The world—or at least, this nightmarish, void-realm facsimile of it—narrowed to a single, terrifying point. The colossal, slit, yellow eyes of Vhala, the Serpent of Disaster, fixed upon Ares. His body, submerged in the eerie, glowing blue water, felt frozen, paralyzed by a fear so deep it vibrated in his bones. Every cell screamed in primal terror, replaying the nightmare etched into his childhood mind. His mother's face, contorted in fear, her last words torn from her lips, the crushing, suffocating weight, the rending flesh… it was all flooding back now, not as memory, but as a horrifying, visceral clarity, like reliving the moment of his deepest trauma.
**"You… You were supposed to be dead,"** The words were torn from Ares's throat, a hoarse, ragged whisper against the overwhelming, unnatural silence of the void. It was a desperate denial, a plea directed at the impossible reality before him. This couldn't be happening. The monster was dead. He'd seen the pictures, read the reports.
**"How… How are you still alive?"**
The Serpent's massive head tilted, a gesture that would have been merely curious on a smaller creature, but on this scale, on Vhala, it was utterly terrifying. Its ancient, impossibly deep voice resonated not just in Ares's mind, but seemed to vibrate the very fabric of the realm itself, sending ripples through the glowing water.
**"Dead?"**
The Echo—Vhala's essence, the fragment residing in Ares's chest—pulsed in sudden, violent, agonizing agreement with the colossal form before him. It felt like two parts of a shattered whole recognizing each other across an impossible distance, and the resonance was a tearing pain in his very core.
**"I was never dead, Ares Roshin. Not truly. I was always… alive."**
Those words, delivered with an almost casual certainty by the cosmic horror before him, left Ares reeling. Shock momentarily eclipsed the terror. Never dead? The monster that had taken millions of lives, that the world's strongest hunters had given their lives to defeat… it had been alive all along? Just… elsewhere?
Seeing Ares's pale, terrified, dumbfounded face, Vhala couldn't help but laugh.
**"HAHAHA!"**
The sound wasn't the simple mirth of a creature. It was the chilling, echoing amusement of something ancient and utterly alien, something that found profound humor in the pathetic simplicity of mortal understanding.
**"Humans. So… linear. So easily fooled by the cessation of physical form."** Its colossal head dropped onto the surface of the glowing water, causing a splash so enormous it sent Ares tumbling back several meters, the unexpected wave catching him off guard.
**"Did you truly think, little ant, that simply because my… shell… showed no signs of life, that I was gone?"** Its voice, closer now, carried a note of arrogant disdain. **"No. I was never dead. Not in the way you comprehend."**
The glowing water rippled as Vhala's head rose again, looming over him.
**"My physical form may have been destroyed, yes. Shattered by the combined, desperate efforts of your strongest. But my… soul… my essence… that is eternal. It simply… withdrew. Retreated to lick its wounds in the silence between realms."**
Ares stumbled back again, the impossible scale of the creature, the chilling implications of its words, pressing down on him. It wasn't just a monster. It was… a concept. A force of nature that wore flesh like a temporary coat.
**"It is a shame our conversation has to end here,"** Vhala rumbled, its massive form shifting, moving closer. Its gargantuan jaws, filled with rows of impossibly sharp, razor-like teeth, opened, revealing a gaping maw of blackness and dripping menace.
Ares instinctively stepped back again, though the water made his movements sluggish. The scent of ozone and something ancient, metallic, filled the air.
"But," the Serpent's voice, colder now, more focused, filled his mind, "the resonance is strong. You carry a piece of me now, little vessel. And unfortunately, this is the best time to finally… reclaim… that piece. To finally step out of this wretched, lingering form, and into one more… promising."
Vhala lunged forward. Not with the raw speed of a physical beast, but with a chilling, inexorable momentum, its open maw accelerating towards Ares, ready to devour him whole, to reclaim the fragment now nestled in his chest.
At that heart-stopping moment, time seemed to stretch, to slow itself to a crawl. Ares was suspended, directly in front of the open-mouthed sea serpent, the rows of teeth looming like a mountain range of death.
Memories, sharp and vivid, flashed before his eyes. Not just trauma, but fleeting glimpses of… life.
Happiness. The simple joy of a shared meal with Ricko and Riley. The warmth of Linda's laughter. The unexpected camaraderie with Jones and Sylvie.
Anger. The cold fury at his father's abandonment. The burning resentment towards a world that had discarded him. The white-hot rage at Kendrick's cruelty and Leon's mockery
Disappointment. The crushing weight of his D-rank. The fading admiration in the eyes of those he loved. The hollow ache of being deemed a failure.
He saw it all, distilled into a single, agonizing second. 'Maybe… Maybe if I had been a little bit stronger,' the old, familiar lament echoed in his mind. 'If my rank had been at least A, or even S… maybe then… maybe then people would have looked at me like they always had. Like I mattered.'
But the past was the past. And now, he was here, in this surreal, terrifying void, facing a being he had only ever known as a nightmare, in the most torturous place he had ever been, despite having only been here for a few days in real-world time.
He remembered his first, desperate meeting with General Brown. The words that had swayed him, the impossible promise that had ignited a spark of twisted hope in his bitter heart.
'Prove everyone wrong.'
He wanted to. God, he wanted to so bad. To shove his strength, his survival, his worth into the faces of everyone who had cast him aside.
But how? How could a mere D-rank, a failure in his own world, hope to defeat a monster that had taken the combined, world-breaking power of the planet's absolute strongest hunters, the very titans he idolized and resented, simply to end its physical form? It was impossible. The universe, as he'd always believed, favored only those it chose. And he had been, was, one of the unlucky ones.
He closed his eyes. He didn't want to see the horror of being eaten alive by the creature that had killed his mother. He was ready. Ready to embrace the inevitable, to fade back into the bitter nothingness he felt he deserved.
Before Vhala's colossal jaws could close, before the impossible happened, a light shone. Not the dull glow of the water, but a blinding, pure white light that erupted from the void itself. It was so intense, so sudden, that it stopped Vhala mid-lunge, forcing the ancient Serpent to recoil, its massive eyes snapping shut against the searing brilliance.
A figure began to appear from the light, stepping forth to stand directly in front of Vhala.
A faint, almost annoyed sound cut through the air, a "Tch!" It was sharp, human, and utterly unexpected.
"Of all damn creatures, it had to be her" the figure muttered, their voice clear and human, laced with annoyance, as if interrupted during something important.
The figure solidified in the bright light, directly in front of Vhala's temporarily blinded form. She was bathed in soft light, her white garments—the same ethereal white he'd seen in his dream—billowing slightly in the displaced water. Her blonde hair seemed to absorb the light, giving off a soft glow, and the same majestic, impossible wings he'd seen before spread behind her, shimmering with golden energy.
Ares saw her face clearly now, illuminated by the light, and remembered her from his dream in the void. The woman from the island.
'It's… It's her!'
Suddenly, Vhala, recovering from the initial shock of the light, lunged upwards again, its mouth opening wide once more as it roared.
"AETHERA!"
The roar, laden with recognition, fury, and something that sounded almost like a desperate, enraged hunger, tore through the void.
Aethera, the woman from the light, responded instantly. She lifted her hands in the direction of Vhala, her movements fluid and effortless, a stark contrast to Ares's own sluggishness in the water. She spoke a single, simple word, her voice calm and clear, imbued with immense power.
*"Bind."
Just as Vhala's jaws were about to close, golden chains erupted from the glowing blue water at impossible speed. They were made of pure, solidified light, shimmering and strong. One shot past Ares, startling him with its sudden appearance, before whipping towards the Serpent.
The chains wrapped around Vhala's massive form, around its head, its body, its snapping jaws, stopping it dead in its tracks a moment before it would have swallowed Aethera whole.
Vhala thrashed against the restraints, roaring to the top of its lungs. The sound was no longer just immense; it was filled with frustrated rage and something that sounded like… grief? Despair? It caused waves to churn in the glowing water, forcing Ares to cover his ears from the sheer, agonizing intensity of the sound cutting through the darkness.
"AETHERA! How long?! How long do you plan on letting me rot like this?!" The roar was a desperate, echoing question, a demand for release.
Aethera simply looked at the bound Serpent, her beautiful face unreadable, her gaze cold and unwavering. She didn't respond directly, didn't offer comfort or explanation. She seemed utterly unaffected by Vhala's struggle, by its indirect pleas for freedom.
Vhala, the Serpent, seemed to recognize the futility of its demands, the cold indifference in Aethera's gaze. Its thrashing lessened, replaced by a shuddering silence. Then, impossibly, Vhala began to cry. Not tears of water, but something denser, darker, dripping down its massive face. The tears fell into the pristine clear water below, contaminating it, turning patches a murky, unsettling grey.
Ares watched this scene unfold, paralyzed, a stupor plastered on his face. Vhala. THE Vhala. The Serpent of Disaster, the world-ending catastrophe, the creature that had single-handedly ravaged nations and left an indelible scar of horror on human history… that same being was crying? The one who had most likely smiled at the pleas for mercy from its victims?
"P-Please," Vhala whimpered, its voice, moments before a deafening roar, now broken and desperate. "I… I have a daughter I want to protect. Please… Aethera… just spare me."
A daughter? Vhala had a daughter? The questions whirled in Ares's mind, adding another layer of impossibility to this already surreal nightmare.
Aethera finally spoke, her voice soft, imbued with a strange, melancholic finality. "Don't worry. You'll see her… very soon."
She raised one hand slowly.
"NNNOOOO!" Vhala shrieked, a sound of pure, absolute terror.
From nothing, a giant sword of glowing light formed in Aethera's raised hand. It was colossal, radiating immense power, its finely crafted, beautiful patterns somehow visible even in the faint light of the void-realm. It was a weapon of divine, overwhelming force.
Vhala thrashed against the golden chains binding it, the metal screeching as it desperately tried to break free, to escape the impending strike. But it was futile. The chains held firm.
"AETHERAAAAAA!" Vhala let out a final, earth-shattering cry, a sound that ripped through the void, a lament of defeat and despair.
The massive sword sliced downwards.
With a sound like reality tearing, Vhala's head was severed from its colossal body.
A wave, immense and powerful, generated by the sheer displacement of Vhala's falling head, washed over the water below, sending Ares tumbling backwards through the glowing blue. When he finally regained his composure, sputtering and disoriented, his eyes widened in shock. The head of Vhala, the Serpent of Disaster, lay detached, slowly sinking into the luminous depths.
The golden chains binding Vhala's headless body shimmered and retracted, dissolving into light now that the Serpent was truly, finally, ended. Aethera raised her other hand, and the colossal light-sword dispersed, fading into nothingness like a dream.
She hovered gently over Vhala's body, now still, the thrashing gone. Slowly, respectfully, she guided the immense form downwards, until it came to rest on the surface of the glowing water. She descended with it, her white garments spreading around her like petals.
Ares watched, star-struck. A catastrophe-level being, a monster that took the world's strongest to kill its physical form, defeated with a single, seemingly effortless slash of light. If he told anyone about this, they would think him mad. He couldn't speak, couldn't move, utterly mesmerized as Aethera tended to the dead Serpent.
Once they were down, resting on the water's surface, Vhala's dead body didn't just lie there. It began to disperse, dissolving into a swirling mass of red, mystic cloud, radiating incredible, raw power and, more importantly, a chilling, palpable wave of murderous intent. The cloud coalesced, shrinking, condensing, until it formed a single, intensely glowing red orb.
Feeling a surge of courage, a desperate need to understand what the hell had just happened, Ares pushed himself forward through the water, walking straight up to Aethera.
"U-Uhh, Aethera… is it?" he stammered, unsure how to address a being who could effortlessly kill a creature that had haunted his nightmares.
Aethera's eyes—the same radiant blue he remembered from his dream—moved, fixing on him, but she didn't turn her head. A chill ran through Ares, a subtle shift in her presence that felt both powerful and… anciently weary.
Aethera finally turned fully to face him, a slight, unreadable smile on her lips. With a graceful motion, she transformed the glowing red orb—the dispersed essence of Vhala, the embodiment of its power and murderous intent—into a mystic, curved crimson sword. It was the length of a standard hunter's sword, beautifully and wonderfully patterned with intricate designs that seemed to shift and writhe like living things. Crimson clouds emanated from it, swirling and pulsing with raw energy.
But Ares didn't have time to admire its terrifying beauty. The moment it solidified, the crimson sword vanished from Aethera's hand.
'Huh?' Ares blinked, confused. Where had it gone?
Suddenly, a sharp, agonizing pain erupted in his chest, precisely where the Vhala fragment resided. He gasped, his hands flying to the spot, fingers digging into his uniform. He looked down, his vision blurring, his eyes widening in horror.
There, lodged into his heart, was the mystic crimson sword, its hilt just visible above the fabric of his uniform. It pulsed with a malevolent, crimson light.
Everything started going dark. The glowing blue water, the towering form of Aethera, the chilling silence of the void-realm—it all receded, fading into an encroaching blackness. He was losing consciousness.
'What… the… hell…' That was the last coherent thought that managed to form in Ares's mind before he slumped forward, his body falling onto the surface of the glowing water, his awareness extinguished.
Aethera came over to Ares's floating, unconscious body. Her face bore an unreadable expression, a complex mix of determination, sadness, and perhaps something akin to regret. She bent over him, looking at his pale, unconscious face for a long moment before giving a slight, almost weary smile.
"Sorry, Young Master Ares," she whispered, her voice soft, carrying across the silent water. "You'll have to bear this… for now. It is the only way."
She raised her hand over Ares's body. With a shimmer of golden light, his unconscious form vanished from the void-realm.
Aethera stood alone on the glowing water, surrounded by the echoes of a battle he couldn't fully comprehend. She looked up to the void sky, her expression now one of profound concern, a weight of responsibility settling upon her slender shoulders.
'I hope… I hope everything goes as… she… planned.' The final thought wasn't Aethera's own. It was another voice, distinct from the Serpent's Echo, fainter, younger, filled with a fragile hope.
The Void-realm began to shimmer, Aethera fading with it. The dream was ending.
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**Chapter End**