Chapter: If you gaze long into an Abyss...
Made By: Eternal_Jokr
A/N: This fanfic is open to criticism and opinions, tell us what you think in the comments section and leave your support. Thank you
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The morning was born clear, but Dante walked through the streets of Orario like a shadow. He wore a black hooded cloak that covered his back and the immense rustic sword.
Hestia walked beside him, holding the hem of his cloak with a silly pride, pointing to the gigantic white tower that pierced the heavens.
"That one over there is the Tower of Babel, Dante" Hestia exclaimed, almost jumping up and down as she pointed her chubby index finger at the marble monument that seemed to support the clouds themselves.
"That's where the entrance to the Dungeon is. The wealthiest gods live on the highest floors. One day, our Familia will have a headquarters so big that you'll have to look down to see the rest of Orario, you hear?"
Dante did not reply immediately, beneath the shadows of the black hood, his deep purple eyes stared at the white structure. Where others saw the pinnacle of divine triumph and the heart of the world's commerce, he felt only the sterile weight of a dome.
The mystical energy emanating from Babel struck against his passive [Apeiron Khaos] and dissipated, leaving a trail of freezing air three feet around his shoulders.
"It is too high" Dante commented, his low, hoarse voice cutting through her enthusiasm. "If it falls, it crushes half the city".
"Good heavens, Dante! Don't be so pessimistic on our first official outing," Hestia puffed out her cheeks, letting go of the hem of his cloak for a second to cross her arms in fake indignation.
But the anger did not last three steps. Soon, she was clinging to the dark fabric again, pulling him toward the bustling Main Avenue.
"Come on, you need to see the market."
As they neared the commercial district, the flow of people increased. Humans, elves, dwarves, and beastmen/Chienthrope jostled each other among stalls of tropical fruits, lizard skin armor, and healing potions glowing in glass vials.
Hestia walked with her head held high, her chest puffed out and the famous blue ribbon that contoured her arms and breasts stretched with pride.
She made a point of walking glued to Dante, as if she wanted to announce to every passerby
'Look! I have an adventurer now too!'.
"Right there on the corner is the Hephaestus Familia shop" Hestia pointed to a stone storefront with the symbol of a flaming anvil.
"They make the best weapons in the world, but they are extremely expensive! Hephaestus is my friend, but she won't give me a discount even if I cry on my knees....But don't worry! Your piece of black iron is... imposing! It suits you."
Dante brought his bandaged hand to the hilt of the Demon Slayer on his back, feeling the rustic metal vibrate subtly against his hands.
"Mine is already good, it followed me for a long time" Dante said simply. "It has no magic. It won't break when I hold it."
The adventurers passing by them began to notice the strange duo. A small goddess, parading alongside a silent giant who looked like he had stepped out of a war tale.
As Dante's vacuum passed by the stalls, some smaller magical item, small light stones and cheap protection amuletos flickered and temporarily lost their glow, leaving the merchants confused.
"Hey, Goddess Hestia" the owner of a meat skewer stall shouted, laughing. "Is that one there your new champion? He looks more like an executioner than a hero! Are you sure he won't eat you alive if you forget to give him dinner?"
Hestia stopped abruptly, turning to the man with clenched fists and her face red with protective fury.
"Shut up, you dummy! Dante is the first member of my Familia and he will be stronger than any of those spoiled little children from the Loki Familia or the Freya Familia! Don't you dare talk about my precious child like that!"
Dante stopped right behind her, his immense shadow covering the goddess and the merchant's counter. The man at the stall swallowed hard, the laughter dying in his throat when he encountered Dante's empty purple eyes beneath the hood.
The air around the stall suddenly grew dense, and the fire grilling the meat diminished in intensity, as if the flame itself were being choked.
Dante placed his bandaged hand lightly on the top of Hestia's head, the touch surprisingly firm yet careful.
"Let's go, Hestia. You still need to show me the rest of the places" Dante said, looking askance at the merchant, who took a step back. "Do not waste your time."
Hestia looked up, her heart skipping a beat as she felt the warmth of his hand against the cold morning wind. The anger vanished in a second, replaced by a radiant smile.
"That's true! Let's leave these idiots behind" she held his cloak even tighter, finally guiding him toward the huge central plaza that opened up beneath the feet of Babel.
"Orario doesn't know it yet, Dante... but the two of us are going to turn this city upside down" the goddess said, raising her small fists high.
Hestia pulled Dante away from the Main Avenue, bypassing the flow that marched toward Babel.
She wanted him to see Orario not just as the Dungeon's backyard, but as the place to which he would always return after leaving the floors of the dungeon.
"Before we go to the boring paperwork at the Guild, you need to see the support districts" Hestia explained, her hurried little feet clicking against the cobblestones as she went around a cart full of medicinal herbs.
"Orario is divided like a big pizza, Dante. And each slice has a purpose."
They entered a wider alley, where the sound of hammers colliding against metal echoed in a deafening rhythm, creating an industrial symphony that made the ground vibrate. The air there was hot, saturated with the smell of coal, sulfur, and quenching oil.
It was the Blacksmith District.
Immense chimneys spewed dark smoke against the blue sky, and dozens of robust beastmen and muscular dwarves wiped sweat from their foreheads while carrying iron bars and boxes of raw ore.
"This is the territory of the Hephaestus Familia and other forging factions" Hestia said, covering her ears subtly as a sharper sound of metal resonated nearby. "This is where the magic of weapons happens! They enchant swords with attributes of fire, ice..."
She stopped her sentence mid-way, looking askance at the immense Demon Slayer Sword on Dante's back. The block of raw iron seemed almost insulting in that district focused on refined designs and glowing runes.
As Dante passed by the windows of the smaller forges, the blue and magical flames of some anvils flickered erratically, diminishing until they returned to common orange under the invisible effect of his passive.
"Well... but as you said yourself, pure iron has its value!" Hestia quickly corrected herself with an awkward smile, tightening her grip on his cloak. "Let's get out of the heat, come on".
She guided him through a shortcut that opened into the Northeast District, an area visually opposite to the previous one. Here, the streets were cleaner, surrounded by flower beds and buildings of classical and elegant architecture.
The silence was almost sacred, broken only by the murmur of mages wearing long robes and carrying staffs ornamented with precious stones.
"Further ahead are the headquarters of the Familias focused on magic and alchemy, like the Dian Cecht Familia" Hestia whispered, instinctively lowering her tone of voice.
Dante looked at the vials displayed in the windows of an apothecary. High-grade healing elixirs glowed in a vibrant emerald Green, Mind potions shimmered in celestial blue,beneath the hood, his purple eyes narrowed.
The excess of concentrated magic caused his muscles to contract in a state of continuous alertness.
A slight black static danced through his bandages on his wrists, and a vial of magical essence that was two meters away from him in the display window began to cloud, the glowing liquid losing its color and becoming brackish, gray water.
Dante took a step back, moving away from the window before the apothecary noticed.
"Too much glow" Dante commented, his hoarse voice making an elf who was passing by look at him with disdain and a glimpse of instinctive fear.
"Yeah, the mages around here are kind of stuck-up" Hestia agreed, making a face at the elf. "They think they are above everyone else just because they can recite poems that blow things up. But they wouldn't last two minutes in close quarters combat."
Finally, Hestia pulled him toward the Southeast District, the bohemian heart of Orario. The smell of monster stew, barley beer, and freshly baked bread invaded the senses of both.
Wooden signs with names of taverns swayed in the wind, and veteran adventurers, some still drunk from the previous night, staggered along the sidewalks.
"And here is where everyone spends the money they earn in the Dungeon" Hestia pointed to a large tavern of rustic appearance but very well maintained, which displayed a sign with a fertility of grapevine branches.
"That one over there is the Hostess of Fertility. The owner there, Mia is a giant dwarf who gives me a part-time job selling fried potatoes when things get tight...The waitresses there are nice, although that elf, Ryuu, is kind of scary sometimes."
Dante fixed his gaze on the tavern for a second. Unlike the mages' district, the smell of dried blood and battle sweat impregnated in the walls of that place was something he understood well. It was the smell of survivors.
They continued walking for a while, with Hestia pointing to some places and talking about them.
Hestia stopped walking, letting go of his cloak and standing in front of him. The immense white stone building of the Adventurer's Guild rose on the next corner, imposing and bustling. The fun was over, it was time for real work.
She looked up, adjusting the blue ribbon on her arms and tapping her hands against her own cheeks to regain the posture of a serious goddess.
"There, Dante. Now you know the board. The forge district to patch up your iron, the medical district in case I'm not around, and the taverns for when you want to celebrate. And right out front..." she pointed to the Guild doors. "Is where your journey officially begins. Let's show them that the Hestia Familia is not playing around"
Dante nodded, the shadow of the hood concealing the corner of his mouth which turned up slightly.
"Go easy on the first floors, alright? I'll be waiting for you at home, well, I'm heading to the stall" Hestia spoke with concern before having to leave.
"Have a good day at work" Dante nodded his head and entered the central plaza. The place was crowded with experienced adventurers from the Ganesha and Loki Familia, sporting shiny armor and jewel-encrusted magical swords. They laughed and talked loudly.
When Dante passed through the crowd, silence began to spread like a disease.
It was not just his size or the bizarre iron sword on his back. It was the presence.
The high-Level adventurers, who relied purely on the flow of Mind and Falna to sense the environment, felt a sudden "emptiness" in their chests upon approaching him. It was as if the air near Dante were devoid of magic.
"Who is that guy?" whispered a werewolf from afar. "He has no smell of magic... looks like a walking corpse."
Dante ignored the whispers. He walked toward the stairs that led to the Pantheon. (It is the name of the Guild)
The air inside the main hall of the Adventurer's Guild was saturated with the smell of leather, polished iron, and the futility of loud conversations. It was early morning, the peak hour where dozens of rookies crowded together in search of maps, last-minute advice, and the validation of their registrations before facing the dungeon.
Dante crossed the entrance of the guild like a rift in reality.
He wore a black hooded cloak that swallowed the contours of his broad shoulders and hid the immense black iron Sword strapped to his back.
The rustic block of black iron broke the golden and heroic aesthetic of the hall; it looked like a bad joke or an execution tool. As he walked toward the service counters, the cheerful murmur of the adventurers around began to wither.
There was an invisible 'emptiness' that accompanied him, an atmospheric pressure that caused the 'Mind' of the higher-Level warriors to stagnate in instinctive alert.
The main building of the Guild is called the Pantheon. It is a large space with counters where adventurers can talk to their advisors and it also features an exchange area.
There are also small meeting booths where adventurers can talk individually with their advisors without anyone else hearing them.
The Guild is an organization that manages the Familias within Orario and provides services to adventurers, they buy magic stones and items obtained as rewards.
Most of the staff works on the first floor of the building, while the high-ranking officials work on the second floor.
He ignored the sidelong glances and stopped in front of counter number 5.
Behind it was Rose Fannett. The young werewolf with red hair, golden-brown eyes, and alert ears maintained her usual posture: arms crossed over her Guild uniform, a bored expression, and her eyes half-closed with the apathy of someone who had already seen hundreds of arrogant boys die in the dungeon before the third floor.
She liked rules, detested drama, and had little patience for anyone who did not take the work seriously.
When Dante's shadow covered her desk, Rose's wolf ears pricked up abruptly, the fur at the base of her neck standing on end.
"Name, Familia, and intended floor" Rose fired off mechanically, though her brown eyes had instantly narrowed upon fixing on Dante's deep purple eyes beneath the hood.
They were two pools of absolute darkness. There was no common glow of ambition.
"Dante Ashborn. Hestia Familia. Entry registration for the 1st floor" his voice was a low tone, hoarse and devoid of any melody.
Rose let out a click with her tongue, pulling a blank parchment sheet and a magical quartz pen that floated over a mystical inkwell.
"Hestia Familia? That pint-sized goddess who just descended from the heavens?" Rose raised an eyebrow, not hiding her skepticism.
"You are a one-man faction with no funds. Let me see your status copy paper. I need to register your initial attributes for the guild insurance."
"There is no paper" Dante placed his bandaged hand over the wooden counter. "The parchment turned to ashes during the ritual".
Rose stopped the movement of her hands. She looked at Dante's hand and then at the magical pen floating beside his fingers.
In the second Dante firmed his hand, the passive [Apeiron Khaos] reacted to the small mysticism of the quartz pen.
The bluish glow of the magical item flickered and went out. The pen fell inert onto the table, cracking the crystal display that regulated the ink flow.
Rose took a half step back, her hand instinctively descending to the hilt of the regulation dagger at her waist. As a werewolf, her senses were sharp to the extreme, she felt the air around the counter grow freezing, and the flow of mystical energy that sustained the internal barriers of the Guild seemed to be sucked away and disintegrated by the proximity of that boy.
"What did you do to the pen?" Rose's voice lost its tone of boredom, becoming sharp and dangerous. "What kind of occult magic or cursed item are you carrying under that cloak, rookie? The Guild prohibits the smuggling of artifacts of heresy inside the hall."
"I do not use magic, receptionist. My body rejects it" Dante tilted his head slightly, his purple pupils locked onto her. "And I have had no Familia before this one. If you want to read my status, you will have to take my word for it or ask my goddess. But I suggest you just stamp the entry pass. The monsters are waiting."
Rose held his gaze for five endless seconds. The hall around seemed to have quieted only in the area of that counter. She looked at the destroyed quartz pen, then at the knuckles of Dante's bandaged hands.
There was no sweet or golden smell of a common Falna from a God; there was only the raw smell of iron, dust, and a biological stubbornness that made her bite her lower lip.
'An anomaly' Rose's analytical mind concluded, her wolf instincts screaming that this boy was the opposite of everything Orario considered safe. 'He is not normal. He is strange'.
With a heavy, irritated sigh, Rose pulled out a common metal stamp, without magical properties, and slammed it hard against Dante's leather sheet, leaving the official Guild authorization mark.
"Counter 5, registered," she pushed the leather pass toward him with the tips of her fingers, avoiding touching him directly.
"Listen here, Dante of the Hestia Familia. I don't care if you are weird or if your body breaks my expensive pens. The dungeon doesn't care about your uniqueness. If you go down there thinking you are immortal, the Minotaurs will use your blunt sword to pick their teeth. Understood?"
Dante took the leather pass, tucking it under the bandages of his arm.
"Understood, Rose Fannett" Dante gave a dry nod.
He turned his back to the counter, his black cloak billowing heavily as he walked toward the staircases of Babel.
Rose remained static, her arms crossed again, watching the dark silhouette disappear toward the Tower of Babel. She picked up the broken magical pen and threw it into the trash can with an irritated click of her teeth.
"Goddess Hestia found a very strange monster..." she grumbled to herself, adjusting her wolf ears which still insisted on standing up. "I hope he survives until dinner. I hate filling out rookie death paperwork."
The immense tower looked like a divine tooth driven into the heart of the earth, and the staircases that descended to the 1st floor exuded a damp, cold wind with a metallic smell of old monster blood.
Dante walked across the stone tiles in silence, the leather straps holding the massive block of raw iron to his back creaking with every step.
Other rookies passed by him, laughing nervously, sporting polished silver daggers and swords and brand new leather armor. To them, Dante looked like an executioner carrying his own execution block.
Dante ignored the whispers. He walked toward the staircases that led to the 1st floor. But before he could step on the first step, he felt a tingling in his neck and a crushing pressure coming from above.
Up there, on the top floor of the tower of Babel... someone was watching.
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At the top of the immense and gleaming Tower of Babel, the wind blowing from the north was cold, but it did not dare touch the interior of the chambers of the Goddess of Beauty.
Freya's hall was a sanctuary of white marble, translucent silk, and divine opulence, suspended hundreds of meters above the human anthill they called Orario.
Freya is the goddess of love, beauty, fertility, magic, war, and death, and Freya is the patron goddess of the Freya Familia, the strongest family in the city of Orario.
Freya stood by the immense Gothic arch balcony. Her long silver hair floated gently, shining like moonlit threads, her skin white as fresh snow, possessing a body of perfect golden proportion, and her fine garments outlined a silhouette that had made kings and gods kneel in despair.
She held a crystal goblet with sommelier wine, but her eyes... two deep, violet jewels endowed with the Divine Sight capable of seeing the color of any mortal's soul, were not focused on the luxury around her.
They were locked down below, on the Central Plaza, right at the entrance that led to the entrance of the Dungeon.
Beside her, half a step back in the shadows, the massive silhouette of Ottar, the Captain of the Freya Familia and the strongest adventurer in the city, remained motionless as an iron statue.
"Ottar..." Freya's voice echoed through the hall, a melodious sound, sweet and loaded with an almost childlike but dangerous curiosity. "Were you able to feel that?"
The ox Chienthrope bowed slightly, his ears moving. Ottar is a tall and muscular Boaz, dark-skinned, with rust-colored hair and boar ears. Being the captain of the Freya Familia and currently the strongest adventurer in Orario.
"Feel what, Freya-sama? The gates of the Dungeon are operating normally. The Mind flows of the level 1 to 5 adventurers are within the pattern".
"No... not the flows" Freya brought the tips of her delicate fingers to her lips, her violet eyes widening subtly before focusing on a specific spot. "It is the absence of them. Look at that boy in the black cloak who just left the Guild".
Ottar narrowed his eyes, focusing his superhuman vision on the dark silhouette of Dante, who was walking toward the staircases of Babel with the immense Demon Slayer strapped to his back.
To the captain, he looked only like an eccentric or arrogant rookie, carrying too much metal for Level 1.
But to Freya, the world had just changed color.
Freya's Divine Sight always saw souls as flames. Some heroes shone in a golden light; powerful mages had auras of a crystalline blue; assassins carried a dense and violent crimson.
And some whose souls had the transparent purity she sought shone with a transparent and gleaming purity.
Dante had no color, or more precisely, it was like a void devouring everything around it.
To Freya's eyes, looking at Dante was like looking at a black hole cut into the tapestry of reality, there was no flame, there was no divine light.
Where his soul should be, there existed a dark-purple emptiness, so dense and freezing that it seemed to suck the glow from the adventurers walking meters away from him.
The colors of the mortals around Dante withered and flickered, temporarily extinguishing as he passed.
Freya felt a genuine shiver run down her spine, a sensation she had not experienced in centuries. Her pupils contracted in a mix of shock and excitement.
"A soul that does not shine..." Freya whispered, her fingers squeezing the crystal goblet so tightly that the wine sloshed dangerously. "A soul that devours the light of the heavens. What is that, Ottar? He looks like nothing I know. He smells of... silence."
"Do you wish for me to go fetch him, my Goddess?" Ottar's hand instinctively descended to the hilt of his black sword, feeling the abrupt change in his mistress's mood "If he is a threat or a heretic..."
"No!" Freya let out a short laugh, a pure and almost insane musical note of pleasure. She leaned further forward on the marble balcony, her violet eyes gleaming with an immediate obsession.
"Do not touch him. He just received the Falna... Find out who the boy in the black cloak is who just entered the 1st floor."
Down below, Dante stopped for a single second before crossing the threshold of the main staircase. As if he felt the weight of the divine gaze falling from the top of the world, he tilted his head back slightly beneath the black hood.
His deep purple eyes aimed directly at the top of the Tower of Babel.
He could not see Freya in the distance, but his body, with [Eclipse of the Gods] active, rejected the pressure of the invisible Charm that always emanated from the goddess.
Dante's gaze was a cold cut in her direction.
Freya gasped subtly, taking a half step back on the balcony. The reflection of his emptiness had made her own Arcanum falter for a second.
"He saw me..." she whispered, a wide and excited smile drawing itself on her perfect lips, her divine heart beating in a way she had not felt in millennia.
She drank the wine in a single gulp, leaving a red drop to trickle down the corner of her mouth.
"The boy who denies miracles. Go... descend into the labyrinth. Let us see how much darkness the monsters can tear out from inside you and see how far that darkness can dance before I take you for myself."
Poor Freya, little did she know that if you gaze, for a long time, into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.
Down below, in the dark of the 1st floor
The journey of the Antithesis had begun.