Take Up the Cross – Chapter 34: Vanishing World

Walking on an unchanging, shifting path, the complete unknown before him is familiar.

 

(Why am I here? Where are…?)

 

Four names he should remember don’t come to him. As the scratching sounds hampering his recollection worsen, he forgets the question.

 

 

 

When the boy searches his adult hands for a sign of what he was doing, his body evaporates in the next moment, joining with the rushing colors that become a hut…

 

 

---

 

 

The man sitting in a loincloth flashes a brief greeting when the shining-black-haired beauty lifts the flap to enter. With her dark-blue caftan drenched in blood, the attractiveness is marred to all but his practiced tastes.

The smell of carnage, after being next to it for so many years, no longer registers except as a fact.

 

“I see you dealt with the problem on your own without waiting for me! Well, it’s not like you can’t. They made a point to piss you off, too; though, it’d be nice if… no, that’s fine.”

 

Reaching into his pack, he throws a water flask made of animal stomach to her, followed by a bag containing a scent wafting from it.

“We’ll get some food later~. I’m almost done with my next idea. Don’t really want to stop in mid thought, y’know?” Gifting his normal smile that contains no real joy, he returns to his actually important work.

The moment he does, the true, evil grin returns as the malignancy in his eyes increases with this rediscovered purpose.

 

 

 

But, the boy notices something wrong with the scene that the man doesn’t.

 

 

 

Gripping the bag so hard that she crushes its contents, starting even more floral notes lifting up to fill the hut, the woman then begins quivering.

Instead of a hard expression as is ever her mask, tears form, joining with the red stains on her cheeks. The proud sword at her hip seems too heavy for her as she sags, staring at the man scribbling with ecstatic energy.

 

 

 

“Help me.”

 

 

 

The softest whisper, one that the man’s sharp senses should still detect, results in…

 

 

 

… nothing from him, as he snickers at what he just wrote.

But the boy’s ears tingle, a soft, hard feeling gently tweaking his lobes as they’re torn off.

 

 

---

 

 

“HE——LP… M-M-M…. E!”

 

The old man had taught him to use aura, yet for the one being dragged away it is an evil present to be bestowed.

Kindness given to an orphan easily turns into a sense-stealing poison applied to honey wine shared with him.

 

“Sorry, m’lad, no choice. Curse me in good health. No apology ’s gonna suffice, I’magine.”

 

Pitiless eyes watch the men adorned in coppery armor abduct the black-haired boy with white streaks away, the victim using his meager skills to force his numb body to twitch and speak. Though the man reveals nothing with his face, there is a brief spark of self-hatred visible in his green eyes before it is quickly snuffed.

 

 

 

(I will… NEVER FORGIVE-!)

 

 

 

The mental words the boy can hear unsaid sound very similar, echoing through his quiet heart that beats wildly.

Though it had happened before, it had never happened before this with the same intensity. This was where the hatred was born.

 

“Impossible! Who would pay that much for this…!?”

 

 

---

 

 

Cooking blood off her blade with a look of disbelief locked on her face, the normally impassive young woman covered in viscera stares at the slightly shorter young man beside her. When she’d entered, she’d been sweating bullets in anticipation of a fight promised to be the worst of her life, so far.

 

“You’re saying… that was the bounty target? He didn’t even put up a fight!?” Eyes changing from disbelief to suspicion, the young man reads it easily as it starts to shift to him. Shrugging with a mystified look on his face while inspecting the room half covered in red blood, to the eyes of spectators he would seem just as confused as her.

 

“Hey… if he wants to die then it’s easy money, right?” Smiling from ear to ear, the young man repeatedly pats the sticky shoulder of his comrade. “As long as we get paid, does it really matter?”

 

Shaking her head while sighing, the young woman flinches when a calm hand comes to rub her head and lovingly stroke through her hair.

 

Opening her mouth for a moment, she then turns away with a difficult expression.

Moments of this pass, eyes moving from him, to the body, and back, before she clicks her tongue and loses all prickliness, unsteadily giving herself to the affection.

Finally closing her eyes, she totally immerses herself in it.

 

“… I mean, if someone wants to throw their money away, who are we to argue? Whoever paid for it…”

 

His voice is light as he congratulates her.

 

“… I hope they got their money’s worth~!”

 

 

 

As the blood in the room begins to swirl and form hands to grasp at the old man’s sundered parts strewn about the room, they sink into the mire spreading around.

 

Watched over by a boy who is not present and the young man with a cold, dispassionate face…

 

“… Did you expect something different? The man surrendered to suicide, but why? Is it always… HARD TO TELL WHY OTHERS DO THINGS WHEN YOU LET THE EMOTIONS DRIVE YOU?”

 

The young woman’s voice is too close for-

 

 

---

 

 

“… Though, it would be stupid to worry about you.”

 

Looking up at him with cold, but beautiful, black eyes, the reserved woman is indifferent to the noisy throng nearby. Meeting in a small tea shop with too many customers on the outskirts of a nearby town, their rendezvous coincides with…

 

“… Ah… yeah, everything worked… out just fine~!”

 

His usual acrobatic posturing seems strangely absent as the bustling tea aficionados in the house follow his every strained movement.

Even though the woman doesn’t pay attention.

 

“You succeeded, as always…” With a bored voice, she goes back to her tea. After sipping it, she finally makes eye contact, with the man wearing his winning smile with a hint of a sheen on his neck easily missed.

Seeing his average face showing signs of victory, she finally breaks character.

Cracking a slight grin…

 

 

 

“… Well, sit down. Impress me with your wit.

… Your latest ‘joke’ after a dry spell might actually be… amusing?”

 

 

 

The woman who always seems distant opens up at news of his success, but completely misses something important as he hobbles to the table.

Sitting down, he angles the movement to hide his back where a red spot has soaked in.

 

Laughing, he launches into his story.

“Ah! You’d have loved it! Went off without a hitch! The important part was the false wall, as I said it would be! Quickest getaway I’ve ever made!” When she pours a cup for him, as is protocol for a close female companion of a man, the boy notices the man’s pain seems to lessen briefly.

 

“Right… you never fail. It’s just a matter of how you make them lose.”

 

 

 

Along with a sentence containing something like respect, dark eyes and eyelashes flash dangerous signals. Though never confident, the woman is ever able to dip into her reservoir of flirtation when desired.

In the rarest of times, often when the man seems strong.

 

 

 

“Hey, you seem to be bleeding, sir.”

A hand at his shoulder attempts to ruin his entire life.

 

 

 

The man grips the hand viciously, evil eyes showing hatred to the stranger who dares to destroy his persona by trying to betray his weakness.

 

 

 

“SHUT-!”

 

“But you’re poisoned… AND… your money pouch was… a LITTLE LIGHT… that day…?”

 

 

 

Whether the interrupting stranger is a patron, a servant, the owner, or a ghost is unknown, for all of the watchers look the same.

 

The boy shakes his head, though he cannot move it, as the scratching joining with declarations of the truth become more like whispers from everywhere all at once.

 

 

 

“Wasn’t that… THE TIME YOU LOST? Even if they died, falling to their DEATHS as you caused them EARNESTLY, leaving without a single… coin…?”

 

 

 

“Fuck… you…”

 

Pushing onto his throbbing wound, the man tries to hold back the tears as the woman pours him another cup with a loving expression.

 

The rarest face she shows, one he never wants to miss.

 

Quickly finishing, she pushes forward a small, earthen-ware bowl containing a sweet sauce that she dips a piece of cooked rabbit meat into.

Offering it up for the man menacing an unknown stranger…

 

 

 

“Try this, [     ]. It might be… almost as good as the sauce you make.”

The alluring eyes, almost flirting but never quite making it, draw attention to her wet lips. A figure which is between athletic and thin holds sexual appeal that he’s cultivated for over a decade, willingly igniting with the man’s tale soon offered for her consideration.

 

 

 

The woman is… always better when the man wins, fondly looking at him as if he holds value in her heart, as the boy recalls.

 

 

 

“ISN’T THAT A PROBLEM, PRETEEEEENDING TO WIN EVEN WHEN YOU CAN’T…? Why are you doing this, [     ]?”

 

A question that seems to be voiced from everyone’s mouths is actually hurled by…

 

 

---

 

 

Stabbed as he is in every major appendage joint, the painful question comes from the man desperately crawling with one half-functioning arm over rough ground. Pulling at the roots of bushes in this wooded area, he longs to flee an inescapable death.

 

Haunted and hunted by this boy/man and his wife, the Beloved plunges into the man’s shoulder again and again, until the ball joint finally shatters with an appealing cracking sound.

 

“AHHHH! STOP! STOP! The sect already… paid you for the blood and hair!? Why are you…!?”

 

The man’s face is caked in dirt mixed with his never-ending tears, the ground turning muddy and liquid as the salty fluid contaminates the world. Pale, thin, and having a sickening sort of glow to him as always, a handsome face is now suitably twisted.

 

Sighing in satisfaction, the butcher smiles kindly as he leans in, grabbing the spear and twisting it before yanking free. The squirt of blood joins with the hideous yell of the quadriplegic man at his mercy.

 

“Weeeelllll, I’m not actually pissed about that. Business is business, and you really helped… us out with saving me from her troubling debts. If anything, I appreciate it! Very much! But, you know… there’s one thing…”

Squatting beside the man, the demonic attacker applies an ointment to the man’s wounds to desperate pleadings not to. The bleeding stops fairly quickly, the exposed inner flesh turning an awful purple color as the body twitches and writhes.

 

Vines lick about the soon-to-be-corpse as the two share this scene alone, all of the flora soaking up the violence with great gusto.

 

“It was all fine until you just had to use those lips for something they didn’t need to be used for. Weaving stories about ‘releasing a bird from its cage and showing it the world’ before… touching some lips that don’t belong to you as a reward…

No, I’ll give you credit: that was a damn good line. I’ll remember that one, in your honor~.”

 

Planting his spear in the thick detritus of the forest bed, the insane killer with an affable smile leans over his unfortunate prey.

 

“But I gotta say, the only intimate relationship you’re going to have with a hole is one you’re not going to lust for, Torrel~!

… No, if it’s you, you might?”

 

Grimacing, the incredible anger seeping from the man’s deceptively strong body destroys the deception of being merely a traveling merchant of dubious wealth.

Instead, a powerful, former Xin’Reh reveals his mercilessly tight lips to his prey.

 

“… The joke won’t work if you swing that way. Oh well, ‘the sparrow when visited by the cat is either late to lunch or part of it’. Too late to change the jest!”

 

The boy is torn between revulsion and delight, with them both being far too similar, as he watches this justifiably impermissible act about to reach its conclusion.

Spitting into the crying man’s mouth when he tries to beg for his life, the monster pretending to be human grabs the other’s useless, dead arms and starts pulling him along the leafy carpet.

 

 

 

“Nobody takes her from me.

 

Nobody!

 

And you won’t have her heart, much less outside of her body. It’s mine! And you are…”

 

 

 

Taking a moment to rest while dragging him, the man breaks the other’s face in with a hard, aura-augmented stomp. Left with a flat nose and a cheek punctured by bone, the man who should be in shock manages to find words for his killer.

 

 

 

“… No, but even if you put me into that barrow and leave me to die for a week with medicine prolonging my agony… that’s not actually going to make HEEEEEER closer to you, RIGHT? Because… you never intend to actually tell her what you did… so…”

 

The boy and man are both surprised by the next words.

 

 

 

“IS THIS FOR HER, OR FOR YOU? ISN’T IT HARD TO TELL THESE DAYS, [     ]? … Coming to Me, This Lady can think of only two reasons…”

 

 

---

 

 

Silk sheets rustle, the woman’s overly thick body pulling to a much leaner one. Though her skin has seen better days, the quality of beauty she maintains is still genuine. A life of pampering and rare mental discipline gives her a lasting youth others would be denied.

 

“… [     ], My… suitor, tell me truthfully: is it This Lady, or what you’ve already no doubt found?” A voice neither grating nor gratifying, but completely ruined by heavy pleasure, seeks an audience with her desperate paramour. With an arm thrown over him, a silent man with sweat and juices staining his body is pulled into an overly warm and equally liquid embrace.

The man’s shivering is what alerted her, it having begun during the story she braggingly told long before his climax inside of her.

 

“This Lady is neither a fool nor a genius, yet capably observant. A pretense for your hidden transgressions is permittable, should you merely voice your eternal oath now. Say it and… This Lady…

 

… I… will…”

 

The self-proclaimed direct descendant of the Emperor asks only that a man abandon the world and remain within her closed one. Unable to recall the thoughts that led to the decision forthcoming, the boy wonders what was so wrong with this outstanding offer of dedication.

Even though her suffocating jade eyes are merciless as always, her heart betrays her as easily as the man does. A wild beating shows that she does not care if the truth is spoken, only that the correct words are honestly said.

 

Staring at her with a handsome smile…

 

 

 

… for the first time in his entire life, something drains from his naked body, with the guilt revealing after.

With lust sated, the brief and perpetual moment shared still cannot overcome what he feels elsewhere, no matter his genuine, fake feelings discovered with this desirable woman he was denied meeting until it was too late.

Quickly snuffing those emotions, he laments the cost of the treasured story she shared at the height of her passion; for, even if he says he did this for another’s sake, he did finally stray.

 

“… It… wouldn’t be real. Even if I say that… I… to you…

 

… I do care… but, if it’s… me…”

 

Voice freezing at every other word, the man finally smiles openly for the first time in his life with another present.

At least another that isn’t also always covered in blood.

 

 

 

“Well, sorry. I’m a… sinner and a horrible man.

I have someone else and always will, even if I don’t ever tell her I… love her? With you… it just…?”

The words uttered by a total idiot in a room full of immeasurable pleasures state how lost he is, leaving him forced to sigh.

 

 

 

“I couldn’t be with you if it’s not… right, you know? And I already used you, so it’s… too late for that, and also for me.

 

But, I will always treasure this moment and you-”

 

 

 

A bone-jarring slap occurs when the man lets it.

The woman’s last words are honest, too.

 

 

 

“If what is ‘right’ matters to you, dung-tongued [     ], then go tell that… whore… now, before you can’t…!”

A calculating woman’s mask drops, her rage at being denied for the first time a first for him, too.

 

Ending up flung out of her meager, but serviceable, palace covered by shade trees while still completely naked, he at least stole the valuable truth.

She watches him depart from the great, golden window bearing the Emperor’s burning sigil engraved into it, a single scream of frustration despising the man who made the wrong decision.

The black clouds falling from overhead will soon devour all these minor disagreements, yet…

 

 

 

“If you truly care about her, then why did you BETRAY HER!?”

 

 

---

 

 

The boy looks in horror.

 

The man thrust without contest.

The spearhead is lodged between her breasts.

The heart he’d aimed for is completely burst by the sharp head.

 

 

 

Within a cursed tomb whose rock walls grind and twitch like the inside of a creature’s stomach, a hateful face is directed toward the woman painting the floor red.

Clattering on the ground, her dropping blade joins with the bodies of the Xin’Reh behind the man.

 

As she strangles the spear penetrating her dark-blue caftan, shock alone causing her to grip it, her beautiful face and black eyes twist with the immense suffering.

 

 

 

But instead of the man’s rage, her eyes reveal sadness and… the feeling of being betrayed.

 

 

 

“NO! YOU WERE THE ONE THAT DID IT FIRST! NOT ME!”

 

Screaming from nowhere at all, the boy finally speaks.

 

 

 

Only doing what was necessary, the man kills the one who sought to kill him.

 

Struggling to breathe, her lips run over with crimson lifeblood as she rejects that statement.

“No, isn’t this… a more supreme betrayal? If you love me, then how… how could you possibly… do this…?” The woman’s arms go slack, as the light drains from her eyes.

She falls to her knees, only the spear keeping her upright.

 

 

 

The man/boy recoils in terror at the implication.

 

Words spoken by a dedicated fake…

 

… finally start to become a wisdom he can digest, as the one he loves dies without any point.

 

 

 

The dead body stares at him, her mouth still moving.

 

 

 

“… DO YOU GET IT NOW?”

 

 

 

Words flow from the fresh corpse, a tone that produces an itchy feeling on the boy/man’s skin.

A hand goes to his flesh, raking the hardening stuff.

 

 

 

“Right? Isn’t it more your fault?”

“She was the one who was ‘less intelligent’, right? So this all falls on you, yeah, because you didn’t guide her?”

“If you really loved her, you would’ve filled in for what she was lacking, or is it all about you?”

“Why couldn’t you see what was so fuckin’ obvious, man?”

“If anything… you should know inside that you were the cause of it all, okay?”

 

 

 

The boy/man looks behind him, shocked by the Xin’Reh soldiers whose skins are greenish and black, the deadly poison inflicted upon them leaving them capable of speech, too. Even though the blood has caked at their sealed mouths, their words flow unchallenged.

 

At these words, the hidden poison inside of the demon wearing a boy/man/human’s skin breaks out, its dermis starting to feel flush with liquid, oozing freely along him and leaving him embarrassed at how he must appear.

 

 

 

“IF YOU STILL DON’T UNDERSTAND, TRY A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE?”

 

 

---

 

 

His mouth is full of blood as his body is impaled against the wall.

 

Staring down at the woman, she finishes the last twirl in her dance as the crimson paints the room with his ground up body.

 

Left silently facing each other at this climax…

 

 

 

“YOU BITCH YOU BETRAYED ME YOU KILLED ME HOW DARE YOU DO YOU NOT KNOW WHO I AM? WHAT YOU ARE? YOU’RE NOTHING! HOW CAN YOU TURN ON-!”

 

 

 

The boy’s mind is collapsing.

 

All of the repressed violence inside bursts out. He pulls at the spear, longing to drive it into her, willing his body to move despite half of it being destroyed completely. The intestines fall out, depriving him of another method of ending her.

 

As rage consumes him, he finally notices what he missed at that moment.

 

 

 

Her mouth is quivering.

Tears are falling.

She’s nearly collapsing.

 

 

 

“… I just… wanted you to stop… lying…”

Holding her hand forward, open and shaking, she begs the man impaled to the wall with all her might.

 

“… you just had to surrender. You’re… always smart. Smarter than… You would’ve… given up to anyone else…”

 

 

 

“EVERYONE ELSE ISN’T YOU, YOU EVIL, RETARDED, WORTHLESS, VIOLENT BITCHHHHHHHHHHHH- GAHHK!!”

 

 

 

Roaring in hatred, the feelings bottled up over a life wasted on petty vengeance choke him as the blackness regurgitates from his mouth. Worse than the lifeblood that he suffocated on the first time around, it corrupts him from the inside before escaping.

Large tears tumble from her face as her nose fills with snot, the proud beauty who always shows such a condescending attitude looking like a lost child as she shivers. Despite being the winner of the fight, arms lift to hug him.

 

 

 

“… [     ], you can’t… die…

I need…!

 

Pleaaase, DON’T LEA-!”

 

 

 

“TRAITOR~!”

 

 

 

In opposition to her desperation, one vicious word silences the entire exchange.

More mocking than the boy remembers, the man of now denies her with all his might, seemingly having heard the admissions and being revolted by them.

 

 

 

Her face goes white, a mouth mechanically closing.

Features tighten, the same look as always returning to her.

 

Serene.

Placid.

Emotionless.

 

Except…

There’s no light in her eyes.

 

 

 

[     ], at his moment of death, had also horribly murdered [      ].

 

The selfish and vindictive boy ended the life of his rage-filled and hateful partner.

A hopeless, twisted love died by equal blows.

 

 

 

At the conclusion of her death, a creaking body stumbles forward. Arriving at the sarcophagus, it climbs until the wraith-like thing is staring at him from behind long, black hair stained red.

 

 

 

“… Hey, [     ]? If you have to ask who betrayed whom, then wouldn’t that person… no, the original betrayal always be one begun by you?”

 

 

 

The boy’s mind goes wild, as the darkness all about him is finally revealed.

 

 

---

 

 

A storm of voices and shadows, all tumultuous, impatient, and reverent, circle the thing at the center of its attention.

With its body collapsing…

 

“Heeeey, it’s pretty easy to understand a life like yours now, right?”

 

The girl wearing torn sack clothes with long, black hair that drips blood at all times dances around it, pestering it childishly as flesh changes and a mind expands with true knowledge. Even now, the sharp bones break free from the fragile arms.

 

“If you think about it, isn’t the one wrong from the start you?”

 

 

 

(RIGHT, I WAS, WASN’T I? THEN DOESN’T THAT MAKE THINGS SIMPLER?)

 

 

 

“No, isn’t that unkind, hee! Not from the start!” A fat man in frayed robes that ill-fit him moves to look down at the thing that is wallowing on the floor.

“Hee, you were just… the best assistant. The quickest, hee, and always the smartest!” Kneeling with enormous effort, the man with elegant jowls reflects delight in his void-filled eyes.

 

“Hee, hee, you always acted like you weren’t listening, hee, like it wasn’t sinking in…”

 

With bubbling warmth on the fat man’s face, he smiles gaily in congratulations, his skin greasy with his own rotted death.

 

 

 

“… but you proved me wrong, son. All of the useful things, hee, I tried to teach, you just stretched your wings and soared with them! Hee, you were far better, hee, than I ever was…!”

 

Full of warmth, the man’s voice is more genuine than it ever was in the thing’s youth. A kind hand pats the monster’s back that then bursts open to reveal expanding chitin.

 

 

 

(… HIDING WAS NEVER GOING TO WORK, WAS IT? EVEN IF I TRY TO BE BETTER THAN YOU… I WAS… ALWAYS ALREADY WORSE…?)

 

 

 

“Rather than worrying about destiny and Fate, shouldn’t you worry about…”

Bending down, the butcher girl grips its head, bringing the revolting killer closer.

 

 

 

“FaCiNg WhAt YoU aRe?”

Producing jagged teeth, her unusually kind smile ends in a kiss.

 

The sludge that flows freely, spewing about the monster’s form and reflecting the satisfaction of the babbling spectators, cannot be traced to its origin.

 

“WhO iS [     ]?!???!”

Unable to say the name, the decades-long dead man begs his protege to understand, with a hissing wheeze coming from where his lungs show through.

 

 

 

“URWRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!”

 

 

 

The scampering lifeform’s attempt to announce its newfound freedom is prevented by its inability to speak, now. The form it longs to share with others is quite new and immensely natural to the black thoughts it was formed from.

It races around in the collapsing world on two limbs, trying to find the exit back to where it was sent from, remembering explicit instructions…

 

 

---

 

 

Grains of rainbow impact him as he falls towards a brightening light, the layers of shining stone he slips through like gelatinous crystal flowing over his body, as he ascends to the source of the beckoning voice.

 

 

 

The man stands in a grand courtyard.

All around him is a synchronized drone.

 

As the man looks around, he realizes he knows this courtyard, though he has never personally visited it.

To be more specific, he recognizes the grand Imperial Bridge which crosses into the inner sanctum.

 

All around him are tiered walls.

On these walls, heavily draped human forms sit, their arms lifted to the heavens while their fleshless mouths linger forever open.

These living creatures do naught but cry out a name, unburdened by anything that can inhibit their praises.

 

The golden-trimmed, jade-adorned walls, overhangs, and architecture bleed rainbow. From the red markings of the Emperor’s sigil, inscribed on every important surface, a great, shining darkness emits.

 

 

 

Looking up over the inner sanctum, a building so large and foreboding that it consumes the very air around it, appearing more like a great oak made of stone than a building…

The man sees a collossal cross stretching to pierce the clouds.

 

 

 

The whole air is captivated by its presence.

The sky itself darkens overhead, the caliginous energies moving to join with it from the rotating clouds above, before spreading out over all of Xin.

Darkness like that which radiates from the sigils confirms to the man that the cross and the sigils are designed to work together, blanketing the entire continent with the will of the one that controls it.

 

 

 

On the bridge.

Is the monster that is the will of the cross.

 

 

 

“The Emperor!?” A strangled scream is the man’s hateful accusation.

 

“How incredibly observant, peasant.”

 

Scoffing with its eyes still closed, the godlike ruler graces the man with a musing sneer. Its voice like the masculine burn of strong alcohol is measured and sarcastically inciteful.

 

“A slave has finally answered the call of its Owner. How dutiful the recipient of My boons and a pledged servitor Xin’Reh continually demonstrates itself to-”

Black eyes with white irises open slowly to gaze upon him, before a minor emotion comes to its face when it stops speaking.

 

 

 

When the monster betrays unexpected emotion, the droning from the assembled masses increases in furiousness. More walls rise with grinding, metallic screams, thrusting more pleading voices skyward.

The entire area centered over a pit that has no apparent bottom is filled with plaintive cries bemoaning this supreme existence’s sudden annoyance.

 

 

 

“… HAH, even when specifically summoned by name, this disrespectful whelp sends a puppet, instead. Such piety!” A short laugh accompanies the monster’s disbelief, the evil eyes narrowing to hostilely regard the man who is now less than dirt in its eyes.

 

 

 

White skin is a contrast against its incredibly long, woven black beard and hair, both of which meet the ground. The thing’s face is the definition of “royal,” yet so rigid its flesh is that it resembles a mask.

All of its features scream pride and arrogance, with an eagle-like nose possibly its only detriment, giving its broad face a sort of jagged knife stabbing towards what it shows condescension to.

 

The thing’s masculine voice warps with its craning stature of over seven feet, the thing’s overly thin body wearing a mesh-gold robe tailored to render its inhuman tallness as a sculpted, peacock-like display.

Liquid Drops of Creation, which should not be able to hold form as jewelry, adorn its body while clasped by silver chains. The necklaces layered over its neck are sufficient to crush an average man’s spine, every Drop priceless beyond imagining.

 

 

 

A decrepit, but powerful, hand lifts to curl its mutant, long fingers, beckoning him.

The man is carried onto the bridge, his legs moving without him willing it.

 

 

 

“Worthless simulacrum of the fool that plundered My divine sleep and drove My eminence to this fell place: answer one question, and one question, only. Dissemble not, nor seek to fool.”

This Emperor of Emperors’ voice fills the man with trepidation, the self-importance denying the existence of all creatures other than it, of the idea that anything but this ruler has true sentience.

 

 

 

“Why does a speck refuse to rule, even if undeserved? When offered… everything, living flesh desires… nothing?”

 

 

 

The man’s voice comes out when disallowed refusal.

“I don’t need to rule like a king! I don’t want it! I don’t need it! No responsibility for it do I desire, no greater purpose needed for my life! All I want is to have what I want to have!”

The man’s thoughts flow like water from a broken dam to rush off this bridge, where his voice can barely be heard over the synchronized cries of this ruler’s slaves.

 

“Everything will go wrong, eventually! You have power, people come for it! All I want is… for them to know just how I can beat them with less! I don’t need them to obey! Just… acknowledge me!”

Collapsing a bit, the man then lets his anger carry him.

 

 

 

“I… want… to… not… be…!”

Even with the Emperor’s irrefusable demand, the most undignified reason cannot be admitted, because it’s not included within the man’s memories.

 

 

 

“I want that… and… also…!”

Images of a woman with long hair are replaced by four girls, their silhouettes not coming to the man, nor information about them, solely a small feeling that he desires to have them.

“I want them! I want to have a life of my own, with them around! I want them to be there, to listen, to grow! I want to share it! While I make them mine!

 

MINE ALONE! ALL MINE!”

 

A contradictory stream of words flow out, overwhelming greed mixing with romantic longings. The royal creature in front of the man finally scrunches its face as if ill, with the man growing angry at the lack of respect.

 

“You old ghost! All you know is slavery! I saw the images! You simply want to destroy their ability to resist! If I listened to you, those girls would belong to me… as brain-dead husks! I don’t want puppets, I want women, you self-aggrandizing, dickless corpse of a man!”

Raising an eyebrow, the creature’s face is emotionless as it asks a sole question.

 

“Believe this puppet does, that such disjointed ramblings represent a way of living that is superior to My Will?”

The even tone seeks to deny the man’s entire life.

 

 

 

“FUCK YOU, YES!”

 

The untamed spirit of the man still exists, trapped underneath all of the lies and failures, the weight of the passage of time still not having killed his ridiculous self-image.

“I refuse to let anyone decide my life for me! It’s happened for far too long! I’ll never give in again!”

Cackling with insane glee, the man manages to point a shaking finger at the Emperor which rules all of existence, producing a mild look of curiosity and surprise from the golden conqueror.

 

 

 

“Shitty old tyrant, I’ve ruined everyone else in my life! Why not try to fuck up your day, too!? AHAHAHAHAHAHA!”

Finding his cursed nature the most lovable thing of all, the man finally loses what’s left of his shattered psyche’s stability.

 

 

Bringing its hand up to stroke the longest beard one can grow, it shakes its head finally.

The monstrous Emperor joins briefly, if in a deadpan manner, with the madman’s cascading laughter.

Its eyes look tired as it dismisses the heap of trash in front of it after the shared moment ends.

 

“What sort of futile life creates a thing like this?”

 

Trying to lash out in outrage, the man finds he cannot.

The droning voices increase in intensity, instead.

 

 

 

“FOOOOOOOOLISH

 

PUPPET!”

 

 

 

A great roar assaults the man’s mind, his knees going weak as his sense of worth and self drain out through his feet, never to return.

 

“… Such hubris, from a mud-covered whelp’s perspective. Of all of the banalities mentioned, only one saves such a roach from being considered perfectly worthless.”

Walking away from the man who is trapped where he stands, the Emperor stops on the bridge and twirls in place to return its gaze.

 

 

 

“VERY WELL. I am still a… roach’s Emperor, as sad as that be, and thus it is My responsibility to hear and understand all desires…

… regardless of worth, for that was My Decree.”

A silver cross flies out from inside of the thing’s golden robes to land in its decrepit hand.

The Emperor holds it aloft.

 

 

 

“Outside, and outside alone, demands My undeserved Mercies granted, so that total destruction may be averted.”

The cross begins to shine in darkness, the larger cross above increasing to join it. The voices calling this thing’s name become joyous as they await for its power to manifest, their bodies shaking in ecstasy.

 

“Desire not to rule, does an insect? Then do not!

As punishment, I shall give a fitting gift, for tomb robbing is in need of correction!”

 

The cross’s darkness lances into the man, who begins screaming as if he’s being vivisected alive. Indeed, his insides begin to spiritually change.

 

 

 

“Bear this message enscribed upon memories, puppet:

 

[You shall never rule another, only yourself! Others shall seek to rule you!]

 

[You shall never hoard treasures unused, only what you yourself wield! All other wealth shall be transitory!]

 

[You shall never be known to others, for all your successes will be spoken of in rumor! All will see only your station and remember your shadow!]

 

[You shall never be loved, except by those who choose to latch onto you! All who see you shall instead loathe your presence, as if you are the day of reckoning they know forthcoming!]”

 

 

 

The oppressive, continent-spanning voice foretells the man’s doom.

 

“Ah, but is at least one aspect not somewhat commendable?”

Smiling like a perverted old man now, the Emperor licks a black tongue over its dry lips.

“‘For the sake of women,’ I feel kinship to this lust. So, for a lesser kindred, I shall decree this:

 

 

 

HAVE ALL THAT YOU CAN! In fact, live not if you cannot.

[All that you shall mark this world with is your conquests, that and nothing more. But ever shall conquests appear before you for tempting…! Muuuu-kukuku!].”

 

Smiling with sharpened teeth, the creature before him chuckles at its own private joke, lifting the cuff of its robe to its mouth as it lingers in its mirth.

The man is slack-jawed, unsure of what to do, before the creature in front of him notices his lack of action.

 

 

 

“Do not further gaze upon My Perfection, puppet. Complete a task, now, and carry this wisdom across the demarcation of My Heaven:

 

 

 

A medicine may heal when imbibed correctly, but when taken falsely it is pure poison. If the medicine which may heal only slightly fails to cure, then more relief may come from the maker of it, should one barter for a superior version.”

 

 

 

Finishing its words, the Emperor nods its head once, wiping its sandpaper face with a black satin cloth before turning around. It strides back to its inner sanctum with true art in its footsteps, a dignity the man has never witnessed before being demonstrated.

 

 

 

The drone of its slaves changes in tone as it departs.

 

 

 

The man looks up to the great cross above and sees that it is shining white, the dark clouds above it parting, something… from beyond these clouds descending rapidly.

 

 

 

A rainbow-colored beam crashes to the stone tiles, obliterating the man before he can even scream, as its brightness disintegrates the entire world.

 

 

---

(Sorry for revisions/corrections. I am tired.)

(More revisions because I’m smart.)

Characters:

 

Glossary:

 

Chapter 33         Table of Contents          Chapter 35