[Klyntar]
Black murky substances could be seen flowing out of the crevices on the barren crust of the dead planet as if they were conscious. The entire hidden planet was slowly being covered with the writhing semi-living black substance and every now and then, a mad cackle would seep through the planet's crust and reverberate through the entire planet.
The being trapped in it couldn't help but let out a maddening grin split his face in a disproportionate manner. He could feel that abundance of light which only belonged to one race he was very well acquainted with, popping on and off the periphery of the planet. They were anxious. Good!
His mind started becoming increasingly overwhelmed with chaos. How much chaos he would spread, how much death and despair will spew forth from his awakening… How much darkness he would bring.
His senses were getting better by the day and his prison bars became slacker. He could already cover a sizable amount of this tiny universe and that was more than enough for him to glean something.
This universe was weird.
No, that was wrong.
This universe had become weird.
It had become too… fixed, for lack of a better word. But no matter, it would fall sooner than later. His first step out of his prison will drown this pitifully bright congregation of stars to a muddy swamp of black.
One again.
As long as darkness never ends, Knull will always rise.
…
We watched as the multiverse started moving in a direction none of us could ever foresee.
A stage as grand as this that none could compare to.
The Judge.
The Abstracts.
The Celestials.
The Elder Gods.
The Darkness from the Beyond.
Knull.
Galactus.
And a host of other players that had not yet made themselves known on the board.
A multiversal war that threatened all of existence. A war that caused trepidation in the hearts of all those involved due to a simple question.
Will he finally act?
Even our stance of non-interference was being threatened. There were no but a handful of universes we've watched that had forced us to a similar situation as the one we were currently watching.
But something about this event made it glaringly different from its other similarities.
It was all centered around a singularity.
The man named Draul St. Cross was an enigma that even we were finding hard to understand.
First and foremost, the individual known as Draul only existed in one universe out of the countless myriad others out there in the multiverse. For this reason, trying to see through or predict his course of action was harder than it ever was, now impossible than it ever could be.
Viewing someone's future was no different than watching the most similar alternate timelines where most of the actions mirrored each other, but in his situation, that wasn't the case. The most similar alternatives were all past timelines to the main one which made seeing the future in his case a lot harder than it should. The moment he had fused with the universe was the moment we lost everything about him, past and future. All we could see was the present.
Who would win in this free for all?
Who would be the first to lose?
These were questions that none of us had an inkling of an answer to and that made the experience even more exciting than it should be because this defined our very existence as the all-present spectator of the multiverse.
This was a once in a lifetime moment that could not be missed. There was no past to make a reference to, no future to draw conclusions from, only a slowly moving present that was too precious to be missed even for a second.
Ah.
It looks like something is about to happen very soon. We all eagerly waited with bated breaths for the beginning and conclusion of the next encounter from any of the forces of the constant multiverse and the singularity known as Draul. How long will he continue to win? Who would he finally lose against? Can he be overwhelmed?
The stakes for this battle was one that will turn the multiverse on its head and maybe something else we all feared.
The birth of a new firmament.
A complete overhaul of the multiverse that once was to a new one that knows not of the old. The number of beings that have lived through such experiences were few and far in between, with Galactus and Knull being a prime example.
At that point it wouldn't matter if we interfered or not because the multiverse would have already been destroyed to a point that any repairs on it would be damaging what could no longer be fixed.
… Despite all this, all our eyes still trailed every motion of this universe, waiting and waiting for the moment where everything goes to shit and we are forced to act. Until such time arrives, we'll dutifully carry out the sacred duty we've been given until the very end.
…
[Draul St. Cross POV]
After getting Yelena a little progress in her abilities, I opted to do a little… sightseeing, if you catch my drift.
The reason I didn't just twitch an eye and have reality change in respect to Yelena's ability was because it would sooner more than later make everything vain. If all we ever needed was to be produced by the snap of a finger, then most things would lose their meaning.
Struggle was a form of human needs and self-sustenance was the actual proverbial demon. Everything was supposed to be on a measured scale according to the world around you; suffering, pain, glory, grace, blessing, life, even death. Being completely sheltered from everything except life and death was in essence a useless life lived. Just because I've lost my sense of contentment with almost everything doesn't mean that I should let them feel the same way.
Back to my sightseeing.
On my quest of finding the best place to spawn a particular Dreaming Celestial, I, with my genius, decided to ask someone who I knew would be the best person for the information I needed.
And who better than He Who Remains?
He was arguably the only person I knew, not personally, who could at least hold an actual conversation without us turning to our guns.
It was a little hard finding the place but given the scope of my powers, all it took was a little time before the shining beacon of energy was imprinted in my senses.
Upon getting the location of the TVA, I warped directly to the side of the person I wanted to meet.
"Woooh! Let me guess – you're here to kill me, ain't ya?" I was met face to face with the goofy version of Kang who had, unbelievably, somehow won the Multiversal War of Kangs.
"Oh no no. I'm just here for a few things, and some information if you will." He looked at me for a second and shrugged before plopping down on a chair while trailing his eyes on me as I made my way to his desk and pulled out a few drawers.
"There they are." I grabbed the Infinity Stones laying around and just stuffed them in my pocket dimension and got to assimilating them.
"I'll be the first to admit that that's a new one. You know those only work in their home universe right?" Kang asked before munching on an apple that miraculously appeared in his hands.
"Oh I know. You don't have a problem with me taking them right?" I asked as I made my way to one of the chairs opposite him and couldn't help the sigh that escaped my lips as my back hit those soft cushions. "Damn. Where'd you get these? I think I need more than a few for my house."
He seemed amused at my laid back reaction and offered me an apple that I gracefully accepted before answering my questions. "Well they're nothing more than rocks to me so I just keep them lying around everywhere. And those chairs are from 3031. I know a guy."
We remained in silence, with only the sound of our occasional munching rhythmically breaking through the silence. He never once let his stare completely leave my body meanwhile all I did was just lay back and started collecting all the Infinity Stones scattered throughout the TVA. If they had found a way to harness the energy inside the stones in another universe, then this Kang wouldn't have had to worry too much about his variant selves.
"Sooooo, am I supposed to know why someone as strong as you suddenly decided to pay lil'ol me a visit?" There was a small smile on his face with the tiniest amount of concern as he looked at me.
"Like I said, I just came for the stones and a tiny bit of information." I shrugged. Sure I could just read his mind but where was the fun in that? Sometimes a little conversation can go a long way.
"And since you've gotten the stones you came for, might I know what information brought you here?" He asked with growing concern.
"Zombies. Dead planets, but still filled with sentient life. Do you know of any universe like that?" I asked after finishing my apple. That really was some tasty apple, no cap.
He looked a bit surprised and then frowned in cautiousness. "That's awfully… specific. Any reason why you'd want to go to a zombie infested reality?"
"So you do know of one, that good. As for the reason… let's just say it's for a friend. I'm assuming you got the coordinates?"
He burst out into a crazy fit of laughter and though he tried stopping himself, he just couldn't. I let the paranoid man get it out of his system once he realized that I actually wasn't here to kill him.
"Yes yes, I've got coordinates." He tapped on his wrist and a holographic image came to life and displayed a lot of spatial coordinates. While I could find the universe I was looking for, it would however be a pain in the ass since I would have to look through a host of universes before finding the one I want. At least with Kang I have a starting point.
Having memorized the coordinates, I nodded at Kang and got up in a bid of resuming my quest.
"Might I ask you a question? Just take it as a curiosity."
"Sure, shoot."
"What universe are you from? You're a human right? It's just that no one I've met, not a single one of my variants, has any information on someone like you. Not a single bit of data, so my curiosity is righteously piqued. I have information on almost everything and everyone of major importance, even to the tiniest detail, but you? Not a single thing."
And yet again, someone just confirmed my existence in the multiverse. I find it truly surprising that there truly is no one with my face or identity in the multiverse. "Hmm, you could say I'm something of a special existence. They are quite a few people who can be considered a singularity out there in the multiverse and I'm one of them. That answers your question?"
"Absolutely." I was about to warp myself away to the coordinates with me but stopped at the last second as I remembered something. "Can I get a few of those chairs? The texture was nice."
He smirked and waved his hand in motion and some chairs started appearing only for them to disappear immediately after as they were all sucked inside my own pocket space.
"Alrighty. I'll be out of your hair then." This little adventure was quite the find as I harvested over a hundred stones of each type. I knew this was but a tiny drop in the ocean when compared to the rest of the multiverse, but to me it was a lot different. I never planned on absorbing all Infinity Stones across realities after all because I knew that a lot of forces won't just sit back and let that happen and sooner or later I'll have to face the Living Tribunal because of what was happening.
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