The Night that (15): The aliens collided.
Sorry for the few hours' delay. Here is the promised chapter!
Next chapter: August 11th.
Well, have a good Blood Moon, everyone, and enjoy the reading!
(P)(A)(T)/CalleumArtori
[...]---[...]
Even with the barrier of pure green color ahead, it was still possible to see the sphere of light—the Sun—that had appeared in the Starless Sky. It shone, partially driving away the night and the crimson moonlight coming from the great red full moon above.
With the exception of the human, everyone on the throne room's balcony stared at the event in astonishment.
The first to speak was Jinn.
“In the calculations you asked for my help with, creating something like this wasn’t possible… how?” she asked, amazement in her voice.
Jinn could remember. The human had called her and spoken with her after returning from Shahrabad. It hadn’t been a long conversation, but it was about:
'How much pressure would I need to apply to a certain amount of mass to create something like an artificial Sun without blowing everything up?'
The answer was: a lot.
Jinn had done the calculations and handed them over to the human, who had been discouraged by the results. The required mass was also immense, so much so that, afterward, he had set the matter aside and focused on more important things, like preparing for the fight.
Before he could answer, a surprised and incredulous cry echoed. It came from Princess Charlotte, who exclaimed:
“You created a Sun?!”
Without replying, the human took a coin out of the VoidBag: 'A Coin'.
Tossing it into the air, he murmured, “Nothing… it’s not the right moment yet…”
Storing the coin away and without averting his gaze, still staring at 'The Eye' beyond the barrier, the human finally answered the question. His voice was calm, the faint smile on his face never fading.
“No. I can’t compress that many atoms. I lack control and power over gravity magic, and I don’t think my current amount is enough for that,” he denied the princess’s assumption.
“It’s far from being a real Sun. Even further from the small white dwarf I originally thought of creating. What a joke,” he scoffed lightly at himself.
Not bothering to explain the term ‘white dwarf’—which those in Terraria shouldn’t be aware of—he continued:
“It can’t even be called a planetary core. The heat is greater, but it lacks size and, most importantly, density. A proto-planetary core might be the right term, or a laboratory star. No… proto-planetary core is a better name.”
“Basically, it’s not a Sun, but you can call it that if you want. It’s the best I can do with what I have right now.”
The human knew that, for his current self, the creation of that ‘False Sun’ was his limit.
Even after splitting his mind in two, using madness to create a Shadow Puppet…
Even after using all ten life and mana crystals…
Even using Hallucination Storm as a ‘cold furnace,’ cooling the entire internal environment to the point where atoms wouldn’t move—or barely moved—thus making it easier to attract them…
Then, drawing them in with Shadowflame and gravitational magic, compressing them, and using the flame to contain the heat generated from such compression…
He had barely managed to create what, in his own words, was a "Proto-Planetary Core."
“But, as I said, the sky above the storm is false, so my false Sun fits right in… A fake copy against a fake copy…”
Shaking his head, the smile on his face took on a sarcastic edge, and the tattoo on his forehead seemed to glow beneath the Bone Helm, along with his orange eyes, before he spoke in a slightly louder tone:
“I don’t have much time to waste, so I’m heading out first. Follow me with Proto-A when you’re ready. Just remember: as long as the Sun shines, as long as you don’t look directly at 'The Eye' or at the Blood Moon, you’ll be safe.”
“Alalia, I know you’re semi-conscious. Open and close the barrier quickly at the spot where I jump.”
Without warning, at the end of his words, he extended his right arm to the side, where the Relic of Destruction appeared in his hand. Twisting his wrist, he switched to a dual grip and, before anyone could speak or react, vanished from the spot.
Far from the royal castle, at the barrier surrounding the kingdom, fifteen kilometers away, a small purple dot could be seen passing through a deliberately opened gap in the pure green barrier, which closed immediately afterward, preventing any sight of what lay beyond.
In the place where the human had stood moments ago, on the throne room’s balcony, something strange remained. His armor, Remnant of the Deerclops, along with the Bone Helm, were still there, but glowing in a dark and ghostly purple hue.
Wearing the armor and the Bone Helm, stood a living shadow. Humanoid in shape and identical to the human, the Shadow Puppet turned. The pale crescent-moon smile on its face, utterly insane, looked even more terrifying with its left eye a milky white and the right one bearing a crazed red pupil.
Placing its right hand on its chest, the Shadow Puppet made a slight, polite bow.
“I am me, but I still feel I should introduce myself. Pleased to meet you. I am Devas Asura. You may call me Asura or Shadow Puppet to avoid confusion, I don’t mind.”
Blinking, Jinn was the first to react. She grunted before speaking:
“The stream blocked the ritual’s information, didn’t it?” she said, more as a statement than a question.
Jinn had read the entire Codex Umbra. As the spirit of the Relic of Knowledge, it was impossible for her not to recognize the ritual the human was performing. Yet, she didn’t.
She couldn’t even correlate what he was doing to the ritual described in the Codex Umbra. It was as if the information had been completely redirected into a subtle deception.
Jinn only knew three beings capable of interfering with her mind: the Brother Gods and the stream. The Brother Gods didn’t exist in Terraria.
That left only one option: the stream's filter that hides secrets.
Laughing—a laugh that sent shivers down everyone’s spines—the Shadow Puppet replied:
“I don’t want someone with an IQ lower than the shoes they wear to end up shattering their own mind.”
“So, Shadow Puppet… what are you? A clone? A projection? A shadow golem?” Dylan stepped forward and spoke.
It was as if the Guide refused to refer to the insane being before him by his friend’s name or surname.
“Terraria has a thing with golems, doesn’t it?… But no. As I said, I am me. Devas Asura will always be Devas Asura. I’m just the more… well, it doesn’t matter.”
The grin on his face grew eerily sinister for a moment, but he gave no further explanation.
Then, he stomped his right foot three times on the ground. On the third time, his foot, even covered by armor, sank into the floor and deformed. The dark shadowy color spread like a whirlpool, where thousands of hungry eyes blinked.
At an unnatural speed, the Nightmares crawled like shadows across the floor, moving in all directions and spreading throughout the kingdom.
A purple pair slipped into Gilbert’s shadow unnoticed.
“They will help. You can use them as a shield if you want.” The Shadow Puppet blinked with its pupilless eye and chuckled lowly, as if unable to stop the sound from escaping its throat.
Then, it explained:
“The goblin armies are coming from the west and the east. I don’t know if Jinn already informed you. There are about thirty to fifty thousand on each side, no more than that. The real army is the Demon Eyes in the sky and the zombies. Those are the real numbers. Almost a million, and they’re coming from the front. The rear is strangely empty.”
“Not all the zombies seem to have been actual Terrarians. Some are just heaps of flesh, probably from animals, so the death toll shouldn’t be that high. Oh, right!”
Dramatically pausing, the Shadow Puppet snapped the fingers of its right hand and opened them. When the stream’s phone appeared in its hand, it quickly activated the dual-camera mode…
The human had known about this camera option for a long time.
Quickly, the camera that had been following him split into two. With a few taps on the phone, Shadow Puppet made the second camera appear above him. The stream recognized it as part of the human rather than as a separate entity.
Ignoring the (CHAT), Shadow Puppet put the phone back into the Void Bag and spoke again, pointing at Gilbert.
"Your angler friend... He caught some unpleasant things. The earring... I can feel it trembling in your pocket. Take it out for a moment and see if it's just shaking or if there's something more."
The Merchant, like everyone else, watched in silence. His gaze drifted to Robyn every few moments, checking if she was okay.
Inside his armor’s inner pocket, the Angler Earring trembled rhythmically, but he had ignored it until now.
Casting a glance at Shadow Puppet, Gilbert pulled the Angler Earring from his armor’s pocket and held it up for all to see.
The fish-shaped earring, colored sea-green, did not shake as it normally would in the presence of danger. Its eyes were black—indicating the highest level of threat—but instead of trembling, it swayed like a pendulum, pulled toward a specific direction—southwest of the kingdom.
Tilting his head at an angle that would have snapped a normal human’s neck, Shadow Puppet looked toward where the earring pointed. He stared at the green barrier in silence for a whole second before scoffing and laughing.
The scoff came out chilling, cooling the already tense atmosphere. The laughter echoed like worms squirming under the skin, making Charlotte and Robyn—the two most unprepared—shudder.
"The title is probably more than just a title, isn't it? The earring must have a blessing similar to the Empress of Light’s, which is why I didn’t detect mana or any other energy in it. I didn’t analyze it either… But why? It doesn’t make sense that I wouldn’t have done that after coming back. Something influenced me? But how? My title should block that..."
"Something bypassed the stream’s protection?… ‘The Moon’?… No, I’d probably already be dead or insane if that were the case. I don’t think it’s something else either… Did I unconsciously stop myself from doing it? Maybe… It’s possible, but why?..."
Shadow Puppet whispered incessantly, his voice echoing like dozens of voices at once. Across his body, hundreds of eyes opened and blinked randomly, looking in all directions before closing again in silence.
Yet, even in his deranged, unsettling state, no one around him was affected—beyond the inevitable chills from the scene. Even insane, the human’s shadow was still a part of him.
The human would not harm those he considered friends and allies.
Shaking his head and returning his neck to normal, Shadow Puppet turned to face Gilbert, who had furrowed brows. His aged face was creased, his serious gaze deep in thought.
After a moment, he asked,
"Is Simon in that direction?"
Shadow Puppet nodded and responded with a single word:
"Yes."
Then, before he could say anything else or anyone could ask a question, the human’s shadow vanished, melting like black tar and sinking into the vortex at his feet.
The whirlpool sealed itself shut, and the throne room’s balcony was swallowed by silence.
In the distance, beyond the barrier, a scream echoed across the kingdom…
▄▃▅▂▃▅▄▄▂▃▃▅▄▄▂
… followed by a storm of madness, insanity, and ice.
[…]
Outside the kingdom, where the Blood Moon and the False Sun clashed in the Starless Sky.
Crimson red and orange mixed in the air, forming a spectacle of intense colors.
The moment the human passed through the breach in the barrier created by Alalia, every being outside seemed to turn toward him. The Demon Eyes, the zombies, the corrupted animals, as well as the bloodied moon above and 'The Eye'.
None of the creatures had eyes, yet their heads turned in his direction. The eyes in the sky stared at him.
The presence of so many gazes seemed to gain physical weight. His shoulders sank slightly under that "weight." The center of his forehead ached, and blood streamed faster from his wound. His left eye twitched and pulsed out of his control.
Without his armor and Bone Helm, the human wore simple pants, ordinary sneakers, the Angel Greaves, and a sleeveless shirt. Everything was red, still soaked in the blood falling from the sky, from the distant Bloodied Clouds.
Paying little attention to his body’s reactions, the human’s calm smile grew slightly as he stared at 'The Eye'.
'The Eye' was massive. A ‘body’ over four, nearly five meters tall. Slightly oval. Its sclera was a dirty white, with black, red, and reddish-brown veins squirming like worms.
Behind it, what appeared to be optic nerves moved in an unsettling, erratic manner—sometimes like tentacles, sometimes like writhing parasites.
Its iris shifted between shades of dark blue and deep green.
Like a Starless Sky, 'The Eye's' pupil stared at him with obvious malice and malevolence. A dark void.
The presence of 'The Eye' infected the surroundings. The world’s mana behaved bizarrely, shifting between something native and something foreign, as corruption spread around.
Something like a disease or a plague tried to seep into the human.
The direct stare made his left eye twitch violently. Thick, slow tears of blood began to stream down his cheek, forming strange droplets that pulsed against his skin.
Everything seemed to slow down, as if the air had turned into thick, sticky sap.
With a serene gaze, the human took a deep breath.
The simple act made the air around him, thick like sap, bubble wildly and heat up. The distant False Sun seemed to surge with power, and the tattoo on his forehead, along with his two orange eyes, shone abnormally bright.
Inside his irises, symbols, markings, and red veins surfaced, spinning slowly in a clockwise motion, wrapped in a golden glow.
The orange and red mocked 'The Eye'. The gold despised it.
The disease or infection trying to corrupt him vanished—evaporated by the heat in his veins.
Using the momentum of his leap, the human, cloaked in purple flames, dashed toward 'The Eye'.
He didn’t even attempt to use the Relic of Destruction’s ability. The sword’s connection confirmed that his lifespan wouldn’t be enough to erase even a single inch of 'The Eye's' flesh.
Paying no mind to the rotting green zombies below or the Demon Eyes above, he gripped the Relic of Destruction with both hands and twisted his arms slightly, preparing for a simple downward strike.
The Relic of Destruction shone purple, coated in molten orange flames—a plasma that seemed to emanate from the human’s very breath.
‘Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — Eighth Form: Solar Rupture’
Perhaps sensing the danger in the strike, or simply too arrogant to be touched, 'The Eye' moved. Its iris and pupil never stopped staring at the human, but its oval 'body' tilted slightly and disappeared.
The air didn’t seem to shift. Gravity didn’t pull it. Time around it sped up and slowed down at once.
Space distorted.
Distance didn’t matter.
In one instant, 'The Eye' was a meter in front of him; in the next, a meter behind, diagonally to his left. Always watching, with no eyelids to blink.
Then, it moved again.
The human didn’t see the air displace, but he felt time and space in that direction twist abnormally, accelerating and warping as if they didn’t know how to behave in the presence of such an outsider.
Using the momentum of his initial strike, the human twisted his wrists and spun midair—quickly, yet calmly.
Then, he struck upward, using the first attack’s force to propel the second.
‘Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — Twelfth Form: Solar Reversal’
The flawless execution sent the Relic of Destruction crashing into 'The Eye's' lower sclera, just thirty centimeters away.
The strike tore open a gash about forty centimeters long and ten deep in its filthy white flesh. Thick, putrid, reddish-brown coagulated blood oozed from the wound.
The liquid bubbled—not from the heat, but as if it were alive.
The drops fell like tears. Within each one, small eyes spun among themselves or fused into a single whole.
The tiny eyes quickly grew to the size of a clenched fist. Their irises, random and misshapen in dull colors, stared at the human without blinking before shooting toward him like bullets, their optic nerves writhing like worms.
Taking advantage of the inertia of the fall, the human grasped the air around him with mana and compressed it to accelerate his descent.
At the same time, gravity distorted to his will.
In two ways.
The first, pressing him downward.
The second, propelling the small eyes and 'The Eye'—already flying upward—even higher.
Gravity affected the human and the small eyes. But 'The Eye' remained unchanged in its ascending path, as if seeking to reach the Blood Moon.
Spinning his body and shifting his legs downward, the human collided with the ground like a meteor.
Without bending his knees, he landed on some zombies, his feet piercing and crushing them effortlessly. The impact created a crater and a shockwave that sent dozens of others flying.
Keeping the Shadowflame close to his body, the human never took his eyes off the sky. 'The Eye' stared down at him, never losing focus.
Around 'The Eye,' tens of thousands of demon eyes watched, floating in the sky like spectators of the battle, with no intention of interfering.
Only the small eyes formed from 'The Eye's’ blood advanced toward the human. They were fast, but their speed was nowhere near that of the entity that had spawned them.
On 'The Eye's’ 'body', the wound was closing rapidly. The flesh writhed as if infested, deforming before stitching itself together in a grotesque manner, like strands of white flesh.
The regeneration wasn’t instant, but it wasn’t slow either.
Expelling air from his lungs and inhaling deeply, the human’s spiritual energy spread through the environment, intertwining with his mana indistinguishably.
The air around him heated up, as did the ambient mana, which began to corrupt.
Like two foreign viruses infecting the cells of the same body, two different-colored paints blending on the same canvas, the human’s mana and the strange energy of ‘The Eye,’ containing an unknown divinity, fought for dominance over the world’s mana.
The surrounding zombies, already weakened by the creation of the False Sun shining in the Starless Sky, began to be purified.
Their flesh melted, their blood bubbled and evaporated, inflating the liquefied flesh. Their bones charred and crumbled into dust as their bodies collapsed into a single pool of reddish-brown slime.
A suffering, bone-chilling scream echoed from their deformed throats.
Even in their rotten, decayed state, their eye sockets somehow resisted. Dozens of hundreds of bone masks fell to the ground, formed from the upper frontal parts of their skulls.
Surrounded by the sea of blood and corpses, the human spoke aloud:
"Purify and purge."
The Shadowflame erupted around his body, rapidly spreading across hundreds of meters, consuming the zombies’ bodies and incinerating the bone masks on the ground.
With each mask destroyed, a spectral sigh, a howl, a growl, or sometimes an animalistic screech could be heard.
At the same time, some of the demon eyes in the sky wavered in their floating before stabilizing. These lost the strength in their gaze and presence.
The Shadowflame couldn’t spread beyond a kilometer. The tide of purple flames was halted by a blood-red wave formed by the bodies of other zombies.
The red wave was filled with eyes carrying 'The Eye's’ strange aura. They stared at the human with malice and resentment before blinking and turning to dust upon contact with the purple tide.
'The Eye' didn’t remain idle in the meantime. As soon as the first word left the human’s mouth, it moved, vanishing from its place as if it had never existed.
The air didn’t shift. The world’s mana didn’t ripple. The environment didn’t change. It was as if the world itself couldn’t comprehend or process its presence.
Space and time, however, could.
Distance wasn’t important.
Following his instincts, the human moved before 'The Eye' could even reappear.
Space wavered, and time paradoxically accelerated and slowed at the same time.
With his fingers and the sole of his right foot, he propelled himself to the right in an instant.
His left side trembled, suffering from static like an old television, before returning to normal. His aura glowed in a dull bluish-gray hue, filled with symbols, markings, and red veins, before vanishing the next moment.
Time wasn’t important. Neither was its alteration.
In the space where he had been just an instant before, 'The Eye' collided with the ground without resistance, sinking into the earth as if matter didn’t matter.
Its movement dragged its presence and strange divine energy along, forcefully pushing back the Shadowflame in that spot for a brief instant—just enough time to disappear underground.
Seeing the scene, the human didn’t stop moving, having distanced himself in that brief moment—only a small hundred meters.
With the tip of his right foot on the ground and his heel in the air, while the heel of his left foot touched the ground and the tip lifted, he began taking quick, illusory steps, walking backward without ever losing sight of 'The Eye'.
Even with 'The Eye' below ground, the human’s eyes followed it. Its presence was unmistakable and impossible to lose.
One step, the tip of his left foot touched the ground, and the heel rose. Two steps, the tip of his right foot lifted, and the heel met the floor. Three steps...
His movement was strange, his feet as light as a feather, barely touching the ground. To any onlookers, it resembled a beautiful dance.
With each step, a mirage, like an afterimage, seemed to take his place, striking around with the Relic of Destruction. Each blow carried a wave of plasma and purple flames, incinerating flesh, blood, and bone before purifying and expelling them.
The next moment, 'The Eye' reappeared from beneath the earth, flying like a glitch in reality, exactly where the human had been mere moments before.
Dodging by a hair’s breadth, the human struck with the Relic of Destruction in his right hand, tearing off a piece of 'The Eye’s' flesh and causing blood to spill.
The blood turned into small eyes that quickly joined the dance, only to be incinerated the next instant by the sea of purple flames surrounding them.
This time, 'The Eye' didn’t dive into the ground. As if inertia didn’t exist, 'The Eye' rotated on its axis, fixed its dark pupil on the human, and disappeared again.
Space wavered, and time paradoxically accelerated and slowed at the same time.
Distance wasn’t important.
Quickly alternating the movement of his feet, the human’s right heel struck the ground in front of his body, while the tip of his left foot did the same behind him.
At the same time, he tensed his muscles. Around him, the Shadowflame rippled briefly.
Just like 'The Eye,' inertia seemed nonexistent for him.
Like a game character canceling a programmed animation, his body froze. Only his eyes moved, tracking ‘The Eye,’ which reappeared in the exact spot where he would have been had he kept walking.
‘The Eye’ stopped mid-air again.
Distance wasn’t important.
The human’s body blurred like a television caught in static before returning to normal.
Time wasn’t important.
The two stared at each other, unmoving.
The tattoo on the human’s forehead glowed, as did his orange irises, filled with symbols, markings, and red veins, with a golden light shining at the center. The soft smile on his face was strangely gentle.
The pupil of ‘The Eye,’ as if attempting to mimic the human’s smile, briefly curled upward—like a black, toothless mouth. A cruel smile, brimming with malice. Its veins pulsed with a repulsive crimson glow.
Above, the Blood Moon and the False Sun illuminated the scene.
Crimson red and orange with shades of purple.
Then, ‘The Eye’ vanished, and the human waited in silence.
At that moment, hundreds of weapons materialized in the air—pistols, rifles, shotguns, miniguns, machine guns—all marked with Mystic Symbols and engraved Runes, aimed at the exact spot where the human stood.
The bullets were made of Dust, enchanted to absorb mana and detonate on impact.
Then, they all fired at once.
The bullets moved far faster than conventional ammunition, burning violet as they left the barrels. Golden threads seemed to weave into the metal, forming linear patterns in the air.
The human’s body blurred, reappearing several meters to the side.
Shifting into a dual-wield stance, the upper half of his body rotated slightly to the left while the lower half turned right. Then, he reversed the motion and struck forward, thrusting with his sword.
'Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — First Form: Solar Flare'
Sensing the human’s intent, ‘The Eye’ pressed forward, reappearing dozens of meters ahead.
The human didn’t hesitate and lunged into the empty air.
At the precise moment his strike reached its peak, as if reality itself had glitched, ‘The Eye’ emerged right in front of him. The distant image of the entity dissolved into nothingness, revealing the Relic of Destruction already impaled more than halfway into its oval-shaped ‘body.’
The blade shimmered with purple flames and orange plasma. Golden veins coursed through the metal, etching sharp, rigid patterns across its surface.
With a faint smile, the human murmured: "A flaw, sometimes, is enough to correct another when the errors cancel each other out."
Then, ‘The Eye’ was riddled with gunfire.
Bullets pierced its flesh from all directions, opening shallow holes and causing its blood to spatter like distant rain.
Yet, the Shadowflame surrounding the projectiles was swiftly extinguished by the entity’s strange aura and divine presence. The next moment, the bullets were expelled from its ‘body,’ leaving behind wounds that closed at a much slower rate.
Simultaneously, the human twisted his wrist, wrenching the sword deeper into the filthy white flesh of the sclera, then slashed sideways, carving a deep, gaping wound.
The flesh writhed like thick strands desperately trying—and failing—to mend themselves, burning with the persistent purple flames that clung to the wound, moving like tendrils, judging the sins of the ‘body.’
Golden threads interlaced mechanically between the flames and flesh. In sharp, rigid patterns, they repelled the strange aura and divine presence of ‘The Eye’…
Kicking off the ground and skimming just above the surface, the human vanished from his position, leaving behind an almost perfect afterimage.
'Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — Eleventh Form: Mirage'
A mere instant later, the afterimage was torn apart by the crimson tendrils that were ‘The Eye’s’ optic nerves.
‘The Eye’ twisted in fury and hatred, dark reddish-brown blood spurting from its open wounds before it surged toward the human once again.
This time, its movements were eerily erratic and unpredictable, maneuvering cautiously around the attacks.
With a faint smile on his face, the human tracked its motions.
Like a strange and illusory dance, much like the moon chasing the sun, the human and ‘The Eye’ tore across the bloodstained battlefield, leaving destruction in their wake. Their movements resembled a warped orbit.
Sometimes zigzagging, sometimes fractal. The human had yet to be touched; ‘The Eye,’ only a handful of times. Their dance continued for moments until they had distanced themselves so much that the distant Bloodied Clouds loomed just overhead.
With the Blood Moon blocking the False Sun, the Bloodied Clouds in that direction remained barely affected.
When the first drops of blood rained down upon them, the reaction was immediate.
‘The Eye’ smiled, its pupil curling into a macabre arc. Its wounds began regenerating faster, absorbing the blood.
Each drop of red rain contained a small, cruel, and malicious eye within it.
With an abnormal serenity and purity, the human also smiled, unfazed by the horror before him.
Drawing the Shadowflame into himself and allowing his body to be exposed to the falling blood, he let the crimson rain drench him. Then, he spread his arms at his sides.
In his right hand was the Relic of Destruction. In his left—previously empty—now rested the Ice Blade. The Remnant of The Deerclops manifested across his body, and the Bone Helm sat atop his head.
The surrounding shadows thickened. Below, thousands of hungry eyes glared at the demon eyes above.
Tilting his head to the right, the human gazed at ‘The Eye’ with calm, orange eyes.
Tilting his head to the left, the Shadow Puppet stared at ‘The Eye’ with milky-white and insane red eyes.
Both of them opened their mouths.
▄▃▅▂▃▅▄▄▂▃▃▅▄▄▂
“Das Klagen der Königin.”
As the blood rain froze and the Bloodied Clouds were corrupted by madness, ‘The Eye’s’ storm weakened. The human and his shadow moved.
Like the four hands of a clock, their arms parted.
The human’s arms moved clockwise—his right arm, holding the Relic of Destruction, pointed upward, while his now-empty left pointed downward.
The Shadow Puppet’s arms moved counterclockwise—its right arm, empty, pointed downward, while its left, now gripping the Ice Blade, pointed upward.
The Shadow Puppet’s right hand clenched in a grasping motion. Ice and snow responded as if in reflex, rapidly converging until they formed a colossal black hand tinged with dark purple, rising to seize ‘The Eye’ from below.
The frozen blood droplets trembled, darkening. The eyes within them shifted—no longer malicious and cruel, but insane and delirious.
With his left hand, the human mirrored the motion—this time, from below to above.
The blood-soaked earth trembled before a colossal reddish-brown hand, wreathed in purple flames and rigid golden patterns, surged upward, seizing ‘The Eye’ from the opposite side.
The two hands formed a cage, their fingers like iron bars.
Then, the human struck. His right arm blurred.
The Relic of Destruction glowed in deep violet, like fire, and waves of purple flames with thin golden threads surged toward the fingered cage.
In a mirrored motion, the Shadow Puppet’s left arm blurred.
The Ice Blade glowed in deep violet, like ice, and waves of blue-violet frost with countless insane eyes swirled toward the cage of fingers.
Meanwhile, as the Shadow Puppet rejoined, Ozma’s voice echoed in the human’s mind.
(“What’s the plan?”)
He didn’t ask if the human could hear him—he already knew, sensing the Spiritual Realm’s connection stabilizing.
(“Kill this thing before the False Sun fades and everything gets even more complicated.”) It was the Shadow Puppet who answered.
Its deranged voice reverberated within the Spiritual Realm, picked up by the mental stream’s microphone. It was simply easier for it to respond than the human himself.
Then, it quickly explained:
(“To be more specific: we’ll likely have to destroy it completely. It regenerates, and that regeneration accelerates with the rain…”).
(“The demon eyes also seem to have some connection to ‘The Eye’ and those turned into zombies. Those bone masks… Something involving the soul or spirit. I’m not sure—it’s confusing, even to my vision. The Shadowflame is effective in that regard…”).
(“It’s likely this thing won’t die as long as there are eyes around—not sure if only demon eyes—and as long as the rain doesn’t stop. I could feel that almost trapping it within the Hallucination Storm weakened it, along with that connection, but not by much. The sky above isn’t mine—it’s the Starless Sky.”)
Above the Hallucination Storm, the Starless Sky formed a blackened ceiling, faintly illuminated by the distant False Sun, hidden behind the Blood Moon.
The crimson moonlight of the Blood Moon slowly seeped into the storm from above, like an infection.
In the distance, beyond the storm, the Nightmares began fighting the zombies. Empowered by the Blood Moon yet weakened by the False Sun, the zombies were as physically strong and fast as a gold-ranked contractor.
Above, the flying Nightmares clashed against the demon eyes.
The Nightmares were faster and stronger. Their powers were greater as well, but they were outnumbered.
The presence of the Blood Moon and the Starless Sky strengthened the demon eyes, and when wounded—but not fatally—they would fly upward, entering the dimension of the Starless Sky before returning, partially healed.
The crimson moonlight seemed to seep deeper into their bodies.
The Nightmares farther from the realm’s barrier were also assailed by the red lightning of the clouds. The storm’s raindrops weakened them significantly whenever they made contact, while at the same time accelerating the healing and amplifying the power of the demon eyes.
The opposite was true near the Hallucination Storm, which was strengthened by the Nightmare Tempests surrounding it, releasing lightning in all directions. The cold winds tore through the zombies and demon eyes, while simultaneously empowering the Nightmares completely.
("Where should I help?") Ozma asked after the explanation, then added: ("I’m watching everything through the stream. I didn’t dare look through your eyes. I don’t think a Nightmare’s body alone will be enough for me to assist.")
("Good idea. You should be safer since your soul is inside the Spiritual Realm, but better not take any risks.") The insane voice echoed and explained:
("With my birth, the connection between the Spiritual Realm and reality has strengthened. Not as much as I’d like, but it should be enough. Go to the portrait I left on the house’s balcony and touch my engraved image...")
("Use this connection and imagine your body. That should be enough for you to create a shell similar to Tyrian’s. The direct link between your soul, the shell, and the Spiritual Realm should allow you to use your mana instead of just nightmare energy. Just don’t overexert yourself and explode, and everything should be fine...")
("Just remember not to transfer your soul into the shell—only deepen the connection. That way, even if you’re affected by the presence of the Blood Moon or ‘The Eye,’ my presence and the main body’s will be able to protect you...")
("And please, don’t get hit. My instincts tell me it won’t be pretty if that happens.")
A second after those words, ‘The Eye’ broke free from the cage of fingers that had restrained it.
Its ‘body’ was partially frozen by a ghostly purple ice, while the other half burned in purple flames interwoven with straight golden threads. Its filthy white flesh writhed and twisted as it regenerated. Its cracked iris and pupil, gleaming with cruelty, stared ahead at the two.
The blood on the frozen side shattered, while the burned side had long since evaporated. No small eyes grew there. The being did nothing for a moment, recovering in silence.
Then, with ferocity, ‘The Eye’ lunged—and vanished the next instant as time and space warped abnormally.
At the same time, Ozma responded:
("Understood. I’m doing it now. But... why did you say ‘main body’? And why are you the only one answering me?")
The Shadow Puppet responded easily, as if it had expected the question:
("Because there aren’t two beings. I am as much Devas as ‘he’ is me. The distinction is only to avoid confusing others...")
("A single consciousness, separated yet not entirely, in two bodies. Or almost—I am more shadow than being. ‘He’ didn’t answer you because I already am. My words are ‘his,’ and my thoughts are ‘his.’ ‘He’ is the main body, and I am the shadow, but we are both Devas Asura.")
With those words, the Shadow Puppet fell silent. Ozma asked nothing more and focused, holding the beach house’s portrait in his hands.
Moments before ‘The Eye’ collided with the human and the Shadow Puppet, the two moved in perfect sync, like mirrored reflections.
The Remnant of The Deerclops and the Bone Helm blurred into purple, turning ethereal and merging into the Shadow Puppet’s body, while the human reverted to wearing only his rain-soaked clothes, drenched in the bloody downpour.
The human, like a mirage, slid to the right, his feet barely touching the ground, alternating fluidly between toe and heel in a strange, effortless motion.
The Shadow Puppet, like a hallucination, moved to the left. Its body flickered in the air, reappearing meters ahead as if it and the environment were one.
Like a distorted reflection in a broken mirror, the human and his shadow turned at the same time and struck together, thrusting with the Relic of Destruction and the Ice Blade.
‘Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — Eighth Form: Solar Rupture’
‘Hallucination Breathing — First Form: Delusional Mirror’
Before the strikes could land, the space between them filled entirely with crimson moonlight—and warped.
The crimson glow seemed to seep into and infect the fabric of space itself, vanishing before twisting it like cloth and stretching it, making it impossible for the attacks to reach ‘The Eye,’ which had reappeared there.
Time itself became unstable—paradoxically fast and slow.
The space turned dark and empty, like a Starless Sky dyed crimson.
For a moment, ‘The Eye’s’ strange divine aura intensified. The air grew heavy, and the red snow around that area turned back into rain. The eyes within the droplets shifted once more, no longer insane and delirious, but cruel and malevolent.
The human’s left eye burned in agony, pulsating even more violently. The wound on his forehead and the cuts on his palms bled faster, the droplets falling in an eerily irregular pattern.
The Shadow Puppet’s milky-white left eye glowed crimson. Unlike its insane red right eye, the left one seemed to reflect the Blood Moon.
The human’s body flickered like static on an old television. Without hesitation, he kicked off the ground and launched himself backward, retreating as far as possible while a near-perfect copy of his image took his place.
‘Sun Breathing (Devas Style) — Eleventh Form: Mirage’
The Shadow Puppet did the opposite. Swinging downward with the Ice Blade in its left hand while grasping the air with its right, it conjured a massive hand made of the Hallucination Storm and lunged forward.
The distorted space caused the human’s shadow to blur unnaturally, but it didn’t hinder his movement.
Vanishing again, dodging the sword strike and storm-clad hand, ‘The Eye’ reacted even faster.
The time around it, already unstable, seemed to warp further after being infected by the crimson moonlight.
Reappearing above the Shadow Puppet, ‘The Eye’ charged down at it with terrifying speed.
Reacting purely on instinct, the human’s shadow released the Ice Blade, sending it into the VoidBag. Then, clapping its hands together, it vanished within the very shadow cast by ‘The Eye’s’ own 'body'.
Without an immediate target, ‘The Eye’ crashed into the ground. Unlike before, this time the impact was direct.
The earth, imbued with the human’s mana and nightmare energy, collapsed, creating a crater and launching ice, snow, and crimson mud into the air.
The next instant, two blackened-red hands emerged from the ground—formed from earth, ice, and Nightmares, empowered by the Bone Helm’s dark hands. The ravenous eyes embedded within them growled as the fingers clenched shut with a deafening crash, trapping ‘The Eye’ at the center and creating a shockwave that pushed away the surrounding rain and snow.
Outlining an opaque contour around the human’s body, the Shadow Puppet reappeared nearly three thousand meters ahead.
And then, like a thought brimming with madness, its voice echoed in the Spiritual Realm:
("Calling me a foreigner in front of this thing is almost a joke. This thing is so ‘outer’ that reality doesn’t even know how to act in its presence...")
("Time works wrong. Space feels like it's made of bubble wrap. Matter is as solid as if it didn’t exist, and the act of ‘traversing distance’ is completely ignored...")
("And then there's this damn crimson moonlight and the Starless Sky...")
("Isolating 'The Eye' within the Hallucination Storm also isolated its world. With only me and this ‘pseudo-world’ suppressing it, this thing is leaking that disgusting ‘alien system’ much more easily than before...")
Even with those words, the thought of removing the Hallucination Storm never crossed the mind of either the human or the Shadow Puppet.
The narrated thought ended with an irritated tongue click and an order:
("Tsk, fuck it. Alalia should be able to deal with the radiation somehow later. Ozma, stall it with me!")
Falling backward, the Shadow Puppet merged with the storm winds and vanished, while the human distanced himself even further.
At the edge of the storm, the human dropped the Relic of Destruction and sent it into the VoidBag. Grabbing the air, he spun it around himself until he created a small storm within the larger one.
Closing itself off so that it was isolated from the perception of everyone outside, the human moved along with the small storm, dragging it to another location. Then, he pulled out a stained yellow stone from his inventory and compressed it with gravity magic.
Creating a purple web of flames and four rings, the human condensed the gravity around the stone and pulled the surrounding atoms, further compacting them.
In the distance, ‘The Eye’ quickly broke free from the makeshift prison that had been created for it. Just before it could fly back toward the kingdom, unable to find any trace of the human, ‘The Eye’ sensed something emerging to the left and turned swiftly.
A humanoid figure, entirely black, taller than the Shadow Puppet. The being wore a gray bone mask resembling a deer’s skull. Beneath the mask, there were no eyes, no mouth, no nose—just a mannequin-like void. Its face was a spiral, glowing with dark green fire that seeped through the eye sockets of the mask.
Neither of them hesitated to move.
Ozma, in the shell created based on his body, struck the ground with the tip of The Long Memory. The earth erupted in spikes, while the air crackled with electricity—both rushing toward ‘The Eye.’
‘The Eye’ vanished before the attacks could land, the lightning bolts and stone spikes missing their mark.
Ozma, looking down, wasn’t startled. Calmly, he let his body fade into nothing, the energy sustaining him merging with the storm. An instant later, ‘The Eye’ reappeared in the spot where he had just been.
All around, space rippled with a crimson hue, while time paradoxically sped up and slowed down.
Snow was gradually giving way to rain, where the crimson droplets, each containing tiny eyes, fell. Many of them flew toward ‘The Eye,’ aiding in its nearly complete regeneration. The being showed no signs of fatigue.
Others blinked randomly in the air, searching for a target.
Hundreds of meters above, though still far from the Starless Sky, the Shadow Puppet’s body took shape in the air. The storm molded itself into two massive wings that flapped slowly, keeping him aloft.
From the right wing, Ozma jumped out, then controlled the air around him to stay airborne.
"Its intelligence isn’t the greatest. But what do you expect from a rotting floating eyeball?" The mocking, delirious voice of the human’s shadow echoed.
With a powerful flap, he shot to the left, shoving Ozma away just far enough that the distorted space and abnormal time flow wouldn’t affect him.
The next moment, ‘The Eye’ appeared between them, its optic nerves moving like spears, attacking with precision.
The eight massive black hands of the Bone Helm materialized around ‘The Eye’ and clutched it from all sides, fingers digging into its filthy white flesh, holding it in place while tearing pieces away.
The hands rapidly shrank and began to deteriorate, twisting and failing, growing more transparent and smaller as the being’s strange divine aura, along with the warped space, suppressed all energy except that of ‘The Eye.’
With one final downward strike, the human’s shadow allowed itself to be carried by the storm winds and vanished like an illusion.
Ozma wasted no time reacting. He pointed his cane toward ‘The Eye’s’ pupil, a flash of light gleaming before a laser beam shot out at extreme speed.
Snapping the fingers of his left hand, he disappeared as well—just as a colossal hand, formed of ice, snow, and Nightmares, crashed down onto ‘The Eye’ from above, while bright green lightning bolts struck it from all directions.
("Light doesn’t blind it.") Ozma reported mentally.
("I figured as much, which is why I didn’t even try. But the confirmation is good.")
Outside, surrounding them, the massive Hallucination Storm began spinning faster, rising into a colossal vortex.
Breaking apart the hands restraining it and ignoring the lightning, ‘The Eye’ stopped in midair. Rotating on its axis, it locked eyes with Ozma, who had appeared atop a tree below.
Ozma’s forehead throbbed as their gazes met by accident. The spot where his left eye should have been bled a black liquid that overflowed, staining the dark gray deer mask.
The liquid dripped unnaturally, with tiny eyes emerging within each drop.
"This body doesn’t even have eyes..." he murmured, his voice pained, disappearing just before ‘The Eye’ reappeared in the spot where he had stood.
Directly above ‘The Eye’s’ form, the storm outlined the Shadow Puppet’s body as it struck downward with the Ice Blade, unleashing a wave of ice that froze ‘The Eye’ solid.
Before the dark purple ice—already beginning to melt and shift into a crimson hue, with cruel, malevolent eyes forming and staring at the human’s shadow—could fully vanish, its insane grin widened, and a voice echoed from all throughout the surrounding storm:
"Das Klagen der Königin."
The frigid air grew even colder, the ice surging in strength. Around the cruel, malevolent eyes, insane and delirious ones emerged, suppressing and consuming them.
Without stopping, the Shadow Puppet swung the Ice Blade again and again, wave after wave of ice colliding against the frozen prison that momentarily suppressed ‘The Eye,’ preventing it from moving or vanishing.
Each strike was accompanied by an insane laughter—one that would make anyone who heard it hallucinate, lose themselves in delirium, and have their sanity eroded.
‘The Eye’ showed no signs of being significantly affected beyond a faint twitch in its pupil, but the laughter continued.
The ice cracked rapidly, time erratically sped up, and the alternating colors of purple and crimson clashed as the space around them distorted, stretching the warring eyes trapped inside the frozen prison.
Rain and snow flickered in the air, melting and refreezing in rapid succession, shifting between deep crimson and dark purple.
Above, the eight black hands of the Bone Helm appeared in the air. Growing in size, eight massive black hammers were gripped by the hands and used alternately to smash ‘The Eye’ into the ground like a nail.
The hammerheads passed through the ice without damaging it, striking the small, wicked, and cruel eyes along with their creator, driving him even deeper.
Around the crater, Ice Dust emerged from within the VoidBag, and Ozma—his left eye healed and normal but his head aching—appeared beside the Shadow Puppet. He skillfully shaped the material before detonating it, creating a massive, jagged, and malformed ice monument that obliterated everything within a two-hundred-meter radius.
Before the ice reached them, both vanished—Ozma severing his connection to the shell, returning to the Spiritual Realm, while the Shadow Puppet disappeared like an illusion into the storm.
Along the inner edge of the storm, mystical symbols and runes were quickly carved and etched into the ground by razor-sharp winds and the claws of the Nightmares.
After circling the entire perimeter, the Nightmares melted into a black sludge, serving as improvised ink for the mystical symbols and as energy for the runes.
“The effectiveness is gonna be shit, but it should help contain the explosion a little and direct it upwards…” the Shadow Puppet muttered to himself above.
Seated on an ornate black throne turned upside down, watching the prison being hammered below, the human’s shadow waited in silence, his left hand resting against his cheek.
After about thirty, maybe forty seconds, the ice prison shattered with a silent explosion.
The crimson moonlight engulfed the entire area around ‘The Eye,’ suppressing the Hallucination Storm and turning the ice into blood. The hammers and the eight black hands of the Bone Helm disappeared.
Wounded—his ‘body’ missing chunks of flesh, dented, partially frozen, and with his pupil cracked—‘The Eye’ stared up at the Shadow Puppet.
Its gaze gleamed crimson as its filthy white flesh stitched itself together with sinewy threads, its veins pulsing and writhing like worms.
The blood rain quickly accelerated its healing, but ‘The Eye’ didn’t wait for full recovery before vanishing beneath the crimson moonlight.
In the distance, the human—having finished his preparations—glanced toward the Shadow Puppet’s position and took aim with his right arm. Above his palm, four rings of purple fire glowed around a white sphere.
Generating a gravitational repulsion, the ‘item’ was launched through the air, tearing through everything in its path at absurd speeds.
Without hesitation, he turned and shot out of the storm, a smaller storm swirling around him, simultaneously activating the makeshift barrier array the Nightmares had created.
The Hallucination Storm’s ceiling briefly closed. Beneath it, a dark purple barrier emerged, filled with thousands of eyes staring at the spot where the Shadow Puppet stood.
The barrier and the storm’s ‘ceiling’ wouldn’t last long against ‘The Eye,’ the Blood Moon, and the Starless Sky, but that hardly mattered.
Above, the inverted throne sprouted two wings and shifted back about six meters. In the next instant, ‘The Eye’ appeared, staring at the Shadow Puppet from barely a meter away.
The Shadow Puppet’s insane grin widened as he watched the being before him charge recklessly, optic nerves lashing out to skewer him.
The bizarre space surrounding ‘The Eye’ distorted the images of the throne and the Shadow Puppet. Time made his silhouette flicker like an old television screen.
Neither of them lost their deranged smiles.
Then, he stretched his right hand to the side and gripped the hilt of the Relic of Destruction, which had appeared there.
Between them, the white sphere encircled by four rings of purple fire hurtled forward. ‘The Eye’s’ pupil never strayed from the Shadow Puppet, but the human’s shadow followed the projectile with delight.
Aiming haphazardly at the white sphere at the center of the four rings of purple fire, the Shadow Puppet activated the Relic of Destruction’s ability. His connection to the human provided the necessary vitality.
He had multiple targets, all minuscule—atoms. But compressed as they were, the chance of missing was negligible. One would be split, or the disruption from destroying a few would trigger a chain reaction. That was enough.
The Shadow Puppet didn’t stay to witness the result, vanishing instantly as he returned to the Spiritual Realm.
But his delirious and eerie voice echoed all around, accompanied by a manic laugh.
“Do you know what happens when you split a uranium-238 atom?!”
Within the Hallucination Storm, the answer came in the form of a colossal blinding explosion that made the ground tremble, vaporized the entirety of the Hallucination Storm’s clouds and a significant portion of all clouds in the surrounding sky with its heat.
It created a secondary steam explosion that swept through trees for kilometers, and an immense mushroom cloud rose, its peak consumed by the Starless Sky, which rippled with the detonation.
In the realm, the Nightmares tilted their heads or stepped in front of those looking toward the explosion, preventing them from going blind.
The demon eyes weren’t so lucky…
For a brief moment, a second False Sun bloomed, illuminating the bloodstained night.