The study smelled of aged leather and dying fire. Henry Huntington's fingers traced the rim of his whiskey glass, the amber liquid catching the dim light like trapped sunlight. Shadows clung to the corners of the room, heavy as unspoken truths. I stood by the window, watching rain slide down the panes—thin, silver veins cutting through the night.
"We're drowning in preorders," he said, voice low, almost reverent. "Even the vultures who wanted you to fail are clawing for a piece of it. You've tilted the axis, Alex. The world spins differently now."
I didn't turn. The glass felt cold against my palm. "And the ones who can't claw? The ones who'll never afford it?"
A log cracked in the hearth, spitting embers onto the marble. Henry's silence was a blade.
"If it's only for them—the kings and their castles—what's the point?" My reflection in the window wavered, fractured by rain. "Power, advancement, the best shouldn't be a privilege. It's a right. Water. Air. Light."
He chuckled, a sound like gravel underfoot. "Idealism suits you. Sharpen your edges. I'm sure that you see the world as something wrong." His chair groaned as he leaned forward, the firelight carving hollows beneath his eyes. "But the world isn't wrong, boy. It just is. You don't feed the masses by handing them a lion's share. You feed them crumbs and call it mercy."
I faced him then. His gaze was a vise—steady, unyielding. The air thickened, tasting of peat smoke and impending thunder.
"Crumbles aren't enough." My thumb brushed the chain around my neck, the runes almost humming like a faint heartbeat. "I won't let this become another toy for gilded hands."
I looked at him in the eyes "I won't allow this." I knew he understood the threat behind my voice. I wanted to make things better for everyone, not only for the rich. The man was making things easy to me but in the end, it didn't change the fact that he was the one needing me. I didn't need him.
Henry rose, his shadow swallowing the room. For a moment, he looked less like a man and more like a monument—weatherworn, inevitable. "You think I built empires on crumbs?" He swept a hand toward the window, where the city's skyline flickered like a dying bulb. "Every bridge I burned, every soul I buried—it was to spare the ones I cared about from the meat grinder. You must understand. Life is evil, Alex. We take, we ruin, we survive. But you—" He halted, something raw fissuring his voice. "Without even trying, you make survival mean something more."
His palm settled on my shoulder, weight like a sacrament. "Don't worry. It'll be done. The factories, the grids—I'll gut the prices myself. Let the suits choke on their gold. Your light will reach the cracks."
The words should've been a balm. Instead, my skin prickled. Promises from men like him were grenades with pins half-pulled. I still didn't get it. I still don't understand why the man was treating me in such a way.
"Why?" The question slipped out, sharp as a scalpel. "Why stake your legacy on my 'idealism'?"
His laughter this time was softer, frayed at the edges. "When you're old, you see ghosts in every shadow. My time… it's a closing door. But you?" He gestured to the device, its outline visible through the fabric. "You're a beginning. I saw it, Alexander. And beginnings… they outlast us."
He moved to the hearth, poking the embers. Sparks spiraled upward, brief as fireflies. "I wanted better once. Wanted to carve a world where my children didn't have to lick boots or be cruel. But good intentions drown in the tide. You learn to swim with sharks or sink."
The rain thickened. Somewhere, a clock tolled.
"You still believe that?" I asked.
He didn't turn. "Belief's a luxury. I have results." A beat. "But you—you'll plant seeds. Watch them bloom. I know that they will grow past the rot."
Henry's voice gentled. It was probably a rarity to anyone he didn't see as family.
"You remind me of her. Someone I once admired, someone I once loved. She used to say, Sometimes good people make bad choices. It doesn't mean they're bad people. It means they're human." His jaw tightened. "She chose a gallows over a gilded cage because nothing else was possible, because it was the edict of the world. I've hated the world ever since."
The admission hung between us, fragile as a moth's wing. Outside, lightning split the sky—a jagged wound of white.
"You'll have to to deal with a lot. They already hate me because what I built." I murmured. "The others… they won't let you undercut their game."
He smirked, raising his glass in salute. "Let them try. I've crossed bridges just to burn them. It's the only way to keep moving."
For a heartbeat, I saw it—a future, one raw and bleeding. The world, the city, everything in ashes, a thousand of dead hands pointing at me, trying to reach me, Thalia's tears as a storm rolled in.
It felt like a calm before the storm.
But then he smiled—a father's smile, proud and doomed—and the moment shattered.
"To seeds," he said, draining his glass.
I didn't drink. Looking at outside, it almost felt as if The rain was trying to whisper warnings to me, as if trying to tell me something akin to the fact that the act of taking is equally evil almost as if it was an answer to the words the Huntington Patriarch had shared with me.
The words, they felt like warnings, about stopping, about distancing myself from him, about giving up my ambitions of going against the gods least I'd be dampened and yet, I'd still take it all, take his deal. Take his money, his influence, his daughter's hungry glances.
For Thalia.
For the cracks where the light could get in.
The fire died. The room dimmed. Somewhere, a storm brewed—not in the sky, but in the silence between two men, one playing to the dictate of the world with disgust and anger, the other playing fool.
And the world, as it always did, kept turning.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I was sitting in the room I had turned into a workshop. The air smelled of ozone and iron, a metallic tang that clung to the back of my throat. In the center of it all, suspended in a tank of translucent fluid, floated her. Elpida. My creation. My sin. My hope.
I sat in my chair, the leather creaking softly as I leaned back, my eyes fixed on her. She was perfect, in a way that made my chest ache. Her skin was pale, almost luminous under the soft glow of the tank's light, her hair a dark halo that drifted lazily in the fluid. She looked like Beryl, like Thalia, like me.
Her eyes were closed, her expression serene, as if she were merely sleeping. But I knew better. She wasn't asleep. She was waiting. Waiting for me to wake her, to give her purpose. And that was the problem, wasn't it? Purpose. I had given her one, but it wasn't the kind of purpose I had ever wanted to impose on anyone.
The clock on the wall ticked softly, a steady rhythm that seemed to mock me. Time had slipped through my fingers like sand, faster than I could have imagined. One moment, I was sitting across from Spielberg, discussing the logistics of a project that felt almost trivial now. The next, I was standing in the Huntington estate, the weight of the Patriarch's gaze pressing down on me like a physical force. And now, here I was, staring at the culmination of everything I had worked for, everything I had sacrificed. It felt like no time at all had passed, and yet, it felt like an eternity.
I sighed, running a hand through my hair. "I always hated people who pushed their dreams onto their children," I said aloud, my voice echoing softly in the quiet room. "People who saw their kids as tools, as extensions of themselves. I hated it with every fiber of my being. In my first life, I walked away from so many relationships because I was afraid. Afraid that I would become like them. Afraid that I would do worse."
The words hung in the air, heavy and unrelenting. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees, my gaze never leaving Elpida. "I gave up on love so many times," I continued, my voice softer now, almost a whisper. "On people I cared about. On people I wanted to grow old with, to laugh with, to cry with. I gave up on the idea of a family because I was terrified that I would turn into the very thing I despised. And now… now I've done exactly that."
I stood, pacing the length of the room, my footsteps echoing in the silence. "I hate that I'm bringing you into this world just to fight, just to struggle, just to obey," I said, my voice rising slightly. "I hate it, Elpida. I wish things were different. I wish this world was as normal as the one I left behind. I wish you could be born into a world where your only purpose was to be happy. I still hope… I still hope that after all of this, that's what you'll find. I hope all of this will be worth it."
I stopped pacing, turning back to face her. My lips twitched into a sad smile. "I always hated that quote, you know? The one that says the best things are always the hardest to reach. It's such a cliché. But… I guess there's some truth to it."
I walked back to the tank, placing a hand against the cool glass. "Right now, you're asleep," I said softly. "But soon, you'll wake up for the first time. The knowledge I've given you, the things I've downloaded into your mind… my words, the ones I'm saying right now, they'll be the only things you know. That's why I need you to remember this. When you find Thalia, when you find your sister, I want you to tell her something. Tell her I'm sorry. Tell her I'm sorry for breaking my promise. Tell her I'm sorry for not being there. And tell her… tell her that no matter what, I care about her. That no matter what, I still love her. That no matter what happens, no matter what the world tries to make her believe, she never did anything wrong. She was never flawed, or stupid, or anything less than perfect. Tell her she's loved. Always."
I leaned back in my chair again, my hand falling away from the glass. I didn't know why I was talking like this, as if something was about to go wrong. But I couldn't shake the feeling. Ever since I left Ambrosia, it felt like a clock was ticking in the back of my mind, counting down to something inevitable. Like a sailor on the edge of a storm, I could feel the pressure building, the air growing heavier, even if I couldn't see the clouds yet.
I had taken precautions, of course. I had finally tapped into the knowledge the stars had etched into my mind, using it to create wards that would conceal and protect this place. Spells that would ensure nothing short of a planet-ending catastrophe could breach these walls. But even with all that, I couldn't shake the unease that coiled in my gut.
I raised my hand, and a hologram of Los Angeles materialized above my palm. The city glowed softly, a map of light and shadow. Little green dots scattered across the map represented the monsters that still roamed the streets, their numbers far too high for my liking. The golden dots, fewer in number, marked the demigods. And then there was the new addition—a massive golden dot, so bright it made the others look dim by comparison. A god. I didn't need to guess who it was. My instincts screamed at me that they had noticed me just as I had noticed them.
I clenched my fist, and the hologram vanished. Of course, this was inevitable. When your goal is to defy the heavens, to challenge the gods themselves, you don't get to do it from the shadows forever. Sooner or later, they would come for me. And I had prepared for that. I had contingencies in place, plans that would ensure my death wouldn't be the end. But still… still, I was scared. I had died once before, and the thought of dying again made my chest tighten. The Alex who would come back… he wouldn't be me. Not really. He would have my memories, my goals, my drive… but he wouldn't be me. And I didn't want to lose myself. I wanted to be the one to fix things. The one to reunite with Thalia. The one to make everything right again.
I stood, giving Elpida one last look. "I've given you everything I thought you'd need," I said. "Even if something happens to me, you'll have the knowledge of what's to come. You'll know how to build more like yourself, how to create weapons, how to cast spells. You'll wake up when I'm gone, and you'll do what needs to be done."
I walked over to a nearby table, my hand hovering above its surface. With a thought, I manipulated the atoms, rearranging them until a small cake materialized, complete with a single candle. A lighter appeared beside it. I picked it up, lighting the candle and watching the flame flicker.
"Oh, before I forget," I said, turning back to Elpida. "It's your birthday today. Your first one." I smiled, though it didn't reach my eyes. "Happy birthday, Elpida."
I left the workshop, the door closing softly behind me. I stopped outside Beryl's room, my hand raised as if to knock. But I hesitated, my fingers curling into a fist before I let it fall. I stood there for a moment, my breath catching in my throat, before I whispered, "See you later, Beryl."
A gap in space opened beside me, a tear in reality that shimmered like a mirage. I stepped through, the world folding around me as I disappeared. The gap closed behind me, leaving only silence in its wake.
I was after all late to my meeting with god.
Fun fact, the same way a group of crows is called a murder, the same way a group of ravens is called an unkindess. Anyway, hope y'all like the chapters. Don't hesitate to comment you liked, found interesting or didn't like in the chapters. Comments are one of my main motivations.
Ps: I got a https://www.patreon.com/c/Eileen715with two more chapters of around if not more than ten thousands words together of this story available for less than 5$. Also with those less than 5$, you have access to everything I write in a month. Come if you want to read more or support. If you don't want to come too or can't, it's fine too. Like ReplyReport Reactions:EyeSeeYou, Addlcove, Kiden and 360 othersAllen1996Mar 26, 2025Add bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Crossroads New View contentApr 19, 2025Add bookmark#1,327Allen1996Versed in the lewd.Hecate was old.
Not in the way mortals measured time—not in centuries or millennia, but in the slow, unfathomable crawl of existence itself. She was older than civilization, older than the first fires kindled by trembling hands in the dark. She had been young when the sun and moon were still new, when the earth was raw and unshaped, when the Titans had ruled unchallenged.
And she remembered.
She remembered the war that had shaken the heavens, the clash of gods and Titans that had nearly torn the world asunder. She remembered standing at the crossroads of fate, her torches burning bright in the chaos, her voice whispering secrets that turned the tide. The Olympians had won, and Zeus had claimed his throne—but not before she had been considered for it. Not because she was loved, but because she was feared.
The world had forgotten.
To them, she was a minor goddess, a shadowy figure lurking at the edges of their myths. A name whispered in spells, a presence felt in the dark. But power? Oh, she had power. Enough to make some of the Olympians seem like flickering candles before her wildfire. And that was without mentioning her knowledge—the spells etched into the bones of the earth, the words that could unmake gods, the curses that could turn divine domains against their masters.
She had seen things—beautiful things, wretched things, things so despicable they had no name. She had learned, experienced, understood so much that there were few mysteries left in the world that could truly surprise her.
Which was why the sight before her now was so impossible.
Alabaster's father lay before her, whole. Not just healed—remade. The remnants of the magic that had done this still clung to him, threads of power so foreign they might as well have been spun from another world. And that was the problem.
She should have known them.
Magic was her. She was its mistress, its incarnation, its living will. Every spell, every incantation, every whispered charm—they were all extensions of her being. Nothing in this world, nothing born of mortal or divine hands, should have been beyond her recognition.
And yet.
She reached out, her fingers brushing the air above the sleeping man's chest. The echoes of the spell hummed against her senses, resisting her understanding like a locked door. It was not just unfamiliar—it was wrong.
Her lips thinned.
This was not something she would allow.
She turned her gaze to Alabaster, her child, sleeping nearby. His face was peaceful now, free of the fear and exhaustion that had lined it before. She had not been there when he needed her. The Mist had demanded her attention, the delicate balance between the mortal and divine worlds requiring her constant vigilance. And in her absence, another had stepped in.
A growl built in her throat, low and dangerous.
She reached into his memories, her presence slipping through the currents of his mind like a blade through water. She saw the chase, the monsters, the terror—and then him.
A figure in armor that did not belong to this world. A being wrapped in a guise of humanity, wearing the name Alex as if it were his own. She watched as he moved, as he spoke, as he burned the monsters pursuing her son with flames that rivaled the sun itself.
She listened to his words—comforting, absurd, sincere. He spoke of pain and healing, of choices and second chances, as if such things were simple. As if the world could be mended with kind words and good intentions. She wanted to dismiss it as delusion, as madness, but the truth was worse: he believed it. He had looked at her son, seen the darkness in his heart, and genuinely tried to help.
Her fingers curled into fists.
This was her duty. Her right. Not some stranger's.
But he had saved Alabaster. And he was... interesting.
She watched as he crafted the artifact—a trinket, really, but effective. A suppression of scent, a minor veil against divine eyes. Useful, but nothing she could not have done herself.
Then she saw what came next.
Her breath caught.
In less than two hours, her son had taken the principles of that artifact and woven them into something new. A spell unlike any she had seen before. A lie so perfect the world itself believed it.
This was not illusion. This was not trickery.
This was reality, reshaped.
Her mind raced, unraveling the implications. With this spell—with enough power—one could lie to the world about anything. One could claim a domain, wear it like a cloak, wield it as if it had always been theirs. She could, with the right adjustments, step into the role of a sun god, a war god, any god. She could become Apollo, could be Apollo, with all his memories, all his power, if she had the strength to sustain the deception.
And this—this Alex—had been the source of it.
Her eyes narrowed.
He was not just unknown. He was impossible.
And there was nothing more dangerous than the impossible.
Hecate moved, acted faster than thought. The air around her stilled, as if the world itself held its breath in deference to her will. Her fingers, long and pale as moonlit bone, flicked outward—once, twice—threading unseen currents of power into the shape of a remedy. Spells coiled from her like serpents, swift and silent, weaving themselves into the fabric of the moment. The magic was not gentle. It did not ask. It took, because that was what necessity demanded.
She had always been a goddess of action, not contemplation.
In less than thirty seconds, she knew his name among mortals: Alexander Chambers.
In thirty-five, she knew his past—his family, his losses, the paper trail of a life meticulously documented yet deliberately obscured. And here, the threads tangled.
A memory unfolded before her, spectral and vivid—her son, spoken of with a warmth that made something ancient and dormant within her stir. But then, the man—Alex—had mentioned a daughter.
Thalia.
A problem. A catastrophic one.
Because Hecate was now certain—absolutely, irrevocably—that the Thalia he spoke of was Thalia Grace, the storm-eyed daughter of Zeus, the girl who might yet be the pivot upon which Olympus would rise or fall. The Great Prophecy clung to her like a shroud, whispering of ruin or salvation.
Hecate's lips curled.
The documents had been easy enough to unearth—legal decrees, court orders, all of them binding Alexander Chambers away from his niece. But the truth beneath the ink was laughable. The man had been the only one to truly care for the girl, more than her own mother, more than Zeus in his mortal disguise. And yet, the judges had ruled against him.
One quick check confirmed what she already knew.
Their minds had been bent—either by the Mist, by Zeus' divine authority as the god of justice, or by something as crass as gold and threats. It didn't matter which. The result was the same.
And then—the device.
A flicker of something like admiration stirred in her chest before she could suppress it.
Alexander Chambers had built an unlimited energy source for mortals. Not just theorized, not just dreamed—constructed. A thing mankind should not have been capable of, not yet, perhaps not ever on their own. And woven through its design was something else, something that prickled at her senses like a half-remembered incantation.
Magic.
But not hers. Not Olympian. Not anything she recognized.
The logical path was clear. The expected course. Any deity who uncovered what she had just learned would take it straight to Olympus. Zeus would need to know. The Council would need to know.
Because Alexander Chambers loved Thalia Grace.
And that meant, sooner or later, he would try to reach her again.
A being of unknown origin, wielding power outside the gods' dominion, with a heart full of love for a girl who might yet decide the fate of the heavens?
It was a disaster waiting to unfold.
And yet—
Hecate's fingers stilled.
Her son's face flickered in her mind, the echo of his voice when he spoke of the promise made to this strange, impossible man. The way his eyes had softened, just for a moment, when he said Alex had healed him.
She could almost hear the unspoken plea.
Don't be the one to break that promise.
And more than that—
Olympus had not been kind to her.
Centuries of service, of loyalty, and what had it earned her? The title of minor goddess, whispered like an insult. The same pantheon that had once welcomed her as a Titan now treated her as an afterthought, a relic to be trotted out when her magic was needed and dismissed when it was not.
The Great Prophecy loomed. The threads of fate were tightening.
And here, standing at the crossroads of it all, was Alexander Chambers.
Something new.
Something unknown.
Hecate's lips curved into a slow, dangerous smile.
Destruction was not always an end. Sometimes, it was a beginning.
And the unknown?
It was where the best opportunities lay.
Still, caution was not unwarranted. She would test him.
Her gaze sharpened, her vision piercing through the veils of the mortal world, seeking the man himself—
And recoiled.
Wards. Thick, layered, brilliant wards, shimmering like a fortress around his essence.
Hecate exhaled through her nose. Of course.
Then—a shift. A displacement of energy. His signature vanished from his home, reappearing elsewhere in the span of a breath.
Her brow arched.
Where are you?
She cast her awareness wider, divine senses stretching across cities, across oceans—
And found him.
A laugh escaped her, low and rich.
Alexander's Island.
How fitting.
The largest island in Antarctica, a frozen expanse of untouched wilderness, as remote as a dream. Eighteen thousand square miles of ice and rock, uninhabited, untamed. A place where even the gods rarely tread.
She did not hesitate.
Gold light swallowed her, the world twisting, and then—
Snow.
Endless, pristine, stretching in every direction, the air so cold it burned. The wind howled like a living thing, but Hecate stood untouched, her robes undisturbed, her breath unfrosted.
And there—
A figure in the distance.
Alexander Chambers.
No longer just a name in a spell, no longer just a shadow in records and memories.
Him.
The man who should not exist.
The man who might just change everything.
Hecate took a step forward, the snow silent beneath her feet.
And for the first time, she truly saw him.
Hecate, goddess of magic and crossroads, saw him clearly now.
Alexander Chambers.
Any doubt about him not being mortal vanished as she saw him, the being before her who could clearly be no mere mortal. He who was an impossibility, a paradox wrapped in human flesh, a creature who wielded magic that had no right to exist.
And yet, he was beautiful.
Not in the way of gods—polished, untouchable, carved from marble and gilded in perfection. No, his beauty was something else. He stood at six feet one, dressed in suit pants and a white shirt, the fabric untucked, the sleeves rolled to his forearms. His tie was loose, as if he had discarded formality somewhere between the mundane and the divine. White sneakers, absurdly out of place in the Antarctic wasteland, barely disturbed the snow beneath him.
His hair was the darkness between stars, a black so deep it seemed to swallow light rather than reflect it. His eyes—cold, glacial blue—burned from within, as if lit by something older than fire. His face was symmetrical, regal, a structure of angles and lines that spoke of nobility, of something beyond mortal bloodlines.
But what fascinated her most were the imperfections.
Gods did not scar. Gods did not weather. Gods did not bear the microscopic marks of living. Yet Alexander did. A faint crease between his brows, the barest hint of wear at the corners of his eyes, the faintest unevenness in the line of his jaw—tiny flaws that should have diminished him. Instead, they made him more. More real. More alive. More dangerous. More beautiful than any divine perfection
He was both less and more than a god.
A slow, knowing smile curled Hecate's lips.
Oh yes.
She understood now why Zeus had broken his oath. If Thalia Grace's mother bore even a fraction of this presence, no wonder the King of Olympus had been unable to resist, no wonder she made him break his oaths twice.
The silence between them stretched, taut as a bowstring. Then Hecate spoke, her voice a melody of amusement and threat.
"Alexander Chambers," she said, savoring the syllables. "You are something very interesting. You helped my son today, and normally, that would mean a reward. But I've learned quite a few other things about you."
She let the implication hang, watching his face for a reaction. There was none. His expression remained as still as the ice around them.
"My duty, after what I've learned," she continued, "is to bring you back to Olympus. To make you justify yourself before the gods—your presence in their territory, your magic, your interference."
She didn't say that she had no intention of doing so.
After all, a being's true nature was only revealed when cornered.
Alexander exhaled, a slow, controlled breath that fogged in the frigid air. When he spoke, his voice was soft, but the words cut like steel.
"I guess that should be expected, even after saving your son. But it's not as if I didn't anticipate something like this. You're a god, after all. And all of you seem to think that because you have power, you are inherently better. That your will is to be respected no matter what. That humans are lesser."
Hecate's eyebrow arched.
Interesting.
She tilted her head, a predator considering prey. "You speak as if you were one of them. As if you were human." A laugh, low and rich. "I wonder what kind of madness makes you think such a thing."
His eyes hardened. "I am human. Nothing more, nothing else."
The goddess smiled, slow and sharp. "You're giving me another reason to bring you to heel, you know? Madness?" She tutted. "I thought that, like most in your situation, you would have tried to beg. To barter."
She stepped closer, the snow hissing beneath her feet as if recoiling from her presence. "You said earlier that gods think humans are lesser, as if that were something wrong. But it is the truth. They are lesser. Because they are nothing without us. They exist not because of some inner worthiness, but because we find them amusing. Pets at best. Bugs at worst."
Her voice dropped, velvet over iron. "Being among them has made you forget that. You can hate my words, but it won't change that they are true. And to make you understand, I'm going to treat you just like them—without giving you a choice. Because what does the will of the weak matter in this universe?"
For the first time, something flickered in Alexander's expression. Not fear. Not anger.
Challenge.
A shadow moved at the edges of his form. Then another.
Blackness—not just dark, but anti-light, a void so absolute it seemed to devour the very air—began to crawl over him. It slithered up his arms, coiled around his torso, swallowed his neck, his face. It was armor, but not like any metal forged by god or man. This was something deeper, older.
Hecate's pulse quickened.
It reminded her of Nyx. Not the goddess she now presented herself as but the concept of her—what she originally had been, the primordial darkness that had existed before the Titans, before the gods, before the very idea of light.
Good.
Alexander's voice emerged from behind the obsidian mask, colder than the Antarctic wind.
"You will try."
Hecate laughed, the sound echoing across the frozen wastes.
She lifted into the air, her feet leaving the ground as power gathered in her palm. The world responded to her will—the sky darkened, the moon above twisted into a bleeding crimson eye, shadows writhed like serpents beneath the ice. Arcane energy crackled between her fingers, a storm waiting to be unleashed.
Across from her, Alexander raised his hands.
Lightning answered.
Not the tame, golden bolts of a bastard of Zeus, but something raw, untamed, a newborn star given form. It writhed between his fingers, casting jagged reflections across his armor, filling the air with the scent of ozone and something deeper—something like weight, like the pressure before a storm breaks.
Hecate's smile widened.
She felt no magic from him. None at all.
What are you?
"Let me share a secret with you," she purred, her voice a blade wrapped in silk. "One thing that is true of all immortals, that will never be wrong no matter what they tell you—there is nothing that feels more right than reminding lesser beings of their place."
Her fingers flexed. The arcane storm in her palm pulsed.
"Please," she whispered, eyes alight with hunger. "Resist as much as you could."
For a heartbeat, the world held its breath.
Then—
Plasma and arcane fury collided, and the world itself screamed in answer. Like ReplyReport Reactions:EyeSeeYou, SilverFlare, Vulpix and 355 othersAllen1996Apr 19, 2025NewAdd bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Angel's notes New View contentApr 19, 2025Add bookmark#1,330Allen1996Versed in the lewd.The island trembled under the weight of their clash, the air thick with the scent of ozone and the crackling hum of unleashed power. Waves crashed against the jagged cliffs, their frothy crests glowing faintly from the residual energy spilling into the sea. Above, the sky churned with dark clouds, split intermittently by streaks of lightning that seemed to mirror the fury below. Alex stood at the edge of the shoreline, his Necrontyr armor gleaming faintly under the storm's dim light. Across from him, Hecate floated just above the ground, her form wreathed in shifting shadows and flickering flames. Her expression was calm, almost bored, as if this were a mere diversion rather than a battle.
Alex's mind raced, his thoughts partitioned into a dozen streams, each calculating, predicting, and adapting. He knew he was outmatched in raw power—Hecate's divine aura alone was enough to make the air around her shimmer with distortion—but he wasn't here to overpower her. He was here to outthink her. His fingers twitched, and the ground beneath him rippled as he manipulated the atomic structure of the sand, turning it into a lattice of crystalline spikes that shot toward her with the speed of bullets.
Hecate didn't move. The spikes shattered against an invisible barrier, disintegrating into harmless dust. She tilted her head, her lips curling into a faint smile. "Is that all?" she asked, her voice echoing with an otherworldly resonance. "I expected more from someone who dares challenge a goddess."
Alex didn't respond. Instead, he clenched his fist, and the air around Hecate exploded in a cascade of nuclear fire. The blast was blinding, a miniature sun erupting on the island's surface, its shockwave flattening trees and sending debris flying in all directions. Alex shielded his eyes, his armor absorbing the worst of the heat and radiation. He didn't wait for the light to fade. With a thought, he summoned a construct—a massive hammer forged from hyper-dense matter—and swung it toward the epicenter of the explosion.
The hammer connected with something solid, and the force of the impact sent a shockwave rippling through the ground. Hecate emerged from the flames unscathed, her hand outstretched to catch the hammer's head. Her fingers tightened, and the construct shattered into fragments that dissolved into nothingness. "Clever," she said, her tone almost approving. "But crude."
Alex didn't let up. He snapped his fingers, and the fragments of the hammer reformed into a swarm of razor-sharp blades that spiraled toward her. At the same time, he manipulated the air around her, compressing it into a superheated laser that lanced toward her chest. Hecate raised her other hand, and the blades froze mid-air, suspended in a field of shimmering energy. The laser struck her palm and splintered into a thousand harmless beams that scattered into the sky.
"You're persistent," she said, her voice still calm. "But persistence alone won't save you."
Alex gritted his teeth. He knew she wasn't taking him seriously—her movements were languid, almost lazy, as if she were swatting away a particularly annoying insect. But that was fine. He didn't need her to take him seriously. He just needed her to make a mistake.
He dropped to one knee and slammed his hand into the ground. The island shuddered as he manipulated its very structure, pulling minerals and metals from deep within the earth and shaping them into a towering golem that rose from the ground like a colossus. The construct swung a massive fist toward Hecate, its movement slow but inexorable. She didn't even look at it. With a flick of her wrist, the golem crumbled into dust, its form unraveling as if it had never existed.
But Alex had anticipated that. As the golem disintegrated, he channeled the energy of its destruction into a concentrated beam of plasma that he fired at Hecate from point-blank range. The beam struck her square in the chest, and for a moment, it seemed to push her back. Her shadowy aura flickered, and her expression shifted—just slightly—from boredom to mild irritation.
"Enough," she said, her voice hardening. She raised her hand, and the beam of plasma reversed course, hurtling back toward Alex with twice its original force. He barely had time to raise a barrier of hyper-dense matter before the blast hit him, sending him skidding backward across the ground. His armor absorbed most of the impact, but he could feel the heat searing through, threatening to overwhelm his defenses.
He didn't let it slow him down. As soon as he regained his footing, he unleashed a barrage of attacks—constructs of every shape and size, beams of energy, bursts of nuclear fire—each one designed to test her defenses, to find a weakness, however small. Hecate responded with equal precision, deflecting or dismantling each attack with effortless grace. But Alex noticed something: her movements, while still fluid, were becoming slightly more deliberate. She was starting to take him seriously.
Good.
He pressed the advantage, weaving his attacks together in a complex pattern that forced her to divide her attention. A construct shaped like a massive spear shot toward her from one direction, while a swarm of hyper-accelerated particles closed in from another. At the same time, he manipulated the ground beneath her feet, turning it into a quicksand-like substance designed to trap her. Hecate raised an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed, but she didn't dismiss the attacks outright. Instead, she countered them one by one, her movements still precise but no longer as casual as before.
Alex's mind raced as he analyzed her responses, looking for patterns, for gaps. He noticed that while she could effortlessly deflect physical attacks, her reactions to energy-based assaults were slightly slower—not by much, but enough to give him an opening. He adjusted his strategy, focusing more on energy attacks while using physical constructs as distractions. He fired a concentrated beam of gamma radiation at her, followed by a burst of antimatter particles that annihilated on contact with her barrier, releasing a devastating explosion.
Hecate's barrier flickered again, and this time, it didn't immediately stabilize. Alex saw his chance. He summoned a construct—a massive, multi-layered drill made of hyper-dense necrontyr—and launched it at her with all the force he could muster. The drill spun at incredible speeds, its tip glowing white-hot from friction. It struck her barrier just as it was reforming, and for a moment, it seemed to pierce through.
Hecate's eyes widened in surprise, and she raised her hand to block the drill. But Alex wasn't done. He channeled more of his energy into a hopefully final, devastating attack—a miniature star, forged from the fusion of hydrogen atoms, that he hurled at her with all his might. The star exploded on impact, engulfing her in a blinding flash of light and heat.
When the light faded, Hecate was still standing, but her aura was dimmer, and her expression was no longer calm. She looked at Alex, her eyes narrowing. "You've made your point," she said, her voice cold. "But this ends now."
She raised her hand, and the air around her crackled with energy. Alex braced himself, knowing that whatever came next would be far beyond anything he'd faced so far. But he wasn't afraid. He'd pushed her, made her take him seriously. And that was all he needed.
The battle was far from over.
The air itself seemed to recoil as Hecate's fingers curled, shadows pooling around her like liquid night. Alex's breath hitched—not from fear, but from the sudden vacuum of pressure, as if the island itself were holding its breath. Her voice cut through the silence, sharp and resonant, like a bell tolling in an empty cathedral. "You mistake persistence for power, little would be human."
He didn't wait for her to finish.
Dropping into a slide, Alex dragged his palm across the fractured earth. The ground erupted in response, not in spikes or blades, but in a wave of molten silica that surged upward like a geyser. Hecate flicked her wrist, and the lava splintered midair, hardening into obsidian shards that rained back down. But Alex was already moving, sprinting laterally as he wrenched iron deposits from the island's bedrock. The metal coiled around his forearm, morphing into a cannon barrel that glowed cobalt as he supercharged its electrons.
Crack—
A particle beam lanced toward Hecate, its path warping the light around it. She didn't dodge. Instead, she blurred, her form dissolving into smoke just before impact. The beam carved a searing trench through the cliffs behind her, igniting the sea beyond in a hissing plume of steam.
Alex's eyes darted. Where—
A cold hand closed around his throat from behind.
"Predictable," Hecate murmured, her breath glacial against his ear.
He didn't flinch. His armor flared, its necrodermis surging outward in jagged filaments, stabbing toward her face. She released him with a scoff, dissipating again—but not before he caught the faint ripple in her shadow, a fractional delay in her reconstitution.
Got you.
He hit the ground rolling, fingers clawing at the soil. The earth buckled, then liquefied, swallowing him whole. Hecate paused, hovering above the sudden sinkhole, her brow furrowing. For a heartbeat, the battlefield fell still.
Then—
The island exploded.
Not upward, but inward, as Alex atomized the bedrock beneath her and triggered a fusion cascade. The shockwave flattened the surrounding terrain, compressing air and stone into a white-hot singularity that yawned open like a starving mouth. Hecate's shadows writhed, straining against the gravitational pull, her form flickering as the void gnawed at her edges.
"Enough games!"
Her voice cracked like thunder. Shadows solidified into talons, raking downward in a single vicious arc. The singularity split, its energy unraveling into ribbons of light that lashed the sky. Alex erupted from the ground thirty meters away, his armor scorched and steaming, but his grin feral.
'She's accelerating,' he realized. 'Reacting faster each time. Adapting or maybe she was slowly but surely taking me seriously. She is a goddess which means that she has a godly form, one she didn't use yet.'
A divine form was a god's true form. It was hen the essence of a deity was reunited in one place. It was when a god was at their strongest.
He sprinted toward the shoreline, feet barely grazing the water as he skidded across the waves. Behind him, Hecate pursued—not with haste, but with the inevitability of a tidal wave. Her shadow stretched across the ocean, swallowing the light, the water beneath her feet freezing into jagged obsidian reefs.
Alex pivoted, skidding to a halt. With a roar, he slammed his fists together.
The sea answered.
A wall of water surged upward, not as a mere barrier, but as a lattice of hyper-pressurized fluid, each molecule aligned into a crystalline matrix. Hecate's shadow collided with it, and for the first time, something splintered—the water held, refracting her darkness into prismatic shards that peppered the horizon.
Her lips twitched. Enjoyment? Amusement? Irritation?
Alex didn't care. He was already weaving his next gambit.
Darting backward, he tore a strip of algae from the waves, its cells mutating midair into a bioluminescent aerosol. The mist engulfed Hecate, clinging to her silhouette like phosphorescent paint. She waved a hand to dispel it—
—and Alex struck.
Every glowing particle detonated at once, a chain reaction of microscopic fusion. The blast stripped the ocean bare, vaporizing water down to the continental shelf. Hecate emerged unscathed, but now she glowed, her outline visible through the settling steam.
'Target locked,' Alex thought.
Alex's hands moved in a frenzy, sculpting the air itself into a fractal lens. Sunlight bent, magnified, focused into a beam so intense it ionized the atmosphere in its wake. The light struck Hecate's chest—
—and stuck, searing a faint smolder into her chiton.
She glanced down, then back at Alex. For the first time, something like respect flickered in her gaze.
"Clever," she conceded. "But as a moon goddess light is my domain."
Her fingers twitched, and the beam reversed polarity, flooding back toward Alex with the added fury of her own divine radiance. He crossed his arms, his armor shedding plates to form a mirrored shield. The reflected light collided with the incoming barrage, cancelling it in a deafening snap of annihilated photons.
The force hurled him backward into the cliffs. Stone, snow and ice crumbled around him, but he was already pushing through the debris, his mind racing.
'She's countering energy with energy, matter with matter. But what if—'
A shadow fell over him. Hecate stood atop the cliff's edge, her hair swirling like smoke. "You've forced me to expend a fraction of my focus,"she said, almost gently. "For that, you deserve a fraction of my strength."
She raised her palm.
The world bent.
Alex's vision fragmented as gravitational waves rippled outward, shearing the cliff face into dust. He threw himself sideways, his armor screeching in protest as the distortion field grazed his shoulder. Blood welled where the necrodermis failed—a shallow cut, but a warning. A cut when nothing less than something able to destroy the surface of the planet should have been able to do so.
"She's taking it more seriously," he whispered under his breath.
He launched himself skyward, matter coalescing beneath his feet into floating platforms of aerogel. Hecate followed, her ascent effortless, each step compressing the air into solid footholds.
Midair, Alex spun, hurling a cluster of blackened orbs—miniature neutron stars, their cores compressed to apocalyptic densities. Hecate flicked them aside, but their gravity wells warped her trajectory, slowing her ever so slightly.
He pressed the opening.
From his outstretched palm, a filament unfurled—a thread of metastable metallic hydrogen, whipping toward her like a razor's edge. It wrapped around her wrist, and for a heartbeat, she froze, staring at the glowing strand.
"Clever trick," she murmured. "But—"
Alex yanked the filament taut.
The hydrogen destabilized, detonating in a silent, sun-bright implosion. Hecate's arm vanished inside the blast radius—
—and reemerged unscathed, her skin unmarred.
"—insufficient."
She closed her fist.
The platform beneath Alex disintegrated. He plummeted, but not before hurling a dagger forged from antimatter-laced Necrontyr. It grazed her cheek—
—and left a faint, smoking nick.
Hecate touched the wound, her fingers coming away glistening with ichor. Her eyes narrowed. "You…marked me."
The air turned gelid. Shadows congealed around her, forming a corona of jagged, living darkness. Alex hit the ground hard, rolling to his feet just as the first tendril lashed out. It missed his torso by millimeters, carving a canyon into the earth and the ice.
He ran, not in retreat, but in a spiraling advance. Each footfall altered the terrain: quicksand pits, diamond caltrops, magnetic vortices meant to disrupt her shadowform. Hecate dismantled them all, but each countermeasure cost her a fraction of a second—a fraction Alex weaponized.
At the spiral's apex, he feinted left, then pivoted, hurling a sphere of compressed helium-3. Hecate batted it aside—
—and Alex detonated it remotely.
The resulting fusion blast dwarfed his earlier efforts, its electromagnetic pulse scrambling the very laws of physics within its radius. Hecate's shadows frayed, her form flickering like a corrupted hologram.
'Now!'
Summoning every shred of focus, Alex plunged his hands into the earth. The island screamed as he ripped its tectonic plate upward, forging a kilometer-long blade of uranium-laced basalt. He swung it in a colossal arc, the edge igniting from atmospheric friction—
—and Hecate caught it.
Bare-handed.
The blade shattered against her palm, but the force of the blow drove her backward, her heels carving furrows through the bedrock. For a single, impossible moment, goddess and mortal stood locked in equilibrium.
Then she smiled.
"Finally," she breathed. "A worthy stroke."
Her free hand snapped forward.
Alex's world dissolved into pain as her fingertips brushed his chestplate. The necrodermis didn't crack—it unfolded, its alien composition, its atomic bonds untethering in a spiral of disintegrating particles. He stumbled back, clutching the gaping wound, his mind racing to regenerate the armor.
Hecate advanced, her shadows knitting into a spear of pure entropy. "You've danced well, would be mortal. But even stars burn out."
Alex spat blood, his grin unbroken.
"Yeah? Then let's go even further, until what remain is a nova."
He slammed his fist into the exposed ground.
The island erupted—not in fire, but in light.
Every atom, every molecule Alex had tampered with—the mutated algae, the aerogel platforms, even the residual energy from Hecate's own attacks—flared in unison. The air itself became fuel, a chain reaction of matter-antimatter annihilations that lit the sky like a supernova.
Hecate's shadows recoiled. For the first time, she raised both hands in defense, her divine aura flaring to contain the cataclysm.
Alex didn't wait to see if it worked.
He was already gone—burrowing through the earth, his armor shedding mass to outpace the shockwave. Behind him, the island ceased to exist, reduced to ash and ionized plasma.
But he knew. He was sure.
'She's not done.'
As the firestorm subsided, Hecate's laughter echoed through the void—a sound like shattered glass and tolling bells.
"Run, little would be human,"* she crooned. "Run until your legs give out. Run until your will and defiance dry up. It changes nothing."
Alex ran. And schemed.
The fight wasn't over. He would not allow it to the be the case.
In his opinion, It had barely begun!
The ground beneath Alex's feet screamed as he remade it.
He didn't run—he unmade his own path, flesh and armor dissolving into a swarm of nanoscopic constructs that tunneled through molten bedrock. Behind him, Hecate's shadows gnawed at the earth, devouring stone and everything that dared interpose itself, but Alex was already rewriting the rules. He used the knowledge not native to this world, the one from the stars in his mind. Matter bloomed in his wake: synthetic elements, isotopes that shouldn't exist, lattices of carbon woven into razor-thin monofilaments that hung in the air like spider silk.
Hecate's footfall cracked the island's spine. She descended into the newly forged labyrinth, her shadowform slipping through cracks in reality—only to recoil as the walls bit back. The filaments ignited, slicing her essence into ribbons that hissed and spat like live wires.
"You copied the parasite's work," she snarled, her voice fraying at the edges.
Alex rematerialized ten meters ahead, his armor reassembling atom by atom. He didn't turn. Didn't flinch. His mind was a hive of cold calculus, every neuron partitioned to track her movements, her tells.
She seemed to reconstitute, faster near light sources. It was like Shadows stabilize her. It was like she favoured them even though she didn't need them. More than that, weren't the gods in some way living energy? Golden light?
So he drowned the tunnels in radiation.
Gamma rays, neutrinos, hard X-rays—all invisible, all lethal. The air itself became a weapon, ionizing her form with every nanosecond. Hecate's silhouette flickered, her edges blurring as particles tore through her. For a heartbeat, her divine aura dimmed.
Alex struck.
A blade materialized in his grip—not metal, but Necrontyr sheathed in a magnetic vortex, made better by the reinforcement spell of the nasuverse, hundred of minuscules anti-divine and anti-monsters etched on it. He pivoted, driving it upward in a lethal arc. Hecate twisted, but not fast enough. The blade grazed her ribs, and reality itself shuddered as matter and antimatter annihilated.
Her blood, her golden ichor—liquid starlight, incandescent and searing—splashed across his chestplate. The necrodermis hissed, corroding where it touched. Alex grinned through the pain. Ichor. She bled.
Hecate's eyes flared nova-bright. "You dare—"
He didn't let her finish.
Snapping his fingers, Alex triggered the labyrinth's final gambit. Every synthetic element he'd seeded destabilized at once, their atomic nuclei unraveling in a chain reaction of forced fission. The tunnels collapsed into a kaleidoscope of light and sound, the very air splitting into quark-gluon plasma.
Hecate screamed, not in pain but in outrage, as the false vacuum around her decayed. Her shadows recoiled, compressing into a singularity at her core—a black hole no larger than a marble, its gravity clawing at the fabric of space.
Alex lunged, his armor shedding layers to forge a spear of neutronium. He aimed not for her heart, but for the singularity.
The spear struck true.
For a moment, the universe held its breath.
Then—
The black hole ruptured, vomiting forth a jet of Hawking radiation that seared the sky. Hecate's form disintegrated, scattered across dimensions—but Alex didn't celebrate. He knew that it was not enough. He was already rebuilding, his armor harvesting raw atoms from the void to forge a new body.
A hand—skeletal, shimmering with borrowed starlight—clamped around his throat.
"Enough theatrics," Hecate hissed, her voice raw, half her face stripped to bone. "You think yourself a human? Experience their plight then when they anger gods.
She thrust her free hand into his chest.
Alex's world dissolved into static as divine energy flooded his veins, as his existence became pain. He used his alchemy on himself to heal as the time as he was destroyed. His cells ruptured, mutated, rebelled—but his armor helped, cannibalizing, turning into a focus, a way for the energy to forge something new instead of hurting. Necrodermis fused with flesh, his spine elongating into a fractal scaffold, his eyes burning with stolen starlight.
He laughed—a sound like shattering glass—and bit into her wrist.
Hecate recoiled, but Alex clung on, his teeth sinking deeper. He wasn't eating flesh—he was eating fragments of concepts, the raw mathematics of her divinity. Her shadows thrashed, lashing his body, but his armor adapted, spinning the darkness into fuel.
"You—!"
He headbutted her, their skulls colliding with a crack that split the horizon. Blood—his now having turned iridescent, hers still golden—sprayed across the ruins.
"You're right," Alex rasped, his voice layered with a hundred harmonics. "just like a human would."
He slammed his palm into her chest.
The necrodermis detonated.
Not outward—inward.
A microsingularity bloomed in Hecate's ribcage, its event horizon shredding her essence. She convulsed, her divine body fracturing, but Alex didn't let go. He rode the collapse, his body disintegrating atom by atom, until all that remained were their entwined skeletons—hers gilded, his now obsidian—spiraling into the void.
Then, light.
Alex awoke kneeling on a plain of glass, his armor regrown, his lungs heaving, the stars in his mind, his alchemy and his magic going overdrive. Across from him, Hecate stood whole once more—but her chiton was torn, her hair unbound.
For the first time, she looked at him not with amusement, but with something like hunger.
"Again," she commanded.
The island reassembled itself as if nothing had occurred.
How unfair.
Alex despite the pain and the exhaustion rose so that the dance would begin anew for its last round.
The world became once again a blur of motion and sound, a cacophony of destruction and divine fury as they clashed. Alex stood amidst the chaos, his body battered, his armor cracked and smoking, but his mind sharper than ever. He could feel the weight of the fight pressing down on him, the realization that Hecate, even holding back, was a force beyond anything he had ever faced. Her power was vast, her presence overwhelming, and yet—he couldn't accept it. He couldn't accept that this was his limit. That a single deity, not even one of the most revered or feared, could be the end of him.
No. He refused.
His mind raced, calculations and strategies unfolding like a fractal, each thought branching into a dozen more. He had fought with restraint, with cleverness, with every trick and tool at his disposal. But it wasn't enough. Hecate was still standing, still calm, still untouchable. And if he continued like this, he would lose. He could see it now, the inevitable conclusion of this battle if he didn't change something. If he didn't do something that was
more.
Victory didn't come to those who were born strongest or fastest or smartest. No. It came to anyonewho will do anything to reach it.
He reached into the depths of his mind, into the well of his Inspired Inventor ability, and invested. Three mental charges, each a fragment of his will, his creativity, his soul, poured into the concept burning in his mind.
The knowledge flooded him, alien and unholy, a torrent of information that no mortal mind should ever hold. It was too much, too vast, too wrong. His brain screamed in protest, his body convulsing as blood poured from every orifice. But he didn't stop. He couldn't. This was his only chance.
Alex's lips curled into a savage smile, blood dripping from his nose, his eyes, his ears. The strain of his thoughts, the sheer weight of the knowledge he had dared to invoke, was tearing him apart from the inside. But he didn't care. Pain was temporary. Pain meant that he was still alive, that there still was chances that the present of him could see his daughter again.
Failure was not something he could allow himself.
A weapon. Not just any weapon, but one that could cut through gods, through planets, through the very fabric of reality. A weapon that had felled beings like Aristoteles, archetypes of planets, entities that dwarfed even primordial deities. A weapon that could win.
Slash Emperor.
The name echoed in his mind, a whisper of power, of destruction, of victory. He understood it now, the weapon's nature, its purpose. It was a blade that grew in proportion to its target, a weapon that consumed the world itself to fuel its power. It was not just a tool of destruction—it was a statement. A declaration that no matter how vast, how powerful, how divine the enemy, it could be cut down. It could be ended.
Alex's body shuddered as the knowledge took root, as the weapon's design unfolded in his mind. He could feel it, the weight of it, the cost. To wield Slash Emperor was to sacrifice everything. The island beneath him, the air around him, the very atoms that made up his body—all of it would be fuel. But he didn't hesitate. He couldn't.
He dropped to one knee, his hand slamming into the ground. The earth trembled, then screamed as he began to draw on its vitality, its essence. The island was dying, its life force ripped away to feed the weapon taking shape in his mind. Trees withered, rivers dried, the air itself grew thin and lifeless. And still, he took more.
His magical energy surged, a torrent of power that he funneled into the weapon, into the idea of Slash Emperor. The blade began to form, not in his hand, but in his mind. It was a seed, a spark, a fragment of something vast and terrible. And as it grew, as it took shape, Alex felt the world around him change.
The sky darkened, the clouds twisting into unnatural shapes. The ground cracked and splintered, the island itself groaning under the weight of the weapon's creation. Hecate paused, her shadowy form flickering as she sensed the shift, the danger. For the first time, there was a flicker of something in her eyes—uncertainty. Fear.
Alex rose to his feet, his body trembling, his mind alight with the weapon's design. He could feel it now, the blade's presence, its hunger. It was ready.
"Hecate," he said, his voice raw, bleeding, but filled with a terrible certainty. "You wanted to see what I could do. Let me show you."
He raised his hand, and the world screamed.
The ground beneath him erupted, not in fire or stone, but in light. A blade of impossible scale and power burst forth, its edge shimmering with the light of a thousand suns. It was not a physical weapon, not in the traditional sense. It was a concept given form, a weapon that existed to cut. To destroy. To end.
Hecate's shadows recoiled, her form flickering as the blade's presence washed over her. For the first time, there was true panic in her eyes. She began to shine gold as she began to assume her true form. She raised her hands, the world around them shifting her power surging to meet the threat, but it was too late.
Alex swung the blade.
The world split.
Somewhere far away, a little girl with electric eyes looked at the horizon, at the dark tower that had appeared and only felt sadness.