Luna's gaze softened at his words, a pale smile spreading across her face as she closed her eyes in fleeting peace.
But when she opened them again, the warmth drained away. Her lips parted, her expression crumbling into horror.
"Amon… your face…"
His smile widened instinctively, but then he froze. A sudden weakness made him stagger. Slowly, almost in disbelief, his hand rose to his cheek. His fingers sank into something soft, wet, and writhing.
When he conjured a blade to see his reflection, what stared back at him was no longer human. Half his face was gone, replaced by a seething mass of pale, transparent maggots squirming where flesh should have been.
Am I… haha… going mad? I thought I was safe from corruption. H-how… no… no, no, no… haha… what the fuck…
Amon's expression twisted, slowly unraveling into something unhinged and horrifying. Letting go of Luna, he pushed himself upright, bracing against the shattered wall as his breath came in ragged gasps.
I need to hurry… I never thought I'd actually do it. This was supposed to be the last resort… but I'm already at my limit.
His knees buckled, and he nearly collapseduntil Caster appeared at his side, gripping his arm to steady him.
"Are you really sure about this? I thought it was just…" Caster's voice trailed off when he caught sight of Amon's state. He exhaled through his nose and released him with a quiet sigh.
Amon only nodded, his single eye flickering toward the figures approaching, it was Seishan and the Bloodsisters.
"Take care of her," he said flatly. "I'm sure there's a healer among you."
Seishan's frown deepened as her gaze lingered on him. His horrifying condition demanded questions, but the urgency in his tone smothered them. Instead, she gave a sharp nod. One of the Bloodsisters hurried to Luna's side... But refused to meet Amon's gaze. She couldn't. One of his eyes was already gone, swallowed by the squirming mass of pale maggots eating away at his face. The oppressive wrongness radiating from him made her chest tighten until she had to hold her breath just to stay near.
Amon let out a weary sigh, his gaze drifting to Caster. Catching it, Caster flicked his wrist. The gleaming jian in his hand dissolved into motes of light.
"Don't even think about it," he said flatly. "I'll forgive you once, and only because you returned it."
Amon's mouth twitched as he stepped forward.
"I wasn't thinking about that… just protect me and..."
His words faded as his head turned toward the shattered wall, where the yawning dark of the city stretched endlessly below.
"It's just… we all have to walk our own path."
Caster raised the eyebrow, then let a faint smirk tug at his lips. He finished the thought without hesitation:
"Even if it leads to chaos."
Amon gave a single nod. Then he turned away, walking toward the ruined wall. For a moment he simply stood there, overlooking the ancient ruins of the dark city. Thinking of his path, his way of life, and the strange, fleeting things he still dared to call joy… and love.
His eyes burned with melancholy, he smiled faintly as his body staggered. Flesh peeled away in slow, sickly strips, revealing writhing maggots where skin and muscle should have been. At this point, Amon was teetering on the edge of losing control, clinging to himself by the thinnest thread.
It was never really about blasphemies… was it? Just a side effect.
Flaw: [Blasphemer's Gambit]
Description: [You trace the edges of a truth better left unseen.]
It never said anything about blasphemy. It said Blasphemer's Gambit. I am the Blasphemer. Meaning… haha… it's my own gambit. To trace the edges of a truth better left unseen... if you put it into runes, it would mean: you walk on the edge of madness, lost to mysteries.
That was why the logical, cautious boy he once had been had slowly vanished, leaving behind something he could no longer recognize.
Why did I do all of this? Why?
The blasphemies, the trickery, the deceit… none of that came from the flaw itself. It was the Uniqueness corrupting him, turning him into this... Nurturing him to become a new God Of Deceit.
"Haha… this is insane…"
Now, standing before the entire population of the dark city, Amon felt the irresistible urge to bare himself, to express his absurdity, his path, his love and joy, his ambitions and elation, even his sadness. So he gave voice to words his younger brother had once spoken to him in a distant, forgotten past.
"Pain… the pain is everywhere." His tone was calm, but it pulled every gaze in the ruined hall toward him.
The slum dwellers dragged Nephis down from the wall, pulling the iron rods from her body. She began to heal, but made no effort to rise because of Caster's cold gaze. So she only watched him in silence, her cold, piercing eyes fixed on him.
"The pain of hoping for something," Amon continued, his voice becoming more sinister and distorted, "yet never receiving it."
At those words, Luna lowered her gaze to the blood-stained floor. Her shoulders trembled as memories surged, the hope she had once carried, that the sleepers might find reason and goodness in their hearts. Yet all she had received in return was mockery… and venom.
"The pain of loss… of losing family, friends and everything one dares to hold dear."
His gaze grew distant, as if staring into a graveyard only he could see. His parents, grandparents, brother, older sister, cousins, friends… all swallowed by time... Time, huh?
"The pain of betrayal," he said softly, his voice like a knife. "Especially when it comes from the one you trusted most."
Cassie flinched, her eyes widening while Nephis's face paled, sorrow casting a shadow across her features.
"The pain of hunger."
"The pain of loneliness."
"The pain of wounds and injuries."
"The pain of birth… and the pain of death."
Amon lifted his head at last. His eyes sought the horizon, where a horde of abominations spilled toward them like a black tide.
"Pain is eternal. Pain is invincible. And pain…"
A self-deprecating smile appeared on his face.
"…pain is inescapable."
Narrowing his eye in displeasure, Amon summoned the Fraud's Bag. From its depths, he pulled the torch he had once stolen from the ruined cathedral's basement, the very day he took the Weaver's Mask. Its ancient blue flame still burned, steady and unyielding, even after thousands of years.
At the same time, soul shards poured from Fraud's Bag, spilling onto the broken ground like a cascade of fractured glass. Amon's gaze flicked downward, settling on the destroyed ship below. With a thought, he dismissed it. The vessel dissolved into white sparks, only to reappear beside him, vast and imposing, taking up nearly half the ruined hall. Normally, a fall from such a height would have annihilated it, but this was no ordinary vessel. It was a Memory of Transcendent rank. So it had endured.
A crazed smile split his face. His body twitched, as if glitching, as he began to shatter the shards in his hands one after another.
He continued breaking them desperately, urgency burning clear in his single remaining eye. First, the shards from Fraud's Bag, then the ones hidden in the ship's secret chamber. The outer hull and deck had been wrecked, but the concealed room where he had been lazily throwing his treasures remained intact.
Gritting his teeth, he kept going, faster and faster, until his runes blazed with numbers that made his breath catch:
Soul Fragments: [2999/3000]
He leaned back against the cold stone. Standing would mean falling, and falling would mean the end and he wasn't ready for that, not when he was about to become a Devil. Breathe… just breathe… This is so, so messed up. He was a coward, a thief, a fraud… and he was terrified. His body trembled. Do I even have a body? Ugh… I don't know…
If this gambit kills me, so be it. If it saves me, everyone will owe me. If it saves no one, they'll curse my name and maybe they'll be right. If I survive, I'll lie to them and call it courage. If I die, they'll say I was foolish, cowardly and monstrous… they'll tell stories either way.
My head hurts… What am I even thinking about? This isn't funny anymore… shit, what a fuck... Compose yourself… All of this is my fault, so I have to take care of my own mess.
Just hold on… just one minute… sixty seconds… that's all I need. Don't become a mindless beast for sixty fucking seconds. I have to try. This is my last gamble. Deep down, I knew it would come to this. I have long prepared for it.
"Even if this insanity leads to my doom… so what? I'm nobody but myself… in this world that tries its best to make me like everybody else… Fine, then. Let's finish this performance properly."
His expression twisted into something inhuman, madness mirrored in the writhing maggots swimming through his flesh, slowly replacing what little remained of him.
With a desperate glare, he raised the torch high. His single eye barely open, heart pounding wildly, elation surged through his veins. Muscles tensed, and with all his almost devil's strength, he hurled the ancient torch into the abyss.
The torch cut through the air like a comet, trailing sparks. It had burned for a thousand years, and no wind could snuff it out now. It fell until its glow vanished into the fathomless darkness of the chasm.
For a few seconds, there was nothing but silence. Amon's expression crumbled in disbelief, despair, and joy… though he could feel that not all the emotions were his own.
Then, before he could truly give up, the earth detonated.
BOOM!
The chasm convulsed, and something surged through its winding pathways. Soon, its true nature was revealed. A blinding explosion erupted upward with the fury of a newborn star. Towers of molten fire tore through the streets, devouring stone and steel alike. The very ground fractured, vomiting torrents of flame that ripped through the Dark City.
A tidal wave of destruction rolled from the chasm toward the Crimson Spire. The streets of the ruined city crumbled in seconds, reduced to ash. The air itself screamed as shockwaves split the sky, shattering windows, snapping pillars, and hurling nightmare creatures like ragdolls.
From the ancient mine shafts once used to extract metal, colossal pillars of fire erupted, spearing mercilessly into the heavens. Each one painted the night crimson, until the city resembled not a settlement, but the yawning throat of hell itself.
The abominations did not even have time to scream. Their flesh blistered instantly, and thousands of grotesque forms were incinerated into drifting ash.
No one understood what was happening, how fire could spread so violently, why the earth itself seemed to detonate. Gasps and screams filled the collapsing hall.
But Seishan froze, her eyes widening with sudden recognition… and then dimming, burdened by memory.
***
Flashbacks:
"Gas… this will work."
"What will work?"
Amon froze for a moment, then forced a polite smile as he turned to Seishan.
"Nothing important," he said smoothly, straightening his back with a faint sigh.
Seishan gave him a skeptical look but chose silence. A few seconds dragged into what felt like hours before Amon shook his head, breaking the tension as they continued walking.
***
So that was his plan? Seishan's expression crumbled in disbelief and horror as she watched the destruction unfold before her eyes. She wasn't the only one, everyone watched in stunned silence. Screams had ceased, and all they could do was remain motionless, staring at the horrifying form of the Blasphemer, terror filling their hearts.
The already broken fortress shuddered beneath their feet. Though the explosion hadn't struck them directly, the catastrophic blast sent tremors rolling through the Dark City. The ruined walls groaned, stones splitting, the entire structure threatening to collapse.
Amon exhaled in relief as he saw that it had worked. It seemed his theory wasn't wrong.
Over countless years, heat and pressure had compressed the endless corpses littering this land, organic matter piled upon organic matter, be they nightmare creatures or humans, all rotting, breaking down, and fusing beneath the surface.
It was the same process that had formed fossil fuels in the waking world, such as methane, oil, or natural gas.
Here, every condition had been met a thousand times over.
Millions of nightmare creatures had died on this cursed ground. Hundreds of thousands of people had been sacrificed by the Seven Heroes to feed the artificial sun above. The sun itself, blazing endlessly, had provided the heat, pressure, and time. Everything necessary to birth a buried ocean of volatile fuel.
Amon had tested before if it was flammable gas, but he wasn't entirely sure that the same gas lay beneath the entire Dark City.
It seemed he had been right.
And, the Dark City was burning.
But this was only step one. Ignoring the destruction and the Spell that announced thousands... perhaps tens of thousands of his kills, he glanced at his runes urgently.
[Chameleon's Cloak], [Jar of a Hundred Poisons], [Hidden Blades], [Hawk's Eye], [Hearth], [Fraud's Bag], [Midnight Shard], [Moonlight Shard], [Spectral Mirror], [Horizon's Edge], [Endless Spring], [Hand of Flame], [Little Helper], [Campfire]…
His gaze lingered on one.
[Hand of Flame].
He needed to act quickly, before rationality bled dry and only corruption remained. If he failed to do it in time, he would become a mindless beast.
Activating the Memory's sole enhancement, Amon felt control settle over his soul essence. Good... One step closer.
Glancing at the soul shard in his hand, he shattered it and absorbed its essence.
Soul Fragments: [3000/3000]
[Your Soul Is Overflowing With Power…]
[Your Soul Is Obscured By Mysteries…]
He began circulating the essence through his body, flooding every vein. With the Hand of Flame guiding him, his control grew sharper, more refined with every heartbeat.
At the same time, a familiar agony pierced his body like a spear. Amon gasped, choking on his own screams. Come on! Work! It needs to fucking work!
[The Second Seal is broken.]
[Awakening dormant powers…]
Amon froze. Then, slowly… a grin spread across his face.
His soul cores radiated with an ethereal, almost tangible heat. The energy surged through his veins, changing and strengthening him. Every fiber of his being brimmed with that mysterious power. The euphoria was overwhelming, washing over his mind like a burning tide of bliss.
The flesh that had been replaced by those writhing, transparent maggots began to dissolve into gray fog. The madness clawing at his sanity was drowned beneath the warmth. The arm he had lost didn't regenerate, but the wound sealed shut at the very least.
That's it! Hahahaha… it fucking worked!
After all... The greatest enemy of corruption… was divinity itself.
After spending ten months in the Forgotten Shore...
Amon, the Blasphemer, had become the War Realm's first natural Awakened.
***
[A/N: Well, this is it! We're here, guys! I told you there were hints left. The Hand of Flame, the Memory that helped him control his essence, that was a hint that it would be used as the foundation for a natural awakening. It also restored the Mantle of the Underworld. The gas that was mentioned after killing the Lord of the Dead was foreshadowing for the natural gases underground. Yes, I did my research and learned how those gases form. The conditions Amon was talking about are real, and they exist in our world. And, yes, he's also a devil. I probably made some mistakes, to be honest, but I don't have an editor and I'm doing this for fun, so it's fine, I guess. All I can say is that I've been excited to write this chapter since the start of the Forgotten Shore arc. That's it, guys. Enjoy the meal, and thanks for all your support!]
***