I was floating in the vast expanse of space, surrounded by the celestial bodies of stars and planets.
Standing... er floating, before me were two beings of immense power, and despite my mortal nature, I dared to challenge them. It seemed like a futile endeavor, but I was determined to give it my all, even if it meant sacrificing everything,
These two beings appeared to be complete opposites in every manner. One was pure white, while the other was of pitch-black darkness. One was left-handed, while the other used their right hand. Their demeanor also contrasted greatly, with one being calm and composed while the other was consumed by pure madness. And then there was me, a mere human, insignificant in their eyes, akin to a tiny ant.
Regardless of how I viewed the situation, the outcome seemed inevitable- I would be defeated one way or another. However, the difference between them and me was that I carried the hopes and dreams of my comrades on my shoulders, giving me the strength to push forward.
A voice called out from somewhere distant: "Child soldier of the gods, this is your future, a future worth living. One where you are the master of your fate and know freedom. All you have to do is struggle and defy all odds. This comes at a cost, however." As those words reached my ears, a flood of visions overwhelmed my mind.
Among them, I saw two worth noting: A blonde orange-haired boy turning his back on me, someone I considered a friend transforming into a menace to humanity, a monsterous figure. Another depicted me holding a man drenched in blood, my voice echoing in hysterical screams, calling him "Dad."
Betrayal, sadness, despair, and anger surged through me as the visions felt real, as if I was actually there experiencing these events.
But then, a gear clicked in the depths of my mind. It cleared away the visions and sharpened my focus, much like using a squeegee to wipe away dirt and grime from a window.
"Tsk, how could I let myself drift off during this!" I exclaimed, grounding myself back in reality.
I instinctively scanned my surroundings for enemies and noticed a different scenery than expected: a desolate wasteland with no flora, water, or wildlife. It was just scorched earth, with soot filling my nose.
The scorched ground beneath my feet emitted an acrid smell of soot, causing me to cough instinctively. Despite the apparent emptiness of my surroundings, an unseen force seemed to press down on me as if the weight of the entire world rested upon my shoulders.
Dust, ash, and smoke clouded my vision, obscuring my sight until I brushed them away with a swift hand motion. As the dust settled, it became apparent that only two figures stood in that desolate expanse- myself and another facing each other.
"Finally returned from your little nap, boy? You are now the last one," the man in front of me remarked, a twisted grin adorning his face. Once I heard that voice, his voice, I remembered why I was here: to defeat him.
My adversary, the Demon King Lucifero, possessed a physique reminiscent of a bodybuilder, with muscles that seemed to be sculpted to perfection, devoid of any excess fat or visible bones.
Standing at a towering height that dwarfed my 5'10 height, Lucifero must have been well over 12 feet tall, his blood-red skin rippling with power as he moved. Four arms, four jet-black horns, and four lifeless black eyes adorned his imposing figure, marking him as the epitome of strength and prowess.
To say he wasn't the strongest did him a disservice.
This was a daunting task assigned to me by my owner- to challenge Lucifero, the being with unrivaled power, and kill him.
I had no option but to obey; I was a peasant, no one with no say.
Our fight began five days ago when I infiltrated the demon king's realm, Darkmos.
Lucifero, the creator of this realm, once resided in a magnificent castle with his family and servants. My companions and I ventured deep into Darkroe, the homeland of the demons, in search of the entrance to Darkmos.
The demon king lit the way for us and allowed entry, facing over 1000 of us single-handedly, toying with us until only I remained standing.
"You speak as if you have won, Lucifero. Yet, here I stand," I declared as I closed the gap between us, imbuing my fists with lightning and fire.
Lucifero greeted my attack with a menacing grin. I struck his ribcage directly, creating a cloud of smoke that obscured my vision. However, I enhanced my sight with mana and observed no visible damage. The king countered my blow with laughter.
Despite my relentless assault, it seemed that my attacks did not affect him. With each strike, I intensified the power of my fists to break through his defenses. He stood unfazed, enduring every hit without a flinch.
Realizing this, I infused my fist with a significant amount of mana and landed a mighty blow on his jaw, causing his massive stature to move back slightly.
Lucifero's face turned to the side, producing a loud crack reverberating across the desolate wasteland once his home, before snapping back to face me.
"Impressive, but now it is my turn." With those words, he instantaneously appeared in front of me.
Caught off guard by his overwhelming speed, I felt a surge of panic, but I quickly regained my composure and prepared for his next move.
"Magma Guard!" I exclaimed as Lucifero struck me in the face.
The impact of his blow caused me to lose consciousness momentarily; when I regained awareness, I found myself amidst a pile of debris.
Slowly rising to my feet, I felt the excruciating pain in my face and realized that he had nearly knocked off my armor with a single punch.
A dark mass descended before me, creating a massive crater as I spat out blood, remarking, "What a damn monster."
Deep down, I knew that all my efforts were in vain.
When I was ordered to invade this realm, I had no idea that the power gap between us was so immense. I had believed that the enhancements I had received would be more than sufficient to confront this man.
However, my superhuman body was failing me, and I felt pain coursing through my entire being. I had no choice but to resort to my trump card and hope for victory. But how could I summon it without being swiftly defeated?
"Cease this futile tantrum. You are no match for me in your current state," he bellowed as he confidently approached me.
Lucifero locked eyes with me and offered a sinister smile. "Your mortal body is failing you; surrender now and join me, and I shall grant you any desire you wish. I do not enjoy wasting potential." He extended his hand towards me.
Tempted to reach out, I knew his words were empty lies. He cared nothing for me or my kind; he wanted to toy with me.
"Piss off. But if you're feeling generous, allow me to summon my strongest weapon. Or are you afraid of being defeated by a mere mortal?" I retorted with a hint of arrogance.
For a moment, Lucifero did nothing, then burst into laughter in the next, causing the Infinite realm known as Darkmos to tremble.
"Go ahead, boy, summon it. I will effortlessly strike it down and SHOW WHY I AM KING."
"I appreciate the courtesy, Your Majesty; I will return your generosity with the power to cut you down," I said as I called upon my most potent weapon: "Answer my call, Archangel Michael, and give me your strongest weapon. I call upon the Sword of Michael."
I raised my right hand to the sky, and an Angel appeared before me, a massive figure wearing a white tunic lined with gold.
Hovering gracefully, the Angel displayed majestic white wings that flapped behind him. His fiery red hair swayed as he met my gaze, moving his arms to reveal a muscular physique with pearl-white skin, all concealed by the white tunic lined in gold.
The Angel studied me intently with his golden eyes, smiling and revealing perfectly white teeth.
"To the mortal that called upon me, I grant you my strongest weapon to defeat your foe. This weapon requires a strong will, or you cannot use its full power. Use it well, and may the gods smile upon you in this battle."
The air gave off a firey glow as a sword appeared above me. It seemed a standard blade given to subjects but held a firey aura that unnerved me yet gave me an undying sense of hope that endlessly clashed against each other.
I grabbed the blade and felt a limitless pool of power contained within.
"Thank you-," I said as I looked to the Archangel to find that he had already disappeared.
"Michael, huh? Lord's little pet? No matter, it's my turn now." The hope that filled me vanished instantly when those words left Lucifero's mouth.
A spine-shaking feeling hit me, like someone standing over my grave.
"I call upon the power of the |_ _ _ _| to banish my foes to Hell. I summon the bane of the Gods. I summon the Sword Nahemah."
The Demon King extended his right hand to the side, causing the space around his hand to distort as he extracted a colossal greatsword.
The magnificently beautiful yet monstrously horrifying greatsword took a moment to fully materialize before the king, whether due to its inherent nature or his desire to torment me with a creeping sense of dread. I suspected it was the latter that held true.
This colossal weapon loomed over me; considering my height among other mortals, that was no small feat.
As I examined the features of his sword, the sense of dread overwhelmed me.
Each second I stood there examining the sword, one thought bounced in my already filled mind: to run as fast and far as mortally possible. Was there a chance for me to escape? Absolutely none, yet the fear stayed with me.
It was a sword adorned in a furious combination of black and red. The blacksmith who forged the weapon appeared to strike at it with a frenzied intensity, as if driven mad by the visions of unspeakable horrors that this single weapon and its wielder would unleash upon the realms.
Nahemah was adorned with sharp, jagged spikes and menacing curves crafted from a mystical metal, each ending in a treacherous point. The countless lives claimed by the pair were so vast that mere words could hardly capture their numbers.
I observed movement on the blade as sentient blobs of darkness tried to detach themselves from it. These dark-colored blobs bore a hellish twist, resembling balloons.
By enhancing my vision with mana, I could tell that these blobs were actually small faces.
As they multiplied, the faces displayed expressions of agony and sorrow, emerging from one another's mouths. Horrified, I took a step back, realizing that the sword held captive souls within it.
Vile crept up my normally muted face, threatening to explode outward.
"Oh, them? Why worry about others when you will JOIN them! Now, let's bet everything on this final strike. SHOW ME THAT YOUR WORDS MEAN SOMETHING!" I stepped forward as I swallowed my fear, ready to hit Lucifero head-on.
We each put our swords in front of us, placed our left hand on the blade, and chanted our strongest spells.
"I ask that you grant me strength beyond my own, God of War, Michael, let me have the power to slay this being before me. A spell filled with the hopes and dreams of mortals, both from the past, present, and future: The Moon Slicer."
"I call upon the |_ _ _ _ _ _| |_ _| |_ _ _| |_ _ _|, |_ _ _| |_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|, to give me strength beyond my own. Bring me the spell of calamity, the one that gives even the supposed gods nightmares. Deliver onto me the spell of terror, fear, and death: The God Slayer."
Violent mana covered our weapons; mine was the lesser of the two and was light green, while he was millions of times denser than mine and was a mix of purplish black and red.
We rushed at each other with our trusty blades, ready to strike each other down.
Instantaneously, my fears were confirmed: I was cut down without a single thread of hope to cling onto.
My mortal body was cut down beyond the concept of bodily structures, with no hope of restoring itself.
'I knew this was the end of me. I mean... how could I contend with a being that rivaled God? The entire idea was insanity. Why subject me to this pointless fight if my owner knew my men and I had no chance?'
As I struggled to gather my fleeting thoughts in those final moments, the king loomed above me, a wicked grin spreading across his face.
The darkness enveloping me felt like the presence of the Grim Reaper, a harbinger who had finally come to claim my soul.
"Thinking of your vain hopes of attempting victory? You never stood a chance against me, not even a sliver of possibility of harming me, mortal. Beings like you are merely the stepping stones for the grand designs my Mother has planned for the universe and all of its boundless iterations."
Lucifero knelt beside me, his grip on my right hand fierce and unyielding, a wicked glint in his eyes as he licked his lips, eager for the dark intentions he had in store.
I summoned every ounce of my fading strength to shift my body or utter a word, only to be met with the king's mocking laughter and gaze.
"Do you honestly think I would let you waltz into the afterlife with a smile of relief? After daring to challenge someone like me to a meaningless fight?" The king laughed warmly as he pulled my body up by my hand.
"Not a chance, not even in your wildest fantasies, ant. Instead, I will tether you, body and soul, to me for all eternity. In every life that follows - be it the next or the countless ones after - you will face me in combat, enduring the most inhumane methods of death possible. Death will be the only thing left in your life until the very concept of time fades away. Fight for me, boy! It won't be entertaining if you break after a mere thousand deaths!"
Once Lucifero completed his cruel promise of endless torture, he channeled a powerful surge of mana into my fingertips, where he gripped me tightly, allowing it to seep into every crevice of my being.
Initially, it felt soothing and comforting, but soon my body was wracked with spasms of grotesque transformations - my bones were breaking down and rebuilding from scratch and my limbs snapped and twisted abnormally, just to heal and redo their tormenting cycle of agony again and again - an indescribable agony.
The blood vessels that filled my body ruptured, leaving my body riddled with nauseating holes. With every new injury inflicted upon my battered form, I felt my warmth, sanity, and life draining away.
The agony was the most unbearable, seizing control of my mind and leaving no room for thoughts beyond the torment of my body being shattered, reconstructed, and shattered again, even more than before.
No sensations remained; only the haunting echoes of my inhuman screams poured forth from my ravaged form. After what felt like a millennium, Lucifero cast my lifeless body onto the barren landscape of his realm and turned away, eagerly anticipating our next "confrontation."
***
What I was doing was treason of the highest level, but I must do it.
Lord had veered off the righteous path, confining humanity - or mortals are what the godlings call them - into a freedom-stripped future.
|_ _ _|, or now, |_ _ _| |_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|, had succumbed to madness. She had the right method of ruling over mortal kind, or at least used to before her descent into insanity.
It now falls upon my other half and I to rectify this situation. Why, oh why, must this unfold this way? How did everything spiral out of control?
The beginning was beautiful; life was free but turned into a shackled, caged life after the Lord was betrayed by the one he loved the most. The creations I've watched over for eons have lost their freedom, and I can't let that stand.
I've waited for the right time to set my plan into motion, and the one that would let me do so was losing his life.
'Who might you be asking, my dear reader? Alpha, of course!'
The poor child was subject to an inhumane command given by his owner, one of the Lord's trusted aids. No speck of hope flew towards the child. Instead, it seemed the concept abandoned him in his most harrowing moment.
Lucifero—the Demon King of Damnation—allowed my plan to begin by binding the two together by an inescapable fate that the gods themselves couldn't sever.
Screams of inexplicable agony echoed in the hollow, desolate realm of Darkmos. Each one made tears flow out of my eyes, which couldn't help but avoid the torment being inflicted upon the child.
'You must endure, my child; I'm sorry for being unable to save you!'
Despite my deep desire to rescue one of my own, the human had to fight against the chilling echoes of the Doors of Death. The haunting whispers escaped from the door and crept into the child's mind, luring him into a nightmare he had no hope of escaping should he walk into the door.
Biding my time, with my patience waning as the screams of death crept out of the child, I sat in the shadows with my presence masked.
Attempting to battle the king would spell doom for me and my plans to liberate Mortalkind from the chains of the immortals. Patience was my best friend.
After witnessing the king dispose of the child and walk away, I crept out of my hiding hole and snatched his dying child, stopping his timer on life.
Just when I was about to leave, a voice boomed, filling me with unease and dread:
"So, Adam, you've finally decided to leave the shadows? Did you truly believe I wouldn't sense you in my own realm? Such foolishness from a godling. Do you really think you can walk away from here alive?"
The king, who now stood before me, leaned in closer before cackling in my face.
"No, not even in your wildest fantasies, Adam." Looking at what I was holding, a twinkle of intrigue flashed in the eyes of the demon.
"That toy you're holding catches my eye and could prove quite amusing next time I meet it. Take it and vanish from my presence at once, or prepare to suffer my wrath."
Waving me away, I traversed the realm, leaving the king, but not before the demon let out a worrisome speech.
"I understand that Lord will try to rewind time-or tinker in an alternate timeline sometime in the past-in another futile attempt to eliminate me, hoping to overpower my crippled Mother without my defense. Such efforts are utterly pointless in the face of what is inevitable. Lord cannot take my life, let alone obliterate the weakened form of the true sovereign of the cosmos. Now, go on, Adam, take your hand-me-down toy and play with it as you wish. Just remember, it will find its way back to me soon enough."
The last thing I heard before exiting the realm of Darkmos was the insidious laughter of the Demon King.