#Philza POV: who is this sassy lost child

[nomsfaultau]

When they first met, Wilbur would’ve sworn Philza was an Angel. 

It felt like awe. Never once did it cross his mind this was battle delirium, not when searing radiance poured over him as the basement door opened, causing his already ragged breath to catch in his throat. The writhing shadows shrieked and fled in a way Wilbur had never known before, leaving him vulnerable and utterly exposed. But why shouldn’t they flee when divine fire incarnate strolled into the room? An Angel, that’s all He could be, Wilbur knew it at once by the glowing arch of light around His head, by the glittering flash of emeralds and countless flashing eyes pressed into his skin, by the silhouette of imposing wings filling the doorway. The creature’s gaze felt like drops of sunlight, ancient and falling with equal deadly disinterest over sinners and saints alike. They quickly fastened upon Wilbur, the sole survivor amongst piles of brutalized dead. 

It felt like awe, but only at first, because then it felt like mortal panic. Wilbur didn’t believe in things like angels, he believed in hunger and pain and abyss and fighting for every second you breathed. But Wilbur knew well the horrors of the demons in the dark, surely there were others out there. A life riddled with shadow entities, was the end of both heralded simultaneously? That’s what the humans said angels were for, didn’t they? Collecting souls?

Did I die? Did I not even notice? 

Wilbur had been fighting for hours at that point, trembling and aching and vibrating with adrenaline. Monster hunters were relentless, and his mouth tasted like blood, both his and theirs. Perhaps he hadn’t actually made it out of this one, his fourteen odd years of life finally cut short like it was always going to be. He’d been running from the moment he could walk but finally it all caught up to him. 

The being stared at him with shocked golden coins for eyes, but it settled into what might’ve been a paternal smile if Wilbur had known what that was. All he could recognize was sharp inhuman teeth just as deadly as his own. As radiance dimmed, the figure sharpened into comprehension. Not eyes, but jade scales scattered like constellations. Not a halo, but the reflection of hellfire upon twisting ivory horns. Viscera decorated the being just as surely as silk did, or at least it did until the blood staining His hands steamed, unraveling into smoke until there wasn’t a single trace of violence on the holy being.

The question in Wilbur’s mind soon shifted as He descended, claws dragging against the series of wooden steps, leaving scorch marks. Not did I die, but will I die? And the answer was a short acerbic laugh and a yes, but was that reply now? Maybe the entity found a room of corpses, but maybe He was about to ensure totality of a reckoning. Wilbur could feel the familiar hands of mortal panic tightening around his throat. Whatever He was, He was like Wilbur, and that meant He was a threat. 

Not a lot of people have the bravado or the desperation to point a knife at a god, but Wilbur had never had much in the way of reverence when he was a teen. And if it took ending an immortal’s life so that his fragile mortal heart continued to beat, Wilbur wouldn’t hesitate to get ichor on his hands.