Reality shattered as blinding white light flooded my vision. The radiance scorched my eyes, burning with the intensity of truth itself. Blood streamed down my face as the celestial luminescence ravaged my sight. This light was destroying everything in its path, and I finally understood its true nature - a god constructed from the essence of harvested consciousnesses. If Avalanche succeeded in their mad plan, this being of pure light would annihilate everything. Yet I couldn't comprehend their motivation. What could drive anyone to pursue such absolute destruction?
I had no time to contemplate these questions as every fiber of my being burned. This was no ordinary dream anymore - my confrontation with the truth had transported me to a different dimension, guided by the monster within. Questions swirled in my mind: What was this creature? Why did it dwell inside me? What were its true intentions? So many questions, yet no answers presented themselves. The only certainty was that I needed to destroy this entity - whether it was a true god or a delusional construct - if I wanted to survive.
Killing a god - it sounds rather grandiose and dramatic, doesn't it? But I had no idea how to accomplish such a feat. This entity's power was overwhelming. My flesh was scorched, my entire body crimson with blood flowing so profusely that it transformed the pristine white surroundings into a sea of red. Yet strangely, I felt no pain. The god managed to control its power, shifting into a humanoid form that stood nearly seven feet tall, with a muscular physique emanating golden light from every pore - a divine being in human shape.
"KNEEL, MORTAL!" it commanded.
"You're no true god," I retorted, surprising myself with my defiance. "This isn't real, and I'm about to kick your divine ass." The source of this sudden confidence was unknown to me - it felt as if someone else was speaking through my lips.
The entity's rage was palpable. Moving faster than light itself, it appeared before me and delivered a devastating uppercut to my already mutilated body's midsection. Blood erupted from my mouth as its fist lifted me skyward. A spinning kick connected with my head, sending me into a complete rotation. The god leaped to match my height, delivering another spinning kick that sent me flying through the void. Yet even before my flight ended, it appeared behind me, landing another kick to my spine that propelled me in the opposite direction.
The god materialized before me, seizing my face with its radiant hand before slamming me into the ground with devastating force. Had I been capable of feeling pain, I would surely have perished from the agony. A distant thought crossed my mind - was my physical body being affected by this battle? Was Lena worried about me? I had no time to dwell on these concerns as the being of light straddled me, raining down endless blows upon my face.
Rising to its feet, it surveyed my broken form, and I could sense its smile even though I couldn't see it. My eyes had been torn from their sockets by its relentless assault, rendering me blind. My tongue had been ripped out, silencing my voice. My nose was shattered, destroying my sense of smell. My ears had been torn away, leaving me in a world of silence. Every inch of my flesh was charred and crimson, rotting away in the divine presence.
I thought this was the end of my story before it had truly begun. The god transformed its hand into a sword of pure light, preparing to harvest my consciousness and absorb it into itself. As it plunged the blade into my brain, drawing my consciousness toward its being, I thought my life had reached its conclusion.
But fate had other plans.
I would become known as the man who defied a god's will, my legend whispered in bars, sung by bards, and dramatized by playwrights. When the god absorbed my consciousness and soul, it unknowingly took in something else - a virus. The monster within me, as I now realized, was the curse of darkness itself, the perfect antithesis to light. Together, the demon and I began to corrupt the god from within. For the first time, we worked as one.
The god screamed in agony as its light began to dim, consumed by spreading darkness. "Release me! No, you cannot stop me. I AM A GOD! I AM GOD!" it shrieked. Falling to its knees, the lower half of its body was already consumed by shadow. As we gradually took control, it made one final attempt to expel all darkness from its chest in a desperate heave.
My consciousness and soul returned to my body, which had been instantly healed by the demon's new powers. Standing before the terrified god, I smiled, transforming my hand into a blade of darkness. Purple aura enveloped my body, the demon's black essence manifesting behind me like a shadow given form. The god stumbled backward, genuine fear in its divine eyes.
But my pride blinded me to the truth - what I saw retreating wasn't the real god, but a clone. Thankfully, the demon noticed at the last moment, allowing me to dodge sideways as the true god attempted to impale me from behind with its light sword. We exchanged blows at impossible speeds, our blades clashing in a dance of light and shadow.
The god suddenly withdrew, spreading its arms wide as countless clones manifested around me, each wielding a bow of pure light. "Let me introduce you to my special attack," it proclaimed, "'God's Wrath.' These arrows are forged from my divine essence. This attack will erase your very existence, cursed devil."
Before I could formulate a response, thousands of arrows of light were launched toward me. The resulting explosion was so massive I would have called it the Big Bang - it atomized my entire being. The god reabsorbed its clones, believing victory was assured.
But as you can see, I survived.
As the god turned to leave, my atoms began to reassemble. My reformation caused it to freeze in place, for the demon within me had grown enraged. Its voice echoed through my reconstructed consciousness: "I'm releasing all my power, Beren. End this wretch."
With those words, my power level surged beyond control, transforming the white realm into absolute darkness. For the first time, I saw genuine terror in the god's radiant eyes. I manifested a black hole in my palm, hurling it toward the divine being. The gravitational force consumed all its light, leaving it defenseless and dim before me.
Moving faster than divine perception, I appeared before it, mirroring its earlier assault. My uppercut sent it skyward, followed by a barrage of kicks that treated the god like a ball in a cosmic game. The tables had turned completely - the hunter had become the prey.
"This is what revenge feels like," I declared, straddling the fallen deity. "I've inflicted upon you every torment you visited upon me. The ancients called this 'an eye for an eye' - but I'm not so concerned with justice." The corruption of darkness had consumed me, transforming me into shadow incarnate. "I'm going to do far worse to you than what you did to me."
I could read the fear in its remaining eye as I tore out its tongue, shattered its jaw, and gouged out one eye, forcing it to watch its own torture with the remaining one. But then...
"Beren..." A voice that stopped my heart. My mother stood there, looking at me with horror in her deep ocean-blue eyes. In their reflection, I saw myself - a blood-covered monster, wrapped in purple aura, consumed by darkness. I had given the demon exactly what it wanted.
The god vanished as I rushed to my mother, collapsing before her in tears. "Mom, I'm losing myself. I don't understand what's happening anymore. I feel my control slipping away. Nothing works without you. I miss you so much. Your death was my fault - if I hadn't been such a curious, greedy child, if I hadn't touched that holo-computer, if I hadn't absorbed that final code... you wouldn't have had to sacrifice yourself protecting me."
Through my merger with the demon, I had learned the truth about Project Ascension. This dream-god was merely a shadow of what Avalanche planned to birth into reality - something far more powerful, more devastating, more apocalyptic. My mother had known this, risking everything despite her high position in the company. She and my father had chosen humanity over loyalty to Avalanche.
My mother remained silent, simply placing her hand on my face, lifting my chin, and kissing my forehead. The demonic features - red horns, black wings, yellow eyes, vampiric fangs - melted away at her touch. Looking into her eyes one final time, I saw my seven-year-old self reflected there. She smiled, then dissolved into stardust.
Standing in that infinite white void, I finally understood my purpose. I could never surrender to the demon or bow to darkness. I had to stop the god's birth and bring down Avalanche. But my journey wasn't over - the dreamscape began to shift, the whiteness giving way to something darker, more ancient.
A castle of pure darkness materialized before me, crafted from shadow and malice. This wasn't just my inner world - it was the physical manifestation of the curse within my heart, the demon's true home. Exhausted both physically and mentally, I longed to wake up, to hold Lena, to cry in her arms. The revelations, the confrontation with my mother, the battle - it was all too much.
The castle's gates creaked open, inviting me into the demon's domain. My footsteps echoed through halls lit by hellfire, casting writhing shadows on ancient stones. What I saw inside would haunt me forever - chained children screaming in agony, each one a version of my younger self. Demons with my corrupted face flew overhead, their wings creating a cacophony of leather and wind.
The demon was sending me a message, but I couldn't bear to decipher it. I covered my ears against the children's screams and the demons' wing-beats, running blindly forward until I reached the throne room. There sat my demon on a throne crafted from the corpses of a thousand child-versions of myself. Behind the throne, crucified like dark mirrors of Christian imagery, hung my parents.
The symbolism was brutally clear: The throne of dead innocence represented the demon's ownership of my soul. The slaughtered children were my murdered innocence, suggesting my destiny was to embrace darkness and become one with the demon. My parents' crucifixion mocked my mother's sacrifice and hinted at some terrible fate yet to befall my father. But why was he displayed in the same manner as my mother? The question haunted me, but I couldn't bear to contemplate its implications.
The demon's true form was terrifying in its magnificence - six eyes gleaming with ancient malice, four arms rippling with dark power, horns spiraling toward the ceiling like obsidian spires. Its crimson neck and tail marked it as something from the deepest pits of hell, while its vast black wings could have eclipsed the sun. Standing four meters tall, it was the embodiment of everything humanity had ever feared in the dark.
This was the entity I'd been seeing every night, whose whispers had filled my head since childhood. I'd convinced myself it was a hallucination, a symptom of schizophrenia, anything but real. But now I knew the truth - it was a cancer growing in my soul, either a tumor that would consume me or a devil that would possess me. Prophecy claimed our destinies were intertwined, that we would become one, but I refused to dishonor my mother's creation - me - by surrendering to darkness.
The demon shifted into human form - a striking figure with golden hair, angular features, brown eyes, and a sharp nose. It gestured for me to sit, and we began our final confrontation.
"Your heart bears a curse," it explained, "and I am that curse made flesh. The darkness in your heart gave birth to me. You'll ask who cursed you - I don't know. What I do know is that you're not ordinary, Beren. Your past is clouded even to me, making you an intriguing mystery. I'll support you because my plans require your survival. Since I can't break you, I'll share my power with you instead. But be warned - your path leads through darkness, and the trials ahead will test you beyond imagination. Know this: I'll only aid you in battle. I still hate you and will never stop trying to break your will."
"Why do you hate me?" I asked, but the demon had no answer. It seemed to hate me instinctively, as if programmed into its very essence.
"Fine, I'll accept your help," I declared. "But know this - as long as I carry my mother's will, Lena's love, and my father's strength, you will never break me." Behind the demon, I saw them standing together, smiling, before a brilliant light consumed everything.
I awoke to find Lena crying over me. She explained how I'd screamed and convulsed, how my heart had stopped before mysteriously restarting. I'd called for my mother countless times, terrifying her. After sharing everything I'd experienced, I gave her a sleeping injection despite her protests - she needed rest, and I needed time to think.
As dawn broke over Avalon's skyline, I caught my reflection in the window - or rather, I didn't. Instead of my own face, I saw my demon smirking back at me. Tomorrow was mission day, and my father had chosen me to meet with Emilia. I kissed sleeping Lena's forehead and stepped out into the morning, carrying new knowledge, new power, and new purpose.
The war against Avalanche - and against myself - was just beginning.