Timeless AssassinC311 311: Bob The Legend
(Time-Stilled world, surface level, on one of the floating islands)
"I'm sure I heard him calling your name at the end…" Bob muttered, his brow furrowed as he stared at the empty edge where Raiden had vanished. "What did you do?"
Karl didn't answer at first.
He stood still.
Too still.
Then, he smiled.
Not the broken, grieving smile of a man who had just lost his friend.
But the kind of smile that belonged to someone who had never once considered Raiden a friend to begin with.
It spread slowly across his face as his posture straightened, shoulders rolling back, spine aligning as though he was finally shedding a mask that no longer served him.
Then the act dropped.
His expression changed from looking like a sorry little slob, to a confident predator, as he looked straight into Bob's eyes with a daunting gaze.
"They say you killed at least thirty-seven Cult members with nothing but a fork, Bob," Karl said casually, his voice no longer timid or unsure, as he sounded rather smooth and confident.
"Is that really true? Or is that an exaggeration? I mean, if it is an exaggeration I might just give you an easier death, so go on, tell me the truth," He said in a mocking tone, as Bob grit his teeth in anger.
"Karl… who the hell are you?" Bob asked, as he took a cautious step back.
"Who am I?" Karl repeated, eyes glinting as a pulse of dense mana exploded off him, his aura surging with enough pressure to make the air buzz, as he finally revealed his true strength as a Transcendent level warrior.
"I'm the weak cook who killed Leo Skyshard. I'm the coward who pushed Raiden when you were asleep.
And I'm the man who's about to kill you next." Karl claimed as he stepped forward at an unhurried and leisurely pace.
Unlike his usual timidness, his every movement radiated dominance now— like a lion casually strolling towards a caged deer, as Bob could do nothing but keep backing up.
"I didn't want to kill you just yet, Bob. I wanted to travel with you a little longer. Wanted to let the fear ferment inside you before I tore you apart piece by piece— slow, painful, poetic."
His grin widened as he watched Bob retreat step by step, until there was no more space left behind him.
Only the endless void below.
"This is for my brothers and sisters in the Cult. The ones you butchered. The ones you have made your strong man legacy from."
Karl's hand extended, as he moved in a blur to push Bob off, however, Bob didn't let him.
When death stared him in the face, Bob wasted no time in trying to save his own life, as in his final moments, the only decision that Bob made was to take Karl down with him.
As the second his leg reached the edge, Bob already made his mind to jump, as he leapt back and poured all his energy into one final attack.
"[Gravity Crumble]," he growled through clenched teeth, his voice low and vengeful, as for his last act, he pulled both his long knives from his hip holsters and charged them up with mana before throwing them towards the base of the platform, where they got embedded up-till the hilt.
*THRUMMMM*
The entire platform shuddered violently as cracks spiderwebbed outward from the impact site and mana-infused vibrations distorted the very structure of the floating rock.
Karl's smug expression faltered.
His balance shifted.
"What—"
"Tell me, bitch…" Bob cut him off, voice low, furious, as he stared straight into Karl's eyes— "Can you fly?"
And with that—
Bob disappeared into the abyss below, however, instead of giving Karl the satisfaction of seeing him panic before he died, he instead died with the image of a panicked Karl in his head, as Karl couldn't help but freak out about the surface below him crumbling.
"BOB!" Karl shouted in anger, but it was already too late.
As not only was Bob gone, but also the damage to the base was already done, as the rock underneath his feet began crumbling one piece at a time.
*Slip*
*Snap*
One by one, chunks of the floating island dislodged, tipping away into the abyss as gravity pulled the remnants down.
Karl staggered.
Tried to jump.
Tried to grab hold of a stable piece.
But within seconds, there were no stable pieces left to cling to, as eventually he too fell into the abyss.
"BOB YOU MOTHERFUCKER!"
Karl cursed as he fell, as despite all his strength, despite all his schemes and his twisted confidence—
In the end, he couldn't fly either, which meant that he fell into the abyss with his arms failing, the same way Raiden and Leo had before him.
In the end…..
He went down the same way he tried to kill the others.
—---------
As Bob plummeted through the open air, all he wore was a massive, unshaken smile—wide and unrepentant—because it wasn't every day that a man got to drag a Transcendent grade Cult bastard down with him.
The wind howled past his ears, tugging at his clothes, slicing across his skin like needles.
While the abyss stretched out endlessly below, like a yawning, merciless void.
But Bob did not fear it.
There was no panic on his face.
No terror in his eyes.
And no scream on his tongue.
Only peace.
Because the moment Karl's eyes widened and his smug face twisted in panic, Bob knew he had won.
'That one's for you… Leo and Raiden, I got rid of the manipulative little fuck for both of you.
You can rest easy now…. Wherever you are,' He thought, as he tilted his head back and let the wind hit him with full force.
'I guess this is the end of me…. I did pretty okay in life all things considered—' Bob thought, as he relaxed his muscles and let the darkness wrap around him like a closing curtain, as memories flickered unbidden behind his eyes.
A campfire.
A forest clearing.
Laughter that shook the ribs.
And a voice, deep, steady, grounding….. one that he hadn't heard in over a decade.
"Kobe…" he whispered, his smile softening, breath steady despite the freefall. "I'll see you soon, my brother."
Because in all his life, Bob had only ever truly loved one man.
Only ever truly missed one soul.
Kobe had been his light.
His anchor.
His reason to become an Assassin and make money.
And now, after so many years of wandering, of killing, of surviving when he no longer wanted to, he was finally going to see him again.
In his final moments, Bob had no regrets.
No fear of death.
No desire to live longer.
Only peace.
And vengeance.
Because even if his name would never be sung, even if no one ever told the tale of how he took down a cult bastard, Bob loved the fact that he died the exact way that he had lived his entire life, which was on his own terms.
As even in his final moments, he managed to drag down one last monster to the grave with him.
Contact - ToS
Timeless AssassinC312 312: I ain't no baby food
(A few hours later, down in the underground cave, Leo)
A few hours after scouting out his surroundings, Leo finally felt recovered enough to stand on his own two feet, albeit rather unsteadily.
'I can bear my own weight now…. Time to get the hell out of here,' he concluded, as after checking his surroundings for any signs of the big monster, he slowly began mapping his descent from the nest down to the floor below.
However, just as he was preparing to abandon the nest, the egg beside him gave a sudden wobble.
*Shake*
*Shake*
*Crack*
A thin crack ran near the top of the egg, followed quickly by a second one that branched off like a vein.
*Crack*
*Crack*
The cracks widened slowly, with a sickening wet sound, as a small slit began to form near the top, just wide enough for something inside to look out.
And then he saw it.
A single eye.
Round, unblinking, and slit-pupiled, peering through the crack like it had been watching him the whole time.
And just looking at that one eye made Leo's skin crawl.
The beast inside did not look aggressive. Nor did it look afraid, as it simply looked to be curious.
Curious in the way predators got before they decided whether to play with their food or eat it, as Leo immediately decided to bail.
'Aw, hell nah. I am not sticking around for baby birth,' Leo thought, as his survival instincts to run screamed louder than any pain he'd endured so far.
Hence, without waiting for a second wobble, he scrambled over the rim of the nest and dropped down to the cavern floor below, landing as softly as his battered frame allowed him.
*Thud*
But even though he landed clean, the impact still sent a jolt of agony tearing up his legs and through his spine, as every nerve screamed in protest— reminding him that while he could move, he wasn't anywhere near ready to take even the smallest of bumps yet.
'Alright… Onwards!' he thought, as the moment his feet touched the cavern floor, he didn't waste even a single second.
He gritted through the pain, forced his legs into motion, and turned his focus to the eight yawning tunnel mouths ahead— each one a gamble, each one a potential death sentence, as he tried to pick which path to stake his life on.
It wasn't an easy decision.
He had no map, no clues, no layout of this underground maze. But while he didn't know which tunnel was safe— he did know which ones to avoid.
As he eliminated three right on sight.
Two of them were scarred with claw gouges too deep and wide to be anything but a beast marking its territory and warning others against the consequences of entering its area.
While the third was covered in a mess of dried blood and cracked bone, which painted a pretty grim picture overall.
Which left Leo with five viable options.
He staggered forward, sniffing subtly as he passed each entrance, as most reeked of rotting meat, mold or some sort of chemical decay that involuntarily made his throat tighten.
But then came the first tunnel to the left.
Which although smelled moist and stale, wasn't exactly as putrid as the others.
It appeared to be cool, moist and neutral, with a harsh downward slope and a narrow entrance that was far too tight for any large predator to pass through.
The walls of this tunnel were lined with faint moss instead of the blue mana stones that covered the rest of the cave and tunnels, which indicated that it might have no illumination the deeper Leo went, however, since it seemed cleaner than the rest, Leo finally chose it as his ultimate choice.
'That's the one,' Leo decided, as he adjusted his footing and began hobbling toward it— one stiff, trembling step at a time.
*PRIIIIIIII—*
A piercing screech echoed through the cave, sharp and shrill like metal tearing through flesh, as Leo froze mid-step, his entire body going cold.
His eyes widened.
'That was the baby screaming…' He realized, as almost instantly—
*THUD*
*THUD*
He heard it.
The pounding of footsteps.
Heavy. Powerful. Fast.
The mother was coming.
His pulse spiked as adrenaline flooded his veins, washing out the lingering pain as survival instinct kicked in again.
Leo broke into a lopsided sprint, each footstep grating against bone and bruised muscle, as he forced himself forward with everything he had.
One second.
Two.
Five.
Ten.
Every step he took felt nerve wrecking, as he could feel the mother approaching fast, however, his damned body wouldn't move as fast as he usually could, as his recovering muscles could only produce so much movement for now.
*CRASH*
He was almost at the tunnel's mouth—so close he could see the slope angling downward into shadow—when he heard it.
Stone split apart behind him as the Transcendent-tier beast burst out of one of the tunnels near him, its hulking form dragging its body forward with terrifying speed as its slit-pupiled eyes locked onto him with predatory clarity.
Leo didn't speak at first.
But as he saw the beast's head lowering, and it's tongue flicking out toward him—
"Uh-oh—" he muttered, and without another thought, he leapt forward, diving into the tunnel and skidding down the slope.
He twisted his body mid-slide, glancing back over his shoulder just in time to see the beast's monstrous head jam into the tunnel entrance, jaws snapping wildly, tongue darting forward like a whip, just inches short of reaching him.
"Too late…. Momma… ain't no baby feed for your kids today—" Leo taunted as he slid out of reach, the tunnel narrowing around him as he was swallowed into complete darkness.
*ROOAAARR*
He could hear the furious roar of a powerful beast behind him, however, with the tunnel being too narrow for the beast to follow, it couldn't chase Leo inside.
Still, Leo didn't smile.
Didn't breathe easy.
Because while he was out of reach for the beast for now…
He never knew what sort of a new problem he would slide right into.
Contact - ToS
Timeless AssassinC313 313: Predatory Moss
(Time-Stilled World, Underground Cave System, Leo's POV)
Leo kept sliding down the dark tunnel for what felt like thirty seconds, where the tunnel took him through a couple of sharp turns before finally dropping him on a levelled surface with a soft, *Thud*.
He had no idea where he was, as the area around him was pitch dark with not a single streak of light in sight, however, while he could see nothing, he could sense that the room around him was at least a few feet wide, as although he stretched his arms wide and rotated 360°, he hit no surfaces for now.
The air around him was suffocatingly still, with the heavy scent of damp stone and musty earth as though it hadn't been disturbed in centuries.
'Am I alone here?' Leo wondered, as he paused to listen for any signs of enemies ....anything that might break the eerie quiet.
But all he heard was the sound of his own ragged breathing and the pounding in his chest, as he concluded that there were no immediate threats in this room.
With a grimace, he pulled out a torch from his spatial ring, before flaring it with a quick flick of his thumb, as almost immediately, the torch flared to life, casting long, wavering shadows against the chamber walls.
*Swirl*
*Swirl*
Leo swept the beam across the chamber, trying to find his way out of here, but it unfortunately revealed nothing but smooth, dark rock in every direction, as he seemed to have dropped into a dead-end.
"Curse my luck," Leo muttered silently, as he began walking around the perimeter of the dark chamber, trying to see if there were any hidden features that he missed.
And thankfully for him, there was one shaft that he missed to locate at the start, as near the west end of the chamber, there was a narrow vertical shaft that stretched upward, its surface covered in moss and pointy rocks, that made it very hard to climb.
It was steep— almost exactly like an abandoned elevator shaft at a 90° inclination, with the path above nearly invisible in the flickering torchlight.
"The hell? Just how far does this elevator-like shaft go?" Leo wondered, as he squinted his eyes and tossed the torch in his hand upwards, so that it could illuminate the shaft to the top.
And by doing so, he spotted that the tunnel was about 150 feet long, with there being a side tunnel branching at about 100 feet height.
"Guess this is it," he muttered, his voice sounding too loud in the dead air, as without any other options to go for, this seemed to be his only path ahead.
—---------
Leo took his time before starting the climb, as he brought out some rations from his storage ring, had a small meal, and a sip of water, before finally deciding to attempt the climb, as he clutched the torch between his teeth and began climbing by firmly placing both his hands and both his legs on the mossy walls.
Almost immediately, although he did not understand why, he felt as though there was something wrong with the moss, as the second his skin came into contact with the grass, it seemed to come alive as it crawled and moved against his body.
However, with the grass doing nothing but a light tickle against his skin, Leo forcibly pushed that discomfort aside and began climbing.
.
.
.
The first few feet were easy enough— he dug his hands into the mossy surface, finding purchase with every move.
His legs worked, though each step was slow and deliberate, as for the first time in hours, he could feel a semblance of strength returning to his limbs after the meal, however, that feeling of easy climb did not last for long.
After just ten feet, his legs began to feel heavy—unnaturally heavy, as the weight of his own body became unbearable.
His breathing quickened, his heart began to race, and his fingers felt as if they were sinking into the wall, grasping at something far deeper than the stone.
His head spun and a sharp dizziness suddenly overtook him.
"Shit," Leo muttered, trying to shake it off, as he reached up again, but his arms refused to lift.
His entire body felt like it was collapsing under some invisible pressure, and the pain that came with it was unlike anything he'd felt since waking up.
It wasn't physical—it was… draining.
Weakness seemed to seep into his very bones, and his chest constricted with every breath, as though he was losing his very life essence with every passing second.
"Fuck…" Leo said, gritting his teeth, as he fought back the urge to collapse back onto the floor.
His head was swimming, but his instincts kicked in, screaming in his head that something was wrong.
And it was here that he noticed the problem.
It was the damn moss's doing!
It was sucking the life out of him.
His pulse quickened as he realized the truth. The moss that covered every square inch of this cursed place, was leeching his energy, drawing from his mana reserves, just like the books had warned about.
The moss wasn't harmless. It wasn't just an unpleasant texture or an obstacle.
It was predatory.
And Leo was its prey.
With a sharp inhale, he forced himself back to the ground, his body sagging as he slid down the shaft's edge, the stone scraping against his back as he landed with a heavy thud.
His chest burned, but the moment his feet hit the floor, he knew exactly what had to be done.
"Fucking moss…. This is the end for you—" Leo cursed under his breath, his eyes flicking back toward the moss-covered walls.
He reached for his spatial ring, digging out the firestone he kept tucked inside, as although his fingers felt numb, he still managed to grab a hold.
"I'm not sure if I should burn you down in such a confined space… because the smoke could just choke me out, however, I think that the other shaft 100 feet up will act like a vent and suck the smoke up—" Leo talked to the moss before he lit it on fire, as if it could understand him.
*Sizzle*
Leo poured some mana into the fire stone, which instantly caused it to burn ablaze, as he then placed it near the moss, which soon caught fire.
Within seconds the entire shaft was turned into a fiery pit, as Leo ran away and watched as the smoke was mostly sucked up into the other shaft, rather than hitting him in the surface cave below, as his gamble paid off.
Finally, as nothing but blackened ash and lingering smoke was left of the initial moss covering the vertical cave, he let out a breath of relief, though it did little to calm the exhaustion gnawing at him.
*PLOP*
Drinking an intermediate grade stamina potion, he tried to supplement the lack of energy with an artificial stimulant, and soon he felt strength return to his body as usual.
Taking one final glance at the now-clear shaft, Leo braced himself for another climb, as he waited till the wall temperature dropped back to normal, before attempting the climb yet again.
Contact - ToS
Timeless AssassinC314 314: Ancient Lore
Once the walls cooled down enough for him to touch, Leo resumed his climbing efforts, as he pushed his hands against the scorched surface and began hoisting himself up the vertical shaft once more.
His fingers found hold in the scorched rock grooves that were still warm but no longer searing, as he dragged himself upward inch by inch, feeling his back muscles work after quite a few days.
Ten feet.
Twenty.
Forty.
His muscles and bones ached due to the movement, but the climb was manageable now— no longer a death sentence, as after drinking the stamina potion, he felt his energy levels hold steady throughout the ascent.
Finally, at around a hundred feet, his hand touched a rough ledge jutting out from the wall, and just past it was a narrow tunnel that branched out horizontally, with a ceiling no higher than four feet tall.
Leo pulled himself into that passageway, with a low grunt, elbows scraping against the floor, chest dragging across the stone, as he began crawling into the tunnel on all fours, his torch clenched between his teeth while the tunnel stretched on endlessly ahead of him.
'I hope this is not another dead end,' Leo thought internally, as he continued to crawl, hoping that his efforts did not end up for naught at the end.
However, while he only prayed that it wasn't a dead end, or a tunnel leading him to his death, he could never have expected what it actually led to.
As after he crawled for about 200 meters, he actually encountered a metal looking grate that blocked him from going any further.
*CLANK*
The grate shook as he probed it with his hands wondering if it were an optical illusion, but it was not.
*Ting*
*Ting*
He reached forward again, brushing his fingers across the rough, rusted grate that was definitely set into the stone around it and was unmistakably artificial.
'What? A metal grate? Down here?' Leo thought, as his heart skipped a beat.
Because a grate meant that someone sentient had built this.
Which meant that a human, or one of the humanoid species had been where he was, and they were lucid enough to actually set up production factories and build stuff.
'The hell? Could I be dreaming?' Leo wondered, as he slapped himself just to make sure he wasn't dreaming, however, this was no joke.
The grate was definitely real.
'But just who could live in a tainted world like this?' Leo wondered, as he flashed the torchlight at the joints of the grate and inspected the craftsmanship.
The bars of the grate were thick, but old.
Rust flaked off at the slightest touch, and they looked to be hand made instead of machine cut, as the size of each grate wasn't perfectly even, and the edges seemed to be hand shaped rather than machine cut.
Leo didn't wait anymore after he made that assessment, as he pulled out one of his daggers and wedged it between the rusted joints, wrenching them apart with slow, careful jerks until the metal gave way with a reluctant snap.
*TAK*
He kicked the loosened bars aside, then dropped through the gap—
—as he found himself standing in something that made his breath catch.
A room.
An actual room.
Not stone. Not dirt. But smooth, tiled floor.
Faded murals lining the walls.
A broken desk in one corner, books scattered around it like dried leaves.
And a massive, cracked mural painted across the far wall— depicting a sun that he had never seen shining in this world, and a painting of twelve beasts standing in a semi circle under that sun.
Leo's eyes widened, as he realized that this wasn't a random cave or a survival hovel.
This… was a conclave.
A chamber of knowledge.
A relic left behind by some race who had lived here for long.
However what Leo could not understand was how?
How did a race even survive inside the time-stilled world?
As everything about this world made civilization impossible.
And yet, despite his doubts, what stretched before him was still something very real.
"Whoa… this is interesting," Leo mused as he flashed his torch towards the painting on the wall once more, taking a better look at the twelve beasts painted up there.
The paint was old, cracked and dry, but the imagery still held, probably because of some special painting technique that was created for the very purpose of standing the test of time.
On the right most side, the first beast was a massive, horned serpent, coiled around a broken mountain, its scales painted in alternating black and white strokes, its eyes narrow slits of venomous green that seemed to glare at any observer even now, with twin fangs dripping a liquid depicted in a streak of gold.
The second was a silver stag, antlers sprawling outward like branches of a dead tree, each tip carved with arcane markings, its body glowing faintly as if the painter had somehow captured luminescence in pigment.
The third was an ape, hulking, arms disproportionate to its frame, with flames erupting from its back and shoulders like wings. Its eyes burned red, and its knuckles were bloodied as if mid-battle.
The fourth was a thin, almost skeletal bird—its wings torn, yet it still soared across the sky, beak open in a silent scream. Its feathers were painted with razor-thin strokes that shimmered slightly under the torchlight, as if alive with static.
The fifth was a wolf, midnight blue, crouched low with teeth bared and eight tails fanned behind it like a storm. Its gaze was fixed ahead, sharp and intelligent, while its fur looked unnaturally well-preserved compared to the others.
The sixth beast resembled a humanoid lizard that stood on two legs, its body clad in stone armor, and its head covered in a crude helmet with glowing orange eyes that shone through.
The seventh was an owl—its wings spread wide and eyes impossibly round, each feather tipped with silver and gold. It perched on a broken obelisk, with its head tilted sideways as if analyzing the viewer.
As the longer Leo looked towards it, the more unsettled he felt.
The eighth beast was a spider. Gigantic. Painted in shadow. Its body was rendered in a shade so dark that even with firelight, it absorbed more light than it reflected, and Leo could almost feel the chill of it watching. Its legs spanned half the mural, and around it, other figures lay wrapped in silk.
The ninth was an ox, massive and peaceful-looking, with skin made of smooth marble and horns curved like the moon. It stood amidst ruins, untouched, its eyes closed as if meditating.
The tenth was a flying lion, wings aflame, tearing through the skies with a trail of white smoke behind it. Its paws were embedded into what looked like a storm cloud, its roar frozen in time as if splitting the heavens.
The eleventh was a beast Leo couldn't name—a shifting, formless creature made of overlapping rings and spines. It had too many limbs, too many eyes, and yet no consistent shape, as though the artist had painted chaos itself.
As the aura that beast gave off was not just wild— but maddening.
And finally the twelfth…
The twelfth made him stop breathing for a moment.
It was a dragon.
Not the kind from bedtime stories or story books.
But a crimson beast, majestic and terrifying, with wings curled inward like a cloak, horns arching back from its skull, and fire curling from its mouth as if frozen mid-roar.
Its eyes were closed, its claws folded inward, but the mere presence of its form radiated a dormant power.
Unlike the others, the dragon's gaze wasn't turned toward the viewer.
It was looking at the sun.
The only one among the twelve.
Leo stepped back, his mind racing, as he could feel it in his gut, that this mural was more than just a random painting.
It was a warning.
Or a prophecy.
And for the first time in his life, he felt an intense urge to uncover the secret behind it.
Contact - ToS
Timeless AssassinC315 315: Learning A Lost Language
(Time-Stilled World, A Lost Conclave, Leo's POV)
Leo didn't move at first.
He just stood there, torch still in hand, staring at the mural— more specifically, at the dragon— because something about the way it faced the sun, so unlike the others, gnawed at the edge of his thoughts like a whisper he couldn't quite hear yet.
Staring at the dragon, Leo felt his anxiety begin to stir. It wasn't fear, nor was it awe. It was something far stranger.
A quiet, inexplicable pull crept through him, tugging at the edges of his soul, making the blood in his veins feel warmer than it should, as if something ancient and long buried inside him had begun to wake.
'This… isn't normal,' he thought, finally dragging his gaze away, as he turned and slowly scanned the rest of the room with fresh eyes, as the more he looked the more he found.
To the left of the mural stood a splintered bookshelf, its wooden frame barely holding together, with stacks of faded scrolls and dusty tomes stuffed into every uneven gap between shelves.
Most of it was unreadable.
The paper was too brittle. The ink too faded. The language—something he had never seen before, as curved symbols and stacked glyphs adorned the paper, with some written vertically while the others were written in spirals.
'What? What the hell is this?' Leo muttered, as he crouched beside a pile and picked up one of the scrolls, only for the brittle parchment to crackle and flake in his hand.
He gritted his teeth, eyes narrowing in frustration as he flipped through book after book, scroll after scroll, but none of it made any damn sense.
Until—
He found it.
Near the corner of the room, buried beneath a pile of torn rugs and half-shattered pottery, was a small rectangular book.
It was thin.
The cover worn and soft, like something that had been handled a lot.
And on its surface was a simple painting of a fruit.
A green apple.
Beneath it, a symbol.
And when he flipped the page, another image, this time of a flame, with another symbol underneath.
'Wait… is this…?'
Leo blinked, flipping forward faster now.
Each page had a single object. A clear, painted picture.
A rock.
A hand.
A bird.
A sun.
And beneath each image, a single glyph.
'A picture book… a damn children's book?' he realized, eyes widening with a jolt of understanding.
It was a teaching book.
A language primer.
Meant to help children associate words with meaning.
And just like that—something clicked.
'Holy shit… this might actually help me decipher the script.'
He wasn't a linguist.
He wasn't a historian.
And he sure as hell wasn't someone who usually got excited over forgotten libraries.
But the painting of that dragon—
That painting had done something to him.
As the moment he'd locked eyes with that painted gaze, he'd felt something awaken inside him, something primal and restless that made his skin itch and his heart race.
He had to know more.
About the mural.
About the beasts.
About the sun.
About how this place was created and how it survived for so long?
'I don't know why… but I need to understand this.'
His fingers curled around the little book like it was treasure.
And just like that, 'The Boss' Leo Skyshard, assassin, circuit winner, and definitely-not-a-scholar, sat cross-legged on the tiled floor of an ancient room lost to time, flipping through a children's book by torchlight…
Trying to learn the language of a dead civilization.
Trying to unlock a secret the rest of the universe had long forgotten.
—---------
Time blurred for Leo as he became engrossed with learning a lost language, each hour melting into the next as he poured over the scattered materials inside the conclave.
He barely ate, barely moved, barely slept— because for the first time in his life, something had seized his full attention that wasn't combat, bloodshed, or survival.
The children's teaching book he'd found quickly became his anchor. A visual dictionary to use as reference, as it became the key to unlocking the secrets of the lost language.
Leo, who had never been a lover of books or languages, found himself slowly piecing the puzzle together. Word by word. Image by image. Symbol by symbol.
As it was funny how a children's book that was probably created to teach 2 year olds how to speak the language, became the guide that helped him unlock all the secrets.
He found the symbols he knew from the children's book in every scroll he could find, and then he wrote down the associated words around it, and tried to see if he could form a sentence, or some connection, as he began with the basics….Fire. Water. Rock. Sky.
Then expanded to verbs. Run. Eat. Die. Burn.
Then slowly, phrases began to form in his mind—primitive, broken phrases that hinted at meaning.
He created a mental log, scratching translated words onto blank parchment he found nearby. He began organizing them by root and structure, grouping symbols based on shape, size, and stroke direction, as patterns slowly began to emerge.
Some sentences were too complex. Some pages had no pictures. Some scrolls were faded beyond use.
But Leo kept going.
Day after day.
Eating simple rations. Drinking what water he had brought with him in the storage ring and sleeping only when exhaustion forced him down.
And just like that a week quickly passed by for him, and by the end, the indecipherable glyphs finally began to take shape.
Sentences stopped looking like scribbles and started feeling familiar.
The words began whispering meaning.
The wall murals, the scrolls, even the warnings on ancient pillars—he could start to read them now.
Not perfectly. Not fluently. But enough.
Enough to know he was getting closer to something.
Something big.
Something tied to the beasts on the wall.
And whatever it was… he could feel it pulsing at the edge of his understanding, just waiting to be uncovered.
Contact - ToS
Timeless AssassinC316 316: The ancient texts
By the twelfth day, Leo's parchment sheets were filled with rows of hand-sketched symbols and crude translations scribbled beside them.
His torchlight flickered across the cluttered desk he had claimed as his own, illuminating the mess of scrolls, broken quills, and half-eaten rations spread across the stone surface.
He was close.
He could feel it.
But something was still missing.
Some of the symbols—particularly those etched into the mural or written repeatedly on the oldest scrolls—kept appearing over and over again. And yet, no amount of cross-referencing with the children's book or the vocabulary he had built gave him a clean translation.
These were not simple words, they didn't represent simple objects like fire or water, or simple actions like eat or run.
They were concepts.
Ideas.
Foundations.
So, Leo did what he had never done before and started naming things himself.
"This one…" he muttered under his breath, tracing a spiral-shaped glyph that he had seen carved beside almost every depiction of a humanoid figure. "This one makes sense in sentences when I read it as 'we the people of this land', as it seems to be a symbol for civilization. However, for my own convenience, I'll just call the people of this land, 'ancients',"
He wrote it down beside the symbol:
[Spiral Symbol] – Ancients
The next glyph was a curved line ending in a sharp peak—one that often appeared near fallen figures or bones, which only made sense in a sentence when he read it as death, and hence Leo named it as such.
[Hook Symbol] – Death
Another symbol, softer, repeating beside growing plants, open hands, and circles of children. This one radiated warmth—every time he saw it, as he instinctively thought of breath and beating hearts when he saw it.
[Looped Triangle] – Life
One by one, Leo named several of these symbols, and began reading them in complex sentences to make sure it made sense, as little by little, he created a vocabulary of his own.
Although he still wasn't entirely certain what the original words for these concepts were, his mind no longer rejected the symbols as foreign.
Instead, it began embracing them. Connecting them. Associating each repeated glyph with the mental idea he had forced onto it, until reading a page no longer felt like deciphering madness, but rather like looking at an encoded sheet that only he could understand.
However, he didn't stop just there.
He pressed onward.
Assigning a word for every emotion, every object, every action he could recognize, sometimes even inventing syllables that sounded appropriate to match the tone of what he imagined these Ancients might have once called them.
And slowly, methodically, obsessively, the language stopped feeling foreign.
It stopped feeling dead.
And though he would never have considered himself a linguist, nor someone curious enough to commit to anything academic for this long, after 16 days of hard work, he was finally proficient enough in the language of the ancients to finally uncover the secrets they left behind.
—--------
"Alright… time to find out what that damn painting actually means," Leo muttered, cracking his neck as he sat back at the desk, his fingers brushing aside the mess of loose parchment, ink-stained cloth, and empty ration wrappers.
He began organizing the scrolls he hadn't yet opened, separating them based on script density, illustrative margins, and context clues he'd begun picking up, such as symbols of kingdoms, geographical landmarks, dates, and strange dividers that resembled modern subject tags.
History, Geography, Science, Language, Culture, and Ritual.
The first category he dove into was History—because that, he figured, would hold the closest link to the mural.
He flipped open the most intact manuscript he could find, its binding frayed and its spine bent with age, yet still held together by the stubborn will of whoever had written it.
As the moment he laid eyes on the first page, his heart skipped.
The first glyph? The spiral. The one he'd assigned as "Ancients."
And beside it, in repeated patterns, the symbol of the upright standing lizard god, the one wearing stone armor in the mural with orange-dotted eyes.
He read slowly, muttering aloud in his self-assigned phonetic syllables, parsing meaning from the web of text, until the picture grew clearer in his mind.
These were records left behind by humanoid beasts.
Beings that bore uncanny resemblance to modern lizardmen, albeit with a few key differences.
The 'ancients' who had once thrived here were intelligent, upright, and fiercely devoted to the lizard god, whom they believed was not just their creator, but the spark of their sentience. He was known as Zharnok, a name Leo mentally underlined three times as he continued translating.
Entire cities bore his emblem.
Ceremonies were held every solstice to renew their bloodline's bond with him.
Newborns were tested for signs of "flame-born purity", a phrase he inferred meant the potential to wield magic or carry divine traits.
And the more he read, the more he realized something staggering—
These people… these Ancients… were not alone in their worship.
They had rivals.
Warring tribes who pledged loyalty to different beast gods—twelve in total, just like the mural had shown.
Leo read through accounts of temple burnings, mass conversions, divine duels between champions of different tribes—ritual wars fought not just for territory, but to prove which god's lineage was most favored.
It wasn't long before another phrase caught his attention.
The Dimming.
He read those two symbols again and again, scrawled in increasingly frantic script as the text went on. It was as though even the ink had begun to panic.
"The light of the sky… ceased."
"The beast gods no longer answered prayers."
"The mana turned black."
Leo's brows drew together as he flipped the page, only to find the next section ripped out, scorched at the edges as though the one who had written it went mad midway and ripped it apart before burning it.
But what was left of the book was enough for him to understand that this world had not always been still.
That this pocket of space had not been created alongside the universe's creation as many modern historians believed.
As though nobody in the outside world really knew how time-stilled worlds came to be, and whether they contained civilizations before they were isolated or not.
What Leo read here was irrefutable proof that this world was once alive and flourishing.
Full of sun, ancient gods, and war.
And then—something happened.
Something that converted it into this time-stilled world.
But what could that be?
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Timeless AssassinC317 317: A shocking truth
(Time-Stilled World, Conclave of the Ancients, Leo's POV)
After finishing the first book, Leo flipped deeper into the second history book, the fragile paper crackling beneath his fingers as he carefully turned another page.
His eyes scanned each line with mounting tension as he delved further into the lives of the ancients— into what they had endured, and what they had lost.
And what he found… was a tragedy.
A haunting account of how their paradise had crumbled.
While the earlier chapters spoke of a golden age—an era of abundance and order beneath the watchful eye of their god—the final sections shifted in tone, growing darker, more personal, as the narrator described how the madness had begun.
He spoke of living in a sprawling metropolis suspended by floating bridges, of a mighty empire that controlled the vast rainforest beyond its walls, where beasts bowed at the command of voice alone, and harmony reigned under the balance of mana and divine will.
He wrote of Zharnok—their god—not as a ruler in the traditional sense, but as the law itself. A silent deity whose breath governed the winds and whose presence shaped their seasons, their blessings, their fate.
It was, by every word and measure, a paradise.
Until the Great Dimming began.
At first, they thought it was an eclipse.
A passing curse.
The sun dimmed over a period of five days.
Their crops suddenly withered.
The sky stopped changing.
And the stars, once visible through high observatories— vanished entirely, being replaced with an endless gray sky.
The priests called it a trial.
The scientists called it a disastrous phenomenon.
But the people?
They just called it the beginning of the end.
Leo's brows furrowed as he skimmed the next few pages, as the narrator's tone changed, and formal sentences gave way to more frantic scrawling.
Symbols were no longer written in straight lines but scattered like afterthoughts. Scribbles in the margins. Whole pages scratched out and rewritten.
What came next was even worse.
As the sun faded, the mana began to shift.
It didn't vanish. It warped.
It turned… black.
Slick, heavy, clinging to the skin like a wet cloth.
First came the headaches.
Then the nosebleeds.
Then the madness.
People began to scream in their sleep.
Some tore out their own eyes.
Others clawed open their chests, trying to release something that wasn't there.
Children were the first to fall into madness, then it was the elderly, and finally the warriors/ scholars and mages.
Cities fell to panic. Empires burned from within. Priests pleaded with the god, but received no answer.
Because it wasn't the sun alone that was gone.
Because, Zharnok was gone too.
Because Zharnok had been slain in battle.
The last sentence on the scroll was barely legible—half-erased, written in a hand so frantic it tore the parchment in places.
> "It was not the sun that died."
> "It was Him."
> "And when He fell, He took the sky with Him."
Leo leaned back slowly, his fingers sliding off the scroll, breath caught somewhere between awe and unease.
So that's what the Great Dimming was.
Not just the loss of light.
Not just the collapse of an empire.
It was the moment this world's god was killed—ripped from existence.
With his death being the turning point for everything wrong that happened to this world.
> "They buried Zharnok's body inside Castle Bravo. However, the high priest turned mad from the burial.
He said that although Zharnok's body was dead, his soul was still intact, and that this world had a barrier that was preventing his soul from escaping it's boundaries"
> "Zharnok was killed by a warrior who wished for his powers.
An Origin Beast cannot be killed, however, absorbing its power can turn a mortal into an immortal."
> "Zharnok's soul still lingers in this world, waiting for a suitable body to take over.
However, his soul bleeds energy every year that he doesn't find a suitable host.
And it's this leakage of divinity that is turning this world mad.
The priests call me a heretic for pointing this out, however, the fact of the matter is, that the corruption is the strongest near Castle Bravo"
Leo read on, his eyes scanning the frenzied lines etched in shaky ink, only for the writing to suddenly stop.
Abruptly. Unevenly. As though the scribe had either lost the will to continue… or something far worse had happened.
'What? What does this mean?' Leo muttered internally, his fingers tightening around the edge of the scroll as a cold weight settled in his chest— because for the first time, he felt like he had stumbled onto something he wasn't supposed to see.
Because if he was understanding this correctly— then everything the outside world believed about Time-Stilled worlds was wrong.
Completely wrong.
It wasn't that the mana in this world had just grown old and stagnant over time, like the universe theorized it to be.
But rather something far darker.
This world hadn't become corrupted by accident—it had been poisoned on purpose.
It was a tomb.
A grave.
A place sealed off from reality because something had died here… something so powerful that even in death, its presence twisted the laws of nature around it.
The stale mana?
The corrupted atmosphere?
The maddening silence and deteriorating sanity?
They weren't natural consequences.
They were symptoms.
Symptoms of a deeper rot.
Symptoms of a divine soul slowly losing its energy.
And suddenly, a line Leo had read weeks ago echoed in his mind.
"No god may enter a Time-Stilled World."
At the time, it had sounded like superstition. Like one of those ancient warnings that scholars quoted in jest.
But now?
Now he understood.
Because these weren't just abandoned ruins lost in time.
They were prisons.
Burial sites sealed off from the rest of the universe—each one holding the soul of one of the Twelve Ancient Beasts, the original divine entities who once ruled existence before the current pantheon rose to power.
Their bodies were long gone. Slain. Erased from history.
But their souls… their wills… remained.
Trapped.
Festering.
Waiting.
Waiting for a body strong enough to host them.
Weaker cultivators, even Grandmasters, were not strong enough to enter their eyes or be affected by their death.
The corruption was subtle with them, nothing more than background noise.
But the stronger one became—the closer one reached toward godhood—the more the pressure would mount, the more the soul of the dead beast would stir, drawn to power like a moth to flame.
And should a true god ever step foot inside one of these grave-worlds…
They wouldn't leave whole.
If they left at all.
Which was why no True God ever entered this place, as they were genuinely scared of the consequences of making such a move.
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Timeless AssassinC318 318: More than what meets the eye
(Time-Stilled World, Conclave of the Ancients, Leo's POV)
After reading the second book, Leo quickly moved to a third and fourth, hoping for more answers about the Great Dimming, but neither gave him what he was looking for.
They did not dwell on the death of Zharnok, nor the divine war that led to this world's corruption, but instead focused heavily on what followed immediately after—the collapse of society, the splintering of beliefs, and the descent of the populace into something far worse than death.
These books were different in tone compared to the second one. They were much less poetic, and were not filled with speculation, but rather only observation, as though the authors who wrote these books did not care for the mysteries of gods or the divinity they once revered, but were instead trying desperately to document and survive in a world that no longer followed age-old rules.
The first journal he read spoke of broken cities and wandering cults. It talked about priests who began sacrificing their own kin in the name of restoring divine order, and about warlords who used the confusion to crown themselves false prophets.
It spoke of beast hunts that went horribly wrong, of how even the obedient tamed species began attacking their owners, as though the very foundation of loyalty had been unthreaded from the world.
The next book was worse. A fragmented collection of testimonies, pieced together from people who had lived through the earliest days of the Dimming.
Each entry grew more unhinged than the last, as Leo read through stories of blood rituals to bring back the stars, of children being sacrificed by their own mothers and of families turning feral under moonless nights.
One particular entry caught his attention was a field report from an unnamed scholar, who wrote with eerie calm about a place known as "The Deep String" or in Leo's rough translation, "The Singing Canyon."
At first, Leo thought nothing of it. Until he read the description.
A deep, winding gorge that ran at the edge of a great rainforest, filled with exposed mana veins and crystal ridges.
It was said that when one meditated on the edge of this canyon, they could hear the resonance of the world itself, like a soft song being sung that guided warriors towards clarity and enlightenment.
The ancients believed that the canyon's song was the voice of Zharnok himself, a frequency so pure that it could wash away doubt, fear, and pain.
Meditation was easier there. Breakthroughs came quicker. And those who spent long hours listening to the canyon often came back changed—calmer, wiser, more whole.
Leo's heart beat a little faster.
Because the more he read, the more convinced he became that this canyon—this Deep String—was the very one he'd fallen into.
The crystal walls. The exposed mana vein, and the soft singing he could hear at the surface, all indicated that it was the same place.
However, something had clearly changed.
As after the world dimmed, the characteristics of the Deep String changed as well.
It became more twisted, its harmony shattered, as the melody that was once a tool for enlightenment, now curdled into a dissonant drone that clawed at the ears of anyone who lingered too long.
The resonance that once soothed, now gnawed at the soul, like a whisper that started pleasant but grew sharper the longer you listened.
Some called it the "God's Grief."
Others said it was the death cry of the world, still echoing through the hollow bones of the earth.
However, Leo saw it for what it really was…. The song of the tainted mana.
Leo put the book down slowly, as his breath caught in his throat.
According to the last warning in the book, the song of tainted mana had turned many of the world's finest warriors into mindless beasts, as after Castle Bravo, it was considered as the second most dangerous place in this entire world, that one wasn't supposed to visit under any circumstances.
"Well fuck…. Someone should have told me this sooner…." Leo cursed, as he realized that he was now trapped within that same canyon that fell under one of the most forbidden zones.
—----------
On his sixth book, Leo finally uncovered the secret of how this Conclave came to be, and it was quite the interesting story.
It wasn't built as a hideout or a survival shelter.
This place was once one of the most advanced magical research facilities in the entire ancient world.
According to the book, it had been established at the peak of the empire's prosperity and was a neutral ground where scholars, researchers, and priests from all tribes gathered to push the boundaries of magical science and divine theory.
The brightest minds of the time worked here, shielded from political agendas, cult rivalries and religious segregation with the sole purpose of understanding the flow of mana, the influence of divine resonance, and the architecture of the soul.
The records described it as a towering pillar of enlightenment— home to seven towers, each dedicated to a different school of knowledge.
The mural room that Leo now sat in was once part of the Central Archives, a place where the most sensitive information was copied, preserved and guarded behind hundreds of layers of enchantments.
But when the Dimming began… everything changed.
As the world darkened and the cities above crumbled, the Head Mage of the Conclave made a final decision.
He ordered a full lockdown of the facility, sealing off the entrances, collapsing the spiral staircases, and instructing his apprentices to bury the way behind magical wards, enchantments, and brute force.
Not because he feared what was outside.
But because he wanted what was inside to survive.
According to the last pages of the book, the Conclave was not meant to be a bunker— it was meant to be a vault. A place where truth could sleep. A place where knowledge would not decay alongside flesh.
The Head Mage wrote that he knew his people would fall. That the madness in the air could not be cured in the short term, but he still hoped that when someone did find a cure to this madness, and they were ready to restart civilization, they would not have to start from zero, and would find all the knowledge the Conclave had to offer to give them a head start.
> "I seal the conclave in hopes that one of the 12 origin beast descendants will someday discover the mural room and uncover the secrets to saving this world, that's hidden inside the mural"
That line made Leo pause.
He reread it again. Slowly. Carefully.
"one of the 12 origin beast descendants will someday find the mural room and uncover the secrets to saving this world"
Leo blinked, torchlight flickering against his wide eyes.
He looked back at the mural, at the twelve beasts gathered beneath the sun, and his gaze naturally shifted once again to the twelfth— the crimson dragon with its wings folded in and its eyes shut.
As he now wondered if there was more to that damn painting than he initially understood?
Afterall…. It did make him quite anxious when he gazed at it.
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Timeless AssassinC319 319: The secrets of the mural
After reading the last line of the book, Leo turned back to inspect the mural once again, this time with far more patience and intention than when he had first stumbled into this forgotten room.
However, no matter how many times he looked at it, the painting refused to feel like just another piece of preserved art, as there was something deeper about it, something intangible woven into its strokes and shadows, that although wasn't obvious when observed simply, still gnawed at one's curiosity.
Thankfully, now that he could roughly translate parts of the ancient language, he could understand the meaning of the symbols scattered around on the painting, like the ones etched on Zharnok's stony armor that translated to 'Wisdom' and 'Honor', and the one written on the base of the stone that the serpent was curled on, which meant 'liar' or 'cheat'.
Leo took his time with each of the eleven gods, analyzing the smaller symbols, noting the patterns and phrasing near their feet and claws, but no matter how much he tried to study them all equally, his gaze was always pulled back to the twelfth—back to the dragon.
His eyes lingered there, longer than they had with any of the others, as his fingers unconsciously traced the sweep of the dragon's wings, the curve of its horns, and the haunting stillness of its closed eyes.
Something about the Dragon unsettled him in a way that was difficult to explain, as looking at the painting, he couldn't help but feel a personal connection to the beast, which was odd since he was very much a human.
He could feel the tension in the way its claws curled inward, in the way its tail wrapped around its base, and especially in how its head wasn't looking forward like the rest of the beasts, but angled slightly up, toward the painted sun above, as if the artist had been trying to convey something subtle—something only those who truly shared a connection with it would understand.
However, although he could feel that there was more to the painting than what met the naked eye, he couldn't wrap his head around what it was?
'What? Just what are you trying to tell me? Just what am I supposed to find out?' Leo wondered, as he narrowed his eyes further, crouching low to examine the detailing in the scales, running his fingers along the raised edges of the paint, wondering just why this particular beast felt so different from the rest.
Then, without a word, he let his mana surge slightly and activated [Absolute Vision], as he tried to observe the painting with his mana eyes instead of real eyes, as immediately the chalked reds on the faded painting deepened into flowing crimson, the black outline thickened like hardened obsidian, and faint filaments of energy began to bleed into view, revealing a layer of the mural that no normal eye would have ever caught.
Behind each beast, Leo saw thin threads of dormant energy, mini mana veins running inwards, with each beast possessing its own unique pattern and color that had, although dimmed with time, was still very much present.
But while all the beasts mostly had a steady mana vein with energy flowing within it at a constant speed, the Dragon was different.
The energy behind it wasn't smooth flowing, it was pulsing—soft and steady like the beat of a sleeping heart—thicker, denser, and more alive than the others, as though even in stillness, it resisted being forgotten.
Leo stared at it, breath slowing, as a strange rhythm began to beat inside his own chest, matching the pulse he saw in the dragon's energy, and before he could stop himself or second-guess the impulse, his hand rose and pressed against the mural, landing squarely on the chest of the painted beast.
The moment he touched it, the surface felt colder than it should have, and in that moment, he felt a strong desire to channel his mana into the painting, as he let a small stream of his mana enter through his palm and into the mural, as he fed it energy rather cautiously.
At first, nothing happened.
Then the mural shimmered faintly.
The lines trembled.
And the eye of the dragon, the one that had always been shut, slowly opened, revealing a glowing red eye behind it that should not have existed on a painting.
Leo barely had time to process what he was seeing before the red eye blinked once and began pulling his consciousness out of his body, as he felt as if he were being pulled into a ghost sleep episode, however, this time he was wide awake and conscious.
Within seconds, the world around him began to bleed into darkness streaked with red and gold, as he found himself powerless to stop the phenomenon.
As the tugging only stopped when he eventually found himself on his knees, surrounded by heat, smoke, and air so heavy with power it made the simple act of breathing feel very difficult.
'The fuck?' he wondered, as he slowly raised his head, only to find himself looking at the feet of a massive ancient beast that seemed to be shifting and alive.
'The fuckkkk??'
He thought again, as he looked higher, only to find out that he was staring right into the eyes of the ancient dragon.
Its gaze wasn't hostile, but it wasn't passive either.
It was sharp, direct and heavy, as if the beast was aware of his presence and had been waiting for his arrival.
Leo didn't move. Didn't speak. Didn't even breathe for a second too long, because the weight in the air felt like it would crush him if he dared to look away.
Yet, strangely enough, he wasn't afraid.
He wasn't calm either.
It was something else.
A slow rising pull inside his chest, like something ancient buried in his blood had finally been awakened, as he felt his mana heart pulsing wildly in his chest.
The dragon calmly stared at him.
And Leo stared back.
Silent. Still.
As two beings—divided by species, time, and fate—locked eyes for the very first time.
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Timeless AssassinC320 320: You might be an ancient dragon, but I am 'TheBoss'
(Inside the Mural, Before The Primordial Dragon, Leo's POV)
Leo and the dragon kept staring at one another for the better part of a minute, until it was the dragon who broke the silence first, its voice deep and deliberate, like a distant avalanche rolling through ancient mountains.
"You are not one of mine," the dragon said without opening its mouth, as it seemed to be communicating via telepathy.
"And yet… you bear a Dragon Heart."
Its head tilted slightly, massive and unhurried, the red eye never once blinking as it narrowed upon him.
"Human boy… What madness brought you to this place? What arrogance gave you the right to carry a flame that was never yours?"
Leo stiffened, unsure how to answer at first as his instincts told him to lower his gaze, show deference and bow, however, something inside him resisted that command.
He wasn't sure if it was pride, stubbornness, or just the fact that his alter ego as 'TheBoss' did not accept bowing to anyone, but in the end, he ended up standing his ground.
He looked up, eyes steady, voice dry.
"With all due respect, Big Red Dragon Sir… that's a question I was hoping you could answer for me," Leo said, as the dragon's eyes widened in surprise at his response.
For a while, the dragon went completely mute, seemingly taken aback by Leo's ability to speak to him so casually, as this was completely outside of its expectations.
"Do you not feel a compelling urge to submit to me? Why is there defiance in your eyes when I am standing before you?" the dragon asked, clearly unable to comprehend how Leo still carried free will, as Leo simply frowned at the question.
'Don't do it…. Don't do it…. Don't you dare say what you feel like saying…' Leo battled with himself, as his left eye flickered uncontrollably.
'He's an ancient dragon…. Picking up beef here is unnecessary and stupid….. DONT!' Leo warned himself, but although he tried his best not to be cocky, in the end, he couldn't resist the temptation.
"Submit to you? Brother, who do you think you're talking to here? I'm 'TheBoss', I submit to no one," Leo declared, as once again, the ancient dragon was taken aback by his response.
For another minute or two, the dragon remained silent, until it finally recovered from the setback and dropped its formal tone in favor of a more casual one.
"Kid… don't call me brother, I take naps longer than the time you've been alive.
Also, I don't care if you call yourself 'TheBoss' or 'TheBitch'.
If this were a different time, and you were actually standing before me or even my true soul fragment, you'd be passed out at my feet before you could ever look past my claws," the dragon said, its tone shifting sharply as it tried to humble Leo real quick.
"Well, let's start over then.
I'm Leo Skyshard, son of Elena Skyshard, student of Ben Faulkner.
I'm an assassin by profession, and a winner by habit. Who are you?" Leo asked, as the ancient dragon raised his chin slightly.
"I'm the Beast of Wrath… one of the supreme overlords of the universe.
The father of all dragons.
The protector of all dragon-kin.
The destroyer of Windgazer Galaxy.
I am known by many names… talked about fondly by everyone across the universe.
But you may call me, King Moltherak." Moltherak said, as Leo rolled his eyes at his response.
"Dude… I've never heard your name before… Talked fondly by who? I don't think anyone even remembers you—" Leo said, narrowing his eyes slightly, as the dragon's head reared back, visibly affronted.
"What do you mean no one remembers me?" Moltherak rumbled, his tone a blend of confusion and disbelief. "How can they not? Everyone loves me."
Leo raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, no. You sure you're not confusing 'loved' with 'anonymous'? Because I've literally never heard your name being spoken in any context ever… Not even in bedtime horror stories."
Moltherak growled lowly, his massive form shifting with indignation. "Perhaps… perhaps you know me by one of my other names." His eyes flared slightly as he said, "Velgarn the Flame-Eater?"
Leo shook his head. "Nope."
"The Ember Tyrant?"
"Nah."
"Wyrmfather of the Fifth Cataclysm?"
"Sounds fake."
"Molthorion the Crimson Dread?"
"Now you're just making shit up."
Moltherak's tail lashed behind him, a puff of smoke escaping his nostrils as he muttered something in a guttural tongue before glaring down again. "Kid… what era do you even live in for people to not remember me? Surely it hasn't been that long since I was slain?"
Leo gave him a flat look. "Well… if you're asking me how long it's been since you got smoked and buried in some ancient pocket realm—then yeah, it's probably been a while."
The dragon fell silent for a long moment, his massive eyes narrowing in quiet existential horror.
"…Damn," Moltherak finally muttered.
Leo crossed his arms. "Rough wake-up call?"
"Rougher than I expected." Moltherak admitted as he finally looked approachable and depressed.
Little by little, the initial pressure that Leo felt while being in Moltherak's presence dissipated, as Moltherak kept shrinking in size, until he reduced himself to about Leo's height.
"I ruled over seventeen galaxies before I was killed... I was KING Moltherak…. I can't believe my legacy is forgotten so fast," he said, sounding depressed, as Leo shot the poor Dragon a sympathetic look.
"Happens all the time, you think you're a real big deal until you realize you were just a frog in the well.
Happened to me as well….
For a while I forgot how awesome I am….
Forgot I'm 'TheBoss'.
Of course, my legacy will never fade like yours, but yeah…. I totally get you," Leo said in a patronizing tone, as it was the Dragon now that was left with a flickering left eye, as it couldn't believe that the first being it encountered in over three millennia, was a kid as shameless as Leo.
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