Hometown was quiet, cold, but not uninviting. Anyone who managed to wander in, though such a thing was no easy task, was treated warmly. Of course, there had to be a limit to what the fine folk considered anyone. Humans, nearly extinct in their pure state, were on their whitelist, and one even lived there full time. Monsters were a given, provided of course that they weren't a literal Moldsmal in intelligence. No, what they rejected, in spirit if not in practice, were things beyond monsters and men. Creatures so great and vast they filled the minds and burst the eggshells that held them, and those so immense and powerful quashed the buildings beneath their feet and everyone inside them.

What we call Kaiju, they call Titans. One such beast, far more literal than metaphorical in its make and wake, was surprisingly not seen until it was far too late. Quiet as an owl's flight, it crawled up Mount Ebbot, tearing trees and boulders alike into the air. A shark, it swam uphill, clearing an empty riverbed behind it. A caterpillar, it ate and ate and ate until nothing but a thin veneer of woods surrounded the small town. A spider, it sat and waited, hungry yet patient as soon, all traffic stopped coming up or down the only road in.

Only then, after weeks of waiting, starving itself slim, did it attack. Rearing its ugly head up high, the dark pink, light purple scales across its body shimmered in the sun as its massive front claws tore houses down with equal, unmeasured disdain. Pinprick yellow eyes bore down on Hometown through its matted, ebony mane as the tallest of buildings, the mayoral mansion, was eaten in one bite. The school was taken out not with a slap of its claws or a stomp of its feet, but rather with the lazy swish of its tail, shattering the walls anyways. Roads buckled, lives were lost, and what was once a cozy place for mostly monsters to grow up in and retire to became a desolate plateau.

No one suffered, if only because after the first half hour, there wasn't anyone left to suffer. Still, the Titan bore several new splotches of red, and dust littered the spaces between its scales where moss still grew. Alone, it curled up in its devastation.

Alone, Susie slept, waiting to find a place where she could be accepted for who she was.

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Pub: 26 Jun 2025 06:37 UTC

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