Territorial Domain, Fifth Layer: Wrath.
Anakin Skywalker's consciousness surfaced from chaos like a drowning man bursting through water.
His long fingers dug into the scorching, charred earth, tiny beads of blood seeping between them. The soil here reeked of sulfur—each grain of sand sharp as a quenched blade.
"Where... am I?"
The "young" Jedi pushed himself upright, the hem of his brown robe instantly catching tiny flames.
He instinctively smothered the embers—only to hear the clinking of chains around his wrists.
Anakin looked down and realized he was completely cut off from the Force. The shackles on his wrists shimmered with dark red Han-script runes—seals that clearly suppressed the Force.
As his vision slowly adjusted, the veins on Anakin's forehead began to throb.
The horizon rippled with heat distortions, and the sky overhead resembled an inverted ocean of blood, roiling with nauseating crimson vortices.
Countless "sinners" rolled in the sea of flames:
Some were dragged by iron chains driven through their collarbones, leaving trails of blackened scorch marks behind them;
Others were nailed to burning bronze pillars, their flesh sizzling audibly;
Still more thrashed like beasts, clawing each other's eye sockets with broken fingers and tearing into one another's rotting entrails with their teeth.
"No!"
Anakin stumbled backward—his heel landing on something slick and sticky.
He looked down, twisted around—
!!
He saw half a human face, frozen in an expression of terror—the "sinner" had been severed at the waist, and his intestines writhed like a living thing, slithering toward Anakin's ankle.
Boom. Boom.
Just then, heavy metallic thuds echoed from the smoke-filled distance.
Twelve giants clad in black iron powered armor emerged through fire. Their armor was etched with burning runes of judgment, each step leaving a foot-deep imprint in the molten ground.
From beneath helmets shaped like flaming skulls came electronically distorted, grim declarations:
"Cowards—into the furnace."
At that, Anakin looked up and saw the giants lifting still-conscious sinners by the fist, tossing them like rag dolls into the boiling lava rivers.
One wretch clung desperately to the enforcer's armored arm, only to explode upon touching the magma. His fat ignited into green ghost-flames across the river's surface.
Seeing this, Anakin's body moved before his mind could catch up—his right hand shot to his waist, fingers splayed in a summoning gesture.
A motion he'd repeated countless times, always feeling the familiar weight and heat of his lightsaber.
But this time, his palm closed on burning nothingness.
"..."
Anakin's voice caught in his throat.
He clenched and unclenched his fist in disbelief, but couldn't feel even the faintest ripple of the Force.
It was like going blind—or being cast into a vacuum.
The connection he had always known, as natural as breath since youth, had been severed by something older, something deeper, something horrifying beyond comprehension.
His temple pulsed with pain; the sweat on his skin was instantly evaporated by the heat, crystallizing into salty frost.
Step... Step...
Heavy footsteps fell like funeral bells on the lava-stained earth.
Anakin looked up sharply—and saw beneath the burning sky a towering figure in black-gold armor walking toward him.
The giant was over 5.5 meters tall, his pauldrons wrapped in rune-engraved chains that slithered like living serpents. Every step he took caused ripples in the magma beneath him.
But it was the eyes that suffocated all thought—like twin stars imprisoned in a skull, blazing gold and leaving retinal burn trails across the air.
Anakin could almost hear the microscopic sounds of his own eyes dying under the brilliance.
"Hhh—"
He forced himself into the Jedi meditative breath—but the sulfurous air scorched his lungs.
Cough—Cough—
He fell to one knee, coughing, yet never taking his eyes off the approaching titan.
Though the Force was gone, his battle-honed instincts screamed: this was the maker of this "hell," the reason he had been cast into it.
The giant stopped ten paces away.
"Welcome," the giant's voice did not come through air—it vibrated directly through Anakin's mind. "Anakin Skywalker."
Hearing his name from that terrible being's lips, Anakin felt a web greater than the Force tightening around his fate.
He reached for a weapon that wasn't there—only to hear the giant chuckle.
The laugh triggered columns of flame to erupt ten meters high from the magma.
"Who are you? Why am I—"
His question was cut off by a thunderous voice.
The giant—no, the Emperor of Mankind, Samuel Young—erupted in a golden blaze so brilliant it dimmed the lava itself.
He looked down upon the kneeling Jedi, each plate of his armor ringing like an ancient battle hymn in the sulfur wind.
"I am ruler of the Human Imperium," the voice imprinted itself directly onto reality. "You may call me the Emperor.
Or—" his blazing eyes narrowed, "you may call me nothing at all."
Anakin felt his throat tighten.
The Emperor lifted a massive energy-wrapped hand—and the magma surged skyward.
"You stand upon the fifth layer of hell: Wrath." As he spoke, the swirling blood clouds above formed countless twisted human faces. "From this day forward, you shall serve your sentence here—until your sins are absolved."
Sins.
The word pierced Anakin's heart like a lightsaber.
He instinctively looked down at his hands.
Though empty now, in his memory they dripped with the blood of Jedi younglings. As Darth Vader, he had hunted the Jedi to extinction, served the evil of the Empire—yes, those crimes were real.
"I accept judgment," Anakin rasped, ready to endure eternal torment.
But the Emperor raised his hand.
With a motion, the fabric of space and time tore—
Anakin's temples throbbed, and a flood of alien memories poured into his mind like molten lead.
He saw another version of himself—eyes glowing red, body engraved with chaos runes, slaughtering civilians on Coruscant with lightsabers, Force, and chaos sorcery.
The screams were too real. He smelled evaporated blood, heard bones shatter in kinetic fields.
The rituals were worse.
The corrupted version of himself offered infants to whispering dark gods—each massacre bringing new blessings and power.
"No! That's not real!"
Anakin collapsed, fingernails digging into molten rock.
The pain was worse than physical—because deep down, he knew: that was him in another timeline. That was what he could have become—a puppet of Chaos.
"Anakin."
A voice broke through like sunlight through storm clouds. Anakin trembled.
He looked up—and through sulfur smoke and hellfire, saw a familiar figure.
Obi-Wan Kenobi still wore his worn Jedi robes, but now he was bathed in a soft golden light, as if his whole being was woven of heaven's radiance. Even his wrinkles glowed with serenity.
"M-Master?"
Anakin's voice cracked. He stumbled forward—then froze.
Memories surged.
He remembered his corrupted hands piercing Obi-Wan's chest. He remembered how their final clash ended in an explosion that seemingly obliterated his master.
But—
"Ha,"
Obi-Wan smiled—that smile Anakin remembered from long ago. The wound on his chest was no longer gruesome, but a glowing golden scar.
"I forgive you, my dear friend."
The old Jedi Master's voice carried peace beyond life and death. "The Emperor granted me eternal rest in the sanctuary of paradise—and let me return to see you one last time."
Anakin dropped to his knees. His tears sizzled to vapor as they hit the burning ground. "I don't deserve—my sins are unforgivable—"
"No, Anakin."
Obi-Wan gently raised his hand.
The purgatory around them distorted, revealing the deeper truth:
Four horrific shadows—strings tangled around Anakin's fate—these were the four Chaos Gods, pulling his every move.
"See clearly now? You thought you chose—but actually…"
The vision shifted back to the Coruscant massacre. Anakin saw it: his eyes glowed with an inhuman violet-red light.
Obi-Wan's image grew faint, but his voice strengthened.
"The Emperor brought you to this purgatory not just for punishment—but to offer you a chance to purge the corruption."
He pointed to the boiling lava. "Leap—let it be your baptism."
As he faded, the old Jedi left one last gift—
A blue-glowing kyber crystal floated gently into Anakin's palm. The core of Obi-Wan's lightsaber, now pulsing like a heartbeat.
"Remember, a true Jedi is never completely lost to darkness. This time… don't let Chaos win, my beloved Padawan."
He vanished into golden light—but the kyber crystal shone brighter.
Anakin looked at the molten river—and for the first time in hell, felt…
Hope.
"Your children still live in the real universe."
The Emperor's voice rang like an ancient bell across purgatory.
With a gesture, a hologram-like vision unfolded before Anakin.
Luke Skywalker—currently aboard a Valiant-class dreadnought, his youthful face determined, mid-jump with the fleet.
Leia Organa—standing confidently in the Yavin IV council chamber, debating Dorne with the poise of a seasoned politician.
Anakin's breath caught.
He reached out, trembling—to touch what seemed impossible. His bloodline lived on.
Not only did he have a son and daughter—he saw Owen was safe, too. For the first time in years, warmth filled the fallen Jedi's heart.
"They… grew up."
His voice broke. Tears finally fell.
The vision shifted again.
He saw the future Luke, clad in Jedi Master robes, teaching new students in a rebuilt temple;
Leia, dressed in the uniform of an Imperial official, working to give her citizens better lives than any outer rim system.
"This is a possible future," the Emperor said. "But only if you complete the purification. Only if you atone."
Anakin took a deep breath—the sulfur didn't choke him now. It clarified him.
He looked down at the kyber crystal—it resonated with the image of Luke, glowing brighter.
"What must I do?" he asked, eyes meeting the Emperor's blazing stare.
The Emperor didn't answer—he simply looked at the magma river.
But this time, Anakin saw not punishment, but a holy spring of rebirth.
He clenched the kyber crystal, stepped toward the lava—not to die, but to be reborn.
When the molten flow engulfed him, the fifth circle of hell trembled.
Golden ripples spread across the sulfur sea—another mighty soul had made an eternal covenant with the Emperor's domain.
The Chosen One had shed Chaos's corruption in the fires of purgatory—and begun a new life as the Gatekeeper of Hell.
The Emperor watched the settling lava. A flicker of satisfaction danced in his burning eyes.
Unlike Fulgrim of the Warhammer 40k universe—whose fall to corruption was absolute—Anakin was still of his bloodline, redeemable through a rebuilt bond.
He required a subtler touch—but that very resistance made his soul all the more valuable.
Deep within the magma, a blue outline began to form—Anakin's new body.
It would retain his affinity with the Force, infused now with the essence of hell. His eyes would see the sins of the soul, and his blade—recast from kyber—would serve as a weapon of purification.
Meanwhile, the soul of Obi-Wan Kenobi, resting in the realm of heaven, had formed a gentler pact with the Emperor.
When the final battle against Chaos comes, the master and apprentice will each stand on opposite shores—Obi-Wan for heaven, Anakin for hell—two cursed warriors fated to counterbalance and complete each other, like the light and dark sides of the Force.
The Emperor turned away, his black-gold armor reflecting the lava's crimson glow.
Behind him, the sound of chains echoed faintly—Anakin was beginning his new duty: judging the souls fallen into this realm.
And from the realm of heaven, came the whisper of Obi-Wan teaching the honored dead.
Two souls once locked in mortal combat, now reborn as twin pillars guarding the fabric of reality.
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Surgical Fruit in the American Comics Universe (Chapter 1422)
American Detective: From TV Rookie to Seasoned Cop (Chapter 1452)
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I Am Hades, The Supreme GOD of the Underworld!(Chapter 570)
Reborn as Humanity's Emperor Across the Multiverse (Chapter 703)
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