The terrible sound still roared through the shattered air, growing louder and more violent with every passing breath. Screams, wails, and the breaking of souls echoed together, a symphony of despair that clawed at reality itself. The very fabric of the world began to tremble under its weight.
Divine Fla surged through Cillian’s outstretched hand, pouring deeper into the creature’s soul. The more he fed it, the more grotesque the monster beca. Its massive body began to swell and split apart as pale, trembling flesh pushed outward.
Dozens of new eyes, mouths, and limbs sprouted across its form, all twisted and deford, each trembling in silent agony.
It was a vision of tornt. Even to look at it made one feel the pain of those countless souls trapped and rged within. The air itself seed to pulse with their quiet cries.
Cillian narrowed his eyes. Amidst the chaos, he began to notice sothing new. The screams weren’t just fear anymore each echo carried a fragnt of hatred and curse.
The sound itself was becoming poisonous. It was spreading through the spiritual plane, corrupting the Sea of the Soul around them.
He could feel the contamination seeping outward, like ink bleeding through parchnt. Even the outer minds, the lesser creatures observing from afar, were starting to fray. Their seas of thought began to darken, consud by the voices coming from this horror.
A faint smile touched Cillian’s lips. "So that’s how it is."
He snapped his fingers. Instantly, the torrent of divine fla reversed course, sealing most of the tears he had opened. The endless screaming faltered, the voices dimming to whispers.
Cillian’s voice carried across the broken hall. "Is this the beautiful future you promised them? The world without suffering?"
The monster’s many heads fell silent. For a long ti, none of them spoke, until the female head of the creature finally stirred, her tone desperate and pleading.
"You don’t understand," she said, trembling. "A consciousness that vast needs a leader! Without one, it would collapse into chaos, it needs guidance!"
Cillian tilted his head slightly, his tone cold and detached. "And yet, looking at you now... all I see is chaos."
He stepped closer. "The malice you absorbed, the pain you ignored, it’s corrupted everything. Those you rged, those you silenced, their hatred has consud you. They’ve grown their own will within your Sea of the Soul, not of idealistic unity or peace, but vengeance, endless vengeance against all who turned on them."
He paused, his voice lowering. "You’ve already beco what you feared, a consciousness that devours everything it touches."
The creature said nothing. Its many faces contorted with guilt and horror, unable to deny the truth.
Cillian’s tone shifted again,. "But I suppose I know what I need to know about your experint. However I still have two questions."
He raised two fingers, his expression unreadable. "First, where did you hide the equations used in the fusion? Second, if you once fused all races together, why did the Hayes clan survive when every other species perished?"
The monster hesitated. Even after all this, its instinct for self-preservation remained. "The original formulas and data," the female head finally said, "are stored within our Sea of the Soul. Free us, as you promised, and they will be yours."
Cillian smirked faintly. "Naturally."
She continued, her expression twisting with disgust as she spoke the next na. "As for the Hayes clan... those brainless rats are the reason everything fell apart."
"Oh?" Cillian arched a brow, intrigued.
"They existed long before the integration," she said bitterly. "But to the rest of us, they were worthless. Weak in body, dull in mind, consud by base desire. They had no art, knowledge, or culture. They multiplied endlessly, draining the world’s resources like vermin. We left them behind useless as they were."
Cillian said nothing, watching her closely as she continued, her tone darkening.
"But that very worthlessness caught our attention. When the integration began, we saw a purpose for them. We decided to ’educate’ them, to give them scraps of our knowledge. They would serve as laborers, builders and slaves... nothing more."
She laughed bitterly, her voice breaking. "But instead, they worshipped us. Those pitiful creatures saw us, the architects of their world, as gods. And though it wasn’t our intent, their devotion proved useful."
"They worked tirelessly," another head added. "They built our temples, hunted for us, even helped us reshape the dying world. We rewarded their loyalty by strengthening them, changing their forms through alchemy and soulcraft. They beca hardier, more obedient. We thought we’d created the perfect servants."
Her voice lowered. "But the fusion... the late-stage process... it broke our sanity. The suppressed fragnts of our minds began to fight for control. The collective fractured."
The female head trembled violently. "And those wretched rats- those Hayes, began to hear the wrong voices. They mistook the whispers of our madness for divine command. They thought we were angry... and in their terror, they began to throw more and more creatures into the fusion chambers."
Cillian’s brows furrowed slightly. "They fed you more souls?"
"Yes," she hissed. "More and more, without reason or selection. They dragged beings from other worlds, captives, monsters, and innocents and threw them into us. Their fear turned to worship, their worship to madness. And with every new fusion, the corruption deepened. Their offerings poisoned everything!"
She scread now, her heads thrashing. "We tried to stop them! We tried to warn them! But we had already lost control. Every mind that rged brought new hatred, new despair. Our collective sea beca a storm of rage. And when it reached its peak... we fell. We beca this!"
Her words broke into sobs, half-pain, half-hatred. "Those disgusting, mindless beasts caused it all! We despise them! We curse them!"
Cillian stood in silence for a mont, the Divine Fla still faintly burning around his hands. His expression was unreadable.
Finally, he said quietly, "And yet, even in your madness... you still call them yours."
The creature froze, its many eyes flickering.
Cillian turned away. "Your hatred is just another echo in this sea. Whether it’s worship or loathing, they both lead to the sa abyss."
His voice echoed across the writhing chamber.
"So, there really are gods driven mad by their own believers," he said, shaking his head in disbelief.
"The Hayes clan, unable to comprehend the oracles, ended up driving their deity into madness piece by piece. How should I even describe that?"
His lips curved into a thin smile. "A ridiculous and hilarious tragedy."
When his voice faded, his expression cooled into disdain. He had expected to et a wild god, sothing raw and untad, perhaps sothing born from primal chaos, instead what stood before him was rely the failed remnant of an experint. A malford consciousness, and the pitiful ruin of the Hayes clan’s misplaced faith.
The sight no longer amused him; it now felt lackluster .
Yet as his thoughts settled, a new spark ignited in Cillian’s mind.
He had suddenly ford a hypothesis, an idea that could reshape his understanding of "reverse ascension within the sea of mind."
He wanted to see it firsthand. To see what kind of consciousness this Mad God would manifest when exposed to the lower-dinsional influence of materialization.
But first, he needed to prepare, he needed test subjects.
Cillian’s smile returned, calm and deliberate, almost benevolent.
"Well then," he said softly, turning to the trembling heads. "Now that I’ve heard your story, it’s ti I keep my end of the deal. Let’s begin your treatnt."
The cluster of faces, bound by gray cords, suddenly brightened with desperate hope.
Their voices trembled with longing.
"Great one, if you free us from this tornt, we shall serve you eternally! Our clan, our world, every realm under our rule, they shall all belong to you!"
Cillian chuckled, tilting his head slightly.
"Oh? Then I must thank you for your generosity."
Before the chorus of heads could respond, the female one let out a sudden shriek.
"Wait—wait, O Supre Deity!" Her eyes flickered with panic. "How will you treat us? Will you use divine fire to separate us, one by one, as before?"
Cillian turned toward her slowly. His smile deepened.
"Of course not. Divine fire is far too precious to waste on sothing like this."
"Then... what are you going to do?" she stamred.
He did not answer. Instead, the air around him warped. The light dimd. Using himself as an anchor, Cillian began pulling a portion of the Endless Abyss down upon the world.
The Mad God’s expressions shifted instantly. Its many eyes trembled as the air thickened with a scent of ash and rot. A black-and-red gate erged before it, veiled in mist.
Then ca another, a violet gate, a gray one, and others beyond sight, each one leaking the breath of death, corruption, and madness.
Cillian spread his arms.
"I’m giving you the finest treatnt possible," he declared, his voice resonating with otherworldly power.
"Healing, from the Abyss itself."
"There, your deepest desires will be unleashed without restraint. And your consciousness will remain intact. Isn’t that what you truly want?"
Behind him, the Ring of the Seven Deadly Sins spun faster and faster. The ground split open. Demons within the Hayes matrix scread in delirious joy as countless blackened arms erupted from the gates. The limbs seized the Mad God’s enormous body, dragging it into the abyssal light.
The sea of its mind churned violently. Within that ocean of chaos, sothing began to transform.
The Mad God’s divine form shattered and reconstituted as a new, grotesque organism. Its consciousness was dragged down to the lowest dinsion, its ager divinity stripped and refashioned into raw matter.
Then the world itself began to change.
From the Mad God’s remains, scarlet veins spread like wildfire across the planet. They wrapped around every ruin, every mountain, every poisoned ocean. Even the surviving Hayes exploded into streams of blood, their bodies absorbed into the network of veins.
The demons too, save for Mirethane and the Four-Ard Demon, were devoured, their forms dissolving into the sa pulsing arteries.
And from those veins... things began to grow.
Bulbous fruits of flesh and thought..which could be loosely called brains—sprouted in countless forms.
From Tiny ones like seeds to massive ones like mountains. So wired with nails and cables. Others fused with writhing eyes and deford organs.
In the end, the entire world beca an ocean of brains, each alive and "thinking".
Every brain was an independent mind, yet all were connected.
And their shared thought was simple:
Obey the Endless Abyss.
Cillian stepped forward through the pulsating landscape, placing a hand upon one of the brains.
His eyes glowed faintly with curiosity.
"Tell ," he said, "what will you call yourselves now?"
From a thousand throats and a million whispers ca the sa answer,
"Damon."
Cillian smiled faintly, feeling their new consciousness resonate against his own.
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