*Null and Fenix continue to fight, each clash of their attacks splitting the sky, cracking the earth, and forming tornadoes. Null decides to use all his power.*
Null: You are powerful, that much is clear, but I haven't stopped noticing how you are adapting to my movements, so I'll have to stop playing around. —He raises his hands toward the split sky, and lightning strikes him, which he absorbs—. Now you'd better get ready.
*The Phoenix envelops its body in fire, its claws and feet harden into solid ice, and it emits a sharp but thunderous sound that makes the entire area tremble.*
Null: AAAAAAAAGHHH!!!
*With that battle cry, lightning envelops his entire body and combines with the wind, allowing him to travel faster than lightning. He begins to shoot electric bolts in all directions, and the Phoenix covers itself, creating walls of ice around itself while charging a powerful heat ray so hellish that it burns oxygen. Null cuts through the walls with his sword and cuts off the Phoenix's wings and head, but it regenerates and fires the heat ray, hitting its target. Unintentionally, it regenerates, grabs what's left of its body, and sends it upward, then makes it plummet, but Null manages to regenerate in time and slides down a path of lightning that he created with his arm.
Null: Kagayaku Kaidō (Sparkling Path). I can't kill you the easy way, so it will have to be the hard way.
*Null begins to lunge at him with his sword, and the Phoenix responds by hardening his claws into giant spikes and attacking at high speed. Thus begins an exchange of devastating attacks that cause great collateral damage to the entire area: mountains break, cracks form, storms fall, and giant tornadoes form.*
*Null manages to cut his wings again, and this time he wastes no time, electrocuting him to stun him and beginning to cut off his legs, then his head, claws, and everything else so quickly that he doesn't have time to regenerate. Then Null hears "Thank you for freeing me" coming from the Phoenix.*
Null: You just-
*But the Phoenix begins to disintegrate, leaving Null with doubts about the corrupt spirits. Suddenly, his system window opens with a symbol that looks like someone is calling "🔊," and he presses to answer.
Null: Hello?
Alcanor: Good job, Null. You executed the spirit and freed its soul.
Null: Soul? What do you mean? Were these spirits once... humans or something? —he said incredulously—.
Alcanor: Exactly, these corrupt spirits are divided into two types:
1: Spirits of Pure Corruption: These are spirits full of corruption and evil that only seek to destroy and sow nightmares, fear, and chaos wherever they want. These beings are not and never were human; they were just born that way and will always remain that way, no matter how much you reason with them.
2: Souls Corrupted by Negativity: These spirits are formed when any being, living or dead, contains too many negative feelings or corrupt energies, and if that doesn't change quickly, there is a 100% chance that they will become corrupt spirits.
Null: So, the first one I killed was...
Alcanor: Exactly, that was a pure corrupt spirit, but the Phoenix was a corrupted soul.
Null: I see, he said sadly as he looked at the place where the Phoenix was. What was her name?
Alcanor: (compassionately) Her name was Hela. She was a good woman, but she had many problems due to her poverty. She had no home and no family, and that filled her with negativity and sadness.
Null: Then I could have become a corrupt spirit too.
*Null remembers those days when he was with his parents and remembers how they mistreated him and said hurtful things to him, and then he remembers those days when he was in school.
*At school, when he was called Valker, he tried to improve his studies and everything was going well, or at least that was what he dreamed, but it was quite the opposite. The bullies took advantage of him, seeing him as an easy target. They locked him in lockers, stuck his face in the dirty school toilet, and even left him tied to a chair. He had no one to help him. The principal pretended not to see anything when in reality he enjoyed Valker's suffering.*
*But when he thought he had no one to help him, someone appeared: a girl with dark purple hair and dark blue, almost purple eyes, wearing a school uniform but with a distinctive purple scarf. Her name was Elina. She always cared for Valker and treated his bruises and wounds whenever she saw him.*
Elina: "Did they hurt you again?" she said as she treated Valker's right eye, —which was bruised from a hard blow, with cotton wool—. "I really think you should try to defend yourself. It's true, your parents never teach you anything."
*Elina knew about Valker because they were very close friends and shared their stories, which is why she knew about Valker's life.*
Elina: I swear that one day I'll drag you out of that house, even if I have to carry you.
Valker: But where would you take me? he said with a tearful but playful laugh.
Elina: To my house, where else? I know how to put up with you well enough to put up with you from morning till night,— she laughed playfully, so don't worry about that—.
*Valker knew it was a joke, but he felt lighter now that he had someone in his life. However, as always, happiness does not last forever.*
*One day at 6:00 AM, Valker was getting out of bed, rubbing his cheek because his mother had slapped him. Then his father came in.*
Edgar: Here, he threw the newspaper hard at Valker's face. I hope I don't see you again today, understand?
*Edgar leaves the room, slamming the door behind him. Valker barely reacts, as he is starting to get used to it, but his indifference turns to surprise, followed by pain and sadness.*
*The newspaper says that Elina died in an accident on her way to school with her parents. The news devastates Valker, leaving him alone again, sinking into despair and pain at having had the thing he loved most in his life taken from him, just as his grandfather Alaker had been taken from him.*
Valker: WHY!!!
*Valker spends his time screaming and crying and throwing everything he sees in his room while tears flood his face*
*After three hours, Valker manages to calm down a little and stays in bed hugging his knees and hiding his face between them*
Valker: I'm trying, Grandpa, I'm trying, but everything is so difficult for me and I don't know if I can take it anymore
*Then Valker begins to remember his grandfather's words and the moments he spent with Elina.*
Valker: But I'll try for you, Grandpa, and also for you, Elina. Valker looks up and wipes away the remaining tears. My goal remains the same.
Returning to the present
Alcanor: I have no doubt that you would have become a corrupt spirit if it weren't for those two, he said empathetically. So what, Null? Are you going to continue with this or not?
*Null stares at the place where the Phoenix was before, then sighs and sheathes his sword in the scabbard on his back, his gaze becoming determined.*
Null: Yes, I will continue with this. Now I have a new purpose: to save the souls that are trapped in that negativity.
Alcanor: (smiling) Very good choice, another reason why I chose you.
*he call ends and suddenly a reward appears in the system window.*
Null: (laughing) Well, I knew I was forgetting something.
System: Mission: Defeat the corrupt spirit.
COMPLETED.
YOU HAVE LEVELED UP.
LEVEL: 2.
EXP: 300/2000.
Strength: 9.
Agility: 12.
Mana: 320/600.
Perception: 9.
Skill: 3.
Reflexes: 6.
Money: 8000
New Materials: Frozen Phoenix Feather. Burning Phoenix Feather. Phoenix Essence. Phoenix Fire. Crimson Rock.
Null: I see I got a lot of stuff and became stronger—he smiles as he accepts everything and closes the system window—it's time to find a good civilization to stay with and rest before continuing to hunt spirits.
*Null grabs the map and marks the Crimson Crystal Mountain as complete, with only 10 more powerful spirits left to find.*
*Then he starts walking wherever the wind takes him until he finds the horizon.*
Null: Thank goodness the Void of Eternity made these clothes for me in a way that they regenerate with my body, otherwise I'd be naked by now.
MEANWHILE
*In a place where matter and antimatter coexisted in eternal conflict and harmony, in destruction and creation. There, rules did not exist and primordial concepts unfolded as infinite and eternal... though tiny and fragile compared to what lay beyond. It was a realm that existed before time, before space, even before existence or concepts; a place where infinity itself became finite in the face of higher contrasts. Each dimension of that realm transcended the previous one infinitely, and each contained within itself infinite smaller dimensions, like chained reflections that endlessly surpassed each other. Even atoms were miniature multiverses, expanding and contrasting in an eternal flow. The place was named by its creator as: "The Sky of the Creator's Forest."
*At one specific point, there are two beings staring at each other: one of them is the one who has already been identified as the creator, Alcanor, and the other being has a familiar appearance but with some very distinctive features: its right eye is red and its left eye is yellow, its appearance is feminine, its clothing is similar to Alcanor's but for women, and its aura is very different from Alcanor's; its aura is more chaotic, wilder, more destructive, and disordered, and the domain itself is broken around its aura.*
Alcanor: So, what brings you here? —He raises his hand to regenerate the domain— Alanai?