your glory continue to shine upon me?" The priest's tone became more fervent.

Velemer nodded calmly:

"The time is almost here; the Secret Party is already in dire need of its own protection."

"finally..."

Then, under the astonished gazes of Zvyagintsev and all the prisoners...

The priest knelt down and kowtowed vigorously to Velemil.

“Great Father, Great Lord!” the elder brother cried out, “End your self-exile, return with me to your kingdom, and rid the unclean of those who are impure!”

Two black skeletons walked over, one carrying a woolen coat and the other carrying an old-fashioned Soviet woolen hat.

Under the watchful eyes of the prisoners, Velemil stepped forward and opened his arms.

Those black-skull soldiers who terrified even the jailers began to dress him! They draped coats over Velemil's body, pressed hats over his white-haired head, and knelt down to put a pair of fine wool boots on him.

Finally, the eldest brother took out a pipe from his coat and offered it to him with both hands.

Instead of taking the pipe, Velemil took a pair of sunglasses from Black Skull and put them on.

“I must tell you, the hardships on this road have never ended,” he told his elder brother. “The ghost of history still hunts us, and this time, it will be our last stand.”

“The flower of evil is about to bloom, and he will have no time for us,” the elder brother whispered.

Velemer nodded slightly, then took the pipe from his elder brother and let him light it for him.

He took a deep breath, raised his head, and exhaled a puff of white smoke toward the high corridors of the Gulag.

When he lowered his head again, the deep blue in his eyes was dazzling, and even his sunglasses could not hide the light!

“They don’t believe in God,” Velemer said, puffing on his pipe. “They’re just afraid of you, afraid of the jailers.”

"The accumulation of fear is a fine specialty of the Gulag." The elder brother bowed slightly.

“Superman has fear, and so do gods and men,” Velemir said in a low voice. “Don’t look down on them because of their fear, but right now, they’re really not that useful.”

The loving father walked up to Zvyagintsev and looked directly into his dazed eyes.

He didn't speak, he just stared at the demigod, watching the determination in his eyes crumble little by little.

His knees collapsed along with them.

Zvyagintsev knelt down, clasped his hands together, and tears streamed down his face.

"No...no...please...I didn't mean to..."

He was terrified—first by the revered priest, then by the ruthless black skeletons, everyone bowed and scraped before this old man who was usually bullied, and even addressed him as Lord.

Zvyagintsev didn't know why things had turned out this way, but he understood that he had messed with the wrong person and he was doomed.

But what awaits him is not judgment.

Instead, it was a revolver tossed in front of him.

“There’s a whale-sounding bomb in here,” Velemir whispered. “Come on, use it to kill me.”

Zvyagintsev raised his head and stared blankly into Velemer's deep blue eyes.

"No...I...I won't..."

"Why?" Velemir said softly, "You beat me in the streets, but you don't dare to kill me because you're afraid of the punishment that comes with order."

"Now you realize your fate, but you don't dare to fight to the death?"

"me..."

“You’ve even stopped speaking ill of me,” Velemir said in a low voice, “because I proved my extraordinary abilities to you? But they respect me, they love me, and I’m just an old man in my twilight years. That bullet could have easily gone through my heart and ended my life.”

"I am but a decrepit, aged statue, and you, about to be killed on my command, are still just kneeling there?"

"I..."

Zvyagintsev didn't get a chance to continue.

A figure picked up the gun, aimed it at Zvyagintsev's head, and pulled the trigger:

"Oh!"

Accompanied by a phantom whale cry, Zvyagintsev's head exploded, crashed to the ground, and fell silent.

Velemer looked down and saw the bruised and battered boy standing beside him, holding the revolver in his hand.

“I told you I would kill you, you bastard.”

He spat at Zvyagintsev's corpse, then looked up at Velemer with some suspicion.

“Well done.” Velemir nodded calmly.

The boy raised his gun and aimed it at Velemir.

His hands were trembling; he was afraid, yet he still held the gun.

“I want to leave this prison,” he said in a low voice.