Chapter 50: Chapter 50: Sovereign of the Forsaken

I lay down on the carpet, panting hard.

My small chest heaved with every difficult breath.

So many brutal ends had passed that my mind simply became numb to the terror.

I do not think I could survive another cycle of torture.

My spirit was fracturing into pieces.

The tall shadow, which was repeatedly asking me to let it in, stood in the corner silently.

It was just waiting for me to break.

Waiting for the moment, I will finally give up.

"Chris, where are you?" My mom’s voice was still echoing outside the locked door.

She was walking in a place where I couldn’t go, no matter what I did.

I suppose this is the ultimate punishment for forgetting her too quickly.

This is not real.

I know it.

I looked down at my small hands.

They were so vulnerable, weak, and useless against a demon.

"Chris..." Her voice faded away to nothing, almost as if she was walking down a long hall into the dark.

Another scenario is coming up.

I braced my tiny body for a death I could not predict.

The walls of my childhood room dissolved into grey smoke.

The new scene shifted into my view.

It was a barren, desolate battlefield.

Thousands of broken bodies lay to the side, dead, some still twitching in their final moments.

Right in the centre of the carnage was he.

Azrael.

The same six eyes looked down at me from his throne, sitting on top of the corpses he had just killed.

I was terrified, but the weak, child-like body I had just seconds ago regressed into my older, scarred self.

I stood there holding my sword.

"What is.... this?" My voice stuttered from all the lingering pain caused by the endless deaths.

"A rematch for your ego?"

"No matter how many times you swing that blade and claim a fleeting victory, this broken world cannot be saved," Azrael spoke.

For the first time, his deep voice was not filled with rage or malice.

It sounded tired, perhaps even mournful of the inevitable end.

"Then why are you acting this fast to take over my mind?" I asked, gripping my hilt tighter.

"If the end is already written in stone, why do you need a human host to witness it?"

"A king needs a vessel to carry his burden," Azrael replied, resting his chin on his fist.

"My original form faded to dust the moment your sword slashed my chest in the old world. A weakened, wandering soul is all I have now."

"Then isn’t it easier for me to just put you down right here?" I raised my sword, focusing the sharp tip directly at his neck.

"I will kill you inside your own illusion and walk the waking world again. The cycle ends with you."

Azrael stood up slowly.

His foot smashed the ribs of the corpses beneath him.

"You still cling to the fragile lie of your own existence," he sighed, shaking his head.

"You do not understand the grand joke played upon us both. This is not my illusion designed to trick you. This is a fractured memory of your own soul."

I stood there confused, refusing to let his words break my physical posture.

But then the cold logic hit me.

’Why am I trapped inside my own memory?’ I wondered, feeling a chill run down my spine.

’Unless he is telling the truth.’

"Your soul was killed right after defeating me," Azrael explained, pacing down the mound of bodies.

"Your essence wandered through the endless void and simply stole the body of another timeline. The original version of you in this world was already killed by my hand long ago. You are just a ghost haunting a borrowed shell, pretending to be a saviour of a people who are already dead. Tell me, human, what is the point of fighting for a future that is not yours to inherit?"

I stared at the demon king.

His taunts were designed to make me surrender my will.

He wanted me to accept that my life meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of the universe.

"I do not care about the origins of my soul," I stated, my voice turning cold and resolute.

"A ghost or a saviour, it does not matter. My only focus is defeating the threat standing in front of me, and right now, that is you."

[Dimensional Slash]

The mana flowed through my arms.

My blade formed fully, the energy reaching high into the sky and splitting the grey clouds apart.

I prepared to bring destruction down upon his head, once and for all.

But then, right as my muscles tensed to swing, I suddenly felt something warm and wet pressing against my lips.

Far away, in the underground cave, the real world moved forward.

Melissa stood over my tied, floating body.

She took a small dagger and cut her own palm, then brought her bleeding hand to her mouth, drinking her own blood.

Anathesia still had her head down, not daring to disturb the ritual.

Then, she leaned down and kissed me, forcing her lips against mine.

She made me drink the liquid as it slipped past my teeth.

Melissa pulled back just a fraction, her breath warm against my skin.

"Wake now, my darling Azrael," she whispered into the cavern air.

"From the dreams of what was, to the hunger of what is."

Her words echoed with terrifying power.

"My blood is the salt upon your tongue. The iron that binds your shadow to my soul. Taste the pulse of my heart, the nectar of this hollowed vein."

The cultists around us fell to their knees in awe, watching their true master return.

"By this kiss, I tear the veil. By this red rain, I claim your crown. Arise, my King of Ashes. The contract is written in my life, and signed in your thirst. Mine. Forever. Only."

Back in the illusion, my magical blade wavered.

"Melissa?" I whispered.

The chanting was definitely her voice, but what is happening?

My body went still.

The taste of real blood filled my mouth, linking the dream directly to the waking world.

My connection to the Blood Manipulation skill flared wildly, recognising the foreign blood entering my system and trying to bond with it.

Azrael stopped walking.

He looked up at the sky, a genuinely fond smile forming on his terrifying face.

"Not Melissa," Azrael replied, his six eyes brighter as the real world called to him.

"That is my queen."

’What the fuck is going on?’ I thought to myself, my brain failing to process the betrayal.

"Raviel."