Wait, this is the presence? I asked.
Something thundered into the ground, sending a cloud of rock, debris and dust into the air. I didn’t need to be a scholar to know who this was.
Asterion emerged from within the dust. “You dare try run away from me?” he asked, anger in his demeanor. He lifted his hand, ready to swing down onto us. “The guts you must have trying to run away from-”
And just like that, the Emperor of Dargonia stopped talking.
I blinked, waiting for a few seconds to see if he’d respond but ultimately deciding instead that doing so would be impractical. “Hey, Freya,” I turned, only to notice that the elf too had completely frozen mid-step.
What’s going on? I thought. A warm glow cast onto my face from the crystal and I looked to it just as its bright blue colors changed to a cloudy grey. Heat and power radiated from its insides, growing exponentially stronger with every breath I took.
“Eternal,” a voice called out.
“What?” I jerked my head around, half-curious and half-scared about who that was.
“Time,” it said.
“Time?”
“The time has come.”
All of a sudden, a loud crack echoed through the room.
“Oh my god,” Asterion gasped, breaking from his statue pose. Vibrations and tremors came from the stone, trembling into the air and through the ground. Whatever was in that crystal thing didn’t seem to like being in there.
“Eternal,” the voice called as the stone’s humming intensified.
“NO!” Asterion yelled.
The crystal shattered, the pieces of debris floating in the air as a gentle wind carried them through. Heat surged out from inside it, as though a firestorm had been trapped in there all along.
And then ‘it’ appeared.
A giant wraith emerged from the broken stone, its colors a horrifying gray, its demeanor even worse. It had no form, just a muddle of smoke with a face atop of it. I froze as it moved its head, locking its haunting eyes on me.
Oh god oh god oh god, I panicked and turned around, only to see Asterion stepping away from this.
Just what is going on here? I froze, a terrible anticipation in my mind.
The wraith screeched the most horrific scream I’d ever heard, and its phantasmal form surged into me before I could even blink. Pain immediately coursed through my nerves as my mind lay frozen, washed with confusion. My muscles twitches and my body convulsed, as though lightning and fire were spreading through my blood.
And suddenly, it all stopped.
DING!
Congratulations! By uniting with your spectral spirit, you have now broken ‘The Eternal seal (1/5)’! Stats have been updated. Inventories have been updated. Skills, Subskills and Special moves have also been updated.
Spectral spirit? Updates? What? I turned to Asterion, pain still radiating through me. Anger made its presence upon my face. “What did you do to me?!” I yelled.
The Emperor smiled. “That is your place to tell me, Zoran Diablo.”
***
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I felt like time had frozen around me once more as my mind processed what had just happened.
Zoran Diablo, the name repeated in my head over and again, seeming more ridiculous the more I thought of it.
“It can’t be,” I whispered, too stunned to concentrate on anything else. It just can’t be, I thought, unwilling to accept what Asterion had just said.
I was not the Phantom Lord.
I couldn’t be.
Freya stood silently at my side, her eyes staring at my face, emotionless. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking, whether she trusted me or whether she was going to turn against me.
You’re not the Phantom Lord, I told myself, my teeth gritting in frustration.
“Do not deny your thoughts, Eternal,” Asterion smiled, amusement on his face. “You cannot hide from what you truly are.”
“Shut up!” I punched the wall next to me. My hand went right through the stone, shattering the wall in a split second.
My eyes widened. “How-” I whispered, my voice shrouded in disbelief. What’s happening to me? I panicked. Why is everything different?
“I told you already,” Asterion stepped closer. “You cannot hide from who you really are.”
I pulled my arm back, wondering whether I should punch him or not.
A hand touched my shoulder. “Don’t,” Freya said. “It’s not worth it. We need to leave.”
I dropped my retracted hand and nodded. I put my arm around her waist and lifted her up, bursting forward at top speed. Everything around me turned a blur as I charged, going through three different entrances as we traversed the ruins. I could tell I’d travelled more than a mile within the place and it’d probably been less than ten seconds since I’d left the room with Asterion in it.
Well, I guess travelling isn’t a problem now, I thought, trying to put a positive spin on my new development.
It wasn’t really helping.
I noticed another entrance come up in front of me, this one a pair of double doors that rose high into the walls. Freya touched my forearm. “Let’s stop here,” she said.
I quickly slowed down, sliding a few yards along the ground before I went into standstill and let the elf down from my grip. She held my wrist for a moment and I could tell she was just as confused as I was about what had just happened. I pushed the doors at the entrance open and emerged to the other side to see that we were on a large balcony overlooking a circular hall.
I gently pushed myself against the wall, resting my back on it. My mind jumped all over the place, not knowing which question to even start thinking about first, but the most important one was of course obvious.
Zoran Diablo, I thought, feeling my very mind shake at the prospects of what that meant.
I put my hand in the air, finger outstretched, and held it there, wondering for a few moments if I should do this.
You have no choice, I said and swiped down.
DING!
My Ga’em menu opened up, only now I had a ton of notification icons on my Player menu and my Inventory Menu. I hesitated for a moment and tapped my Player Menu.
DING!
Stage one of the Seal of the Eternal has been broken. Status updates have been made to reflect changes.
Name
Zoran Diablo
Level
518 (2% to next level)
Health
12650
Mana
13800
Stamina
11090
Strength
1598
Agility
2361
Dexterity
1236
Wisdom
3409
Constitution
1265
Intelligence
1380
Endurance
1109
Charisma
862
Luck
200
I looked at the screen in a daze. My mind did not know what to do with this information now. Those stats were numbers people would die a hundred times to get. I was completely astounded by what I saw, and things only went up from there.
DING!
Ability updates have been made to reflect changes.
My secondary stat screen shifted into view.
Name
Zoran Diablo
Race
Eternal
Abilities
Resurrection
Spirit King
Titles
Phantom Lord
Undead Emperor
Resistances
All Arts
Alignment
Neutral
Reputation
Level 10 - “Kings shake in your presence”
My eyes hesitantly moved to my ‘Titles’ section and my heart dropped the moment I read the phrase ‘Phantom Lord’. I knew what that implied. It meant I’d just gone onto the wildest goose
chase ever. It meant Asterion was right.
It meant I was the villain I’d been chasing all along.
That doesn’t make sense, my mind whispered, and I knew it was right. Something didn’t add up here. If I was the Phantom Lord then who made the Valdar who attacked me? Who created those tortured wraiths? Who raised the Desert Snake back from the dead? More importantly, who put the Death Seal in my mind?
It was clear I needed to look into this more but for now, I was just going to stop feeling anything about the situation. My emotions could take the back seat till things calmed down again. I quickly tapped on my Abilities screen, giving myself a chance to read what my new ability was all about.
SPIRIT KING: You now possess total control over all spirits, including spirit-infused creatures and objects. Gain ability to host spirits within yourself. Other effects unknown.
Host spirits within myself? I blinked.
DING!
You have obtained a new skill: Dark Arts. The domain of darkness is a familiar old friend. Attack increased by +200% in darkness. Agility increased by +150% in darkness. Increased resistance to all forms of magic. Max damage of Dark Arts spells increased by +100% in darkness.
You have obtained a new skill: Death Arts. The Undead will rise for their Emperor once again. Attack increased by +5% with every one-hit K.O landed. All stats temporarily increased by +50% in the presence of mass death. Increased resistance to all forms of magic. Max damage of Death Arts spells increased by +100% in the presence of mass death.
You have obtained a new skill: Chain Casting. One can never cast too many spells at once. You can now simultaneously cast multiple spells of different kinds. While activating the skill, the mana cost of each spell is temporarily multiplied by the number of spells being simultaneously cast at that moment.
My eyes turned away from the screen, looking at the moon elf sitting next to me, watching as she gazed upon the floor with no clear intentions. Thoughts wrung my mind, wondering if this was her way of rejecting me, if my new-found identity meant our relationship was going to end.
“I will not judge you, Zoran,” she said, her eyes still looking at the floor. “I have not known you for long, but I trust you. I don’t care if you really are the Phantom Lord. I will give you one chance to show me you are not the man the ancient scriptures claim you to be.”
My heart lifted, the warmth of happy thoughts seeping into my mind. “Thank you, Freya,” I said.
The sound of steps came from beneath me, the sharp sound echoing off the circular walls of the room. I could tell it was coming from a small group of people, but I didn’t know how many since I didn’t want to look over and expose my location.
“Eternal,” Asterion’s voice sounded. “I know you’re in here. You can hear me can’t you?”
I kept silent, pushing my back against the wall, trying to hide from sight as much as I could. A part of me didn’t want to be a part of this silent conversation, but a part of me also did, and so I struggled for a few seconds, wondering if I should just make a break for it and ignore him.
“You know, Zoran,” he chuckled. “It’s quite funny how things turned out.”
Sure, I mumbled to myself.
“I do feel bad for you though, Eternal,” he said. “To go through so much, thinking you’d find your oppressor, and then finding out you’re the worst kind of man to have walked this lands since existence - that’s a harsh thing to deal with.”
Don’t you sympathize with me, I thought, controlling myself from yelling the words out at him. Freya reached out and touched my hand, her fingers gripping my palm. I felt her warmth on my skin, her gentle caress soothing me. I looked at her smiling face, calming myself down a little.
“You must be wondering why I am here, young man,” Asterion said. “There are many questions you probably have, and I will answer them. Whether you like it or not.”
I don’t like it, I thought.
“First. That seal that you have,” he began. “The seal of the Eternal, is from the greatest sealing magic ever know. That seal is a soul-seal, meaning a spirit’s very essence was used and manipulated to create it. Your seal is however quite special,” he chuckled.
I heard footsteps move away from me as Asterion walked around the room. “You see Zoran, as the Phantom Lord you were not the nicest of people. Actually, as far as niceness went, you were pretty much the last one on the list. Any list actually. But that wasn’t surprising given you also had one of the worst anger displays ever.”
What? I blinked. That didn’t sound like me at all, but then again, maybe it wasn’t supposed to.
“You went on a rampage a few millenia ago,” Asterion said. “You started levelling towns and cities, sending some people to the afterlife, and using the rest in your own undead army.”
He paused for a second. “Things…got worse when you started attacking the cities and towns overseen by the people who called you allies. No one knew what went wrong, and so thought that you had gone senile. You were ready to take down the entire continent when the Eternals finally came together to try and stop you.”
Wow, I thought to myself, his statement leaving me a little stunned. I realized how strong the Phantom Lord really was, and that only made me feel more conflicted about everything that had just happened.”
“In their panic to calm you down, the Eternals did what they could do; they put a seal on you,” he said. “Unfortunately, those idiots didn’t realize that your power was too strong to put you under a seal, and so you broke your restraint mere seconds after it was imposed you. Moreover, your anger at your own kind turning against you was not a fun thing to deal with. And so, your rampages got even more hectic and destructive.”
That’s unlucky, I thought quietly, my mind drawn into his story even though I didn’t want it to be.
“You see, Eternal, you are what I would call, the biggest danger to the world,” Asterion said. “And so, the Eternals came up with the greatest solution they had. A soul seal.”
My eyes widened, my mind already catching up to what he was going to say.
“The Seal of the Eternal that you have? It was made from the lives of every last Eternal alive in your time.”
No, I blinked. No no no no.
I didn't want to accept what he said. Was I the one who made them all disappear? I asked myself, but I was quite certain the answer to that was something I knew and didn't want to accept.
“You always called me a monster, Zoran,” Asterion said, his voice headed in my direction. “But you’re the true monster here.”
The words sunk right into me, stronger than any weapon I’d ever felt, harsher than when the wolves tore my very being.
“Don’t believe him, Diablo,” a voice spoke. “You’re not a monster.”
My eye widened. You’re the voice from before, I said, images of the Valdar massacre and the Golem attack quickly appearing before me.
The space in front of me darkened for a moment and turned completely black the next. The faint lashes of wind that I’d felt before stopped abruptly. I felt like I was trapped in a box. A box of darkness.
“I am indeed the voice you’ve been hearing all along,” the voice said. An orb of light emerged in front of me, glowing bright as it took the shape of a featureless humanoid. “Took a while until I could finally meet you, Zoran Diablo,” he said. “You may call me Nyx.”
“Nyx,” I said softly, no longer watching my voice now that we were here, wherever ‘here’ was. I looked up and around, seeing nothing but darkness for as far as my gaze could go in every direction I could see. I turned to the humanoid. “Where are we?” I asked.
“Your Spirit Space,” he said. ‘It’s where the spirits from your Spirit King Ability are stored.”
“Wait,” I blinked. “So you’re a spirit that’s in me then? I’m your host?”
“Of course,” he smiled. “It is understandable you are confused since your memories are now lost. But I, as Nyx, am the spirit that has always stayed with you
in your Spirit Space.”
“My memories,” my eyes widened. With everything that’d happened, I’d completely forgotten about that. My heart raced as I thought of how I’d broken the first stage of the Seal of the Eternal. Did that mean I was slowly going to start getting my memories back?
“Indeed,” Nyx said. “Apologies for reading your thoughts, but your memories have been manipulated because of the Soul Seal. They will slowly come back to you as you break the seal further.”
“I see,” I said, my voice a tad flat, but my heart beating like a drum. My memories would finally come back to me. I’ll finally know who I am, I thought.
And then my mind went silent, realizing I already did know who I was now. It was just that I wasn’t sure I liked it.
Nyx chuckled. “It is easy to feel conflicted based on what other people tell you about the Phantom Lord, Diablo,” he said. “I will however tell you this. Scriptures change over time. Experience doesn’t. I have known you since you existed, Eternal. You are not a villain.”
“Maybe,” I said softly.
“It seems you are confused about something else as well.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Is it about the Valdar and the Tortured wraiths?”
I nodded. “For the longest time it seemed like the Phantom Lord was coming after me,” I said. “So it just makes things confusing to learn that I’m the Phantom Lord.”
“There is a simple explanation for that,” Nyx said. “When you were constrained by a soul seal, the seal split your spirit into five parts, or spectral spirits, hence a five-part seal. Asterion seems to have managed to summon one of these spectral spirits of yours through that mass sacrifice of his.”
The Eternal: Awakening - A LitRPG Saga (World of Ga'em Book 1) Page 21
