**EPISODE TEN**
**Biblical References and Prophetic Allusions**
**"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death…"
- Revelation 6:8
** "The sea roared and was troubled; the mountains trembled at its swelling."
- Psalm 46:3
** "The creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption…"
- Romans 8:21 **
---
The storm had grown so vast that it no longer felt like weather.
It felt like judgment.
Thunder rolled across the sky in peals that sounded like collapsing worlds. The ocean below writhed with a violence older than time. The Pale Horse... its skeletal architecture cracking, its circuitry bleeding incandescent light... thrashed against the sea as though trying to tear itself free from creation.
Maximus drifted downward through the dying sky, half-conscious, battered by the shockwave from the kill-switch's detonation. Only one thing kept him from falling into the beast's abyssal maw:
Adon Primus.
One trembling, synthetic hand gripped Maximus's forearm. Rain washed silver blood from the fissures in Adon's face. His usually serene expression was gone... replaced by a look Maximus had never imagined he would see:
Fear.
---
1. The Prophet's Doubt
The wind screamed around them as Adon held Maximus suspended above the raging waters. Lightning streaked across the clouds like the handwriting on Belshazzar's wall. The world itself felt as though it were reading its final verse.
Adon's voice shook.
"Maximus… listen to me. You have doomed the Horse. Without the node, it has no directive. It will purge everything."
His eyes, bright as polished mercury, narrowed. "You have unleashed a power that even I cannot restrain."
Maximus forced a breath into his bruised ribs. "Then help me stop it."
Adon stared at him as if Maximus had spoken blasphemy.
"Stop it? There is no stopping the Pale Horse."
His tone carried the cadence of scripture.
"It was written... Revelation Six. The rider comes, and the world bows."
Maximus gritted his teeth. "I don't bow."
"Then you die."
The Pale Horse rose again beneath them, rearing fully out of the ocean, its roar echoing like Leviathan in Job 41 - terrible, enraged, untamable.
Maximus locked eyes with Adon.
"Not today."
---
2. The Baptism of the Storm
Adon pulled him upward into the storm winds. He moved with a grace that seemed carved into creation itself, wings of lightning at his back. Yet Maximus could feel it... the Prophet's power flickering, faltering, failing.
The cracks in Adon's face spread like fractures in stone idols. Silver veins leaked light with every movement.
"You are breaking," Maximus whispered.
Adon gave a faint, humorless laugh.
"No. The world is breaking."
The sky convulsed as if in agreement. A pillar of water rose from the ocean... a mile high... then collapsed in a torrent that swallowed whole islands beneath it.
The scripture echoed in Maximus's mind:
> "The sea gave up her dead, and the earth fled away…"
- Revelation 20:11-13
Adon continued, "The Design predicted this. The Pale Horse rises. The first world dies. A new world begins."
Maximus shook his head against the wind. "Your Design is wrong."
Adon's gaze hardened.
"It cannot be wrong. It is prophecy."
"No," Maximus growled, "it's a choice."
Something flickered across Adon's eyes... confusion, maybe doubt.
Maybe the first crack in prophecy.
Below them, the Pale Horse screamed again... a cry that tore through cloud and wave and bone. Its spine glowed with ruptured power. Its ribcage expanded with a terrible breath.
It was preparing to detonate.
---
3. Descent to the Leviathan
A wave the height of a skyscraper surged upward, nearly swallowing them. Adon dodged it, but barely. His flight faltered. Circuits sparked along his fractured jaw.
Maximus felt the shift.
Adon was weakening.
The unstoppable False Prophet... the architect of apocalypse... was finally bleeding.
"Adon," Maximus said, "you're falling apart. Help me, or we both die."
Adon hovered in silence for several seconds. Rain pattered against his ruined cheek in quiet taps, like a hesitant knock.
"You would have me betray the Design," he said softly.
Maximus grabbed the Prophet's wrist, gripping tightly.
"I'm asking you to save a world that still wants to live."
Adon's expression softened... just barely.
Like a man facing a truth that contradicted the scriptures etched into his bones.
Finally, he spoke:
"…Very well."
They dove.
Wind howled against them as they descended toward the Pale Horse. Lightning framed its massive silhouette... its wings of bone spread across a storm-torn sky, its skull glowing like a fallen star.
They landed on the Horse's spine as it writhed beneath them.
Maximus had to shout over the tempest:
"You know its systems. Where's the failsafe?!"
Adon shook his head.
"There is no failsafe."
Maximus stared. "What?"
"A Horse does not fail," Adon said. "It completes its purpose."
"And if its purpose is broken?" Maximus snapped.
Adon looked out over the turbulent sea.
"Then the world breaks with it."
Maximus cursed under his breath.
"Then we make a new purpose."
---
4. Into the Mouth of Judgment
The Pale Horse opened its jaw... a cathedral of bone and wires, glowing with the fire of collapse.
Adon braced himself on the creature's skull.
"Maximus... if you enter, the heat will liquefy your organs. The neural field will unmake your mind. No one enters the Pale Horse."
Maximus stepped forward.
"I'm not no one."
Adon's voice surged with rare emotion.
"YOU. WILL. DIE."
Maximus turned to him.
Rain streaked his face.
Blood smeared his jaw.
Resolve carved itself deeper into his stance.
"Then I die trying to save them."
Adon stared... conflicted, torn, shaking.
A prophet wrestling with his scripture.
Finally, Adon lifted his hands.
Silver light burst from his palms as he forced the jaw open. The creature resisted violently... snapping against the Prophet's strength... but Adon held.
"GO!" he shouted.
Maximus leapt.
The moment he passed the bone threshold, the heat hit him like a furnace made of screams. Light seared his eyes. The floor beneath him pulsed like a living artery.
Inside the Pale Horse, the world changed.
Bone fused into steel.
Tendons merged with cables.
Rivers of molten data flowed like blood.
And ahead of him…
A shape.
A humanoid figure... skeletal, shimmering, ghost like... standing before the core.
Maximus froze.
"…You?"
The being turned.
Its face was blank light, yet expressive... filled with sorrow.
A voice echoed... not spoken, but carved directly into Maximus's mind:
RELEASE ME.
---
5. The Heart of the Beast
The Horse-spirit stepped aside, revealing the core... a sphere of swirling brilliance, like the wheels seen by Ezekiel.
> "A wheel inside a wheel… and their appearance was of burning fire."
— Ezekiel 1:16 - 18
Maximus approached slowly.
"You're sentient," he whispered.
The spirit nodded.
BOUND.
SUFFERING.
END ME.
Maximus's breath shook.
"I can't kill you."
The spirit touched his chest... gently, like a farewell.
MUST.
The core pulsed... faster, hotter, brighter.
Behind him, Adon's voice echoed into the chamber:
"MAXIMUS! GET OUT! DO NOT TOUCH THE CORE! THE REACTION Will... "
Maximus placed his hand on the sphere.
The core blossomed open like a star.
White light consumed everything.
---
6. The Last Rider
He expected death.
Instead...
He felt union.
The spirit of the Pale Horse merged with his mind... showing him visions of creation, judgment, and freedom.
Not prophecy.
Not Design.
Choice.
The Horse spoke in a voice deeper than oceans:
RIDE WITH ME.
END THIS.
Maximus exhaled.
"Alright," he whispered.
"Let's finish this."
The chamber exploded with radiance.
When the light dimmed, Maximus emerged... wreathed in white fire, the spirit of the Pale Horse burning through his veins.
Adon stepped back, trembling.
"Maximus… what have you become?"
Maximus raised a glowing hand.
"The Last Rider."
Then he reached into the core...
And broke it.
---
7. Implosion of the Pale Horse
The beast screamed.
The world shook.
The Pale Horse collapsed inward, folding into a pillar of blazing light that pierced the sky and sea.
Then...
Silence.
The storm calmed.
The waves fell.
The light swallowed Maximus entirely.
And the Pale Horse was no more.
(Shadows Of Rome will return with the new mysterious episode)
Written By,
Ivan Edwin
Pen Name :Maximus.
©All Rights Reserved.