You want me to spare you?"
Neo asked and felt something was off.
An illusion wouldn't fear for its life, but here Jesse was.
It was becoming more than clear that Jesse was no longer just an illusion,he was now something more.
"Alright, fine"
Neo agreed, but not because he was merciful, he was just curious about what made Jesse unique.
"But it has to be on my terms"
Neo suddenly pulled something out of his pocket. It was a crystal. The crystal that he had in the illusion was gone, this was a new one he created.
The crystal suddenly began to grow and expand until it was about the same size as a human. With a flick of his wrist,Neo sent it flying towards Jesse.
The crystal slammed into Jesse and absorbed him into it, trapping Jesse in the crystal. Chains suddenly appeared inside the crystal, binding Jesse's hands and legs.
The crystal then flew to one of the planets circling the star and entered into it, ensuring that Jesse now had three things holding him: chains, the crystal, and a planet.
Neo smiled as his work was done, but before he could think of what to do next, the entire star system suddenly began to shake and tremble
************
Zen originally thought she was something left over from the trial, but the closer he moved to her,a growing sense of familiarity welled in his heart. This was the real deal.
"It's really you?" Zen asked as he sat next to her.
"Oh come on. If anyone could get into your head,who else would it be but me?"
"..."
"Are you having fun?"
"..."
Raven sighed dramatically.
"Fine, i get it. You'll have to tell me all about it when i come visit though"
Raven suddenly jumped off the cliff and into the water, but suddenly burst into purple flames halfway to the bottom and disappearing completely from the realm.
Zen got up and looked down for a few seconds before teleporting back to the castle.
He was about to walk in when he suddenly felt the entire realm start trembling and shaking.
"What now?"
Zen asked.
Unlike what he thought, though, this was actually a good thing.
Congratulations,you have passed the trial. The gods of your realm are pleased.
Neo was also receiving this message at this time.
"Gods? Do such beings really exist." Neo asked
They have seen your hearts,both through your realms and your actions. Your will is unyielding. You shall be rewarded, champions
Zen felt his entire soul shake with every word the voice uttered.
You! Child of the shadows. Your realm is one of eternal night,an ethereal kingdom of darkness, but existing to serve the light. A castle, the king's fortress: its purpose is to protect,to guide, and defend. The most important task of a king is to protect and guide his subjects, not through the light, but the darkness.
You have been judged
Receive your gifts
Now! Awaken
RISE ANEW WITH A NEW NAME AND TITLE AMONG THE GODS
***************
Son of the stars! Your realm is a star system. All embracing, life encompassing, with all elements of nature coexisting in harmony and chaos. A star, harbingers of life and death. Equal parts creation and destruction, with fierce unstoppable power. Fiercely loyal, protective and territorial. A creator and a destroyer of worlds.
Receive your gifts
Now! Awaken
RISE ANEW WITH A NEW NAME AND TITLE AMONG THE GODS
NOVA: THE STAR OF CREATION AND DESTRUCTION
******************
UMBRA: THE KING IN DARKNESS
Both Zen and Neo were shaken to the ground as both of their soul realms started rapidly expanding , becoming more than ten times larger than they originally were and even more grand.
Zen's castle and Neo's star grew even larger than before, becoming more defined and grand. Multiple more islands appeared in Zen's, and many more planets appeared in Neo's world.
Outside their soul realms,both humans and beasts had temporarily paused as a grand bright pillar of light descended onto the two of them and the obelisk slowly started to disintegrate.
Zen opened his eyes and struggled to get to his feet but was easily able to do it when someone came and took his hand.
He looked up and suddenly saw it was Lilith, flinching back a little bit,to which Lilith replied by chuckling.
"Relax,i couldn't hurt you now even if i wanted to....master"
Zen raised a brow at the last part.
Lilith slowly walked into the castle and Zen followed her,a bit apprehensive.
Zen's eyes widened in suprise as he looked at the inside of the castle. He hadn't had enough time to see the outside, but the inside was something else.
The walls looked like they were made of silver, and the floors out of pure marble.
The previous statues, paintings and tapestries depicting monsters, demons,angels, and other mythological creatures became even more lifelike, like they could all just come to life at any moment.
[Ding!]
[Soul awakening ceremony complete]
[Gifts received]
[Awakening soul senses]
[Obtained new title]
[Umbra: The king in darkness]
[Receiving Perks]
Zen didn't know, but outside, his body was visibly changing as these messages appeared.
In the center of the throne room was a new majestic pitch black throne with statues depicting three different colored dragons, and behind the throne was a painting depicting a black hydra with all of its heads being different colors.
A few steps in front of the throne were three pedestals,two having different weapons on them.
One was Freya's sword, and the other was a crimson and gold spear with a silver tip.
Zen instinctively knew what to do and took off the wind ring, dropping it as it automatically flew to one of the pedestals and positioned itself on it.
"That spear is..."
Lilith nodded.
"Guess I'm your's now"
Zen suddenly noticed a large window that wasn't showing the outside but was instead showing the physical world.
They were all struggling and had been reduced to simply running from the beasts instead of fighting them. Sable had even fainted again.
"Are you going to help them?"
Zen didn't answer and looked at another window.
It suddenly began to change according to his will. On the window was now the image of a little blonde haired girl. It was his sister.
Zen felt like he'd need a constant reminder if he wanted to start looking for her. He hadn't yet forgotten his new quest.
[Evolution completed]
[Quest completed]
[Unlocking all system features]
[Skill: ??? Triggered]
A bright light suddenly appeared in the realm, like a miniature sun, and immediately started glowing brighter and brighter, Illuminating the entire dark realm with holy light.
Zen sensed it, but other than feeling its immense power, Zen didn't feel any threat, almost like it had always been there.
He slowly walked to the throne with Lilith following behind him.
"Aren't you going to do something about this,your majesty?"
Zen raised a brow at the honorific but didn't say anything except
"Equip soul: Lilith"
Lilith smiled and turned into a ball of red light before flying towards Zen who had sat on the throne, merging with him.
*************
Xavier looked around at the horde of beasts that had surrounded him.
A strange smile appeared on his face as he looked at the dire situation.
"Ah well. This is a pretty good way to go out"
He suddenly locked eyes with a beast. Sighing he forced his already aching body to get up as he took a fighting stance.
The beast started charging towards him, probably sensing that he was weak and could be taken easily.
Xavier took a final glance at the two behind him he had been protecting.
"Sorry guys "
He once again focused on the beast. His body hurt too much for him to even throw a single punch,so he simply stood there staring it in the eye. If he was going to go, he'd go fighting.
The beast pounced, about to rip him to shreds when....
"Sledgehammer"
"Heavy strike!"
He suddenly felt an intense amount of wind blowing against his face and the next thing he saw was the beast flying in the opposite direction, very much dead, and with two distinct fist indentations on its head.
He suddenly saw two silhouettes standing in front of him.
"Man,looks like we woke up just in time"
Neo said joking while stretching his body.
"Man, how long was i sitting there, my muscles are aching"
Zen didn't say anything, but he also lightly stretched a bit.
They both suddenly turned to look at Xavier.
"You can rest" Zen said
Xavier didn't know what it was, but he felt a visible pressure coming off the two of them. Like they both had an entire world backing them.
He suddenly noticed something about Zen. His left eye was once again pitch black, but now there was a red iris Illuminating it.
Zen suddenly took off towards the nearest beast without warning, while Neo went to check on Xavier.
"You okay?"
Xavier suddenly pointed behind Neo to warn him but Neo already knew.
He had felt different the moment he woke up. He couldn't explain it but he definitely felt stronger.
Without turning around,Neo sidestepped, easily dodging the beast before grabbing the beast's tail with one hand and stopping it completely, surprising Xavier and even himself.
He had done it on instinct and hadn't at all expected to stop it, but he had.
Neo added his other hand and pulled the beast back before punching its head and crushing its skull, but not killing it instantly, unfortunately for the beast.
He punched it one more time and this time it was dead.
"I'll go deal with the others"
Neo suddenly bolted away without any words, heading for Maximilian who was currently being surrounded.
He could visibly see Maximilian's pale face. He had clearly given up hope as he faced a beast.
He noticed his staff's two pieces on the ground and immediately picked them up and leaped towards the beast, mimicking a move he'd seen from Zen and stabbing the two pieces into its eyes.
Neo dropped in front of Maximilian with the two bloody staff pieces as the beast fell to the ground.
He extended his hand to Maximilian to help him get up.
"Sorry we're late"
Maximilian was shocked, but for now he was just happy to be alive. He took Neo's bloody hand without any problems, after all,he was even bloodier.
"I'll deal with the ones outside"
Neo said before going out of the dungeon to fight the beasts.
Zen swung his fist covered with blood aura, decimating beasts with at most two hits.
This was a unique feeling. He felt like him and Lilith were the same person. Every move he took, she took with him.
"It's fun isn't it? It would feel better if i was at full power"
Zen didn't reply, not because he didn't want to, but because he was focused on something else. Ever since he woke up, his body had been heating up, and now it was getting a bit unbearable.
"What is this?"
"It's a skill you had, being triggered into activating by the evolution"
A cheery bubbly voice suddenly answered.
"Huh? Who was that?"
A small girl with white hair, dressed completely in black suddenly appeared in front of him, floating in front of his face.
"I'm your lucky system AI assistant"
Zen looked at the girl that was around the size of his index finger and asked.
"Aren't you a bit late then?"
"I was only activated after you evolved,if anything, you're the one who's late. The name's Theia. Nice to meet you,partner"
The girl introduced herself , tipping an imaginary hat to Zen.
Zen suddenly dodged an attack and punched another beast, this time, he clearly saw signs of scalding and burning on where he punched.
"What's going on?" Zen asked
Theia was quick to answer.
"Whatever skill you activated clearly has some holy, light, and fire damage effect... and... you're glowing."
Zen's body suddenly started giving off a visible golden light that rose out of his body accompanied by steam due to the heat.
With every second that passed, Zen's golden light glowed brighter and brighter, making him look like a miniature moving sun in the dungeon.
A few strange markings suddenly appeared as Zen's body began to change and transform.
"This is strange. Whatever this skill is doing,its affecting your transformation "
"Transformation?" Zen asked.
"Oh yeah. Your first evolution will cause you to transform into your true form. You must remember you're no longer human"
Zen gritted his teeth and pushed through the burn and kept killing beasts.
"This method is ineffective. We need to finish this fast, and you need to burn energy"
"I can see that"
Theia suddenly smiled.
"I have an idea"
"...."
"...."
Zen seemed thoughtful as he heard her plan.
"Will it work?"
"We have less than a ten percent chance of failure. Besides, you'll have me to help you "
That was more than good enough for Zen.
He took a huge leap into the air
"Theia , now!"
"You got it! Equip wind spirit ring"
The ring suddenly materialized on Zen's finger, glowing in a green light. At the same time,he unequipped Lilith.
The wind in the room suddenly started swirling and churning, and in a few seconds a raging tornado appeared in the room.
The tornado seemed to be able to differentiate friend from foe and only picked up the beasts in the room flinging them into the air.
Zen stood at the center, completely unaffected by the wind.
"Now" he gave Theia the order.
"Equip Soul: Freya"
Zen suddenly lost control of the wind, but the tornado kept going without stop.
His left eye turned black with a blue ring. By now he was fully transformed, but the intense light and winds made it impossible for even him to see what he looked like.
[Thunderstorm]
Zen felt liberated as his astraphobia didn't act up, thanks to Freya's.
A large amount of lightning spread out from Zen, striking anything and everything in the tornado and even being visible outside.
To everyone outside the tornado,it looked like a miniature sun with a thunderstorm and tornado surrounding it.
After all the beasts in the tornado had been thoroughly fried, the wind slowed down and the beast began to descend.
Without having to hear Zen's order,Theia initiated the next phase of the plan.
[Equipped soul: Lilith]
[Equipped soul weapon: Crimson doom(spear)]
Zen dropped to the ground and as he did, Lilith's shadow appeared over him as he yelled.
[Death spire]
[Transformation 50% complete]
[Not enough energy to complete transformation]
[Cancelling transformation]
He plunged the spear into the ground with all his might and as he did, blood energy seeped into the ground. Huge spikes made of solidified blood energy suddenly sprung up from the ground, impaling beasts as they fell to the ground, killing all the beasts in the room at once.
[SP: 0]
[AE: 0]
"Ultra kill!!!" Theia celebrated as she floated next to Zen.
At that moment,Neo walked in covered in blood and dragging something behind him.
"Cool light show. Guess what i found" Neo said as he dragged in the dead body of a third grade beast similar to the one Jade and Maximilian killed.
The terrifying thing about this was that the corpse of the beast looked like the head had exploded.
"H-how did you do that?"
Neo chuckled
"Hehe,i have absolutely no idea"
They all turned to look at Zen next who had luckily transformed back in time.
Zen shrugged with a look that said "don't ask me,i barely know what's going on"
The truth was that other than everything that had to do with Lilith, he really didn't know what was going on.
It looked like no one could see Theia but him as she was hovering right next to his face with a smug grin.
"Well what are you guys waiting for? Aren't you gonna celebrate?" Neo said, trying to lighten the mood