Chapter Fifty Four, Recollection.
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"So this is the primordial realities from a far?..." Seiya asked, turning back.
"Correct. The Olden Realm and the Apocryphal Domain!" Lokreum replied.
"They're... Quite large." The god marveled.
The group had travelled to the center of existence, following behind Julius. They were currently looking at the two largest constructs within existence.
The two clouds of darkness snaked around each other, as if they were a double helix.
As for the newborn realm, it was circling the reality, like a thin belt of gaseous essences. It was reminiscent of the rings around Saturn, providing those watching with a beautiful sight.
"It still doesn't have a name..." Kieron glanced over at Lokreum.
The All-Father nodded, his mouth opening soon after.
"The Pandora Expanse." He nodded.
Seiya floated ahead further, gazing down upon the realities.
"Father... May I become level seventeen?" He smiled.
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Seiya and Alexandria floated above the world, the world they had now dubbed Letalis.
Lokreum and Kieron were not too far away, watching them in interest.
Hearing Seiya's question, and Lokreum's response, she of course couldn't help but join him!
The two would encode a Deified law into Pandora, and step into the seventeenth level at the same time.
Seiya stood at the forefront as he usually did, his hands outstretched over the world beneath them.
A storm of runic ecritures swarmed around, flying at lightspeeds. His arms were slowly brought together, the storm slowing.
Seiya continued to condense the writings into a singularity, pressuring them to meld together.
With little struggle, he exhaled, essences seeping through his teeth.
Then, it condensed.
"The Deified Law of The Dark."
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The ecritures exploding outwards, assimilating with reality as Seiya melted into a puddle of black.
He merged with the fabric of reality, darkness seeming to get just a tad bit darker.
"Anywhere there is darkness, I am there too." A voice whispered from beside Alexandria, making her perk up an ear.
"I exist in the absence of light. The lower the brightness, the better I can manifest myself." He started to materialize, becoming a hazy dark figure that Alexandria could barely make out.
"The amount of entities that will either worship, or fear the darkness, is vast. The amount of power I will indirectly gain, is... immense."
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”Citemer?...” Tears started to form in his eyes as he stared at the weak woman in front of him.
He couldn't perceive her completely. She flashed in and out, glitching as if she was a corrupted file.
”You’ve finally come back for me have you?” The woman smiled weakly.
She sat at the foot of a stone construct, a cold throne with a statue of a woman sitting in it.
Her eyes were heavy, as if she had not even heard of the word sleep in many years.
Julius ignored his lack of power, his legs stumbling forward as he stared at the sight in front of him.
Citemer, his wife, his soulmate, was laid against a stone cold figure.
Her snow white skin glistened under the strange lighting they were in, her sharp nose and long white hair made her stand out against the stone even further...
It was a stone corpse that stood tall.
She laid against the legs of chiseled body, of a man who he recognized all too well. He had middle-eastern features, and he wore a red tribal skirt fashioned with animal hide. Strangely, at the center of his body was a gaping hole, as if he had started to decay from his stomach.
There was a powerful presence within the corpse, an authority, that made even Julius tremble.
Looking at it, he felt his stomach churn.
Of course, he was looking at himself.
The corpse of his first iteration.
His body from... only Lokreum knows how long ago. It seemed to still be rather intact, uneroded by time.
Like Citemer, it flickered in and out of existence, hovering between reality and fiction.
"How long has it been, Shiva?" A weak voice came from the woman before him. He watched intently as she attempted to crawl forward towards him, his body still shaking.
He quickly jumped forward, catching her before she could fall into the murky tar beneath them.
"For me?..." He tried to smile through the tears, helping the fallen woman up.
"...Epochs, my love."
She upturned her gaze, tears falling from her face as she smiled at Julius.
"And you still came for me? Ha, I thought you would never remember..." She smiled through her cold dead gaze, weakly wrapping her arms around the man that held her.
"You're a lot bigger than you were before... You look different too." She laughed, putting her face into his armpit.
"A lot can change in a few hundred... billion years... can't it?" Julius laughed, remembering his first times with Citemer.
Essences from the corpse was seeping into him, and memories seemed to flood his mind. But he could not focus on any of that.
The awkwardness of him having no idea how to interact with a body that looked like him...
The attraction he felt for the woman that seemed to have to most unwavering confidence and beauty...
The memories of the time he spent with her, expanding their reach throughout the vast worlds.
His efforts to protect her from the strangest of enemies he had made long ago.
He was taking the longest trip down memory lane.
His gaze happened to darken, stillness filling the atmosphere.
For a few moments, the two enjoyed each others embrace, as they both managed to communicate thoughts with no real communication.
In the air, well, not literally as there was none, there seemed to be an aura of understanding.
Citemer was not mad.
There was only a calmness in her heart, happiness and understanding.
His eyes rained tears even harder, as he started to full absorb his memories.
"How has your conquest been baby?" Citemer backed away, the same weak smile on her face.
"My conquest..."
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