The world convulsed.
A violent tremor split the horizon as if the very fabric of existence screamed in agony. Crimson fractures tore open across the sky, spilling rivers of blood-light that twisted the clouds into shards. The ground beneath Lacolone's feet cracked apart, rising and falling in spasms of distorted gravity. Stones floated upward, suspended like lost memories in the choking air.
The Soul Maze had awakened.
And it was furious.
All around him, walls trembled like beating hearts. The air was dense with the static of agony—whispers of countless lost souls bleeding through the seams of reality.
> "It hurts… silence… devour us…"
Their voices tangled together until the sound became unbearable.
Lacolone staggered forward, hands clutching his temples. His pulse thundered in his ears, his veins pulsing with a heat that felt too alive to be his own.
> "This presence…" he thought, breath ragged. "It drowns the air itself."
---
The Arrival
The rift tore wider.
From its depths crawled a figure so vast that the world itself bent to accommodate him. His body was forged of writhing shadows stitched together by pulsing rivers of blood. Eyes—countless and unblinking—opened across his shifting form, each one burning with ancient, predatory hunger.
Reality recoiled.
Stars dimmed and collapsed into nothing.
He was the Scarlet King—a wound given sentience. A god of endings made flesh.
His presence silenced everything. Even time seemed afraid to move.
> "He is the endless nightmare," Lacolone realized, every muscle trembling. "The devourer of cosmos."
---
The Unseen Terror
The Scarlet King's first step shattered the earth.
A wave of crimson light rolled outward, turning stone into molten glass. The Maze wailed in response, its corridors collapsing inward like ribs breaking beneath a colossal heartbeat.
The King's many eyes focused on Lacolone—piercing straight through skin, through bone, through soul.
> "…Little flame," the god whispered.
The sound wasn't a voice but a vibration in the marrow, a whisper that tasted of iron and despair. Lacolone's fists clenched, blood seeping from between his fingers. His resolve flickered but did not fade.
---
The King's Creed
The Scarlet King loomed higher, the sky bending beneath his weight.
> "I walk among worlds collapsing under their own delusions,"
his voice thundered, each word shaking mountains.
"Do you know what binds existence, mortal?
Not love. Not order. Only the certainty of rot."
Lacolone forced himself upright. His aura sputtered like a dying ember struggling against a hurricane.
> "You face a spirit forged in pain and fire," he growled. "I won't break."
The King smiled—a jagged, impossible grin.
> "You already have," he said. "You just haven't accepted it yet."
One of his eyes flared crimson, large as a moon.
And the world bled.
---
The Siege of the Mind
The King's aura hit him like a tidal wave.
The ground vanished beneath his feet; he was weightless, drowning in invisible pressure.
> "Every cry ever uttered," the King whispered, "vanishes into silence."
Visions tore through Lacolone's mind—planets imploding, suns collapsing into black voids, galaxies fading like candlelight snuffed by a cruel wind.
> "Every star is born only to die in ash."
He fell to his knees, clutching his head. Blood streamed from his nose, from his ears, from the cracks in his palms.
> "No… I—"
> "Existence," the King said gently, "is a wound that never heals."
---
The Philosophy of the Void
Lacolone roared, defiance cutting through the storm.
> "Pain is strength! Endurance is meaning!"
The King's laughter rolled like the shattering of mountains.
> "Childish noise," he said. "Pain does not ennoble you—it exposes you. Weak flesh straining against eternity."
The Maze fractured—walls cracking open, bleeding light.
> "The universe is chaos. Hope is the drug of dying animals."
Shadows wrapped around Lacolone's legs like serpents, dragging him toward the abyss.
> "Power," the King continued, "is only hunger devouring itself."
---
The Distortion of Stars
The King advanced.
Each step distorted time. The stars overhead flickered once, then vanished entirely.
Lacolone stood his ground, trembling but unyielding.
His single burning eye locked on the god before him.
> "I will not yield."
---
The Abyss Within
Black smoke coiled around his head, whispering in a thousand voices.
> "Your victories? Dust."
"Your loves? Soon bones."
Faces appeared—friends, comrades, mentors—crumbling to ash in his hands.
He gasped, trembling.
> "Because… we fight—"
A single massive eye filled his vision.
> "No," the King said. "You flail. You bleed. And you vanish. As all do."
---
The Spark
Something within him snapped—not in defeat, but in ignition.
His aura burst outward, shredding the suffocating smoke.
Crimson light met crimson shadow, and for a heartbeat the world held still.
> "I am flame born in fury," Lacolone roared. "I will never fold!"
The King's pupils narrowed in surprise as waves of energy tore through the Maze, distorting space between them.
---
The Bloodstorm
The Scarlet King answered with violence.
A storm of blood and thunder erupted from his form, shredding the Maze's walls. The very air screamed.
Lacolone was thrown backward, skidding across stone. He coughed blood, spat red, forced himself to breathe.
> "…Still burning," he whispered.
---
Resilience
He rose. Barely.
Every limb trembled, yet he refused to fall. Around him flickered five shimmering pillars—blue lightning, red shield, silver fog, black quake, and gold blur—his soul's arsenal. They danced, weak but alive.
> Endure, whispered the voice of his training. Endure.
> "Master the abyss…" Lacolone murmured through blood, "or die."
---
The Abyssal Truth
The Scarlet King's tone deepened, tolling like a funeral bell.
> "Do you want truth? Life is not a gift. It is a cage woven of meat and fear."
Lacolone's aura burned unstable, his light fighting the encroaching dark.
> "To live is to serve decay. To die is to return to silence.
Everything else is illusion."
He stepped closer, claws outstretched, eyes aflame.
> "True power lies in yielding to the void—shaping it into a blade to cut away falsehood."
---
The Rallying Flame
Lacolone's response was a roar.
All Five Pillars ignited at once—flame, lightning, quake, fog, and speed merging into one furious storm. The energy lashed outward, shoving back the King's tide.
The Scarlet King recoiled, his shadows thrashing.
> "I won't fall here!" Lacolone screamed, the Maze glowing from his defiance.
---
The Lord of Oblivion
The god's laughter rolled through the dark, cold and amused.
> "Your defiance is gorgeous… but futile."
Lacolone staggered, barely standing.
The King's grin returned, sharp and cruel.
> "You cling to fire, yet fire is hunger consuming itself. You are no different from the stars—brief, radiant, meaningless."
Lacolone's fist tightened, trembling but still burning.
---
The Breaking Point
> "You know I speak truth," the King whispered. "You feel it in your marrow."
Tears mingled with blood on Lacolone's face.
> "How many nights have you wondered if it's worth it?"
Shadows constricted tighter, crushing breath from his lungs.
> "That ache you bury deep—that is my kingdom."
Through pain and tears, Lacolone met the god's gaze.
> "Broken souls…" he hissed, "…still rise."
---
Flame Against Void
The world erupted.
His aura exploded into crimson-gold flame, tearing the shadows apart. The King's smoke recoiled, shrieking as radiant waves of energy surged outward.
Lacolone stood alone in the storm, body cracked, spirit unbroken.
> "I am not yours to consume!"
---
Declaration of War
He took a step forward, fire blazing from his eyes.
> "The abyss is mine to command," he declared.
"This darkness will forge my strength!"
The crimson rift began to collapse, the King's laughter echoing as the void consumed itself.
> "Then dance madly on the edge of oblivion, flame."
Lacolone raised a burning fist, his light slicing through the black.
---
The Aftermath
The Scarlet King vanished—leaving only trails of blood-light swirling in the dying air.
The Soul Maze groaned, sinking deeper into shadow.
Lacolone's breathing was ragged. His aura flickered like a dying sun.
His knees buckled.
Through the haze, a shape approached—graceful, radiant, haloed in white fire.
A woman. Wings of light unfurled behind her, feathers shimmering with golden dust.
Her face—unreal, divine—tilted toward him with sorrow and warmth.
> "An angel…" he whispered, eyes dimming. "Beautiful…"
His vision blurred. The world fell away.
And as he collapsed into darkness, her light reached for him.
Whether he would rise again—or vanish before the year's end—no one could tell.