Dancing on the golden ashes-Chapter 280: A perfect copy?

The fire around me began to shift—still searing, still golden—but no longer blazing with the kind of heat that threatened to consume me whole. It had become warm, almost tender to the touch. Don't get me wrong, I know fire. I am fire. My entire body was reforged in it, reborn through flame. But this? This flame was different. It was hotter than anything I'd ever felt—and that's saying something. Hot enough to make even me hesitate, to make me wonder if stepping forward might mean surrendering everything. If it truly wanted to, this fire could devour me, burn my soul down to its roots. It wasn't just divine—it felt supported by an entire planet, by something ancient and alive... and by the person inside the barrier.

I watched as the wall of flame melted away, dissolving into cinders that drifted upward like ash-born stars, carried off by a gentle wind. It was quiet. Beautiful. Sacred. And then I saw her.

The one who had waited behind the barrier.

She was beautiful before—I remember that much—but now… she was beyond. Like a vision of the world itself carved into the shape of a woman. A goddess not forged to rule the world, but to become it.

Her crimson hair danced in the flames, glowing like embers caught in a storm, wild and alive, and for a moment I couldn't take my eyes off her. She looked so damn beautiful it almost hurt to look directly at her—there was a softness in her features, a fragile kind of grace, but beneath that delicate frame lay something unmistakably demonic. The horns that curled like obsidian crowns, the slender tail that swayed with a mind of its own, and those black wings—thin, sharp, full of dark memory. She hadn't changed. She looked exactly like she did the last time I saw her, like a memory pulled straight from the depths of fire, and yet... something was different. Something in the way the flames clung to her, kissed her skin like they belonged to her. And then I saw it—really saw it.

Her body. Her form. Her presence.

It was like mine.

No, not just like. It was mine—or at least, it had been. The wings. The tail. Even the subtle shape of her body beneath the flames. It was all there, all too familiar. And that terrifying realization struck me like a blade to the chest.

Had I taken her form without knowing?

Had I been shaped in her image? ƒreewebɳovel.com

Was the me I once was—when I wore those same wings, when I called myself a demon—not my own creation, but a reflection of her? Was I always meant to walk in her footsteps, to become like her, or was it something deeper, something planted inside me long ago by the other me? And if that's true… then what was I? A reincarnation? A copy? A shadow chasing the ghost of someone else's past?

I didn't know what scared me more—the idea that I was becoming her, or the idea that I already had. That I had been molded, bit by bit, soul by soul, into something I didn't choose. And the worst part? It felt right. Her presence didn't feel foreign. It felt familiar. Too familiar. Like I had always known her, even when I didn't remember her. Like my fire had always carried the memory of her within it, burning low in the corners of my being, waiting for a moment like this.

And now I had to ask myself—was my existence ever meant to be human at all?

Or was that just another mask, another illusion created by someone else's sins?

Just what the hell did the other me do... to make me, to make all of us?

The questions were crawling under my skin, hissing through my flame, and I couldn't stop them. I didn't want to. I needed answers. I needed to rip every layer off this truth until I saw the bleeding heart underneath, until I knew why I was born the way I was—and why, even now, I still felt the fire calling me home.

"You really look—and even smell—like her… a perfect copy." Her voice echoed through the air, smooth as smoke, and though her tone was calm, almost affectionate, those words hit something raw inside me. A perfect copy. That confirmation, no matter how softly it was said, still stung. I didn't know why, but it did. It made my jaw clench. Made my flames hiss under my skin like they wanted to lash out and burn something, anything. Maybe it was pride. Maybe it was the thought that I was never truly original. Maybe it was both. All I knew was that I suddenly felt like tearing this whole place apart just to prove I was more than that.

"Haha! Even your fluctuations are the same," she added with a laugh that sounded both amused and nostalgic, "but don't worry. I don't mean you're just a lifeless copy. You're more like a… rebirth. A continuation of the woman who once stood beside me as my closest friend. She came here, created a legacy of her own, burned bright enough to leave a mark even after death. But you're right, too. You're not her. You are just you. And you have every right to feel that way." Her eyes softened as she turned to face me fully, that smile blooming across her lips—bright, charming, and warm in a way that pulled at me like family, like something sacred and long-lost. It felt strange. Too strange. Because I wanted to trust her. I wanted to fall into that smile, to believe it was meant for me. And yet, somewhere deep inside, I still felt that hollow ache of being born from someone else's shadow.

"So tell me, Lee Gaon," she said, her voice dipping to something gentler, something solemn, "what is your goal in this life of yours? And why have you come here to meet me, the old demon who long ago lost any purpose to live?"

I met her gaze without flinching. My answer was already burning on my tongue, bitter and bright.

"My goal?" I scoffed, letting the fire ripple through my skin, letting it show in my voice. "I think you can already feel it. It's to kill him. To destroy every last one of those damned angels. And then? I'll take that fucking throne from all of them. I'll end this endless struggle. And I'll become the one who rules it all. That's my goal. You don't like it?" I leaned in slightly, my smirk sharp and wild. "You can fuck off."