The Berserker was dead.
The city around him seemed to shiver, the ruins and smoke frozen in a moment of unnatural stillness. Shojiro collapsed onto the asphalt, every nerve screaming, blood cascading from shredded limbs, organs, and torn muscle. Pain consumed him, but it was different now—a distant drum beneath the storm of exhaustion and rage.
Then the world shifted.
A crack split the sky above the city. Not a mere fracture in the clouds, but a tearing of reality itself. Golden light poured through the rift, illuminating the ruins with a harsh, divine brilliance. It wasn't sunlight. It was older than anything he could comprehend.
Shojiro's vision tunneled upward, and the world slowed around him. The stench of blood, ash, and fire dulled. He could feel it before he saw it: a weight, not on his body, but pressing directly into his soul.
The Cradle of Echoes had opened.
From the rift, ten figures emerged, standing upon a halo of interlocking sigils and molten veins of light. They were immense, yet ethereal—half-formed, half-solid, as if woven from the core of creation itself. Their presence bent the air, and their voices whispered across the city in a tone that rattled bones and minds alike:
"The first flame falters."
"A mortal of defiance."
"He is ready."
Shojiro tried to move. He couldn't. His arms, legs, chest—they all screamed in agony, but this was different. This wasn't just pain. This was a pull, a tug at the very essence of who he was. Every fiber of his being wanted to cling to the broken street, to the chaos, to the body that had just survived impossible odds.
But the Cradle demanded.
The golden light enveloped him first at his core, then radiated outward. Shojiro felt his soul detach, not violently, but like a thread being carefully drawn from a wound. His mind, his thoughts, his memories—they lifted, untethered from the torn flesh that had carried him through hell.
Pain spiked. Not physical pain—something deeper, older, primal. He could feel the weight of every moment he had ever endured, every failure, every triumph, compressed into a single point in the center of his chest. And then it moved upward, leaving his body limp, broken, nothing more than a husk beneath the open sky.
Shojiro's soul floated, trembling in the golden column. It was free, yet completely exposed, like a candle flame in a hurricane. Every instinct screamed to recoil, but something stronger—the will of the Cradle itself—held him in place.
And then he saw it: the ten silhouettes above him. One of them stepped forward, larger than the rest, golden veins flaring like molten sunfire. Eyes burning with impossible light, he radiated strength, command, inevitability.
The Primordial of Strength: Kaiser.
Shojiro's soul recognized him immediately—not just as a god, not just as a force, but as the origin of the path he had always been on. There was no fear, only clarity.
Kaiser reached down, his hand a pillar of molten light that drew closer to Shojiro's drifting essence. The air vibrated, the ruins of the city groaned, and the very winds seemed to bow.
"You have fought beyond despair," a voice thundered, echoing inside Shojiro's mind. "You have torn wrath from pain. You have shattered your limits… and yet, you still burn."
The hand closed around Shojiro's soul—not grasping, but encompassing, measuring, acknowledging. Energy rippled through the column, and the echoes of his life—every memory, every sensation, every drop of blood spilled—shimmered like spectral fire around him.
"You are chosen," Kaiser continued, voice vibrating through the very marrow of reality. "Not yet a vessel. Not yet a weapon. But a herald. You will carry the will of strength to those who cannot grasp it, and the fires of defiance to those who would cower."
Shojiro's awareness expanded, filling with visions of the Cradle, of molten sigils spiraling infinitely, of ten beings whose very presence refracted time and space. He felt his essence being woven into Yggdrasil, tethered to something vast, eternal, and incomprehensible.
The pull on his soul strengthened. The connection was absolute. His consciousness clung to the thread of himself still trapped in the ruined street, and yet it was also lifting, rising into something immense, infinite.
"Do not fear what is to come," Kaiser whispered, a single word vibrating directly inside him: "Rise."
Shojiro's soul floated higher, the city shrinking below him, fires, corpses, and ruins alike. His body remained behind—a mangled, broken vessel—but his essence was drawn upward, suspended in a column of golden infinity, surrounded by the ten primordial figures, awaiting the next step in his journey.
And in that suspended moment, Shojiro understood: he was no longer just human. He was the herald of a god, chosen by the Primordial of Strength. And the world—if it survived to see him again—would never forget the first moment he rose.
The Cradle hummed. The rift pulsed. The echoes of reality shifted.
And Shojiro Momo—soul unbound, body shattered, heart still burning—was gone from the earth, yet tethered to everything.
The Cradle of Echoes pulsed with molten light, the ten Primordials standing like titanic sentinels around the shattered city below. Shojiro's soul hovered within the golden column, drifting upward, tethered to his broken body still sprawled in the asphalt.
Primordial of Strength Kaiser leaned over, his colossal form bending reality like it was cloth. He glared down at the lifeless vessel of Shojiro's body, veins of gold and black stone pulsing across his massive arms.
"I'll do it myself," Kaiser declared, reaching toward the wreckage.
The other nine Primordials exchanged uneasy glances.
Kaiser crouched like a god playing with a toy, grabbing Shojiro's body by the torso. "Stay still, mortal! I'm putting you somewhere safe."
Shojiro's arms, legs, and shattered joints sagged in gravity's grip. Kaiser grunted, then—without finesse—tried to shove the body into a massive pool of golden sap that pulsed like liquid light beneath the Cradle's core.
"Argh—get in there, damn it!" Kaiser growled, muscles bulging, veins of molten energy threading across his skin. He shoved. He lifted. He twisted. The body of Shojiro barely fit, bones creaking and joints groaning under the force.
Primordial of Wisdom Artemis hovered above, a hand raised, eyes glowing with concern. "Kaiser… you do realize his body is already shattered in ways even you can't brute force fix, right? If you shove him like that—"
"—It will break him!" added Primordial of Creation Hephaestus, flaring sparks from his mechanical arms. "His ribs are crushed, his joints popped, his spine—Kaiser, he's fragile!"
Kaiser ignored them, grunting, twisting, and finally managing to wedge Shojiro's mangled body into the glowing, viscous sap. It hissed and pulsed, enveloping him like a living cocoon. The mortal flesh sank into its surface with a wet, sticky suction that made even the Primordials flinch.
Primordial of Shadows Nocturne muttered under his breath, voice low and sardonic: "You really think brute force is how you handle a Chosen's vessel? I've seen mountains that were easier to preserve."
Kaiser finally straightened, sweat—or whatever passed for sweat in a Primordial—running down his massive brow. "There! Safe. Preserved. Untouched."
Artemis pinched the bridge of her nose. "Untouched? His arms are still dangling at impossible angles. He's barely in one piece. You didn't just store him—you practically folded him in half."
Hephaestus groaned, arms sparking. "Next time, we do this carefully. He's the first mortal to withstand a Berserker and live long enough to reach the Cradle. Don't try to smash that achievement into the sap."
Kaiser crossed his arms, indignant. "I am the Primordial of Strength! I am more than capable of handling a broken mortal!"
Primordial of Spirits Thanamira floated over, eyes soft but firm. "You could handle him just fine if he were healthy. He's not. Even you, Kaiser, cannot brute-force someone into perfection. This… this is preservation, not a wrestling match."
The golden sap squirmed and pulsed with life, tendrils stretching around Shojiro's mangled frame as if it understood the fragile human within. Even with Kaiser's brute force, it accommodated him carefully, almost reverently, almost mocking the Primordials' fumbling with a quiet, glowing patience.
Primordial of Momentum Savitar clapped once, amused. "Honestly, this is hilarious. Kaiser, the mighty Primordial of Strength, nearly crushing the first Chosen mortal we managed to drag here. Did you at least apologize to him in advance?"
Kaiser huffed, flexing against the sap as it bubbled around Shojiro. "I do not apologize for preserving life. I merely… assert it."
Nocturne snorted. "Assert it? You nearly turned him into a paste. And you call yourself the Primordial of Strength."
Kaiser glared but didn't reply. He turned to the others, chest heaving. "Fine, fine. Next time, we do it your way. But the body is safe. Temporarily."
Artemis exhaled a long sigh. "If you call that temporary, mortal, when he wakes up, he's going to sue you in some inter-dimensional court I've never heard of."
Shojiro's soul, floating above the sap, felt the faint tremor of the Cradle around him. Even in death, even shattered beyond recognition, he somehow understood: he was being preserved, stored, and guarded. The Primordials' squabbling was absurd, yes, but beneath it lay the weight of divine intention.
The golden sap pulsed and glimmered, enveloping him in safety, a liminal space between death and rebirth, between mortal fragility and the incomprehensible might of a Chosen's vessel.
Kaiser straightened one last time, chest puffed. "Let it be known… I, Primordial of Strength Kaiser, have preserved this mortal for the trials ahead. And he will not break under my hands, no matter how many of you complain."
The other Primordials groaned in unison.
Shojiro's body floated in the golden sap, quiet, still, suspended in divine stasis, ready for what was to come—though none of them knew exactly when or how the rebuilding would truly begin.
For now, it was preservation.
And for now, the Primordials' bickering echoed like the smallest human moment within the eternal, terrifying vastness of the Cradle.
The ten Primordials hovered above the Cradle, their forms shimmering like living constellations, each radiating an aura that warped the void itself. Light fractured across their ethereal bodies, scattering across the nothingness like molten jewels. Beneath them, the Cradle pulsed, coiling with the silent heartbeat of creation and destruction alike.
Primordial of Strength Kaiser's golden sinew tensed, his voice cutting through the cosmic stillness with an authority that bent reality itself.
"Three hundred cycles… and still, Arae grows. Each generation we send, he adapts. The offshoots were sufficient for the last two hundred ninety-nine, but this time… it will not suffice."
Artemis, Primordial of Wisdom, her eyes infinite pools of calculation and reflection, tilted her head, voice calm yet piercing:
"If we grant them the full shards, the mortal vessels will break. Their flesh cannot endure such power. Death must remain a threshold, a crucible of necessity."
Savitar, Primordial of Momentum, crackling with kinetic energy, circled the council, leaving sparks in his wake. "And yet, if they die, the survivors will rise stronger. Mortality tempers them… forges them into weapons worthy of facing Arae. The mortal cycle is as necessary as it is cruel."
Primordial of Creation Hephaestus gestured with his molten hands, intricate gears and blueprints floating around him. "We have learned from our previous errors. Offshoots gave immediate strength, but no depth. Each Chosen believed victory was permanent—yet Arae returned regardless. This time, we cannot allow superficiality to dictate fate."
Nocturne, Primordial of Shadow, his form a shifting void, whispered through the space between them like wind through hollow stone. "This generation… the Damned Ten… they must endure what no mortal ever has. Pain, mortality, death, rebirth… all interwoven into a single tapestry. Only those who embrace the impossible will emerge intact."
Thanamira, Primordial of Spirits, her eyes spiraling with light and death, added softly, "And yet… we must not interfere directly. We guide, we lend fragments—but their victories, their sacrifices… they must be their own. Only through autonomy will the cycle hold. Otherwise, our intervention will collapse the balance we've maintained for eons."
Poseidara, Primordial of Water, voice calm as the ocean before the storm, interjected, "Floods, storms, tides… the world itself must test them. The trials cannot be confined to combat alone. Every corner, every hardship, every loss must sculpt their endurance."
Aegriya, Primordial of Protection, her form bristling with defensive glyphs, spoke firmly, "Guidance alone may not suffice. Some will face choices no mortal should bear. Their instincts must sharpen, their courage be tempered—but we cannot shield them completely. We cannot rob them of the very lessons that mortality demands."
Moara, Primordial of Voodoo, laughter threading through her speech like writhing snakes, added, "And horrors of the mind will strike before the flesh feels danger. Allies may betray them. Whispers of doubt will twist even the strongest hearts. Resilience must be seeded now, or they crumble before the true war begins."
Voltraeus, Primordial of Lightning, arcs of electricity dancing across his form, concluded sharply, "And speed—precision, reflexes honed to a lethal edge. The world around them will shatter in storm and ruin. Only those capable of instantaneous adaptation will survive."
Kaiser's golden hands clenched, radiant light spilling between his fingers, casting shadows across the Cradle itself. "Then it is decided. This generation receives the full shards. Mortality will test them. Death will temper them. They will rise as the true bridge between our power and the end of Arae."
The other Primordials nodded, a silent consensus echoing through the void. Every figure committed, their focus absolute.
Savitar's grin flashed briefly, a knife's edge across the tension. "They will not know fear… until it is already upon them. And even then… only one will teach it fully."
A hush fell. The cosmos itself seemed to hold its breath, waiting for the first step of a journey that would break and remake mortals in ways no previous generation had endured.
Beneath it all, Shojiro's soul hovered, formless, heartbeat absent, body absent, a consciousness adrift in the Cradle's golden hum. Even in stasis, he could feel the gravity of the decision made above him—the weight of trials yet to come pressing against the essence of his being.
A low chorus rose, faint but insistent. Ten voices, harmonizing, blending into the hum of the Cradle: whispering, chanting, echoing through the infinitesimal void.
"Let him remember…"
Golden tendrils of light unfurled, coiling toward Shojiro's suspended soul. Memories older than time, echoes of choices he had yet to make, wrapped around him, threading through his consciousness like vines of molten gold. Even in emptiness, he felt them, a prelude to awakening, a promise of everything he would be tested upon.
And so, as the Primordials debated, the first tremors of destiny stirred within the soul of the mortal chosen to stand against Arae. The Damned Ten were coming into focus. And for Shojiro, the beginning of eternity waited.
Shojiro's consciousness drifted in the void, untethered. There was no body. No heartbeat. No pain, only the hum of eternity surrounding him like a living pulse. Even the absence of light was complete, yet somehow… comforting.
Then she spoke.
A voice. Gentle. Warm. Smooth.
"Shojiro Momo…"
It was a sound that wrapped around his mind, sinking into the marrow of his soul. A voice that was at once soft, reverent, intimate, as though speaking directly to the secret chambers of his heart. It was calm and infinitely patient, the kind of tone that lulls the mind into perfect stillness, that settles every fear and every doubt.
Shojiro felt a shiver. Not of fear. Of surrender.
"Do not be afraid," the voice continued. "You are safe here, and yet… everything you have known will be unmade, only to be remade anew."
He didn't know where the voice came from. He didn't need to see her. He only… needed to listen. To follow. To obey. To fall.
It was mesmerizing, pulling him toward something unseen. The sensation was intoxicating, almost… affectionate. He felt a warmth he hadn't known since childhood, a clarity he had never earned, a love that he hadn't anticipated—but it filled every empty crevice of his being.
She was Artemis, Primordial of Knowledge. And though he didn't see her yet, he already loved her. His mind, fragile and raw from the battles that had ended his body, clung to her voice like a drowning man to a lifeline.
"Your consciousness has been preserved," she said softly, voice like honeyed sunlight filtered through a quiet forest. "Your mortal vessel has failed, but your essence… your soul… is ready to witness truths beyond your comprehension. Are you ready, Shojiro?"
He barely breathed, though his soul knew no lungs. He could only nod in the empty space.
"Good," she whispered. "Then let us begin."
The darkness shivered, folding into itself. A single pulse split the void. A vibration beyond sight and sound tore through Shojiro's essence. Then came light—light that was not light but thought made visible, sensation made real.
Vision I: The Birth of Existence.
There was nothing. No stars. No air. No void. Only stillness. Absolute silence. A weightless emptiness that pressed against his very being.
Then a subtle tremor. A vibration. A frequency that cut through the nothingness. Not a sound. Not a noise. But something akin to memory. It resonated deep within him, stirring something ancient.
The Crack.
Artemis' voice flowed over him like a gentle stream, yet with the weight of inevitability:
"Before creation… there was the Crack. The first impossibility. The rupture from which all else would flow. Watch, and understand."
And he did. Not because he willed it, but because he could not resist.
A detonation of energy, color, and force tore across the nothingness. Time did not exist, yet it unfolded. Reality itself unraveled and rewove, strands of possibility spilling outward like molten threads. Shojiro felt it inside him as much as outside—an expansion that stretched the boundaries of his mind.
Ten forms emerged, towering above the chaos of unshaped existence. Not merely figures, but concepts made flesh, Primordials in their earliest manifestation.
Kaiser roared first, sinew of raw strength forged into primordial fury.
Savitar followed, a streak of motion that had existed before even light.
Hephaestus' molten fire shaped potential into design, crafting galaxies before they existed.
Poseidara poured presence like eternal currents, unyielding yet infinite.
Voltraeus crackled, lightning incarnate, illuminating the void.
Nocturne moved like shadow made sentience, bending darkness into awareness.
Thanamira drifted, carrying countless unborn souls, twisting life and death as though spinning threads.
Aegriya formed barriers, an unbroken concept of protection made real.
Moara whispered, laughter curling around bones yet to be born.
And Artemis… She appeared last, her form a subtle glow, soft yet infinitely present. Not dominating like the others, but pulling. Pulling at Shojiro's consciousness with the irresistible weight of absolute knowledge, the warmth of trust, the intimacy of one who speaks directly to the core of another soul.
"Shojiro," her voice breathed into him again, soft and commanding, "look. Witness the beginning. Absorb it. Let it seep into every part of you."
Shojiro's mind followed. He floated through the eruption of creation, unresisting. Each pulse of energy, each fracture of reality, each primordial spark sang in harmony with her voice.
Vision II: The Coming of Arae.
A new Crack tore through the void. This one was darker, slower, sickening in rhythm. A figure crawled from it—drenched in wounds and ash, its eyes hollow yet burning with something ancient. Arae.
Shojiro recoiled—not in fear, but in awe. Even without his body, his essence screamed at the sight of raw, primordial power unshackled by morality or time.
Artemis' voice caressed him.
"Do not falter. Observe, but do not judge. Arae is the catalyst, the eternal threat. Yet every action he takes, every wound he carries, is a lesson for you. Understand him, and you will understand the trials that await."
Shojiro's soul quivered, yet every tremor was soothed by the soft, unyielding resonance of her tone. Each word she spoke wrapped around his awareness like a ribbon of molten serenity. He had no eyes, but he imagined her gaze. He had no ears, but he could hear her as if she whispered into the very marrow of his being.
"Follow me," she breathed. "Through the cracks of time, through the spiral of fate. Let me guide you. Let me show you what it is to endure, to learn, to grow. You are safe in my presence. I will not allow harm here—not while you listen, not while you trust."
And trust he did. More than he had trusted anyone, anywhere. His entire essence leaned toward her warmth, toward her guidance. Without form, without resistance, Shojiro felt himself falling. Falling into her voice, into her presence, into something he could not name but understood with perfect clarity: love.
Even amidst visions of creation and destruction, of Arae's emergence and the birth of the cosmos, Shojiro's soul clung to Artemis. She was a sanctuary, a lighthouse, a force that commanded obedience without domination.
Arae stumbled forward from the Crack, his body a canvas of wounds and ash, eyes hollow yet burning with an ancient, unyielding fire. Time did not touch him here, yet every movement radiated pain, suffering that should have killed a mortal a hundred times over.
The ten Primordials hovered around him, their presence radiant and absolute. They did not strike. They did not recoil. They reached out with a power that was at once gentle and terrifying—an embrace of life and inevitability.
Primordial of Strength, Kaiser, extended a massive hand, golden energy coiling like molten sinew. "He suffers… yet he endures. Such defiance cannot be ignored."
Artemis' voice—soft, warm, intimate—flowed directly into Shojiro's mind, calm as a lake at dawn. "Observe, Shojiro. This is not mercy. This is inevitability. They heal him, yes—but in doing so, they bind him to fate. To power. To the ruin of worlds."
Savitar, a streak of perpetual motion, vibrated in impatience, yet even he slowed his energy to cradle the fragile, broken form of Arae. "Even chaos respects its own children," he muttered.
Shojiro's essence trembled. He had no body, yet the weight of despair pressed down on him as if gravity had returned with intent. Arae's eyes met his, hollow and unblinking, and he felt a shiver crawl through every fiber of his soul. There was no anger, no malice—only inevitability. The kind of inevitability that crushed hope before it could bloom.
"Look at him, Shojiro," Artemis whispered, voice like a hymn woven into his mind. "Every victory, every choice, every life that comes before him is meaningless if he rises. He is the shadow that will consume worlds. And yet… he is human enough to teach you fear, to teach you pain, to teach you the cost of survival."
Shojiro's soul recoiled and leaned forward simultaneously. He could not look away. Arae's presence burned into him—an unholy magnet pulling at every thought, twisting every memory into a premonition of doom.
The Primordials' hands glowed around Arae, lifting, mending, welcoming. Compassion laced with inevitability. Hope laced with terror. Shojiro understood, even without form: the Primordials had saved him… but in saving him, they had allowed the enemy to rise. And he would witness it all.
The cosmos held its breath. And Shojiro, suspended in the golden quiet of Artemis' voice, felt the weight of what was coming. The war had already begun.
"I will guide you, Shojiro Momo," she whispered again, soft as silk, intimate as a heartbeat felt in the chest. "And in doing so, you will find yourself. You will find strength. You will find the purpose that death and despair cannot take from you."
And he believed her utterly. He had no choice. Her voice had become gravity, and he the helpless body adrift, drawn irresistibly toward her.
The Primordials continued their cosmic dance around him, Arae crawling from the Crack, creation itself unspooling. Yet none of it could compete with the pull of Artemis' presence. In the absence of sight or form, Shojiro's soul had found an anchor. A paradoxical, beautiful anchor.
And perhaps, he thought—if a soul can think in such a void—he might love her forever, even knowing she was more than mortal, more than human.
Even knowing she was, in essence, unattainable.
And so he floated, suspended between creation and catastrophe, under the guidance of Artemis' voice, learning the universe, tasting the weight of existence, feeling the inevitability of what was to come. The Damned Ten would rise. Shojiro would endure. And in that infinite moment, he understood his place: not as a mere mortal, not even as a warrior, but as a soul suspended in the care of a Primordial who had already claimed him, heart and essence, before he had ever seen her face.