Chapter 78 – The Power of Will
The door vanished behind him like it had never been there.
John walked forward.
His steps echoed softly on smooth stone. Ember padded at his shoulder, claws making almost no sound, silver fur muted by the dim light. Runes glowed faintly along the walls—old script, worn to the point where the meanings were more feeling than word.
Alaric spoke in the back of his mind, voice calm as ever.
"It seems like a challenge realm, Alaric said. Each room has its own challenges. To move forward, you must clear all the rooms it requires.
"So there's a pattern."
"There's always a pattern. The trick is seeing it before it kills you." Alaric said
The corridor ended in two doors.
They grew out of the stone itself, opposed like mirrored fangs. There were no handles, no hinges, only words carved into the surface with inhuman precision.
The left door read:
Will Power
The right:
POWER OF WILL
John stopped between them. Ember lifted his head, golden eyes reflecting both sets of letters.
He stared for a moment, weighing the words.
"Of course," he said dryly. "Pyramid riddles."
"You'll have to choose," Alaric said. "The realm won't move until you do."
John huffed a quiet breath. "I understand."
Alaric paused. If you want the softer test, you probably shouldn't pick the one that literally calls itself power.
"Noted."
He put his palm on the right-hand door.
The one that says Power of will
The carved words pulsed under his skin—once, like a heartbeat. The stone warmed, softened, and then flowed aside, opening into light.
John stepped through.
Ember followed, fur lifting as the air changed again.
The door closed behind them without a sound.
The world that waited on the other side shouldn't have existed inside stone.
Heat touched his face—not desert heat, but soft warmth, the kind that soaked into muscle and bone instead of burning skin. The ceiling above was not a ceiling at all, but a curved glasslike dome through which an artificial sun hung, suspended in a sky of pale, impossible blue.
They stood at the edge of a greenhouse valley.
Grass rolled down in gentle terraces, each step edged by beds of flowers—violet, gold, and white—petals heavy with dew that never fell. Strange trees rose from the earth, their trunks white as bone, their leaves broad and translucent, catching the sunlight and bending it into muted color.
Water ran everywhere.
Thin streams threaded between the terraces, laughing over smooth stones, feeding into a wide pool that reflected the false sun like a mirror. At the far end of the valley, a waterfall poured from the dome itself, tumbling in a curtain of silver down into a lake so still it looked painted.
No wind. No smell of rot. Just the faint scent of earth and some distant, sweet thing like crushed mint.
John stared. Ember blinked owlishly, then sneezed.
"…this is inside a pyramid," John said at last.
John took a few steps forward, boots sinking into grass that sprang back under his weight, impossibly alive.
"I'm still in the pyramid," he said.
Physically, Alaric said. But not really.
John let out a slow breath. "Lucky me."
He walked.
The path wasn't marked, but his feet found it anyway—small stones set into the grass, leading down toward the central lake. The greenhouse light shifted above as he moved, the false sun sliding behind the leaves in slow, smooth arcs.
He passed a tree with bark like polished marble, its branches heavy with fruit that looked like glass pears. Another bore blossoms that burned faintly with their own light, petals shedding sparks that vanished before they hit the ground.
Alaric muttered Places like this are usually gardens. Sanctums. Meeting grounds between old powers.
He reached the edge of the lake.
Up close, it was stranger. The surface showed a perfect reflection of the valley, but not his own body. He saw the trees, the false sun, the waterfall—no John. No Ember.
Ember growled low in his throat, not liking that at all.
"What does power of will have to do with any of this?" John asked.
It'll show you, Alaric said. Just… be ready when it starts.
"I hate when you say things like that."
"Then you're really going to hate what comes next."
A sound rolled across the lake.
Not a splash. Not a crack. More like a deep, distant rumble—the noise stone makes when it remembers it used to be a mountain.
The waterfall brightened.
The silver-white stream darkened at its center, a shadow forming in the falling water. The spray shifted, eddies forming around something.
It stepped out of the cascade.
The creature that emerged from the waterfall looked like the mountain's idea of a man.
It was tall—easily three meters, maybe more—with a body made of pale, corded muscle wrapped in fur the color of sand. Its arms were too long, ending in hands with thick, black claws. Its chest was broad, ribcage rising and falling in slow, deliberate breaths.
It was vaguely humanoid, with a heavy jaw and horns swept back like jagged stone, eyes sunk deep under a bony ridge. Those eyes burned—not with fire, but with a dull, patient gold, like coals buried under ash.
Water beaded on its fur and slid off in sheets as it stepped fully from the falls. The lake did not ripple beneath its feet. Instead, each step hardened the water, the surface turning glass-solid under its weight, then liquid again once it passed.
Ember went silent.
John's hands tightened at his sides. Every instinct he had screamed run away.
"Do not attack", Alaric said. For the first time in a long time, there was something sharp under his tone. "That thing will kill you before you even blink."
"How strong is it." John said
"D-Rank at least", Alaric replied. If you throw yourself at it, you'll die before you touch fur.
"…Good to know."
The creature walked until it was only a dozen paces away, towering above john. Up close, he could feel its presence—weight, heat, and gravity.
It studied him.
Not like prey.
Like a craftsman evaluating a flawed blade.
When it spoke, its mouth barely moved. The voice came instead from the water, from the air, from the bones of the valley. Every blade of grass vibrated with it.
"So," it said. "You've come. I haven't seen a cursed in a very long time."
The words were clear, if heavy. Old.
"You've chosen the Power of Will."
John swallowed. His throat felt dry despite the humidity. "Is that a good thing?"
The creature tilted its head. "You are not the first to walk these halls."
"What does that mean?"
"But you are the first in many lifetimes to step into this garden," it went on. Its golden gaze sharpened. "The realm favors you. Or curses you. It is the same."
John didn't answer.
The creature's eyes narrowed a fraction. "Good," it said. "You understand enough to keep your tongue still."
It lifted one arm. Claws the size of swords caught the false sunlight.
"Then," it said, "let us see how much power your will truly has."
It flicked its wrist.
The world fell on him.
No warning. No build-up.
One moment John was standing on the grass, lungs working, heart beating. The next, something invisible crashed down from every direction at once, compressing him from all sides.
His knees hit the ground.
Bone creaked under the weight. Air fled his chest in a single violent exhale. His vision burst into static for a heartbeat—white, then black, then a narrowed tunnel of color.
He couldn't move.
Ember flattened against his neck with a strangled sound, the little beast's claws digging into his shoulder. Even its aura seemed crushed, flames that usually danced alive now smothered to a faint, trembling glow.
"I can't—" The words didn't make it to his mouth. They echoed instead somewhere between ribs and teeth.
His pulse thundered in his skull. Each heartbeat felt like someone driving a spike into his sternum.
"If you can endure," the creature's voice rumbled, "you pass."
The pressure increased.
It wasn't just physical. It was mental, a grinding force pressing against his thoughts, squeezing them thin. Memories flickered at the edges of consciousness: the orphanage, Revenak, Ember as a terrified cub, Tamara's hand on his wrist.
They felt distant. Fragile. Easy to crush.
"John", Alaric said. "Listen to me."
He couldn't nod. He couldn't breathe.
This is not strength you can fight head-on, Alaric said. "You must endure it."
Something moved near his boot.
A soft slither against stone.
From the edge of the lake, a small snake slid into his narrow field of vision—no thicker than his thumb, scales black with a faint silver sheen, eyes pale and empty as glass beads. It glided over the hardened surface of the water as if drawn by the pressure crushing him.
John's heart hammered as it came closer.
It reached his knee, then his thigh, then his arm. He could feel it now, cool and light against his skin as it climbed. He wanted to flinch, but the weight held him frozen.
The snake's head reached his hand.
It paused.
Then it struck.
Its fangs drove into the back of his hand with bone-deep precision. Fire exploded under his skin.
John's world turned red.
The poison didn't burn in lines. It flooded.
His veins lit up all at once, a storm of molten glass ripping through every channel at the same time. He couldn't even scream. His jaw clenched so hard his teeth felt like they would crack.
Blood burst from his nose first, hot and thick, running over his lips. Then from his ears, from his tear ducts, streaking his vision scarlet. The taste of iron drowned his tongue.
His body convulsed—not visibly, not under the pressure, but he felt it. Muscles seizing, heart spasming in his chest. The world jerked, swam, tilted.
"Focus John", Alaric snapped. The word cut through the fog like a blade.
He clung to the sound.
"There's—" The thought tore through him. "There's nothing I can do."
"You need to cultivate", Alaric said.
The idea felt insane. His body was breaking apart. Blood was leaking from everywhere it shouldn't. Every instinct screamed stop, shut down, vanish.
This is the Power of Will, Alaric said, each word cold and clear. It's not about whether it hurts. It will keep hurting. The question is simple: do you keep moving anyway?
Something in him snarled.
Not out of pride. Not out of arrogance.
Out of sheer refusal.
Refusal to die here. Refusal to leave his crew in this cursed place. Refusal to disappear into someone else's story.
He forced his legs to fold.
The pressure made the motion feel like mountain lifting. Stone ground under his knees as he pushed himself into a kneeling position, then further—forcing his spine straight, hands resting bloody on his thighs.
His body screamed. The snake's fangs were still buried in his hand, its body rigid, as if frozen mid-bite.
John closed his eyes.
"Good", Alaric said quietly. Breathe. "Find your core. Don't fight every drop—draw it into a cycle."
He dragged his awareness inward.
Past the pain in his skin. Past the crush in his bones. Past the screaming, thrashing instinct telling him to shut down.
Into the center.
Into the place where his Light gathered—bright and defiant, scarred but unbroken.
He pulled.
He imagined it as smoke, as liquid, as whatever his mind needed it to be—something that could move, be guided, be turned. It didn't want to come, but his will wrapped around it and dragged.
It tore through nerve and muscle like glass. Every millimeter was agony.
"Good", Alaric repeated. "There was something under his tone now—something like approval."
The pressure from above did not ease.
The guardian watched in silence.
"Good," its voice rumbled distantly, as if from the bottom of the lake. "Now we will see what happens. You will either grow or die from the pressure."
John's breath came ragged now, each inhale a battle, each exhale a victory.
He dug his nails into his thighs and kept pulling the poison in, letting it scour his channels, letting it scrape away everything weak, everything loose, everything that didn't belong.
He didn't know how long it lasted. Seconds. Minutes. Hours.
He didn't stop.
Couldn't.
Wouldn't.
The lake around him stayed perfectly still.
Above, the false sun shone on, indifferent.
Deep in the pyramid, in a realm stitched from someone else's tragedy, John knelt in his own blood and refused to fall.