The laboratory hummed with cold efficiency, the fluorescent lights flickering overhead, the low drone of machinery, and the distant murmur of scientists monitoring banks of screens. Rows of reinforced cells lined the walls, each holding mutant test subjects trapped in suspended misery. Tubes fed into them, electrodes monitored their vitals, and cameras recorded every twitch, every breath.
The air was sterile, thick with antiseptic and dread.
In one corner, guards in tactical gear paced with weary vigilance, rifles slung but ready, eyes scanning every shadow.
Suddenly, the sterile calm shattered.
Without warning, a figure materialized in the center of the room shadows coalescing into form, darkness folding upon itself. All For One stood there, as if summoned by the fear etched into the very walls.
The guards reacted instantly, weapons snapping up in reflex, rifles aimed and fingers tightening on triggers.
But before a single shot rang out, a sound filled the chamber, raw, piercing, and unnatural.
A sonic scream tore through the air, crashing against the guards' ears like a tidal wave of sound. Their faces twisted in agony as disorientation flooded their senses. Guns slipped from their grasp, clattering uselessly to the floor.
Taking advantage of the chaos, All For One's skin shimmered, transforming into a gleaming diamond-like armor that caught the harsh lights, reflecting cold and unyielding.
He moved with swift, deliberate force—reaching out with psychic energy that surged invisibly through the room, crashing into the minds of both soldiers and scientists alike. Thoughts faltered, muscles seized, and consciousness faded as the psychic block overwhelmed them.
One by one, bodies crumpled, falling into stunned silence.
But the victory was brief.
With a low growl, All For One flexed his strength—unnatural and immense. His armored fists crashed into the reinforced doors, splintering steel and shattering locks with brutal ease. The doors gave way with a deafening groan, setting off blaring alarms that pierced the sterile silence.
From the corridors beyond, more soldiers poured in, rifles raised and ready to strike.
But All For One was no mere target.
His diamond skin deflected bullets with a metallic hiss, each round bouncing harmlessly off his impervious armor. When the enemy closed in, he met them with crushing blows—necks snapped beneath his grip, bodies dropped like broken dolls.
The corridor echoed with the clash of violence as All For One advanced.
Suddenly, from the cells lining the hall, desperate voices erupted. Mutants banged on their cages, shouting, pleading for freedom, their rage and fear palpable.
Without hesitation, All For One unleashed a psychic probe—an invisible shockwave that rippled through the minds of the prisoners, silencing their cries as unconsciousness claimed them one by one.
But the assault had not gone unnoticed.
More soldiers stormed the hallway, weapons blazing.
With a fierce hiss, All For One combined two of his powers—his insect-like wings unfurling with a terrifying grace, while from his mouth spat a searing wave of acidic plasma, charged by his sonic scream. The acidic roar tore through the ranks of soldiers, melting armor and flesh alike, disintegrating all who dared approach.
The acrid stench of burning flesh and acid filled the air.
Wings beating, he took to the air, rising above the carnage with effortless power. His eyes locked on the main control room at the corridor's end. Where the man named Stryker stood, waiting.
The final confrontation was near.
Far above the chaos below, Colonel William Stryker stood rigid inside the dim glow of the main control room. His eyes, cold and unyielding, scanned the flickering monitors that displayed every corridor, every cell, every desperate moment unfolding in real time.
The alarms blared like war horns, red lights strobing against the sterile walls. His hands tightened around the console, fingers tapping a steady rhythm, calculated, controlled.
They had thought this place secure. Thought it sealed and forgotten. But the impossible had come crawling back from the abyss.
He had heard the reports. The broken communication. The lost recon team. The brutal efficiency of the intruder.
And now, through the glass, he saw him.
A shadow soaring above the corridor wings unfurled like dark storm clouds, acid flames trailing behind like a harbinger of death.
Stryker's jaw clenched.
He had spent a lifetime hunting monsters, mutants, aberrations, threats to humanity. But this was something else entirely. Not just a mutant. Not just a demon. A force of nature, an ancient power unbound.
His hand hovered over the emergency lockdown controls.
"No," he muttered. "Containment is gone."
He turned sharply and pressed a button on the console.
"Security teams, intercept now," he ordered, voice low but resolute. "Don't engage unless absolutely necessary. Capture if you can. Kill if you must. But do not let him reach the core."
Outside, footsteps thundered as reinforcements poured in, but Stryker knew it was a delaying tactic—a brief, futile resistance before the inevitable.
His eyes flicked back to the main screen, heart steady but mind racing.
The Demon Lord had returned.
And this time, Stryker would not fail.
All For One broke through the reinforced door with a thunderous crash, shards of metal and glass exploding outward. He stepped through the breach and there, framed in the doorway, stood Colonel Stryker, gaze steely and unbroken.
A soldier ahead of Stryker fired his rifle. The report cracked through the room — but before the bullet even reached him, All For One's diamond skin flared with light, deflecting the shot back into the soldier, obliterating him instantly. Windows cracked. Panels smashed.
Another scientist, struck by the madness of the moment, dashed toward an exit in panic. All For One raised a hand, and a psychic probe pulsed outward. The scientist froze mid-step, mind crushed by the invisible force, and collapsed unconscious to the floor.
He advanced toward Stryker, laughter low and confident. Stryker steadied a weapon, aiming at his face but All For One's fingers wrapped around it mid‑air, freezing it in place. With a snap, he twisted the rifle until it split in half, metal groaning, parts flying in splinters.
Stryker tried to resist, but All For One pressed his other hand against his skull, probing inward. Memories flooded his vision:
The name Bolvar, tied to hidden facilities and clandestine experiments
The whispers of Weapon X, programs aimed at shaping mutants into weapons
Codenames like Weapon 23, Team X
And the most painful memory of all: Stryker's son, frozen in time, a vengeance wrapped in grief over the loss of his wife
All For One smiled.
"Interesting," he murmured.
He released the probe. Stryker's eyes fluttered, half-lidded, struggling for clarity.
The Demon Lord stood before his long-time hunter.
"You spent decades trying to control chaos," All For One said coldly. "To cage gods. To dissect potential and chain evolution to your primitive sense of order."
Stryker growled, spitting blood. "You're just another monster."
"No," All For One whispered, eyes glowing. "I am the end of monsters. And the birth of a dominion."
He leaned in.
"…you will be forgotten."
With a brutal twist of his hands, a sickening crack shattered the silence. Stryker's body went limp.
All For One let it fall like trash.
Back in the main testing chamber, the unconscious soldiers lay like discarded tools. All For One moved among them, lifting their bodies with a flick of his hand puppets to his will and hurled them into the very containment cells where mutants once suffered.
Fitting.
Then, with a subtle pulse of energy, he awoke the unconscious scientists.
They gasped, panicked until he spoke.
"You may panic. But only briefly."
What followed was not negotiation. It was indoctrination.
He offered them a choice power for obedience. Knowledge for loyalty. Evolution for submission.
And one by one, they bowed.
"We serve."
"We follow."
"All for One."
Their voices still echoed as he turned away.
"Follow," he said simply.
Like shadows behind their new master, the scientists trailed All For One through the blood-slicked halls, toward the heart of the complex.
Past shattered walls. Muted alarms. Discarded weapons. Echoes of a failed resistance.
Until finally they arrived.
The Main Control Room.
Once Stryker's throne room. Now a relic of a bygone tyrant.
The metal doors creaked open at All For One's will. The command center flickered with life monitors glowing, systems still humming like a wounded beast.
The scientists took their places in silence.
All For One walked forward, unhurried. He approached the central command chair Stryker's old seat of power. The seat from which war was waged. Where fear was manufactured.
He turned slowly and sat.
The black armor of his body gleamed beneath the red lights. One arm rested on the armrest, fingers curling against the edge like talons. A smirk sharp and knowing tugged at his lips.
He belonged here.
He had always belonged here.
The scientists watched, breathless. Not as men witnessing a monster but as followers beholding a god.
And All For One spoke one final time.
Not to them