Noah smiled at Joel's colorless, disbelieving expression. It was a cold smile, from one who hadn't just won an exchange of blows, but had uncovered the pathetic motivation behind them.
"What are you doing here? You've already been dismissed." Noah commented, his voice laden with cutting disdain. The shadows around him gained more life, writhing with renewed intensity. And then, a subtle but fundamental change occurred: a Blue Spirituality began to emanate from them, mixing with and dominating the previous darkness. "You allergic boy."
The final insult, an echo of a humiliating past, was the trigger.
Foosh!
The shadows, now imbued with Noah's Blue Spirituality, surged toward Joel. They didn't creep; they covered the entire cemetery with darkness in an instant, a veil of absolute darkness that swallowed the starlight and the night itself.
Joel's expression grew more aggressive and irritated, a blind fury taking over. Joel's eyes glowed scarlet red, and flames erupted from his body in one last desperate attempt to break free.
Foosh!
The fire erupted, a personal inferno trying to break through the siege of darkness. The flames flowed and began to burn everything around – the dry grass, the ancient tombstones – but it didn't push back the darkness.
Noah's shadows were made of something more than an absence of light; they were an entity of their own, imbued with the power of the Path of the Door. And, with that power, the Shadow tentacles advanced through the very flames, relentless.
Stack!
The sound was horribly wet and metallic. Joel had his stomach pierced by one of the tentacles, even as he activated his steel skin in panic. The steel cracked under the concentrated force.
The fire around Joel raged in a roar of agony and anger as he, with a superhuman effort, destroyed the tentacle piercing him and, in an act of extreme self-mutilation, cauterized the wound with his own flames and, at the same time, reinforced it by turning his blood into steel and hardening the skin around the new injury, sealing it in a grotesque metallic carapace.
"I am not that pathetic boy anymore!" Joel shouted with rage, his voice distorted by pain and fury, his eyes glowing scarlet red while everything burned around him. "I gained power... And now I am more worthy than anyone else to be part of her family!"
Noah smiled again, but this time it was a different smile. His eyes gained a heterochromatic gleam, the blue and red burning with equal intensity, while the shadows around him danced and space seemed to distort around him, rippling like water under intense heat.
"We agree on one thing, you gained power!" Noah shouted, his voice echoing unnaturally, as if coming from all sides at once. And then, he disappeared.
It wasn't a fast movement; it was a complete disappearance. And in the next instant, he reappeared in front of Joel, so close he could feel the heat of the flames still licking the young man's body.
"But you're still pathetic!"
Boom!
Noah's punch wasn't just a physical blow. When his fist connected with Joel's metallic torso, the impact carried the weight of 100 versions of his own past from 100 seconds ago. It was Historical Void Borrowing, a power from the Sequence Scholar of Yore. It wasn't just the strength of one Noah, but the strength of a hundred of them, all concentrated on a single point in time and space.
The impact wasn't a thud; it was a silent detonation of absolute force. Joel's steel carapace, which had withstood blades and fire, buckled inward with an agonizing metallic groan.
Every bone in his torso cracked, and some shattered instantly. The air was expelled from his lungs in a jet of blood and disbelief. His body was thrown backward like a ragdoll, flying through the burning cemetery and colliding with an ancient tombstone with a bony crack that echoed in the night, before falling into an immobile, twisted heap on the ground.
Noah approached, his steps silent on the scorched earth. He didn't seem triumphant; he seemed... contemplative.
"I must admit, Joel, you are talented." Noah spoke, his voice echoing softly in the post-chaotic quiet. He knelt in front of him, an almost intimate position. From his back, shadow tentacles began to emerge, not in a threatening manner, but as a natural display, like the wings of a fallen angel unfolding. "I imagine the Path you took was that of the Red Priest..." His bicolored eyes scanned Joel's destroyed form, as if reading the marks of his power. "It is said that Red represents 'war' and Priest represents the 'ritualist of strength'. But it seems," he concluded, his voice without judgment, merely factual, "you are still not strong enough."
Joel slowly rose, a miracle of pure rage and obstinate will. His metal skin dissolved, flowing like rusty mercury to reveal the burned, bloodied flesh beneath. His eyes burned with rage, two embers of pure hatred in a disfigured face. He grasped the scorched grass in his hand, and it burned in his fist, consumed by his own internal fire.
"I cultivated this power for 4 years!" Joel's voice came out as a hoarse growl, a mixture of pain, fury, and despair. "The power I conquered—"
"Is useless." Noah cut him off promptly, his voice an ice blade's strike that silenced Joel's cry. The interruption wasn't rude; it was final, like a teacher correcting a fundamental mistake. "During those four years, you only reached Sequence 7. You must have forced yourself enough to use the power of Iron from Sequence 4 as a trick, a shortcut... but..." Noah paused, and his gaze went beyond Joel, to something much vaster.
"None of that matters."
And then, the reality around Noah began to unravel. Noah's figure distorted, not like an illusion, but as if the very fabric of his existence was unfurling.
From the nothingness around him, from the very air and shadows, worms emerged. They were small, transparent worms, but within their gelatinous bodies, three-dimensional patterns of sinister tentacles writhed, as if each worm carried a miniature universe of horror. Tentacles of worm emerged from the void, snaking through the air, a myriad of ethereal appendages that belonged to something much larger and older than Noah's human form.
"In 5 years," Noah's voice resonated, but it no longer came only from his mouth. It echoed from all sides, powerful and beyond human comprehension, laden with the weight of ages. His eyes shone in heterochromatic blue and red, but now the colors seemed like portals to different dimensions. "I achieved more than you could imagine. I worked hard. Even talent is not enough to reach the high sequences."
The air trembled. The light bent. The darkness around Noah deepened, becoming not just an absence of light, but an active, hungry presence.
"Behold." the Voice proclaimed, and now it was impossible to tell if it was Noah speaking or something speaking through him. "A Beyonder of the Saint class."
The transformation was partial, but enough to make reality groan. Noah was partially transformed into the Form of a Mythical Creature. His torso was still human, but his back was a tangle of shadow tentacles and cosmic worms.
One of his arms seemed composed of condensed blue light and impossible geometries, while the other pulsed with a primordial red.
His face was a mask of serene divinity, his heterochromatic eyes now pits leading to realms of pure concept. He was no longer a boy, not even a powerful Beyonder.
He was the incarnation of a principle, a Foolish Principle, and a Saint who walked among men, and before him, Joel Glicker's four years of power were less than a breath, a candle trying to illuminate the black sun now being revealed.
Joel trembled, his body responding before his mind could even process the horror. His flames flickered, withering like candles in a gale, reduced to impotent sparks. And then, something he hadn't felt since the most humiliating days of his childhood: tears welled in his eyes, rolling down his burned, dirty face, betraying absolute despair.
"N-no... You..." Joel trembled, the words choking in his throat. Fear invaded his entire body, a paralyzing cold that didn't come from outside, but from his own spirit breaking before the entity that could no longer be remotely called human.
Noah raised his hand, an unassuming gesture that carried the authority of a minor god. The shadows around him rose, coagulating into a giant tentacle, a serpent of pure darkness and murderous intent.
He pointed at Joel, and the tentacle flew like a divine spear, destined to pierce the young man and erase his pathetic existence from the world.
Foosh!
The attack, however, never completed. Suddenly, a bone sword appeared in a perfect arc, its white, phantasmal blade covered with strange patterns that seemed to suck the light around it. It intercepted the giant tentacle, slicing through it with a dry hiss that sounded like a groan from the void itself.
The sword then spun, seeking to strike Noah in a lightning counterattack, but stopped in the air effortlessly, inches from his skin, as if it had hit an indestructible barrier.
'Sword of Darkness.' The recognition was instant in Noah's mind, knowledge extracted from the vast and enigmatic Gray Mist Library. There were records of other Paths there, glimpses of the Path of the Red Priest and, yes, the Path of Darkness.
A new young man materialized from the gloom beside Joel, as abruptly as his sword. He appeared to be the same apparent age as Noah, wearing dark leather clothes that seemed to absorb light.
His long black hair was tied in a ponytail, with a few rebellious strands falling over his forehead. His eyes were focused, experienced, and carried a weight of battles Joel had never known.
"Joel... You've found quite an Enemy." Spoke the Beyonder of the Path of Darkness, his voice deep and contained. He raised his hand, and the Sword of Darkness flew back to his grip like an obedient bird of prey.
"Jim..." Joel called him, and in his voice there was a new, fragile tone: hope. "Jim, this guy is in the same Class as you! Can you defeat him?"
Jim looked at Noah, who remained motionless, observing them with an unshakable calm, without any change in his divine and distant expression. The Beyonder of Darkness studied the chaotic aura, the cosmic worms, the distorted, heavy air, the immense latent force.
"I'd like to say yes," Jim spoke, his voice remaining firm, but his posture was tense, ready for action. He assumed a guard position, the Sword of Darkness emanating a deadly chill. "Only... He is stronger." The admission came out reluctantly, but without doubt.
"His powers... Are from a Path we don't know. That barrier, the worms, the shadow control... and that immense strength. I have no idea which Path he walks."
Noah made a quick and valuable mental note. The knowledge of the Beyonders in this world is limited. They may not even know of the existence of the Path of the Door or the Fool. They are operating with an incomplete map of reality.
Jim didn't wait for a reaction.
"Anyway, let's leave." He ordered, his voice gaining urgency. "NOW!" He shouted, and in a fluid motion, spun his sword and plunged it into the ground.
The effect was immediate. The bone blade seemed to crack the very earth, and from it, a wave of pure, consuming darkness erupted, not like a mist, but like a viscous liquid of pure absence. It enveloped Jim and Joel in an instant, swallowing them completely.
Noah half-closed his eyes, his spiritual perception extending, but the darkness was a thick curtain, specifically designed to conceal and escape. Within seconds, the wave dissipated, evaporating into the night air as if it had never existed.
The cemetery was empty, except for the destruction and Noah. The Worms and Tentáculos around him vanished, withdrawing back into the depths of his being, and his divine form began to unravel rapidly, the heterochromatic light in his eyes fading as his common human figure reasserted itself.
He stood alone among the broken tombstones and scorched earth. A genuine smile, laden not with anger but with intellectual fascination, touched his lips.
"More Beyonders... Interesting."
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I'll try to bring you the last chapter of Volume 1 today, if I can't I'll release it tomorrow between 4 and 6 pm.