AuthorSME
patreon
TO Rewrite: B3 — 25. Bend And Break
🕑 Added 2024-12-31 22:58:08 +0000 UTCPoV:
1. Rachel Park (Our Lunar Hare!)
--------------------
The void swallowed her whole. The last glimmer of the Dark Djinn and Mirrorverse flickered, its fractured edges bleeding into nothingness, leaving only silence. Misfortune was nowhere to be seen as if she’d evaporated into the black.
Rachel floated, weightless, her breath hitching as her hammer dissolved into motes of light. Then, her blood ran cold when her clothes—Nia—fading into nothingness. Wide eyes opening further, she watched a dark pane of glass form in front of her; her irises were brown.
Her tail. Gone. Her long ears. Gone. Her long, alabaster hair. Black. Normal. Everything was normal. Utterly bare. Utterly exposed. All the knowledge and emotions she’d felt, something swallowed everything…everything as she spiraled into oblivion.
Nia! She reached out instinctively, but there was no comforting hum of her Soul Item. No presence of her Living Denier. Just emptiness. No! No. Nia’s a part of my soul. Intertwined with it! She can’t…
Her heart thundered in her chest as all she saw was…her. Human. Fragile. Flesh and bone. Eyes watering, she couldn’t help the fire crawling up her throat. Unsure why, but her chest hurt. It hurt more than any scream could convey.
“Is this Neil’scera?” Her voice cracked, echoing faintly into the abyss. There was no reply, only an oppressive silence that pressed against her ears—human ears. It pressed against her skin, her mind. “Is this…the truth?”
The single mirror standing upright in the void gleamed faintly, its surface pristine and untouched, showing her. Powerless. Rachel’s throat tightened as it approached. Her bare feet brushing against an invisible ground and the reflective surface wavered as if it were water caught in a gentle breeze. For the first time in what felt like eternity… Her mind was blank.
Her reflection stared back at her, unwilling tears sliding down her cheeks.
Not the Lunar Hare she’d become, not the woman who wielded divine power and broke gods and monsters alike. This was the face she hadn’t expected to see again: her human self.
The sharp cheekbones, the dark brown eyes of her childhood, the black hair that fell past her shoulders, unadorned and plain. Her skin bore no glowing Hell tattoos, no ethereal aura. Only scars—faint, pale reminders of fights she thought long forgotten.
Rachel trembled as her gaze traveled down her body. She wasn’t the towering, honed warrior she’d become after The Oscillation. She had muscle again, bulky and toned. Her form wasn’t as lean. There were small areas of fat. Fat she’d stare at in the gym mirror after her workouts.
“I’m…human.”
She clenched her fists, her nails biting into her palms, and her reflection did the same.
“What happened?” she muttered, her voice harsher this time, weaker.
The mirror rippled.
Her reflection twisted, her human features stretching and warping. Blackened fur sprouted along her skin, her eyes morphed into glowing crimson orbs, her teeth sharpened into jagged fangs. Long, prehensile ears rose like cruel tendrils, and her long, bushy tail lashed, a weapon in its own right. Her hands elongated into claws, the tips dripping with unseen Eldritch ichor.
“Hello, Rachel,” the reflection purred, though its mouth didn’t move. Its voice echoed from all around, smooth and venomous. “Did you think you could enter the City of Reflections without seeing yourself? What, you thought you were…me?”
The darkness behind the mirror stirred, swirling like a living storm. Rachel’s chest tightened, but she held her ground. Strength rose up within her, stopping the tears.
“Nice trick,” she murmured, her voice low, steady. “You’re not me. So, this is your game, huh? Not very subtle.”
The monstrous hare laughed, the sound reverberating through the void like breaking glass. “Oh, the delusion. But I am, human. I’m the part you’ve locked away. The part you’ve run from. The part you hate…and love.” Its eyes narrowed, glinting with cruel amusement. “I am Misfortune. We are Misfortune…in part.”
Rachel took a step back, her bare feet skimming against nothingness. The swirling storm crept closer, the mirror’s edges stretching outward like tendrils of shadow.
“What do you want?” Rachel demanded, searching for anything to stay grounded. Her hands flexed instinctively, but there was no hammer, no weapon. She was alone. “Are you some kind of guardian for this city?”
Misfortune grinned, baring rows of jagged teeth. “Oh, you’ll never see Neil’scera with that attitude. I’ve always been here. You’ve carried me, relied on me…used me, with every step, every fight. You call it strength, but we both know that’s not true. Why do you use me?”
Rachel snorted, crossing her arms and taking a calming breath as the Eldritch vibes cascaded through her. “Okay. I’ll play along. You’re the embodiment of my misfortune, then? It’s convenient to know the direction of things. You’re a tool. I’d like some clothes now.”
The entity tilted its head, hollow eyes of swirling energy narrowing with its smile. “The desperation for control is laughable.”
“What?” Rachel growled, the hair on the back of her neck prickling. “Cut the shit or we’ll be here forever.”
“There it is. Fear.” Her stomach cramped as the Eldritch hare leaned in to come inches from her face within the mirror. “Before you had a face to deflect it to, what did you see? Why the tears, Rachel? Does it scare you to be vulnerable? To be weak? To be…you?”
Rachel’s jaw tightened. She forced herself to straighten, to meet the creature’s gaze, but she was breathing harder. “You’re wrong. If we’re the same then your power is my power. Circular reasoning? I’ve faced everything. You’re a side character. I’ve built myself up, piece by piece since changing. I’m not afraid. Not even of myself.”
The mirror darkened, its surface now reflecting the void itself. Misfortune’s grin widened, the swirling shadows pulling closer. “Is that so? Then why do you feel so small now? Why are you so naked? Where is your power, Rachel? Where is your strength?”
Rachel’s breath hitched. Her hands trembled as the mirror and hare grew larger. Misfortune leaned closer, the reflection pressing against the glass as though it would crawl through. Her pulse skipped a beat as the hare took on a new form, her smile barely holding back vulnerable tears.
“Do you know why you hate weakness so much? It’s because you see it in her…”
“Mom… You don’t get to wear her face!” Rachel snarled, a sharp whip crack in the void. “She’s worth more than anything you could ever twist into your lies. My mother always has her reasons.”
Rachel tried to lash out, yet her muscles felt locked in place. I can’t move? Am I trembling? No. None of this is real! Breathe. Find an anchor. It’s just an illusion!
“Is it an illusion?” her mother whispered, guilt and shame turning her gaze away from her. “Is it wrong to hate weakness? To hate her? The woman who fell apart while your father and brother held her together—held you together. You swore you’d never be like her, didn’t you? That you’d be stronger. Better.”
Rachel’s heart thundered, a sharp, painful rhythm. “Stay the hell away from her memory! You don’t get to touch her,” she growled, her voice shaking as fragments of the past that she’d tried to bury clawed their way through the mud she’d covered them in. “You’re just a parasite. You don’t know what she endured…because I don’t even know.”
The mirror cracked, faint fractures splintering across its surface and onto her mother’s reflection. A single tear traced down her mother’s cheek, a silent scream of effort as she tried to hold her breaking world together. Childhood emotions bubbled their way through the muck, tightening their grip on her chest like a vice at the sight.
Misfortune laughed again, the sound low and mocking. “Oh, Rachel, every lie you tell Scarlet, the family…yourself. You can’t hide anything from me. This is the tarnish in your soul… Why do you think you have no power here? Because you know I’m right.”
More fissures ran down her mother’s reflection, and Rachel felt the openings as if they tore through her own heart. The rifts bled into the void, mixing with her mother’s silent tears, an endless stream of pain and resilience.
“She’s better…” Rachel whispered, her voice carrying defiance as much as sorrow.
“Is she?”
Those two words made her blood freeze, her pulse stuttering as if the void itself had turned against her. She wanted to storm off. Disengage. Yet, she couldn’t. The past coming back in waves she’d tried to shove down ever since gaining [Strategic Mind]. Misfortune ignited a vision: Rachel, splashed with goblin blood beneath the Azure Moon, alive and unyielding. The image flickered, colliding with the memory of her mother in the hospital—doubtful, scared, trying to hold her back.
“I am the part of you that thrives on blood, on power, on control. You fight and fight, but it’s never enough, is it? You’ll always be chasing something you can never reach. That’s good. You have the world in your palm now. You know she’s in your way…not me. Love is your weakness… Love is the death of peace of mind. And you know it. That’s why you’ll never stop running from her.”
That’s not fair… A tear sliding down her cheek, feeling as if she were losing her mind but the truth of it was a dagger to the heart. Of course, my mother would want me to be safe… I’m her baby girl. That’s not weakness… She had faith in me in the end! She let me go.
Her mother broke, the shards falling into oblivion…and she couldn’t move. Rachel’s fists clenched tighter, her nails cutting into her palms. Her reflection—Misfortune—returned in the mirror, loomed larger, the shadows around it spiraling outward.
“Did she? Or was she just too weak and afraid that we’d leave her behind if she did stop you? Fear me or love me…it’s all the same. There isn’t a price we won’t pay for victory…which is why we’re building this empire, and no one will convince us to stop.”
“Are you satisfied?” Rachel mumbled. The icy air bit into her skin, making her shiver. Her knees threatened to buckle, but she locked them in place as she glared at the giant, feeling cold, exposed. “Are you done acting like a stereotypical villain, trying to make me give up my heart or some shit? If you’re me. You know I’ll never break.”
Misfortune’s grin widened, her crimson eyes narrowing. “Never break? Oh, Rachel, that’s your favorite lie, isn’t it?”
She leaned closer, her monstrous features framed by the jagged fractures of the mirror. Once again, her mother’s makeup smeared face came into view, upside down, flashing red and blue lights dancing across her blank face—the car crash.
Needles cascaded down Rachel’s skin while staring up at her mother’s hollow, tear-stained face from her lap. Her aunt’s weak cries digging into her mind nearby, yet her mom wouldn’t let her look, her dark hair veiling the scene. Pain pricked her chest and liquid leaked out of her eyes.
Mom… Did I…make a mistake coming here?
“Breaking isn’t always loud. Is it, Rachel? Sometimes, it’s a quiet shatter…like the way you looked at her when she fell apart.”
“Don’t!” Rachel froze, her defiance flickering as the scene changed to a hallway, her ten-year-old frame creeping through the darkness to peek into her mother’s room. The feelings in her chest weren’t pain…it was anger. “Don’t…”
“Don’t what? Say it? Show you?” The mirror twisted, the cracks spiraling outward to reveal Rachel as a child, watching her mother sob in her bed, unwashed, the room a mess. “You stood there, didn’t you? Pretending not to see. Pretending it didn’t terrify you that she—the woman you thought was unbreakable—was nothing but a trembling mess… Weak.”
“Shut up!” Rachel’s fists clenched, nails digging into her palms. The edges of her vision blurred as her heart pounded against her ribs. “She had the right to be!”
“You didn’t believe that,” Misfortune hissed, her voice curling like smoke. “You hate weakness because you saw it in her,” Misfortune hissed, her voice curling like smoke. “…You don’t believe that…because you would never be her.”
Something bent within her, knees giving way as she turned her head away, clutching at her chest. “Someone has to be strong… Not everyone can have moments of weakness. You don’t know how strong she is…”
“Do you hear your contradictions? Mixed messaging?” she whispered, all-consuming eyes bleeding into view from within the floor. “Are you satisfied? You’ve spent your whole life running from it, Rachel. But the harder you run, the closer you get to being exactly like her. Tell me…do you think she sees the monster you’ve become? Is that why she tried to stop you from gaining my power…like she did to Nam?”
The air grew heavier, suffocating. Rachel tried to push the words away, but they clawed into her chest, ripping at the fragile seams she’d tried so hard to hold together. She forced herself up to take a step forward, the ground beneath her feet cracking like glass as she stomped on the eyes.
“I’m not like her,” she snarled, though her voice wavered. “She’s strong. She’s always been strong. You don’t know her. She knew… She knew and had to protect me.”
“You keep saying that.” Misfortune laughed, the sound reverberating through the void. “Oh, but I do. I know everything about her…and you. The lies you tell yourself. The lies you tell Scarlet, your family. ‘I’m strong. I can protect them.’ You can’t even be trusted with the truth from your mother…to save your own brother.”
The mirror shattered beneath her, shards spinning around her like a storm. Each fragment reflected a different image—her mother crumbling under the weight of grief, her father’s strained smile, her younger self beating her thirteen-year-old cousin into the ground over a simple joke. Each one a wound she’d buried deep, now torn open and bleeding into the void.
“Stop it!” Rachel screamed, swinging wildly at the fragments. Her hands passed through them, the shards reforming instantly with each strike. “I’m more than this! Stronger than you, which is why I’m in control!”
Misfortune’s voice came from everywhere and nowhere. “You think fighting will save you? Punching, clawing, breaking…like you broke your father and uncle apart by beating Soo-geun to the hospital? Three years younger. But you had control…right? A car crash joke. That’s all you’ve ever done, Rachel. Break things. It’s all you know how to do. But not here. Here, you face the thing you fear the most. Who you cannot defeat… Yourself.”
The storm of shards condensed, swirling into a single, massive reflection. Rachel’s human form stared back at her, trembling and bare, cut and bleeding—red blood. Misfortune’s twisted form stood behind her reflection, claws resting on her shoulders as a dark specter, darker than the black.
“This persona of ours is weak,” Misfortune whispered into the mirror’s surface. “And you always have been the weaker link. That’s why you need me. Why you’ve always needed me… Twilight. I defeated her. Seed Scarlet. Relica. Conner. Dionysus. Elizabeth… Aurora.”
“No…” Rachel’s breath hitched, breath coming out in pants, cold sweat slicking her skin, but she forced herself to look into the eyes of her reflection. “No, I’m misfortune. The power is mine… We’re one in the same. Right? You’re just my shadow that I’m outgrowing, not the other way around!”
Misfortune’s fur bristled like needles, her grin monstrous. “Outgrowing? Haven’t you realized your own lie yet? It is the other way around… I am the monster you are growing into. You know it’s true. I don’t bend. I don’t break. I am the creature that even gods and devils fear.”
The reflection in the mirror stepped forward, its eyes gleaming with a cruel light. The jagged, fractured glass stretched, distorting her reflection until it towered over her. The mouth opened impossibly wide, rows of razor-sharp teeth glinting in the dim light, and the surface rippled like liquid as the monstrous visage lunged. Rachel barely had time to gasp as it engulfed her.
Darkness wrapped around her like a vice, suffocating and thick. She fell, her limbs flailing, but there was no ground, no sense of gravity. She was human. No lunar powers. No support from Nia or the deities she’d rallied to her.
Here…she had no power. Only the crushing weight of the void. When she landed, it was sudden and jarring, like slamming into solid stone. Rachel groaned, but not from pain…but the weight. A pressure that tried to slam her further into emptiness.
She pushed herself up on trembling arms. The world began to form—not a world, but a distorted nightmare of overlapping mirrors, each angled and warped, reflecting fragments of herself. This. This wasn’t the Black Moon—a sphere that fed on hope. Somehow, this was darker…deeper.
One mirror caught her attention. It showed her mother’s face—young, vibrant, and smiling. The image flickered, twisting into the tear-streaked, hollow version Rachel had seen after the accident. Her mother’s lips moved, but no sound came out, only the faint, mocking laughter of Misfortune echoing through the fractured space.
“Weakness, Rachel,” the voice whispered, close to her ear. She spun, but no one was there. “You’ve always hated it. You’ve always feared it. Because you saw it in her, and you knew it lived in you.”
Rachel’s fists clenched. “That’s not true. She was strong…stronger than anyone gives her credit for.”
“Stronger than anyone gives her credit for?”
Another mirror lit up, this one showing Rachel as a child, fists curled in fury as she watched her mother cry alone in the dim light of their living room. Her father’s voice echoed faintly, distant but firm. “Rachel, she just needs time. Let her heal.”
“Dad…” Her watery eyes widened further, watching her own eleven-year-old nose twist and she turned away with a huff. “I…was angry she embarrassed me at the parent teacher conference? Dad knew…”
“You didn’t believe him,” Misfortune taunted, her voice like silk laced with venom. “You thought, time won’t fix her. She’s broken. You wouldn’t be like that. Running away when someone asks tough questions or jabs at you…like that teacher did, asking about your grades. And you swore you’d never be like her. But look at you…just as fractured.”
Rachel’s breath came in sharp, shallow bursts. “Not true… I’ve fought for everything I have. I don’t crumble. Sure, I was angry,” she mumbled, watching each fight she had throughout school…each time she got smarter, learning how to manipulate those around her to maintain control.
“Oh?”
The mirrors around her shifted, the reflections warping to show moments she’d tried to bury: her cousin’s bloodied face after she’d beaten him, the tears streaming down her father’s face as he stood between her and her uncle.
It…was a mistake.
“A mistake?” For the first time, Misfortune’s smile faded. “You’ll never be worthy of mistakes. Think back. When did you ever make a mistake?”
Bruises and cuts formed all across her skin, her naked frame looking broken and beaten after the car crash as she saw every girl attacked—the strive for perfection throughout her teenage years. The biting words she launched at Alexa as she beat her to look worse than her, emotionally, mentally. It wasn’t just her. Countless other girls that had to be more flawed than her.
I’m not innocent… I realized that when I changed.
“Did you?” Misfortune mumbled. “You broke everything around you that was more perfect than you… Alexa made your brother happy. Happier than you could. She took your rock. So you attacked her looks, her lack of education, her lack of accomplishment… You were right to spread misfortune to her.”
Tears gathered in her eyes while reliving the hollow ache of her own chest as she pinched at her stomach in the gym mirror as a 13-year-old. She watched the other girls changing into their P.E. clothes, comparing…hating. She moved a hand over her slightly chubby belly, fingers digging into the fat.
What girl doesn’t have self-image issues… I made mistakes. I was cruel. But I didn’t stop. I didn’t crumble like they did. I get better. I got better.
What followed was the spiteful, envious actions—little things that built into crashing waves in their lives—that she’d taken. The smirks and internal laughter she’d have when their perfect bubbles collapsed.
“You don’t crumble, do you? Angry at your own fat. Your mother. Your cousin, being weak, when he’s a boy—a man—who should be stronger than women. Stronger than you. Women are weak. You need muscle because women don’t have muscle… You hate being a weak woman… Hated your mother for it.”
That’s…in the past. All teenage girls go through those…thoughts. I worked out… I got stronger. I liked myself… Didn’t I?
“You think working out fixed you? Learning to fight? That every bruise and every drop of sweat made you whole again? No, Rachel. You just buried it under muscle and smiled in the mirror.”
Rachel staggered back, her bare feet scraping against invisible ground. The mirrors followed her, closing in, showing her staring at her muscular, unfeminine figure a month prior to her transformation, watching a tone, beautiful blonde woman changing nearby out of the corner of her eye—her fingers coiled around her own smaller bust.
“Shut up! You don’t know me… I…don’t know what I want. That’s not wrong.”
Misfortune appeared in the largest mirror, her monstrous form lounging lazily. “But I do, Rachel. I know you better than anyone. I know why you push everyone away, why you’re so desperate to be strong. What do you fear right now?”
Tears leaked onto her front as the wide eyes gleamed. “You’re terrified to be normal…to be human…to be without me… To be nothing but a burden.”
“You have to have power to do anything!” she countered. “Wanting power isn’t wrong! I make mistakes… Yes, I made a lot growing up. I didn’t see it. Alexa was right. I was a bitch, but…I’m better! I am more than I was…always more. I have to keep everything I have!”
The mirrors flickered, showing Scarlet, her mother, Nam, and every ally she’d made. Each face turned away from her, their expressions cold, distant.
“It isn’t hard to realize and admit, is it? You think they need you. You think you’re their savior. But the truth is, Rachel…they fear you.”
“What?”
A hollow pit formed in her gut.
Deny it… Say she’s wrong! The terrifying visage of Misfortune towered over her, unsightly smile plastered with fangs, dozens of swirling eyes watching her from every angle. Why…can’t I say she’s wrong? Because…I don’t know.
Rachel’s knees buckled, but she caught herself. Memories flashed through her soul nonetheless, the looks they’d given her, the apprehension and fear on their faces. “Mom doesn’t fear me… At least she doesn’t.”
“Are you sure? You’re not,” Misfortune purred, her voice a serrated whisper that cut through Rachel’s defenses. “Because you fear yourself. You hate the things you can’t change, and you lash out at the things you see in others. You call it strength, but it’s just your shame dressed up in claws and teeth.”
Rachel’s pulse quickened, each beat like a hammer against the fragile shell she’d built around her truths. Misfortune leaned closer, her grin widening with cruel delight. “You know they only tolerate you because they fear what you’ll do if they don’t. They walk on eggshells, praying you won’t snap…because they’ve seen what you do to those who challenge you.”
The mirrors around her warped and shifted, showing fragmented scenes of her past. Moments of power. Moments of destruction. Her fists clenched as she saw herself standing over Alexa, victorious and hollow. She wanted to scream, to fight back, but the words stuck in her throat.
“You think you’re better than the ones you’ve broken,” Misfortune murmured, her voice softening with mock sympathy. “But you’re no different which is why you keep feeding me. You hate weakness because it terrifies you. You hate those who falter because they remind you of the parts of yourself you can’t change. The parts you run from.”
Rachel’s chest tightened. I’m not…like that. I’m better. I’ve fought to be better.
“Have you?” Misfortune’s laughter echoed, a haunting melody of doubt. “You look down on those who crumble, who can’t shake their chains, but you’re still bound by your own fears…by the fate you can’t shake. You just dressed them up in muscle and control. You call it survival, but it’s the same addiction to weakness that you despise in others. You’re no different, Rachel. You’re one and the same.”
“They…they care about me… It’s not all fear,” she redirected, throat thick and forcing her to swallow. “Scarlet needs me. I have to be strong for them. My family… They’re just trying to protect me.”
“Protect you?” Misfortune laughed, a hollow, chilling sound that was like teeth digging into her flesh. “Now you need protection? The truth comes out… But what are they protecting you from…or hiding from you?”
Trapped in a blizzard, doubt crept into her thumping heart, curtains deep within her soul unfurling. Hands rising to hug her naked shoulders, tremors ran through her frame with every word Misfortune spoke.
“Your mother keeps secrets. She doesn’t trust you. Nam’s slipping away, broken from your weakness. His wife is nearly a widow. Will he live next time when the curtains call? Grace, Aella, and your own sister-in-law…everyone who meets you is terrified…because of me. Because you need me.”
“Stop… Please.”
“They don’t trust you, Rachel. Do they even love you? They’re waiting for you to break, so they can finally be free of you. You think of yourself as a savior… The only one who can get anything done. In truth…you fear what they see isn’t you…but me.”
A wave of ice crashed over her. The mirrors showed scenes of abandonment: Scarlet walking away, her mother turning her back, Nam’s grave, a silhouette fading into shadow. Rachel shook her head, tears streaming down her face.
“No. That’s not true.”
“Admit it,” Misfortune purred, stepping through the mirror again, larger still, to loom over her. Suddenly, a second form emerged from her darkness, reaching forward. Her claws brushed Rachel’s cheek, leaving a trail of chilling pain. “Admit that you’re afraid. Afraid of being weak. Afraid of losing control. Afraid of being alone… Afraid of being the monster.”
Rachel’s voice cracked. “I’m not afraid.”
“Liar.”
Her own eyes fractured, showing fragments of her—the girl who wanted to be strong, the teen who craved power, the woman who feared she’d lost her humanity. They cut into her soul, leaving thin trails of golden blood. Her head curled in with her knees, trembling.
“I can’t…” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “I can’t do this.”
“Yes, Sweetie. Yes, you can.”
Misfortune hissed as a voice, soft, warm, and familiar, cut through her shattering persona. Rachel’s eyes widened as a gentle light bloomed in the darkness. Her mother’s face appeared, not in the mirrors but within her heart. Her expression was steady, resolute.
“Mom? No…”
The image of her mother from her childhood, before the accident. Strong, stalwart, loving…a picture of perfection. Her mom.
“No one is flawless, Rachel, not even the gods and goddesses. You make mistakes. Just like the Onyx Rabbit and the Limpid Jade Hare… Sometimes, bad luck can be good. It’s okay… You don’t have to be perfect to be my diamond. You don’t have to fight anything alone…because your mother will always be here for you.”
The light grew, pushing back the darkness. Misfortune snarled, recoiling as the warmth spread through Rachel’s chest. The shards melted away, leaving her scarred but whole. She rose slowly, her breathing steady.
“You’re right,” she whispered, voice unsteady but growing stronger as she forced herself up, smiling at the child-like image of the goddess of a mother. “I let you become me to escape…or maybe to confront myself. I have been running, Misfortune. From fear. From the truth that I do have fears…flaws. Just like my mother. But I’m done running.”
Misfortune’s smile returned as her form flickering in the light of her warrior queen of a mother, or at least how she saw her as a child. “What a pity… I was so close to correcting everything. Karma is a bitch. But do not think this will be the last time we meet… You cannot defeat Misfortune. I am always here…and at some point, you will answer for your betrayal.”
Rachel huffed, holding up her hand to see dark fur running down her arm in a gentle wave as an oscillation rippled within her core, [Curse of the Wise] and The Song of the Deep resonating within her.
“I won’t speculate on what that is for now. Maybe I am a monster… Maybe I fear not being the monster…being human. And that’s okay.” A jagged-toothed smile lifted her lips as she stared at her mirror. “But you don’t control me. And you never will.”
The light burst outward, shattering the last remnants of Misfortune as her shadow laughed, knowing some secret yet to be revealed. Rachel stood alone in the void, her scars aching—real damage done to her soul—but her heart steadied. The healing began.
The oppressive darkness peeled back like layers of ancient parchment, revealing the splendor of Neil’scera.
Rachel’s breath caught in her many lungs as the vision unfolded before her. It wasn’t a city in the traditional sense; it was a cathedral of light and shadow, built on an infinite scale, where time and space seemed like mere suggestions.
Towering spires of mirrored crystal pierced the infinite heavens, their surfaces reflecting an endless cascade of stars that shimmered with colors her Eldritch-enhanced eyes couldn’t fully comprehend. Rivers of liquid silver twisted between radiant streets, their currents whispering secrets in tongues both foreign and achingly familiar.
A realm reflecting the 8th dimension.
Bridges of glass arched over chasms of swirling void, connecting floating sanctuaries carved with unknown runes that pulsed like the steady beat of a cosmic heart of multiverses. The air was thick, not with weight, but with meaning—every clash of objects carried the echo of countless lives, countless choices, as though Neil’scera bore witness to the fate of all things.
The horizon stretched forever, curving into itself like a serpent devouring its tail, trapping Rachel within an endless loop of reflections. At its center, suspended above a vast, spiraling chasm of obsidian glass, was the source of it all—the slumbering arbiter. A seed.
It floated in serene defiance of the chaos around it, its surface a perfect, dark sphere that seemed to drink in light and color alike. Tendrils of shadow unfurled from it like roots, weaving themselves into the fabric of the city and pulsing with an eerie rhythm. The seed was dormant, yet its presence vibrated in Rachel’s bones, resonating with the fragments of her that Misfortune had left raw and exposed.
The seed’s name in the tongue of The Mist, Melishna: The Flower of Light.
Rachel’s many eyes narrowed. Pieces began falling into place in her mind, rapid flashes of understanding as she stared at it that left her flooded brain reeling.
Neil’scera wasn’t just a city; it was a nexus, a reflection of all realities bound together by the weight of choice and consequence—a counter to Fate. Melishna was its anchor, starved and isolated. A dormant vessel of The Endless Renewal containing something far more dangerous than anything Rachel had ever encountered to this point…and she was only a candle.
She staggered, overwhelmed as her hammer flickered into existence beside her, the Song of the Deep humming with energy. Memories of the past—of Misfortune’s taunts, of her own insecurities—aligned in her mind like stars forming a constellation.
It wasn’t clarity she felt, not entirely. It was something deeper, primal—a sense of what had to be done, even if she didn’t yet understand why.
The hammer’s weight steadied her trembling hands as she flew forward. Her reflection moved with her in the countless mirrored surfaces, each one carrying a fragment of her past, present, and future. Her voice echoed, firm yet reverent.
“This is where it begins.”
She swung the hammer in a wide arc, scattering the black coils around Melishna with a burst of golden light. Her weapon never struck, cracking reality itself…and it shattered into countless pieces, creating a gate right back to the corrupted Fable of Ali Baba.
The energy from Neil’scera converging on the head of her hammer, drawn to the rift. The Song of the Deep grew louder, each note vibrating with power as Ahriman, the Dark Djinn screamed his rage. The black force around the seed seemed to resist, its surface rippling as if aware of her intent.
Yet the shockwave of light and sound rippled through the city, causing a chain reaction. The mirrored spires shattered, fragments flying outward in an endless cyclone. The rivers of silver boiled to mist to swirl around them in a dense film, and the spiraling chasm beneath the seed erupted, spilling darkness and brilliance into one another like a dying star.
Neil’scera began to unravel, carrying the Eldritch entity of The Mists into the fictitious realm of the breaking Lesser Seed.
Melishna’s dark surface cracked, a jagged line splitting its obsidian perfection, and a piercing, resonant hum exploded outward like a supernova. The light was blinding, not in brightness but in depth—a pure, cascading flood of colors beyond perception that seemed to peel away the fabric of reality itself.
The shell around The Flower of Light fractured. Splinters of black and liquid gold unraveled like petals in reverse bloom, revealing what lay within. Tendrils of light and shadow coiled inward, feeding into a pulsating core that shimmered with radiant instability.
An intricate lattice of living energy, both crystalline and organic, rippling with the heartbeat of dimensions. Countless eyes blinked open within the lattice, each reflecting numberless universes within it, lives, and endings. They followed Rachel, bearing no malice—only a quiet understanding of the fragile balance she had just shattered… What she was awakened to accomplish.
Rachel couldn’t breath as she was drawn with the fractured city, Melishna swallowing everything on their path through the gate. The cleaving world of Ali Baba loomed below as they exited above the planet itself, its halves cracking apart as waves of black and gold spilled into its skies to overshadow her moons.
For an instant, Rachel hovered in the void between worlds, her hammer glowing with the combined force of Neil’scera’s collapse and the Song of the Deep’s defiance. And then she moved, plunging through the rift, Melishna’s awakening echoing in her mind like a whispered prophecy as the screams of the Eldritch entity imprisoned within the planet reared to face one far greater than it.
Soon. Very soon. Rachel knew all the power she’d gained to achieve this one goal was about to be stripped…but she’d won. Fate’s cord around her neck would break and two new players were about to enter the game.
----------------
Comments
Opala
😵
