Allen's return always comes with unavoidable changes. For starters, crime drops by around 50% worldwide during his streams and by nearly 90% when he isn't streaming.
This is because, since no one knows where he is, every criminal, villain, and malevolent entity is afraid that he might suddenly appear out of nowhere.
Just imagine you're a thief and you decide to break into a bank where he happens to be (that already happened). Your fate is uncertain. If he's in a good mood, he might beat you up; if he's in a bad mood, you could end up in Hell, literally. (In Arkham, Allen threw Scarecrow into Hell and forgot about him.)
So most people don't want to take the risk and prefer to wait until he leaves for another world.
Another important event is that the world begins to focus on his actions. Governments, good and evil organizations, everyone keeps an eye on Allen.
Allen has already made it clear that he has no intention of ruling, destroying, or even altering the world to suit his desires. However, that doesn't change the fact that half of the world's leaders break into a cold sweat whenever he's around, especially those who aren't exactly well-behaved...
On the other hand, the number of his fanatics is also incredible, whether they are people who want Allen to rule the world, end all wars, eliminate hunger, and turn the world into a paradise. It is no exaggeration to say that many worship him as if he were the savior incarnate or even God.
Considering that he could literally turn time into vanilla ice cream and space into tomato sauce, it isn't that exaggerated. Nevertheless, Allen has refused to take on that position more than once.
This belief became even more firmly established after his conversation with Lucifer, when he realized that his power had begun altering the world simply by existing. Of course, the people close to Allen also don't want him to drift away from his humanity and become some incomprehensible entity that sees life and existence as irrelevant, like what happened to Dr. Manhattan.
If that were the case, Allen would rather remain an ordinary man in the world and limit his current power as much as possible. Perhaps just enough power to destroy the universe or recreate it from scratch. That's enough, right? There's no need to overdo it.
....
The sound of small taps against a table was the only thing heard in the room.
Allen sighed as he stared at what appeared to be a red five-dimensional cube.
This was the crystallization of Lucifer's will, or rather, a small fragment of it, and Allen had obtained it after returning from One Piece. However, unlike other times, he hadn't assimilated it immediately and had instead kept it stored away.
This was because of a problem called Void...
Once the conditions required to leave One Piece for the first time had been fulfilled, Lenalee urgently brought Allen back, only for him to discover that Void hadn't disappeared and was now free.
Allen immediately went to Record of Ragnarok, where he learned what had happened.
It had become customary for Allen to take advantage of time dilation in certain worlds.
Harry Potter, MHA, One Piece, and, of course, Record of Ragnarok all had this characteristic, allowing Allen to leave for a thousand years and return as if he had never left. However, Void was essentially Allen, so while he was in that world, the flow of time began to align itself with Marvel's timeline.
Because of that, when Allen returned to Ragnarok, two hours had passed. That was how long Void had been there.
He had killed Hercules and Jack the Ripper. Apparently, several gods had also disappeared without a trace. Allen investigated that world further but couldn't find anything else Void had done, so he could only be grateful that Void hadn't destroyed the entire world.
Although Void lacked Lucifer's will and the Dunamis Demiurgos, he had the equivalent strength he had possessed when he confronted Lucifer alongside Allen, making him a monster capable of annihilating universes with ease.
Allen had to perform some brief damage control. He considered erasing everyone's memories in the world, but then decided to simply pretend he knew nothing. It was easy enough, since even Buddha, with his all-seeing eyes, couldn't connect that terrifying monster to Allen.
"What a problem..." Allen said as he looked out the window.
Unable to find anything, Allen decided to seek out the only person capable of offering him wisdom, even if he didn't like it, and that person was Lucifer.
Flashback
Once again, Lucifer and Allen met in that room, although this time it wasn't to negotiate the terms of the next world.
"Looking at me with those eyes won't change the truth," Lucifer said with amusement. "Void escaping has nothing to do with me."
Allen frowned and then sighed. "You can't blame me. Right now, you're the only one capable of fucking up my life, or at least that's what I think."
Lucifer took a sip of wine before relaxing his gaze. "That's flattering coming from you, Allen."
"..." Allen felt uncomfortable. He hated how friendly Lucifer was despite the fact that their goal was to kill each other. "Then can you tell me what happened? Why is Void free? No, to begin with, he's me, isn't he? It doesn't make sense for him to exist outside of me!"
The place began to tremble—not just Lucifer's bar, but literally the entire universe, all from a small display of Allen's bad mood.
Lucifer narrowed his eyes slightly. "Relax. Don't destroy my bar. I don't go to your house and throw tantrums, do I?"
Lucifer's words caused Allen to calm down.
"I'm sorry."
Lucifer smiled again. "I understand, you know. There's probably some guy with your face who could be annihilating universes... no, entire worlds, like someone popping bubbles, as we speak, so I understand your urgency. But... rushing won't solve anything. Besides, from what I can see, you can't find him, can you?"
Allen tensed his jaw slightly. "No. I originally thought about tracking Void, since he's essentially me, but he completely disappeared."
Lucifer laughed. "That's good news, isn't it?"
"What?" Allen looked at Lucifer in confusion.
Lucifer took another sip of wine and then gave Allen a sidelong glance.
"For someone so intelligent, you're pretty dense when you let your emotions get the better of you. Void knows you can find him if he uses his power, and he knows he has no chance of defeating you at that point. So instead of acting like a destructive monster, it's safest for him to do nothing conspicuous and hide..."
"No, but even so, I..."
"I should be able to find him, shouldn't I?" Lucifer finished Allen's sentence. He then stood up and walked over to his bar, took a bottle of bourbon, and poured two drinks. He made one appear in front of Allen before walking back to his seat.
Allen clenched his teeth. Even with his current power, he wasn't capable of locating Void, which had him deeply worried. He wasn't a saint or a savior, but Void was him. How could he stay calm if he was committing atrocities? To begin with, none of this made sense!
Lucifer looked at Allen's frustration, helplessness, and misery. He didn't mock him. Instead, he took a drink and spoke with a relaxed expression.
"It's only a theory."
"..."
"Allen, do you remember what happened when you obtained too much of my power?"
"Yes..."
The power of Lucifer Morningstar and Michael Demiurgos created all the multiverses of DC; all of creation came from them. It was practically omnipotence beyond omnipotence, something a human couldn't handle, and Allen had suffered the consequences.
His desires, his longings, his conscious and subconscious thoughts, or even the slightest thing he saw or heard that managed to reach his mind could alter his world. According to Lucifer, that was only the beginning. With each fragment of power, he could go further and further. He would go from simply altering reality to creating universes just by thinking about them. This would continue to grow until he could give birth to multiverses with nothing more than a movement of his hand, and it would keep increasing until he was capable of creating beings of inconceivable power simply by wishing for them... but it wasn't a power a person was supposed to possess.
"Allen..."
Allen clenched his teeth. He knew the answer... the reason Void was now free.
"Void was an entity born from the darkest parts of you. He shouldn't have been a separate entity. That's why your confrontation happened that time, and you eventually accepted him... However, at some point, you deviated from what you originally wanted to be. You felt that he could become a monster, a being without mercy or a heart, and that led you to change once again..."
"But I never rejected him..." Allen said.
He knew he wasn't someone with a noble heart. Even so, he had decided to try to become a better person, but he had NOT rejected Void a second time.
"I know. Void existed for too long, so long that he developed his own ego. He couldn't accept that you wanted to change, or rather, that you wanted to remain a 'human.' That's why he rejected you, and since you were the same being, that caused him to 'disappear,' or at least that's what should have happened."
"Yeah, he didn't disappear. He was inside me the entire time..." Allen smiled bitterly. "Then subconsciously, at some point, I was happy that I had made that decision, and I was so satisfied with my current life that it caused this?"
Lucifer smiled. "Right now, you don't control your own power. This power moves with the slightest thought, and when you rejected Void, since it couldn't eliminate him because he was essentially you, it separated him from you..."
[I knew it!]
Allen wasn't surprised, as he had already anticipated that it would be something like this. A second after accepting it, Allen sighed with self-loathing. "Trying to become a better person, I released the most dangerous creature of all..."
Lucifer placed his glass on the table and relaxed, leaning against the armrest of his chair.
"I wouldn't say that."
"What?" Allen looked at Lucifer, who smiled mysteriously.
"Right now, Void is just as lost as you are. Despite having an ego, it's not that he wanted to be free. In essence, he is you, but he's also trapped in a contradiction. That's why he didn't seek to destroy your world or anything you care about and simply left.
"He isn't seeking revenge...
"He isn't trying to destroy you...
"He simply can't accept you as you are now, so he decided to leave..."
"What will happen to Void?" Allen asked.
"Perhaps you'll know once he finds his answer. But rest assured, if he destroys a universe, you'll find him. However, I doubt he'll do that. In fact, I doubt he even wants to see you again, so most likely he'll keep a low profile, at least until he makes a decision." Lucifer smiled with amusement. "Perhaps he'll decide to destroy you and come at you with everything he's got, or perhaps, on the contrary... he might even reincarnate just to stop being you. Either way, I find it very interesting."
End of flashback
"At least Void shouldn't be a problem for now..." Allen stared at the fragment of Lucifer's will.
Allen was also caught between a rock and a hard place. This power that grew with every world had just created another headache for him, yet he had no choice but to keep obtaining it.
[What do we do now?]
Allen stood up, put the fragment away, and smiled. "Rest... until it's time to leave once again."
....
...
....
A few days later...
A door appeared in an alley in the middle of the night, and two people crossed through it as if it were an impossible illusion.
One of them was Rebecca, who had abandoned her usual style of clothing and gone back to wearing a black jacket.
"Did we make it?!" Rebecca asked anxiously, almost frightened, as if she couldn't believe she was in this world.
Standing beside her was Allen, dressed in casual clothes. He calmly observed his surroundings with his usual half-smile, without any lingering changes brought on by his deal with Lucifer.
"Of course. This is the world, although I don't know if it's your world," Allen said.
Sirens could be heard, accompanied by gunshots. It was a city filled with neon lights and the smell of garbage, rust, and traces of blood.
In the distance, large modern buildings with futuristic flying vehicles could be seen. However, the nearby scenery was the complete opposite. There was garbage in the streets, cheap neon lights, and people, most of whom had some kind of cybernetic implant, looking at you as if they were waiting for someone to blow your brains out so they could try to steal your shoes.
"Rebecca, do you want to visit the graves of all your friends?" Allen observed this in silence and sighed.
He knew that the recent change in his deal with Lucifer had forced him to practically leave his Dolls at home. This was unfair, so Allen decided that the first thing he should do this time was make it up to the Dolls.
Although fulfilling their requests, accompanying them, taking them on dates, or simply spending time with them was more than enough for all of them.
He wanted to do more, so with the help of the system, Lenalee, and his recent increase in power and control over it, Allen had finally gained enough ability to locate the worlds of the Dolls!
This news should have been something good. It was what he had always wanted. However, it brought a problem: many of them had died in their worlds, meaning that returning might not be such a pleasant trip. Even so, Allen decided to keep his promise and return to their worlds with the girls, even if their stories had already ended.
Rebecca didn't answer. Allen thought that perhaps a flood of emotions had hit her upon returning to Cyberpunk, her world.
"Rebecca?"
Just as Allen was about to touch her shoulder, she laughed.
"Hahaha!"
She burst into laughter, which drew the attention of several passersby.
They seemed alert for a second, as if they thought Rebecca might go crazy and start a massacre in a state of cyberpsychosis. But when they realized it wasn't anything like that, they simply wrote her off as someone overdosing on Glitter.
Allen smiled awkwardly. He didn't want to alter this world more than necessary. It wasn't part of his deal with Lucifer, and he was no longer collecting fragments of destiny, so it would be better to avoid altering the world, right?
"I'm here, you son of a bitch!" Rebecca pulled a shotgun from her jacket, which was actually a way of concealing the fact that she had materialized it out of nowhere, and began firing into the air.
The people around them moved away, but a group of gang members wearing red and black clothing looked in their direction.
Allen looked at the men and women. They had glowing tattoos that looked like neon lights, with a roaring tiger standing out among them.
Their clothes looked like a mixture of Yakuza and cyberpunk aesthetics. One had a mechanical arm, another had a bionic eye, and one of them even had cybernetic claws. However, they also carried weapons, both firearms and knives and katanas.
Every single one of them had given up some part of their body and replaced it with cyberware, or what was commonly called chrome.
"Rebecca..." Allen said cautiously.
"I'm here..." Rebecca said, losing all her momentum, lowering her head and letting go of her shotgun. "I'm really here..."
Rebecca clenched her teeth...
Allen knew Rebecca wasn't in any condition to do anything, but Allen couldn't just start unleashing magic and powers that didn't exist in Cyberpunk.
What should he do?
"Hey, handsome!" said a woman with a cybernetic jaw and a punk hairstyle.
"Tch." Allen picked Rebecca up and ran back into the alley.
The gang immediately began shooting at him, but he managed to reach cover behind a dumpster.
"What's wrong with these guys? I literally did nothing to provoke them. I mean, people normally want to shoot me, but only after I do something to them," Allen said indignantly. "Besides, who are these guys?"
"They're Tyger Claws... Naturally, they'd show up. We're in Little China, in the Watson district. It's their territory," Rebecca laughed, but she still didn't move. She seemed to have fallen into a state of depression and euphoria at the same time.
[Fool, you're in Rome. Do as the Romans do!]
"..." Allen blinked before a smile spread across his face.
He touched behind his ear and made a Neuroport appear. Then his hand glowed for a moment and transformed into a cybernetic arm. He also made Evony and Evory appear.
"You know what? You're right. Fuck it!" Allen stepped out from cover and shot a gang member in the head. The bullet pierced the metal plate in his head and scattered his gray matter across the ground. "Sons of bitches, don't you know I'm trying to be a good person?! Now you're trying to make me relapse! I'll send you to meet Skynet!"
There was a brief pause caused by Allen's sudden action and shout, but the Tyger Claws immediately flew into a rage and began shooting.
A shootout broke out, announcing Allen's arrival in Cyberpunk: Edgerunners/2077.
====
A/N: We've been neglecting the Dolls, so I thought it was only fair to dedicate this "Interlude" to them and their worlds.
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