Niko awoke coughing, his lungs desperate for air as a cloud of dust settled around him. His entire body ached, the crash from the temple's collapse leaving him sprawled in a cavernous hollow beneath its ruins. The Book of Beginnings was clutched tightly against his chest, its surface cold and oddly smooth, as though it had never been touched by time.
[Notification: Objective Completed – Retrieve The Book of Beginnings.]
[New Objective: Investigate the book's contents.]
The notification faded from his vision, but his mind buzzed with unease. He stared at the book. Its cover shimmered faintly, the material shifting between obsidian black and a deep, rich crimson. The title was etched in an unrecognizable script that pulsed faintly with light, as if alive.
Niko frowned, his fingers brushing over the strange markings. "You better be worth all that," he muttered.
The cave was eerily quiet. The oppressive presence of the shadow entity seemed to have receded, but Niko didn't trust the calm. He forced himself to his feet, his knees wobbling as he scanned the surrounding darkness. His essence reserves were dangerously low, the battle upstairs having drained him more than he cared to admit.
"Alright, let's see what all this fuss is about," Niko said, flipping the book open.
"Hello if you are reading my book Kindly kill yourself or place the book back where you found it. This is a whole record of the world before my birth and after the world ends this is not something most would be able to handle without their brain blowing up and turning into an eidolon."
Niko looked at the book bewildered "Oh what the… hell? Who thinks of writing a book like this?"
He ran his fingers along the smooth, shifting cover, half-expecting it to react somehow. When nothing happened, he sighed and turned the page, his curiosity outweighing his unease.
The next line was no less unsettling:
"If you're still reading, congratulations. Either you're too stupid to heed warnings, or you're the kind of fool who thinks they're invincible. Either way, welcome to your reckoning."
Niko's eyebrows shot up. "Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence," he muttered, flipping the page again, half-hoping the book would insult him further just to keep things consistent.
Instead, the text shifted tone:
"The demon of fates arm lay underneath you and to the right go and consume it to defeat it's guard"
Niko's scream tore through the cavern as the pain intensified, a visceral sensation that clawed at every inch of his body. His skin felt like it was being scorched from the inside out, as if every inch of his flesh were being burned and gnawed on by a thousand invisible creatures. His muscles convulsed, his veins pulsed, and his bones cracked, snapping and shifting in ways they weren't supposed to.
His hand—no longer his hand—swelled unnaturally, inflating like a balloon, stretching the skin to its limits. The fingers elongated and twisted into grotesque shapes, claws sprouting from the tips. He could feel his wrist and forearm bulging, the bones reshaping themselves under the strain. His palm burned with the sensation of his essence consuming his flesh, remaking it into something new, something alien.
A guttural, pained noise escaped from his throat as his face began to contort. His jaw seemed to elongate, his cheekbones pressing out of alignment, skin stretching and then snapping back as his features became an unrecognizable mask of agony. His eyes rolled back as his head throbbed, veins bulging from his temples. His brain seemed to writhe inside his skull, as if it was being reconfigured, twisted into something sharper, something more aware.
The pain in his chest deepened, searing through him like fire. His organs shifted, contracting and expanding, rearranging themselves as though they were being forced into new positions. His heart seemed to beat erratically, sometimes too fast, then too slow, as if it were trying to find its rhythm in a body that no longer fit him. His lungs burned with each strained breath as his body stretched and twisted, the transformation taking hold of him completely.
He felt his essence—his power—surge through him, clawing at his bones, pulling at his muscles. The darkness within him churned, and he could feel it fighting for dominance. This wasn't just a transformation; it was a battle for control. The essence inside him wanted to consume him, to take him over entirely, and Niko could feel himself losing ground.
His body snapped upright, his spine arching unnaturally as he involuntarily tried to regain control. But the essence kept pushing, shifting him, remaking him. His hands clenched into fists as his body finally froze, the pain abating for just a moment. The air around him grew cold as he felt something click into place inside of him. The sensation of the world sharpening, becoming clearer—his senses heightened to an extreme, the cavern around him coming into sharper focus. His hearing, his sight, even his sense of smell became unnaturally acute.
"No I can't die, I am… I am the Antithesis of fate and fortune".
Saying his true name seemed to bring his body back into his original shape his senses dulled back to normal. It was as if his true name reminded his body of his true identity?
"Ah ha ha ah ahh ah ohhhh man how rich of course I saved myself in the absolute last moment. On the brinks of death I managed to claw myself out of hell again. Oh Niko did i ever tell you how smart you are" Niko spoke to himself again
He stood, his body now steady, the oppressive weight of the transformation lifting as if it had never been there. With his essence humming quietly beneath the surface, Niko grinned. That was too close, but now? Now, he was in control.
He was the Antithesis of fate and fortune.
And fate would have to bend.
____________________________________________________________________________
Reading the text again he wondered what did that even say? "The demon of fates arm lay underneath you and to the right go and consume it to pacify it's guard"
"Oh wow, that's so oddly specific. How did it know it'd be right where the author left the book?" Niko muttered to himself, looking around the room once more. He couldn't shake the sense that he was being watched or guided, as though the book had been placed here for him to find, with instructions already laid out.
His mind raced as he replayed the words over and over. "The demon of fate's arm lay underneath you and to the right. Go and consume it to pacify its guard."
Underneath him and to the right… Niko's eyes darted around, scanning the room for anything unusual. The temple was old, forgotten, its crumbling walls steeped in shadows. There was a chill in the air, the kind that made you feel like you were being buried alive in the earth, even though the space around him was wide open.
He couldn't afford to second-guess himself. With a determined sigh, he moved cautiously across the room. The stone floor creaked beneath his weight as he carefully approached the right side of the chamber, where his eyes began to pick out a faint shift in the stone—a subtle indentation that seemed out of place.
A low, guttural hum filled the air, vibrating through the floor beneath his boots. Niko knelt down, brushing away dust and debris with his hand. Beneath it, he found what he was looking for: a rough, stone slab, partially hidden in the floor, its edges worn down by time. His heart beat faster, and a part of him almost wanted to run. This could be it, he thought. The demon's arm...
Ignoring the growing tension, Niko pressed his palm against the slab. The hum intensified, vibrating through his entire body as the stone shifted, revealing a dark, hollow space underneath. It was as if the temple had been waiting for him to find it, guiding him with the book's cryptic message.
With a deep breath, Niko reached down, his fingers brushing against something cold, smooth, and unnervingly... alive. The sensation made his skin crawl. It was like touching a piece of frozen flesh, but there was no warmth—just an eerie coldness that seeped into his bones.
"Here goes nothing," he muttered, his voice barely a whisper. He gripped whatever it was tightly, pulling it free from the shadowy recess.
As soon as the object came into the light, Niko froze, staring at the grotesque sight before him. What he held wasn't just a part of a body—it was an arm, but not a normal one. Dark veins snaked across its surface, twisting and pulsing as if it were a living thing. The skin was pale, almost translucent, and in places, it seemed to shift, flickering like a shadow in the dim light.
The weight of the arm was unsettling, as though it was both too light and too heavy at the same time. Niko could feel the power radiating off it, a cold force that seemed to tug at his very essence.
His breath caught in his throat as he stared down at it. "Consume it?" The words from the book echoed in his mind again.
The arm in his hands twitched slightly, sending a jolt of panic through his chest. Something inside him told him to drop it, to run, but he knew he couldn't. This was his only way forward.
Niko took a slow breath, his fingers tightening around the arm as he slowly lifted it. His heart pounded in his chest. "Alright, let's get this over with," he muttered, feeling the essence within him stir in anticipation.
Without another word, Niko brought the arm to his mouth, his body trembling as he prepared to consume the dark power that radiated from it