What do you mean when you say I’m supposed to be the devil?! (Essence Cyoa DxD self insert): chapter 1:Cendre et poussière

The smoke hit the back of my throat, harsh and familiar, a welcome burn in the frozen air. I exhaled slowly, watching the grey plume twist and vanish into the endless, dark snowfall above. The flakes fell thick and silent, muffling the world, burying it. My gaze drifted down, past the swirling remnants of my breath, past the skeletal trees, to the stark white rectangle of disturbed earth. Steven’s earth.

"Christ, brother," I whispered, the words barely stirring the cold clinging to my lips. "You really struck hard."

Alone. Utterly alone in this city of the quiet dead. The headstone stood sentinel against the relentless white: ‘Steven. Friend. Brother. Son. May He Rest In Peace. 17 June 2002 - 02 july 2025.’ Twenty-three years. A stupid, cosmic punchline. The dates carved into the granite felt like accusations, marking the beginning and the brutal, premature end of something I hadn’t known I needed until it was ripped away.

"I always kinda knew," I murmured to the stone, my voice raspy from smoke and unshed tears. "Knew life was fragile, brittle as old glass. Had to learn early. Big family? Yeah. Also meant a front-row seat to the fucking farewell tour. More funerals than birthday parties after a while." Another drag. The ember glowed fiercely in the gloom. I watched a single snowflake drift down, impossibly delicate, a tiny crystalline dancer. It landed right on the cherry-red tip of my cigarette. For a heartbeat, it held its perfect, intricate shape against the heat, a miniature world of frozen beauty. Then, almost reluctantly, it surrendered. Melted. Vanished into a tiny hiss of steam. Gone, like everything else. Tragic? Maybe. Mostly just inevitable.

"I lost Nana first," I continued, the confession spilling out into the indifferent snow. "The one who actually smelled like cookies and unconditional love. Then Grandma, who taught me how to swear in three languages and fix a leaky tap. Then Grandpa, who just… faded away after he went. They raised me more than those biological donors ever did." The words ‘mother’ and ‘father’ tasted like ash. "Both sides of the family tree? Saw me growing wrong. Saw the things I liked, the person I was becoming… and decided I wasn’t worth the graft. Rejected. Cut off. Like pruning a diseased branch." A bitter laugh scraped my throat. "You’d think family meant acceptance, right? Some unshakeable bond. Fairy tales. Real life’s just… what it is. A series of losses you learn to carry."

The cigarette was burning down. I could feel the heat intensifying, a slow, insistent threat against my fingers. It was getting uncomfortably close to the filter. The sensation was bizarrely specific – not just heat, but a low, grinding ache, like tiny, invisible insects were slowly chewing through the skin and bone. A warning. I ignored it. Held on tighter. The pain was a grounding counterpoint to the hollow ache inside.

"It hurts, Steven," I admitted, the raw truth hanging heavy in the air. "Losing them… losing their love, their pride… Christ, it hurt more than this fucking body ever has. More than the joints screaming, the organs staging their little revolts. It felt like dying. Continuously. Hour by hour. It made me… give up. Just… surrender." I took another drag, the heat flaring against my lips now. "Unhealthy? Yeah, probably. But I built my whole damn life on that sandcastle. Their pride. Their love. ‘Allen, I’m proud of you.’ ‘Allen, I love you.’ Heard that enough times, maybe I started believing it meant something. Did things I hated. Became bits of people I despised. But hearing those words… it was like oxygen. Made me think the suffocation was worth it."

The cigarette crumbled between my fingers. Ash drifted down onto the pristine snow at the grave's edge. The heat was a brand now, a sharp, focused agony biting deep. Still, I held on until the last possible second, until the ember threatened to sear my skin, before finally letting the stub fall. It landed beside the first one I’d placed on the stone when I’d started this vigil. Two tiny, spent sentinels.

My hand dipped into the pocket of my worn wool coat, colder than the surrounding air. Two more cigarettes emerged. One for me. One for Steven. I placed the second one carefully beside its predecessor on the cold granite. Then, the silver lighter. Steven’s lighter. He’d left it at Alex’s place after game night months ago. I was supposed to give it back. Now it was all I had left of his hands, his careless laugh as he’d fumbled for it in his pockets.

It was cold metal, heavy. I turned it over and over between my numb fingers, the engraved pattern catching the faint, sickly yellow light from a distant streetlamp. A nervous habit, tracing the familiar lines. My thumb found the top, pulled it back with a soft, definitive click. The flame sprang to life, small but fiercely bright. It bathed my face, the snowflakes swirling around it, the edge of Steven’s headstone, in a sudden, crackling sphere of orange light. Harsh shadows leapt and danced. I released my thumb. The flame vanished, plunging the immediate world back into monochrome gloom.

"I just wanted to give up," I said, the words quieter now, directed solely at the name carved in stone. "Was ready. So tired, Steven. Bone-deep tired. The plan was simple. Travel. Every country I could scrape the cash for. See… something. Anything. Before I blew out the candle for good. My own eulogy tour. A funeral procession starring me, ending in a quiet fade-out somewhere scenic." I flicked the lighter open again.

Click. Flame.

"Then… I met the others. And you. Luck? Providence? Random fucking chance colliding atoms in the void? Doesn't matter. I met you all. And even though the only thing on my itinerary was oblivion…" I paused, the flame trembling slightly in my grip. "We became… something. Friends. Then… family. Found family." The word felt sacred and fragile. "Never believed in it. Not really. How could strangers care? Love me? When the people who shared my blood, who watched me take my first steps, who should have loved me without question, without a fucking checklist… couldn't? How could strangers possibly measure up?"

Click. Flame gone. Darkness.

My voice dropped to a whisper, raw with remembered disbelief. "But you did. You all proved me wrong. Felt… loved. Truly. Cared for. Like I belonged somewhere, for the first time since Nana’s kitchen. I started wanting things again. Wanting to live. For you. For the me you all seemed to see, the one I couldn't find in any mirror. You made me believe he might exist." A ghost of a smile touched my lips, fleeting and painful. "Started writing. Because you encouraged me. Marguerite with her fierce critiques, Marceline with her boundless enthusiasm, River nodding along to my rants, Alicia asking the perfect, insightful questions, you… Steven… just grinning and saying ‘Fuck yeah, Al, that bit slaps!’" The memory was a physical pang. "You read every damn chapter. Every typo-ridden, grammatically catastrophic mess. You made me think… maybe I could make people feel something. Forget their own shit for a minute. Dream a little. You made me… eager. Eager for tomorrow. For that future you all painted – rich, content, laughing together in some big, stupid house filled with our chaos." I swallowed hard, the lump in my throat like stone. "You made me believe it. Truly believe it. And then… Marguerite. Marceline. River. Alicia. And you. Gone."

The lighter felt suddenly heavy. Click. Flame. I stared into it.

"Knew death didn't play fair. Knew it could kick your door down any second. But… all of you? In less than a year? Feels like a cosmic joke played by a particularly sadistic fucker. ‘Hey, let’s give that loser Allen everything he ever wanted, make him actually hope again… then yank it all away. Show him he was right the first time. Happiness? Not for you, pal. You don’t deserve the crumbs.’"

Click. Darkness. But the anger flared, hot and sudden.

"I went to all your funerals. Every fucking one. You know what pisses me off the most? Besides the gaping hole where you all used to be?" My voice rose, cracking on the frozen air. "The priests. The rabbi. The fucking pastor. Each one, standing up there in their robes, saying the same soothing poison: ‘It was God’s will.’ ‘God called them home.’ ‘God needed another angel.’" I spat the words. "Bullshit! What about your families, Steven? You were the oldest. You adored your little sisters. Doted on them. Drove them crazy with big-brother nonsense. I saw you with them. The way your face lit up. If you’d been standing there, looking at their faces… crushed, broken, crying like their world ended… you couldn’t have borne it. None of you could have. It was the same with Marguerite’s parents, Marceline’s brother, River’s partner, Alicia’s whole goddamn hockey team weeping… So tell me, how is that fair? How is it right? What kind of ‘loving God’ wills that kind of suffering?" My breath came in ragged gasps, pluming white in the dark. "That’s why I stopped believing. Long before you. Because what about the families left behind? What about me, standing here freezing my ass off, wanting you back? What’s the fucking point, Steven? What is it?"

My hand was shaking. Badly. The silver lighter felt slick, treacherous. I tried to bring it close to the fresh cigarette dangling from my lips.

Click. The flame sputtered. Missed. I tried again. Click. Missed. The tremors were winning. And with each failed attempt, the memories surged, unbidden, cruel in their vividness.

Click.

Laughter exploding around a cramped restaurant table, Marguerite wiping tears from her eyes after Marceline’s terrible pun, Steven stealing fries from River’s plate, Alicia trying to balance a spoon on her nose. Warmth. Safety.

Click.

The sharp squeak of sneakers on the court, Marceline shouting playfully as River and I double-teamed her, Steven effortlessly sinking three-pointers, Alicia coaching from the sidelines with mock seriousness. Sunlight, sweat, the pure joy of movement.

Click.

Couch chaos. Controllers clutched, eyes glued to the screen. Marceline dominating Smash Bros with terrifying calm, a serene smile on her face as she effortlessly countered our frantic, coordinated attacks. River’s eclectic Spotify playlist – punk rock to Mongolian throat singing – providing the soundtrack. The comfortable silence of just being together, each lost in a book or sketchpad, yet profoundly connected.

Click.

Marceline’s arms around me after a particularly bad pain day, a hug that didn’t feel cloying or invasive, just… solid. Real. Steven ruffling my hair. Alicia teaching me to snowboard, patient through my endless tumbles, her laughter bright in the cold mountain air.

Click.

Gathered around a terrible reality TV show, united in our mockery, sharing popcorn, passing judgment on lives far messier than ours felt at that moment. A shared, uncomplicated idiocy.

Each memory was a fresh stab. Each failed ignition a betrayal. My hand shook violently now, the lighter jerking like a live wire. The trembling wasn't just grief; it was a herald. A deep, familiar ache began to bloom in my knuckles, a dull throb that quickly sharpened into needles. ‘Not now. Please, not now.’

But my body, ever the traitor, didn't listen. Hemochromatosis. My unwanted inheritance. The doctor had explained it with weary patience: too much iron, slowly poisoning my organs, settling like rust in my joints. “Common in folks with Celtic ancestry, especially redheads,” he’d said. A dry joke. My mother’s vibrant, fiery hair had skipped me, leaving me with muddy brown. But the gene for turning my blood into slow-acting poison? That, she’d passed on generously. ‘Thanks, Mom. Truly. The gift that keeps on giving, right up until it stops.’

The pain escalated with terrifying speed. It wasn't just my hands anymore. It was my knees, locking up; my hips, grinding like unoiled gears; my liver, a hot, heavy stone lodged under my ribs. It felt like my bones were being slowly crushed in a vise, while acid seeped into the marrow. A wave of nausea rolled over me, cold sweat beading on my forehead despite the freezing air. My vision swam, the headstone doubling, tripling.

The lighter slipped from my spasming fingers. It hit the deep snow with a soft thump and vanished.

"No," I gasped, the sound more animal than human. Desperation cut through the pain fog. Steven’s lighter. The last tangible piece of him. I dropped to my knees, ignoring the screaming protest from every joint. I raked through the snow, my hands clumsy claws, digging, scraping, frantic. The cold bit deep, but the internal fire of the attack was worse. Tears pricked my eyes, hot and shameful, blurring my vision. Was it pain? Grief? Both, a toxic cocktail. Find it. Find it. My fingers brushed cold metal. I closed my fist around it, gripping so tight the engraved pattern bit into my palm. Precious. Solid. His.

Getting the cigarette to my mouth was a battle. My jaw felt tight, uncooperative. The lighter… bringing the flame to meet the tip seemed like scaling a mountain. My hand, slick with sweat now despite the cold, trembled uncontrollably. The lighter jumped, the flame guttering wildly, missing the cigarette entirely. The pain was a crescendo, a white-noise scream drowning out thought. My breath came in short, ragged bursts. The world narrowed to the agony, the cold, the lighter, the unlit cigarette, and Steven’s name carved in stone.

"It’s pathetic," I whispered, my voice thick, choked. Tears weren't falling, not quite, but my eyes burned, my throat constricted, the pressure building behind my face like a dam about to burst. My vision swam, the headstone blurring into a grey smudge. "Can’t even do this right, Steven. Steven…" His name was a sob caught in my chest. "I’m so fucking tired. And I miss you all… so fucking much."

The admission hung in the air, raw and final. "I want to see you all again," I breathed, the words tasting like ash and snow. "But whatever happens after… I don’t think I’d end up where you are. Stopped believing in the whole rigmarole – heaven, hell, reincarnation, cosmic waiting rooms – a long time ago. But if… if souls are real? If I have one?" A grim, humourless smile touched my lips. "I’d give it freely. To anything. Devil, demon, god, sentient toaster. Doesn’t matter. Just… bring you back. All of you. Alive. Laughing. Here."

My fingers spasmed again. The lighter tumbled from my grasp, landing softly in the snow beside me. I stared at it, defeated. Too much. Just too much. I couldn’t even muster the strength to reach for it again.

Then, movement at the edge of my blurred vision. A hand. Pale, elegant. It dipped down, effortlessly plucking the lighter from the snow. Click. A steady, unwavering flame bloomed. The hand moved, bringing the fire close. Not to the lighter’s owner, but to me. To the cigarette still dangling uselessly from my lips.

I leaned forward slightly, instinct taking over. The tip glowed orange. I inhaled. The smoke filled my lungs, a brief, familiar anchor in the storm. I exhaled, the plume ghosting past the figure now kneeling beside me in the snow, before turning my head.

"Thanks," I rasped.

"You’re welcome." The voice was like dark velvet poured over honey. Smooth, deep, resonant. The kind of voice that could talk you into anything, or out of everything. The kind that felt like it should narrate the end of the world, making it sound like a reasonable proposition.

He – and the voice suggested ‘he’, though the face made certainty elusive – was… arresting. Not handsome in a conventional magazine way, but possessing a kind of impossible, unsettling perfection that made everyone else look like rough sketches. High cheekbones, a jawline sharp enough to cut glass, eyes the colour of old, polished amber, holding depths that seemed to shift and swirl. Hair the shade of winter moonlight fell in careless waves. He wore an impeccably tailored white suit that seemed utterly untouched by the snow or grime of the cemetery, crisp against the gloom. Androgynous beauty perfected, radiating an aura of contained power and ancient weariness.

The only flaw, if it could be called that, was a single, stark scar. It began high on his left cheekbone, just missing the eye, and carved a ruthless path down across the sculpted cheek, bisecting the corner of his lips, ending somewhere beneath the sharp line of his jaw. It wasn't disfiguring; it was a mark of defiance, a crack in the porcelain that made the whole visage more compelling, more real. It whispered of violence survived, or perhaps delivered.

He held the lighter loosely, his amber gaze fixed on me with unnerving intensity. "You may call me Louis. Couldn't help but overhear," he said, his voice a low thrum in the quiet. "Your words. About giving your soul. To see them again."

I took another drag, the smoke curling from my nostrils. My body still screamed, but the sheer absurdity of his presence created a strange pocket of numbness. "Truly, Louis?" I asked, my voice flat, exhaustion stripping away surprise. "A blonde in a perfect white suit named Louis, appearing in a graveyard at my lowest moment, hinting he can grant the impossible?" I raised an eyebrow, the gesture feeling heavy. "Bit on the nose, don't you think?"

A ghost of a smile touched his lips, not quite reaching those ancient eyes. "You don't believe me."

"Honestly? No." I exhaled smoke, watching it mingle with the falling snow. "Odds are you're a grifter. Maybe cult recruitment’s your angle. Or organ harvesting. Black van waiting just past the yew trees? Classic." I met his gaze, the amber depths unreadable. "I don't believe you're who you want me to think you are. That the Devil exists. That God exists. That the mythical Morningstar is kneeling in the snow next to a wreck like me." I shrugged, a gesture that sent fresh spikes of pain through my shoulders. "But honestly? I don't care."

He tilted his head, a faint flicker of genuine curiosity crossing his features. "You don't care? That, as you said, I could be leading you straight to your death?"

A genuine, weary smile touched my lips. It felt alien on my face. "I'm already dead, Louis. This?" I gestured vaguely at myself, at the graveyard, the world. "This is just the credits rolling. Slow credits. With them gone… there's no point. No reason to keep playing the game. I'm tired. Bone-achingly, soul-crushingly tired of trying. Always trying. Always failing. I don't want to try without them. I just want to rest. I just want to be with them. That's all."

He watched me. Not with pity. Not with the condescending sympathy of the untouched. But with a profound, unnerving understanding. Like he’d stood exactly where I stood, felt the weight of that same exhaustion press down on a different set of shoulders, millennia ago. He didn't argue. Didn't offer platitudes. Just absorbed the raw truth of it.

Slowly, deliberately, he reached into the inner pocket of his immaculate white jacket. He withdrew something small, round, gleaming with an inner light that seemed independent of the weak cemetery lamps. An apple. But not like any apple I’d ever seen. It looked forged from pure, soft gold, radiating a warmth that had nothing to do with temperature.

I stared at it. "An apple? Really?"

The ghost-smile returned, wider this time, touching the scarred corner of his mouth. "Classics," he murmured, the velvet voice softening almost imperceptibly, "are classics for a reason."

He extended the golden fruit towards me. Our eyes locked. His held that ancient weariness, that deep understanding, and now… a flicker of something else. Challenge? Invitation? The amber depths seemed to swirl like molten metal.

"You stated your position clearly," he said, his voice low and deliberate. "You don't care. The worst outcome, if I am merely a charlatan or a murderer, is your desired end: final rest. Silence." He paused, the golden apple hovering between us, catching the faint light. "If, however, I am who tradition names me… then this apple signifies a contract. A binding agreement between you and me."

My gaze shifted from his impossible eyes to the offered fruit. It was mesmerizing. The surface wasn't just metallic; it seemed alive, subtly shifting, reflecting the falling snowflakes and my own pale, strained face with impossible clarity. My reflection looked like a ghost already. Steven’s name on the headstone was a stark backdrop.

"Complete the task I set before you," Louis continued, his voice weaving through the silence like smoke, "and in return, I will restore them. Marguerite. Marceline. Alicia. River. Steven. All of them. Not merely returned, but restored to the path of the dreams you shared. The happiness you envisioned. The future you believed in." He held the apple steady. "One bite seals it. The pact is made."

My eyes flickered one last time to the granite slab. Steven. Friend. Brother. Son. The dates. The crushing finality. Then back to the impossible golden fruit. What did I have left to lose? Only the pain. Only the waiting. The alternative was… nothing. Or Steven. Either was better than this limbo.

I reached out. My hand, still trembling slightly, closed around the apple. It was warm. Not hot, but alive with a deep, resonant heat that seeped into my chilled bones. I raised it to my lips. Didn't hesitate. Sank my teeth into the golden skin.

The taste… it wasn't fruit. It was an explosion of meaning on my tongue. It tasted like Marceline’s rich, slow-cooked stews we had shared on cold nights, warmth and comfort seeping into the marrow. It tasted like the profound, quiet peace I’d only ever felt in moments of pure, uncomplicated belonging with them. It tasted like the fierce, protective love Steven radiated for his sisters and us. It tasted like the sharp, clean air on the mountain when Alicia taught me to snowboard, the exhilaration of almost-flying. It tasted like the deep, dreamless sleep after a day filled with their laughter. And underlying it all, a final, metallic note. The taste of cold earth. The taste of ending.

As the impossible flavour flooded my senses, a heavy lethargy began to seep into my limbs. Thick, syrupy. My vision blurred at the edges, darkening. Sounds became muffled, distant – the wind sighing through the pines, the soft hiss of falling snow. My body felt leaden, sluggish, an anchor pulling me down.

Gentle hands caught me as my knees buckled. Louis. He lowered me carefully, my back coming to rest against the cold, solid bulk of Steven’s headstone. The granite was a shock against my spine, the only sharp sensation in the growing fog. The world narrowed to the falling snow, the amber eyes watching me with that unnerving understanding, and the fading taste of love and death on my tongue.

My hearing was the last to go. The sounds of the world retreated, replaced by a soft, cottony silence. Then, his voice cut through it, clear and final, settling into the marrow of my fading consciousness:

"Here is my demand. Seek. Fight. Reach. Until the very end. Attain a happy ending… for yourself. Then, they will be returned."

The last flicker of thought, fragile as a snowflake on a cigarette, drifted through the encroaching darkness:

‘A happy ending… without them? Silly Louis. Asking for impossible things…I guess there would be no points if it was not difficult.’

Silence. Snow falling on snow. The golden apple, bearing a single, perfect bite mark, lay gleaming in the trampled whiteness beside a still form resting against cold stone. Lucifer, the Morningstar, the Scarred One, looked down for a long, silent moment, his expression unreadable. Then, he turned and walked away, his white suit untouched, leaving only footprints that vanished almost instantly beneath the relentless, forgiving snow.