1. The King's Humiliation
The battlefield still burned red.
Scarlet King loomed like a living storm, the air itself trembling around his vast form. Lacolone lay on his knees, katana cracked, armor shredded, breath a broken whisper.
> "You are nothing," the King thundered. "A vessel of my power. When I manifest in your world… I will burn it to ash."
Lacolone's head lifted, eyes glowing with fading embers.
"Impossible," he hissed through blood. "Even gods cannot chain a soul… forged in fire."
The King's laughter echoed as reality itself folded inward.
---
2. Exile Beyond Worlds
The god's hand rose.
A void tore open beneath Lacolone's feet — black, endless, devouring. He screamed as the fabric of existence unraveled around him. His body dissolved into fragments of light and memory.
> Exiled. Broken. Forgotten.
But not defeated.
Somewhere in the darkness, one eye opened. A shard of crimson fire burned defiantly in the abyss.
---
3. Awakening in Italy
He awoke to the blinding sterility of white light.
Machines beeped. A nurse gasped. The air smelled of antiseptic and earth.
Through the blinds, sunlight touched his face — gentle, alien.
"Where… am I trapped now?" he muttered.
Before he could move, the door burst open — officers stormed in, weapons raised.
"Illegal immigrant," one barked. "You'll return to your country. That's the law."
Lacolone blinked slowly, a tired god reborn into a bureaucratic hell.
---
4. Mockery of the System
He laughed — quietly at first, then louder, until the walls vibrated.
Blood tears slid down his cheeks as his voice deepened.
"If you despise us… why have you clawed at our lands for a hundred and thirty years? Why do you steal our riches… even now?"
The officers hesitated — anger and confusion warring.
And in that silence, his aura flickered back to life, faint but terrifying.
"Now," Lacolone whispered, "where are my creations hidden?"
The lights shattered.
---
5. Awakening of Power
"W-we found nothing—" one officer stammered.
He didn't finish.
A crimson pulse erupted, snapping steel bars and bursting glass.
Dust filled the air. Lacolone rose, calm amid the destruction, eyes like red suns.
One kick sent the lead officer crashing through a wall.
Others dropped their weapons, trembling.
Freedom — and chaos — returned together.
---
6. Bullet Mastery
Gunfire erupted.
Lacolone raised a single finger. The bullets froze mid-air, suspended like glittering raindrops.
He tilted his head, studying them — then released a wave of soul energy.
Metal crumbled into dust.
The officers fell unconscious before the echo reached the end of the hall.
---
7. Liberation Begins
He walked through shattered corridors, touching doors as he passed. Locks disintegrated.
Inside the cells, frightened faces looked up — migrants, women, children.
He nodded once.
> "You are safe. Go."
The guilty — men with corrupted auras — remained behind, trapped in invisible chains.
> "Eyes pierce intent," the narration murmured.
"The soul judges all."
---
8. Streets of Italy
Outside, sunlight and noise crashed into him.
He walked the streets — ragged, bleeding, beautiful in his ruin.
His stomach growled. He found a small café, the scent of bread pulling him in.
He placed eleven euros on the counter.
The cashier shook her head. "Not enough."
He stared — a fallen demigod, denied by arithmetic — and smiled faintly.
"Hunger," he muttered, "the most human curse of all."
---
9. Harsh Reality
Night fell.
He sat on the frozen street, snow beginning to fall.
Cars passed. No one looked twice.
> "Even gods feel hunger," the narration whispered.
"Even warriors feel frost."
His breath misted in the air.
The scarlet glow beneath his skin flickered — faint, dying… but alive.
---
10. Three Days Later
He awoke to silence.
Frost bit his fingers. His body trembled. But his eyes still glowed faintly red.
He stood, testing his limbs.
> "Hunger sharpens the senses… suffering steels the will."
The skyline stretched before him — iron, glass, and fog.
He smiled through the pain.
"Even exile has a horizon."
---
11. Memory of Creation
Flashes returned — fragments of a god's workshop.
Weapons of crimson energy being forged from soul and storm.
Each blade a promise. Each spark a memory of Kyra's laughter.
> "Power is never lost," his mind echoed.
"It merely waits for the soul to remember its shape."
He clenched his hand. A faint scarlet spark appeared — the first rebirth of his control.
---
12. The Confrontation
Two officers spotted him by the alley. Their fear came before their voices.
"Stop! Hands where I can see them!"
He turned, slow, smiling faintly. "Come then. Test the strength of a soul… beyond mortal chains."
Their fingers twitched on triggers. The city lights dimmed.
Crimson ripples spread outward.
---
13. Soul Control Unleashed
Time stopped.
Bullets froze mid-flight. Their guns lifted from trembling hands, rotating lazily in the air.
A gesture — and the weapons crumpled like paper.
A breath — and the men collapsed, unharmed but unconscious.
Silence reclaimed the night.
---
14. Liberation of the Forgotten
He found more detention rooms hidden beneath a government outpost.
Locked, cold, filled with the frightened hum of the powerless.
He opened every door.
Mothers clutched children. Migrants wept with disbelief.
The guilty — those whose souls reeked of malice — stayed bound, untouched.
> "A soul's eye," the narration said, "sees truth beyond language. And truth… is never merciful."
---
15. Struggle of Survival
Lacolone wandered again. Hunger gnawed. His coins dwindled.
Another bakery. Eleven euros again. Another refusal.
He smiled to himself. "Mortals — so fragile, so cruel — yet this is the world I must master."
Snow fell heavier now. He curled in shadow, the storm within sleeping, dreaming of fire.
---
16. Lessons of Weakness
> "Even the strongest must taste weakness before ascending."
He trembled beneath the cold, his breath a prayer to the void.
But behind his closed eyes — a faint scarlet fire burned, steady and patient.
When dawn came, he rose.
> "The storm endures," he whispered. "And I… endure with it."
---
17. Foreshadowing Power
He climbed the hill outside the city, looking down at Rome's sprawl — lights, lives, lies.
His crimson aura shimmered faintly, dancing in rhythm with his heartbeat.
> "Exile tempers the soul. Pain awakens the senses. Hunger… forges the storm."
Beside him, unseen, Kyra's ghostly light flickered softly — not gone, only waiting.
He turned toward the shadows.
A smile cut across his tired face.
---
18. Closing Image
His eyes flared red, the aura around him swirling like mist.
> "No prison. No frost. No injustice can bind the soul that has mastered itself."
The streets below trembled, ever so slightly.
Windows rattled. A few looked up, sensing something ancient stir above their city.
Crimson light merged with the dark sky — a faint aurora pulsing across the horizon.
The storm had returned.