"You lied to me!!"
"You're in collusion with those damned gods!!" Gorr raged.
When he handed over a part of the power of the All-Black the Necrosword to Aron, it was in exchange for trust. And now that trust had been betrayed.
"Gorr, it's not that I wanted to deceive you. The point is that this weapon is connected to me." Aron spoke calmly.
Black liquid streamed down his arm.
The weapon created by Knull, the god of symbiotes.
The All-Black the Necrosword was not an ordinary sword.
It was a weapon akin to a living symbiote, capable of changing shapes or separating from its wielder.
At first, Gorr felt great relief when he handed Aron a part of the sword.
As the master of the All-Black, he could always reclaim part of the weapon back into himself at any moment.
But…
He never thought Aron would outwit him.
"Aron! I trusted you so much! And you lied to me!"
"Liar!"
"I'll kill you!!"
Gorr had never felt such hatred.
For a moment, it seemed that even his hatred toward the gods was not as strong as that toward Aron.
Betrayal, after finally opening his heart, was unbearable.
At last, he had once trusted someone and was utterly betrayed!
"What, Gorr… I truly didn't mean to lie to you, nor to kill you. Or…" Aron tried once more to negotiate.
"What if you hand me the rest of the All-Black? I'll send you back home. Besides, I still have a bit of the Morningstar's power left. You can dig up the ashes of your wife and children, I will resurrect them for you. What do you say?"
For the first time, Aron felt a trace of guilt for his actions.
He was even willing to use the remaining power of the Morningstar he had preserved from the last resurrection of the Ancient One.
"???"
In the shadow dimension, in complete darkness, something moved.
An existence resembling a shadow had been watching Aron and Gorr the whole time, until it spotted the guilt on Aron's face.
The shadow exploded with rage!
"You lied to him! You feel guilt! You lied to me, how can you claim to be pure?!"
From the darkness appeared a shadowy demon – Sarco.
"Who are you?" Aron paused, unable to immediately recall who that was.
He had no time to think.
Because Gorr…
"You want my weapon?!!!"
"Fine!"
The All-Black the Necrosword returned to its original form in Gorr's hand. The black blade aimed straight at Aron.
The god-killing power began to gather.
The shadow dimension, dark and colorless, now took on a new shade – black!
This was not ordinary black. It was a darkness so deep that the very shadows around them looked bright.
In just one moment…
A rift opened in the shadow dimension!
In the end, this was not a powerful dimension, but just a small pocket space, limited even for dimensional lords.
The shadow demon was the mightiest entity here, but still only a newcomer among the heavenly beings.
"You'll take this with you into death!!" Gorr swung the sword.
It was the power to kill gods!
The power of Knull, god of symbiotes – a divine force sealed in this weapon!
Power that originated from a dead Celestial!
Enraged to the extreme, Gorr spared nothing.
He unleashed that terrifying force, ready to consume it down to the last drop, all at once!
"Oh, yes!"
"Oh, yes!"
Aron and the Shadow Demon exclaimed simultaneously.
The first, because he realized that this power was one-time only, and that when Gorr exhausted it, he would have nothing left to threaten with.
The second, because it was a special force, a force that refracted through the very shadow dimension.
Boom!
Darkness swallowed everything!
The shadow dimension collapsed in an instant.
The terrifying power tore through the rift and burst into the dimension of reality.
The first victim, the nearest star!
The power of the Celestial, unleashed from the All-Black, took the form of a colossal python that devours stars and swallowed the sun in one gulp!
On one of the primitive life planets, Hela and the others watched in horror as the darkness consumed the star.
The sun… extinguished!
The power of a dead Celestial from another universe exploded in the cosmos where Aron resided, leaving behind the final afterglow.
---
Deep in space.
Within a skull the size of an asteroid, the Collector – one of the Elders of the Cosmos – suddenly looked up.
Energy waves shook the space.
"Is this… a battle among gods?"
---
In an even farther region of space.
Arishem the Judge had just delivered judgment upon a planet – death.
He was preparing to depart, but then he felt something.
"This is… the power of a Celestial from another universe?"
Arishem sensed anger and hesitation within that force.
He realized it was the power of a dead Celestial.
"The number of Celestials in this universe must increase."
With that conclusion, he moved toward the next galaxy, ready to continue his judgment.
---
The sun was gone.
The galaxy plunged into darkness and cold.
On the primitive life planet, death began to reign.
The sky darkened, and snow began to fall.
The oceans froze, and the last traces of warmth faded.
An eternal darkness and icy wasteland were coming.
"What is this power?"
Thor stood stunned.
"The power of a Celestial," Hela answered, as she and the equally shocked Ares and Hercules looked on.
---
In the blackness of space.
Gorr slowly emerged from the void.
His face was cold and grim, with traces of rage that had not yet faded.
Behind him, the pocket dimension lay in ruins.
Before him, the sun swallowed by darkness.
"That is the price of deceit you pay."
But then…
Just as Gorr thought Aron was dead, the voice he hated more than anything resounded once more from the darkness.
"What I said still stands."
"Give me the All-Black, and I can still help you resurrect your wife and daughter. I mean it."
Aron emerged from the ruins of the shadow dimension, his face shrouded in darkness.
Behind him, the Cloak of the Great Shadow was pulled by the gravity of a nearby planet, billowing like a black storm.
At last!
Aron had reached the upper limit of energy absorption for his cloak, power at the level of Single Universe!
That meant only one thing, now he had the chance to strike back in kind.
"Gorr, I truly don't want to kill you. That is the one thing I never lied to you about."
Behind him, the Cloak of the Demon Shadow spread and pulsed.
The power of the dead Celestial… still smoldered.
And there was always the possibility it could erupt once again!
–––
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