Chapter 21
Then, these creatures took him to a watery lake to reveal his past after the global Mushroom War. Marcus returned home and didn't speak to me for months and weeks.
Marcus sat in his small apartment, his eyes fixed on the cracked wall in front of him. The sounds from the street seemed distant as if they were coming from another world. All he could hear was the echo in his head—the screams, the explosions, the gunshots that pierced the darkness like the fangs of a hungry beast.
He had returned home after the Mushroom War, but he was not the same man who had left. There was no celebration, no warm embrace, no tears of joy. Only a heavy silence and a woman who had once been his wife, looking at him as if he were a strange ghost.
Elena had waited for him, her eyes filled with a mix of love and worry. But the man who returned to her was not the man she had said goodbye to. His body was present, but his soul remained on the battlefield, buried under the rubble with the bodies that were never buried.
At first, Elena tried to help him. She cooked his favorite meals and sat beside him for hours, whispering words of comfort, but he wasn't there to listen. He was sitting in the same room, but his mind was trapped in other places—in that dark alley where he had killed the first man, in that burning building where his friend had fallen, on that night when he had seen something he should never have seen.
"Marcus, please..." Elena murmured one night, her hand trembling as she held his. "I'm here. I'm with you. Just talk to me."
But Marcus said nothing. He just looked at her with dead eyes. That was the moment she realized that the man she had loved was gone.
Anger began to fill her, her frustration turning into a flame that burned away her patience.
"Do you even care about me?!" she screamed, tears glistening in her eyes. "Or do you prefer to stay trapped in that hell?! I'm here, Marcus! Here! But you don't even see me!"
Marcus didn't move, didn't even blink.
At that moment, something inside her broke. She grabbed the plate of food she had placed in front of him and threw it against the wall, the shattered pieces scattering across the floor, trying to make him feel something—anything.
But Marcus just kept staring into the void.
That night, he slept alone on the couch, while Elena slept in the bedroom, the door closed between them. In the morning, he woke up to find her gone, leaving behind a short note:
"I can't live with a ghost."
He should have felt something. He should have grieved, raged, screamed. But he just sat there, staring at the words, unable to even understand them.
Because Marcus wasn't alive. He had died in the Mushroom War. What had returned home was just a body moving out of habit, a shadow stuck in a war that never ended.
On the desolate, icy side of the island, Detective Karl awoke to a world of white. The storm had passed, leaving behind a frozen wasteland. The camp was abandoned, the tents buried beneath layers of snow. His colleagues were gone, their footprints erased by the merciless winds.
Karl's breath quivered as he trudged through the snow, his heart hammering in his chest. The silence was suffocating, broken only by the crunch of his boots against the ice. He called out for his team, but his voice was swallowed by the endless void.
Then he saw it—a dark shape in the snow. As he approached, his stomach twisted violently. The body belonged to his closest friend, Barren. His head and hands were missing, his corpse frozen in a grotesque pose.
Karl collapsed to his knees, his hands trembling as he reached out toward the lifeless form.
"No… no, no, no," he muttered, his voice cracked and hollow. "This can't be real. This can't be happening."
But it was real. The blood surrounding Barren's body had frozen into a crimson pool, a stark and sickening contrast against the pristine snow. Karl's mind spiraled into panic. Who—or what—could have done this?
He forced himself to stand, his legs barely holding his weight. He had to keep moving. He had to find answers.
With each step, more bodies surfaced—his colleagues, their faces contorted in unimaginable horror, their bodies defiled beyond recognition. The snow was stained with blood, forming a sinister trail leading into the depths of the wilderness.
Karl followed it, his heartbeat a deafening drum in his ears, until he arrived at a colossal cave, its entrance shrouded in impenetrable darkness. The snow around it was littered with human remains—hands, feet, and other severed body parts, frozen and discarded like rotting meat.
His breath hitched as he stepped inside, his flashlight casting jittery beams on the cavern walls.
The cave was vast, its walls inscribed with strange symbols and alien carvings. The air was thick with the stench of decay and something far, far older. Karl's footsteps echoed ominously, swallowed by the abyss.
Then he saw them—two enormous, glowing red eyes, staring at him from the void. They radiated malice, a malevolent intelligence beyond human comprehension. A low, guttural growl reverberated through the cave, slithering into Karl's bones like a creeping frost.
The entity slithered into the light, its form monstrous, inhuman. Its mouth overflowed with rows of jagged, rotting teeth, its twisted smile a mockery of joy.
Karl froze, his mind shrieking at him to run, yet his body refused to obey.
Then the creature lunged, its claws raking through the air. Karl barely managed to dodge, instinct snapping him into motion. He turned and fled, his pulse a deafening roar in his skull. The creature's laughter followed him—an otherworldly cackle that would haunt his nightmares until the end of his days.
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In a distant realm of the universe, where the boundaries between worlds blurred and twisted, a battle beyond mortal understanding raged.
Zolish, the ancient entity of chaos, clashed with Erkantha, the primordial witch. Their powers shook the very fabric of reality, their voices echoing through the cosmic void.
Gabriel stood in the shadows, his eyes burning with an unyielding resolve. He had seen enough. There was no time left for hesitation.
He stepped into the battlefield, his presence a blinding rupture in the darkness.
"Enough!" Gabriel's voice boomed, reverberating with an unnatural force. "This ends now!"
Zolish and Erkantha turned to him, their glowing eyes brimming with fury.
"You dare interfere, mortal?" Erkantha whispered, her voice a thousand overlapping murmurs, dripping with ancient malice.
Gabriel stood firm. "This isn't about power or dominion," he said, his tone sharp as a blade. "This is about everything, Erkantha. If we don't unite, the Shadow Demon will consume us all. You think you have control, but you're nothing more than his pawns.
"I've looked into your eyes—you're too intelligent to be fooled by his empty promises. Do you really believe he'll give you dominion over four galaxies? You are siblings! You must refuse to live as slaves to that wretched being."
Erkantha let out a cold, mirthless laugh, her form writhing and distorting. "You talk too much, but you understand nothing of our struggle… or what you mortals so naively call mythology."
Gabriel's stare hardened. "I understand enough to see that your war is meaningless. The Shadow Demon thrives on your conflict. If this continues, you'll soon realize that nothing you're fighting for has any meaning at all."
For a moment, silence engulfed the battlefield. Zolish and Erkantha exchanged glances, their deep-seated enmity wavering. Gabriel's words had struck something within them.
"…Very well," Zolish murmured, his voice dripping with venomous reluctance. "We will join forces—for now."
Erkantha's expression darkened. "In the end, I will not let the Lord of Demons, Dimovus Tempest, deceive you and kill you so easily, you foolish brother."
She turned, whispering into the void. "Cthulhuoooth, hide within the shadows of his domain. Lurk in his universe and lend him your strength."
A voice, ancient and monstrous, slithered from the abyss.
Cthulhuoooth: "So be it, sister."
Gabriel gave a firm nod, his conviction unshaken. "Then let's finish this."
As Marcus sank into his abyss of despair, Karl fought to survive the frozen horrors, and Gabriel gathered the cosmic forces, the very island trembled. The barriers between worlds were collapsing, and the Shadow Demon's dominion grew stronger with each passing moment.
Yet, amidst the chaos, there was a glimmer of hope—a fragile, fleeting chance that might be enough to turn the tide.
And so, they set forth—toward the fortress of the Demon Lord himself.
End of the Chapter.