Havenburg , a young city renowned for its  towering buildings, busy people, economic growth never ceasing and was one of the one and only city which happen to contain the twisted , the bristlecone pine trees.

The fully grown Bristlecone pines which lives upto a thousand years on average seems to be mysteriously fitted inside this bustling urban city. It seems as if the trees were planted there ages ago, just to be in the right placement with the young city.

In the heart of the city, laid between two old abandoned decaying 5 storied building, was an alley that everyone seemed to overlook. It wasn't just any normal alley - it was the kind of place that felt intentionally avoided, as if the city itself had grown around it and forgotten it existed. It seems like the city deliberately made the alley inconspicuous.

Leonard Blake had walked past it every day for years on his way to work. But today, curiosity or FATE drew him in. It was as if he was experiencing some 'call of the void' from that alley

The alley was unusually dark, even in the middle of the day when the sun was right up. At most distance Leonard have his vision clear was four feet. As Leonard ventured deeper, the noises of the bustling city faded until there was nothing but an eerie silence. The silence was such that he could hear his own heart beat. He checked his watch but the time was stuck at 12:05 , the seconds hand of the watch ticked at the same position. The air grew colder, and the walls seemed to close in on him. From the outside, the buildings weren't that much of a length. This fourth dimensional mystery grew stronger until he began to have claustrophobic feelings. He reached a dead end, but there was a door there- an ancient, ruined door that looked out of place amidst the bricks and graffiti.

Compelled by an unknown urge he couldn't explain, Leonard pushed the door open. The creaking sound of the door piecered through his ears. Inside, he found a narrow staircase spiraling down into the depths. He peeped down only to get a vertigo attack. A thick layer of dark fog hid the enigmatic bottom. He descended, the air growing colder and the darkness gradually conquered with each step. He heard some strange whispering voices. The voices grew as he descended. At the bottom, he found a cavernous room, its pillars lined with bookshelves filled with volumes of books bound in strange, unidentifiable materials. There was no visible walls but only darkness beyond the pillars

In the center of the room was a pedestal, and on it laid an open book. Leonard approached, drawn by the whispering voices that seemed to flow out from its pages. He looked through the pages. The words were in a language he couldn't read, but the longer he stared, the more they made sense. Leonard started to understand this strange language unknowingly. They spoke of fallen ancient gods and cosmic beings beyond human comprehension- beings that slumbered beneath the fabric of reality, waiting for the right moment to awaken and consume the world. He started hallucinating the things written in the book.

As Leonard read through, he felt a presence behind him. He turned slowly, expecting to see a monstrous entity, but there was nothing there. Just the overwhelming darkness and the feeling of being watched. He turned back to the book, his heart pounding, and saw a phrase that chilled him to the spine: 

"You have been chosen."

The room began to shake, and Leonard stumbled back, his mind consumed by terror. The walls seemed to pulse and breathe, and the whispering voices grew louder, more relentless. He knew he had to escape, but his legs felt heavy. With every bit of remaining strength, he tore himself away from the book and ran up the staircase. 

He burst out of the door, back into the alley, and the noises of the city came back into him. Panting, he looked back at the door. It was gone. There wasn't any sign of the existence of the door. The alley looked just as it always had—empty and unremarkable. His watch was running again from 12:05 and the actual time in the world froze with him during the incident

Leonard stood there, shaken but relieved to be just out of that nightmare. He hurried back to the street, blending into the crowd. He was like a sparrow in a hurricane. He decided to forget what he had seen, to convince himself it was just a hallucination brought on by work stress.

Many weeks passed, and Leonard continued his routine, but the memory of that alley and the book clung onto him. It was December 29th. The news of a strange meteor was widespread among Havenburg, of an advantage of getting the best view of the meteor from earth. Astronomers couldn't predict its orbit or its definite path. They observed its shape to be somewhat elliptical and left behind a trial which was twisted and not steady. 

 That evening, as Leonard walked home, he felt a strange compulsion to check the alley again. He resisted the feeling at first, but the urge grew stronger, and finally, he gave in.

The alley was just as he remembered it. He walked to the end, but the door wasn't there. He felt a mix of relief and disappointment. With a final glance, he turned to leave-and there, at the entrance of the alley, stood a man.

The man was tall and gaunt, with eyes that seemed to pierce through Leonard's soul. His pale face and the long black robe contrasted 

He smiled, a cold, unsettling smile, and said, "You've seen it, haven't you?"

Leonard's blood ran cold. His words refused to come out of his mouth. He nodded slowly. 

The man stepped closer. "Then you know what must be done."

Leonard shook his head, backing away. "I don't understand."

The man's smile widened. "You will."

And with that, he disappeared into the crowd, leaving Leonard alone in the alley. He stood there for a long moment, the city's noise fading into the background. The whispering voices from the book echoed in his mind, and he realized with a sinking feeling that there was no escape. The ancient gods were surreal but not unbelievable, and they had chosen him.

-He was a part of their plan now, whether he liked it or not-

Leonard came out from the alley into the street , finally inhaling the usual air. He was still shaken by this encounter, and for a brief moment , he felt something. He felt something unusual , when he looked up at the sky . Unusually even though it's afternoon, the sun vanished from the sky. Leonard couldn't make through what was going on. And then he looked the ground, surprisingly only his shadow was visible and people walking around him didn't cast any shadows. As Leonard was dumbstruck not able to figure out between what's real and illusion, he noticed that none of the surrounding people noticed the sun and shadows as they were busy and in a rush as usual. They were all so consumed in their daily routine with no self awareness or were just too selfish to care about the surroundings. He approached a guy hoping he could inform about this strange disappearance of the sun. And when Leonard started to say a word, his throat itched like a hundred needles piercing it from the inside. He was unable to say even one word.

He approached to various people around him but all he did was cough aggressively before them. He knew some force was stopping him from communicating to others, and thus Leonard started communicating with hands , pointing at the sun. And surprisingly none of them even cared to listen to him. Leonard walked some distance hoping he would atleast tell one man about the situation . But this time, when he coughed , he noticed blood. He looked his way back only to see he was coughing up blood all way long.

With his voice disrupted by this strange happenings around him, he moved to a place where there were less humans and gave up the intention to inform about the sun. He looked up in curiosity , just to get his eyes burned by the powerful ultra violet rays from sun. 

Yes , the sun was back again , shining innocently.

Leonard made his way back to his apartment, carrying the weight of the inevitable doom with him. 

That night, he had nightmares about the happenings around him. In his dream, he heard a voice saying 

"Ye mortals shalt be chastised of thy iniquities, ..."

Leonard felt disturbed in sleep as he heard this great voice thundering into his head.

".....Shalt suffer in naught for ages for thy practice of blasphemy and malice towards others."

"The Supreme One hath chosen thee, mortal."

Leonard jumped waking up from the dream. Not so late did he realised, there was no air in his room. The thin papers on the floor laid still as a rock. And not a single breathe could he inhale. Leonard rushed to the closed window , pushed it open and threw his head out for fresh air. Finally the air returned inside the room and the thin papers started hovering about the floor.

As he gasped for oxygen through the window , he looked down on the street to see two to three mysterious human like figures in white stood there like corpses looking up to him, all eyes staring at Leonard just like the strange man from the alley. He wasn't sure if those things even were humans , they looked that skinny. A sudden door knock made Leonard skip a heart beat. He peeped through the door hole, the enigmatic humans stood there just like a rock. Leonard blocked the door by all the way he could right away, and looked through the window again. This time there were more humans , few of them holding sign boards written 

"please fulfill His will" And "don't die"

Leonard considered these signs were haunting until he saw a little kid among them hoisting a sign saying 

"He isn't the God we know , IT isn't God. It's the fallen , It's the declined , the dethroned , It's the beginning of the cycle of THE NEW WORLD ORDER "

Leonard can't stop thinking about the fact that he HAD to escape this city no matter what. He knew something was off about the place he live, from the beginning. But to realise that he is a just a puppet to the puppeteers, shattered his will to escape.

That day passed but the horror clung steadily onto him, while the others were excited about the strange meteor on the new year's Eve, the next day.

December 31

That night, when all the people were eagerly outside waiting to see the meteor, the sky over the city darkened unnaturally. People looked up in confusion and fear as the stars seemed to vanish one by one. The sky turned pitch black. Leonard watched from his window, the whispers growing louder in his mind. He felt the universal superior being awakening.

A blinding flash of light erupted from the alley, and an unearthly roar shook the buildings. An angelic choir rang all around. Thousands of white glowing humanoid figures ascended into the sky from the alley. They looked almost like what we call a ghosts or spirits. And when they all reached up above, the sky was lit up by the meteor. The meteor was unusually very slow and though it was small , it made a clear majestic appearance. All the white glowing spirits hurried towards the meteor zestfully. The spirits made themselves as a layer on the meteor and they attained their salvation. And finally amidst the brightly lit sky, a single black spirit emerged from the alley towards the meteor. Thousands of glowing hands from the meteor invited the black spirit wholeheartedly. When the dark spirit reached the meteor, they attained an ABSOLUTE SALVATION from their curse and the meteor suddenly disappeared and made the sky hauntingly pitch black. People felt like falling into the sky when they looked at it 

"Ye mortals shalt suffer in naught for ages for thy practice of blasphemy and malice towards others." , the voice rang inside Leonard's head

The sky split open, revealing an abyss filled with writhing, distorted and incomprehensible forms. A bright glowing ball of light descended from within the split. It came down in a spiral movement and in a hypnotising manner. The city was plunged into purgatory as people cried loud and ran, but there was nowhere to hide. The once busy city is now filled only with horror.

The earth shook and the city was completely obliterated killing more than half of the population there. The two old buildings which enclosed the alley came down to debris along with most of the building surrounding it. Most of the city was destroyed but nothing happened to the bristlecone pines, it's as if they were  physically invisible and was not affected by the disaster. And as each people died, a white spirit ascended into the ball of light from the ground accordingly. The rest of the humans, hypnotised by the swirling movement of the light , were drawn towards the alley and were moving there. Leonard figured out that the light manipulates the humans to act that way, so he decided not to look at the light. 

Leonard's apartment tumbled down and fortunately, he survived. He looked away from the glowing ball of light and started to walk the opposite way. He walked through the crowd of humans who were moving towards the alley as Leonard walked the counter direction from them.

The people gathered around the alley forming a big circle gap between them as they raised their hands, welcoming the otherworldly glowing light. Leonard felt that the light stalked behind him , trying to hypnotize him. Leonard overcame many obstacles set by the light for him to look at it, from sending a hypnotized person to make Leonard look it to confusing him in his direction which would eventually lead him to see it. 

Leonard saw two paths diverging in front of him. One path was lit up and clear and the other one was dark and ominous. There was a saying board saying

"Choosing the clear path requires a strong mind and choosing the dark path requires a good heart".

Without hesitation he chose the bright glowing path. As he ventured forward, he saw many kids playing around a bristlecone pine in a beautiful little garden along the path. He saw people with wide opened smiles , which felt as if they never experienced any distress. Then at last , he met an old wicked man, with short proportions holding a wooden stick seated on a throne. His eyes were like twin blackholes absorbing all the light and hope in that path. His voice was like millions of dry leaves screeching on a rough rock ground, which could send chills down the bones of people who hear it.

"Beyond me lies your only salvation , your mind is your only crucial asset. Slip once and you will fall forever" said the old man with his voice reverberating all around with an unsettling echo.

Leonard had his hope and went past him.

Leonard had mixed feelings that he wished to escape this disaster as well as wishing to participate in the welcoming of the gods. As he was marching away from the light and was few steps away from the edge of the wicked city, he suddenly heard a voice in his mind saying,

"Then you know what must be done."

This disrupted his mental stability and distracted him from his way out. He shook his head with disapproval and stood still at a place trying to put himself back together and when he looked forward with determination , a mirror stood firm like an angel of death before him, revealing a clear sight of the ball of light behind him. Leonard's thoughts faded away like fog and was subconscious, hypnotized by the light. 

"You will" 

was the last voice he heard in his mind.

Leonard walked away from his destination, he set his footprints back in the path he came along. His simple human mind fell into oblivion. He came all the way back where it all started , inspite of given a chance to take one more step to freedom.

As the light was descending , gusting away all the dust and debris, ruined mythical patterns on the ground was uncovered. Havenburg was thus discovered not a young city but civilization was there from a long time ago. An ancient generation which built a city and got destroyed by the light a long time ago. As the ages passed, a new city was built by the next civilization who settled there which met the same fate, and the cycle goes on.

As Leonard wearing a black dress crawled through the silent white dressed crowd of Havenburg gathered at the alley, he heard the whisperings from before louder. It was from the ball of light. He moved through the flock of people and stood in the nucleus of the circle gap left among them straight below the light. He looked up at the light and the light stopped it's swirling movement and proceeded straight down.

Leonard felt a calm acceptance wash over him as the ancient gods descended upon the city. He closed his eyes, raised his hands reaching out the light. The whispers finally fading to silence.

"This isn't the end of human being. This is our end of being human" he murmured unconsciously 

The city and all its inhabitants were obliterated, consumed by the cosmic inexplicables.

And then, there was nothing. A void swept over the place. The ancient gods returned to their slumber, the city erased from existence as if it had never been.  Life on the other places went on, and the memory of the city and its people faded into the void, lost waiting forever in darkness...

...lost waiting Forever in darkness , until a new Havenburg is built.