"We can spend our lives letting the world tell us who we are. Sane or insane. Saints or sex addicts. Heroes or victims. Letting history tell us how good or bad we are. Letting our past decide our future. Or we can decide for ourselves. And maybe it's our job to invent something better."
― Chuck Palahniuk, Choke
"Still hung up on your memories of a simpler time, huh?" The Titan's words threatened to strip the atmosphere from the Earth, stopped only by Ven's aura. The massive Titan shook his head. "You need to let that go… there are infinite Earths, and now I've just found out there are infinite infinities of Earth, chilling in a disgusting soup!"
He reached out a massive hand and took hold of the sun. A simple tug and it was tossed into his mouth, the end of a light that had graced Earth since the beginning.
"None of this matters… kill one version? There is another next door, and another, forever," The Titan turned away, hand raised. He struck a blow that opened a path to a different parallel, indifference in his eyes. "Save them if you want, this universe will collapse soon, I've eaten its core!"
Ven's hands spun as the giant vanished into the shattered vortex. A line of runes filled the skies, piled ten layers deep and set into reality by his system's energy. A vast light rained from the heavens and Ven teleported above the planet, taken by the magic of the runes. His plan could only work if he stayed behind.
'System… are you sure this is safe?' He didn't want to explode and die, not for some random Earth he just met.
[The stability of your inner realm is governed by me, a single world is irrelevant.]
Ven straightened his back, a rush of breath into his lungs as he began to draw. A familiar pattern, somehow more difficult than his first attempt. A small, golden sun that resolved into a nondescript key. A final rush finished the array around the earth, a flash that coincided with the turn of a key.
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"Is it working?" Kalina squinted at the tower, raised onto the tips of her barefooted toes. "Maybe we need to…"
A resonant thrum, a shift of sound in the air that pushed against the chest, interrupted her words. A corona of black spilled over the space elevator, forced downward by countless ant carved runes. Drawn into a complex formation, it bathed a simple key, held in the hand of a drone.
A twist of the hand, timed with mechanical perfection, and a doorway snapped into place. Wave after wave of energy pulled itself from the heavens and forced its way into the cracks of the door. The realm howled, echoes of Cain's suffering as the overload of power clashed with his defences.
A skeletal hand formed from the void and wrapped the elevator in a wall of bone, a temporary stop against the damage. Cain's reapered face poked from the void, drawn thin, almost translucent.
"This had better work," The wounded murderer spat, voice quieter than a whisper. "I'm finished after this, I'll barely be able to keep this place safe from the ocean above…"
"It will work…" Mara bit her lip, tail lost in a spiral as it danced behind her back. "It's almost there…"
Thick bolts of black lightning corded around the gateway, plugged into an ever widened gap. The door creaked open and a powerful burst of light sucked away the colour of the world.
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A vast pressure. This universe was dying… it didn't matter. She was safe, hidden within her crystal prison. The walls of reality could fall around her, and she would be safe. The touch of a hand, a breath of life. Someone had found her? Impossible, she drifted through interstellar space, and most of that had fallen into distorted compression.
'What could survive out there?' This was a backwater place, a lesser universe rooted in an unknown multiverse. 'Earth Deities would be torn to shreds… and this place shouldn't hold stronger.'
Gripped in a stranger's palm, she let herself drift back to sleep. She was safe, no matter who was outside. Unless the Unity came, she would remain like this forever.
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A deep pain gripped his chest. Energy ripped free of his cores and funnelled beyond his awareness, drawn into a hungry void. A mistake in the runes? Ven shook his head and focused. It didn't matter now, he had to stabilise his bottomed out foundations, or his cultivation would collapse.
A vast mountain, forged of shadow, spilled from his body like a tide. Ven seized upon the collapsed space, smashed it further, and burnt it for fuel. The Earth was safe, hidden away within his inner world. So long as he could return some energy to his cores, he could tunnel free like the Titan did.
"Hmmm?"
A small fragment resisted his aura, a crystal shard no bigger than his thumb. Perfectly reflective, it brought to mind a bit of metal, shaped into the form of a riverstone. He snagged it from the void, cool in his palm.
"That's weird…"
For the first time, his item bag failed him. The shiny stone refused to be stored. Ven shrugged and tucked it into his robes for later study. The rush of power, harvested from the broken reality, finally calmed the disease within his cores.
"Now… what the hell happened with my spell?"
***************************************************************
"What the hell happened!" Mara reeled, vision consumed by the flash. She fumbled around, until her hand found Brull's. "Is everyone alright?"
Spots filled her eyes, brief glimpses of the world as her sight returned. Among the group, only Huan and the Dragon God stood, eyes fixed on the sky. The rest crouched, or sat, half-blinded by the light.
"Our location has changed…" Cain's desiccated body drifted from beneath the sands, held together by his blood-red robe. "We are no longer within the tainted ocean."
Space above was dominated by a massive sun. Pure and white, it carried vast waves of power, shone free upon the face of the realm. Starlight drifted to the ground, a gentle rain that blossomed an ocean of plants across Cain's barren desert. A jungle rose from the ashy sand, a return of vitality that forced a sigh from the murderer's lips.
[Intruders detected… initiating lockdown protocols…]