Emily made a new friend... He only appears when civilizations deserve to die. His name is Clifford
Nobody knew exactly when Emily Elizabeth stopped smiling.
At school, they blamed grief.
At church, they blamed “bad influences.”
Online, people whispered about depression, isolation, maybe even cult activity.
But the truth was stranger.
It began the winter her mother disappeared.
Not died. Disappeared.
The police found the family car abandoned beside Blackwater Reservoir with the headlights still on and the driver’s door hanging open. Emily was found three miles away in the woods at dawn, shoeless and half-frozen, calmly sitting beside the carcass of a deer that had been ripped apart by something enormous.
When they asked her what happened, she gave only one answer:
>“The red dog kept me warm.”
No tracks were ever found.
After that night, Emily changed.
She stopped reacting to cruelty. Stopped crying. Stopped sleeping normally. Teachers noticed her staring at people too long, as if she could hear thoughts they hadn’t spoken. Animals became terrified around her. Birds struck windows near her home. Dogs whimpered and rolled onto their backs when she walked by.
And then Clifford arrived.
Not the cartoon dog from children’s books.
Not a friendly giant.
This Clifford was ancient.
Nine feet tall at the shoulder when on all fours, nearly twelve when standing upright, with crimson fur like wet blood and eyes that glowed like brimstone. His body was adorned in iron rusting armor, shrouded in cloaks of woven blood, etched with symbols older than language. Pieces of broken temples and human bones hung from his spiked collar like trophies.
He was not a god for he had no worshippers.
He was what remained after civilizations forgot one.
Long ago, entire kingdoms fed prisoners into volcanic pits to keep Clifford asleep beneath the earth. He was worshipped as the Devourer of Cities, the Red Hunger, the Last Punishment. Wherever empires became corrupt enough, priests would summon him to erase them...Ask the survivors of Pompeii...
And he always did.
The strange thing was that Clifford adored Emily.
Not because she was powerful.
Because she was empty.
He could smell it in her — the quiet resentment, the loneliness, the hidden fury she buried beneath politeness. Clifford fed on destruction, but destruction did not always begin with fire. Sometimes it began with humiliation. Neglect. Silence.
He followed her home one night during a thunderstorm, emerging from the woods behind her apartment complex without making a sound despite his impossible size.
Emily looked up at him, soaked by rain.
“Are you going to kill me?” she asked.
The giant beast lowered his head.
>“Not unless you ask.”
His voice sounded like mountains grinding together.
From then on, Clifford became her shadow.
Bullies vanished.
A landlord who threatened her elderly neighbor was found folded inside his own car like paper.
A gang that cornered Emily in a parking garage disappeared so completely that investigators found only blood and melted concrete.
People started noticing scorch marks wherever Emily went.
And Emily… liked it.
That frightened her more than Clifford ever could.
Because Clifford never lied to her. He never pretended humanity was good. Every night he whispered truths into her mind while curled around the apartment building like a monstrous guardian gargoyle.
He showed her visions of wars, starving children, corruption, murder, cruelty hidden beneath smiling faces.
>“Your species begs for destruction,” Clifford told her.
“I merely answer prayers nobody admits making.”
At first Emily resisted him.
Then she started asking questions.
“How many people deserve it?”
Clifford’s burning eyes narrowed.
>
The world began changing around them.
Electrical grids failed whenever Clifford grew angry. Rivers near sightings of him turned black and hot. Entire neighborhoods reported hearing growling beneath the earth. Ancient symbols appeared burned into walls across cities Emily visited.
Governments formed secret task forces. Religious leaders called him a demon. Military forces attempted to hunt him.
Nothing worked.
Missiles only made him stronger.
Fear only fed him.
And Emily was becoming something else too.
People near her experienced violent thoughts. Rage spread through crowds like infection. Riots erupted in cities after she simply walked through them. It was as though Clifford’s presence was hollowing her out and replacing pieces of her humanity with something divine and terrible.
One night, standing atop an abandoned cathedral while storms churned overhead, Emily finally asked the question she had feared most.
“What happens when you destroy everything?”
Clifford sat behind her, vast as a building, his red eyes glowing through the rain.
For the first time, the god of destruction sounded tired.
>“Then,” he said softly,
“maybe I can rest.”
Emily turned toward him.
And for the first time since her mother vanished…
…she reached up and touched his face like he was just a lonely dog.