Running to alert his elderly neighbors to an oncoming Russian airstrike, a brave youth risked his own life.

When missiles started raining down on Odesa’s coastal city on Monday, Viacheslav Yalyshev could have run to the nearest bomb shelter.

However, after hearing the warning sirens, he dashed to inform the retirees of the impending attack. Two rockets hit a dormitory and shattered the roof of a nearby church, killing Viacheslav.

Despite a conflict raging in Ukraine for more than two months, family and friends praised the boy as intelligent and studious, saying he was still excelling at school.

Viacheslav continued to study and do his homework in the basement, despite the bombs and missiles raining down around him.

“He was a very good, kind, and sympathetic boy. Very capable, sincere. I just have no words,” said one woman, who did not want to be named.

According to MailOnline, Viacheslav’s father, Yevhen Yalyshev, is a member of the Ukrainian air force and a veteran of the 2014 fighting in eastern Ukraine.

“You are my hero, you are the hero of Ukraine,” he wrote in a dedication to his son.

He said his son was concerned that their neighbors would not have put apps on their phones that alerted them to oncoming bombings.

Odesa’s mayor, Gennady Trukhanov, described the tragedy as “another blow”: “There will never be forgiveness for those who shed the blood of innocent people, especially children.”

Odesa has mostly escaped the brunt of Russia’s invasion, but in recent weeks, Vladimir Putin’s forces have intensified their bombardment on the city.

The Ukrainian government believes Moscow is attempting to block off Ukraine’s access to the country’s whole southern coastline, limiting the country’s capacity to sell goods overseas.

Three generations of one family were killed when a Russian missile hit an apartment building in Odesa on April 23, during the Orthodox Christian Easter weekend. Yuri Glodan, a chef and baker, lost his wife, three-month-old daughter, and mother-in-law.

Putin’s Easter massacre claimed the lives of eight individuals, including newlyweds Lyudmila Chernetskaya, 28, and Bogdan Kirillov, 21, who were expecting their first child.

Although Russia continues to deny targeting civilians, many are believed to have killed, and mass graves continue to be unearthed in freed cities.

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