Lord Joyde The Madman: Heylo, everyone! How are you all doing today?

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An unknown amount of time later... - Lucius' Point Of View...

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My eyes open after what feels like an eternity of colorlessness.

I.. seem to be in a hospital room but... something is wrong. I..

The room... well, while I have regained some of my colors, it looks like all that amounted to was white, black and obsolete grey. Like one of those ancient movies from back on Earth.

This place is.. familiar."Father, why am I getting more injections? Am I sick again?" A voice echoed through my skull, making me slam my hand onto my forehead from the pain. Huh. Pain.

Can't remember the last time something hurt me enough for me to actually react like this. And that voice..."No. You are not sick. You are merely, inadequate."

Tilting my head to the side, I felt myself choke on nothing. My heart turned inside of my stomach as the voices finally revealed themselves. Father and... Me?

I finally realized that I was laying on a derelict hospital bed, seemingly ruined and rusted for no apparent reason. Only one light worked within this room and it was the one above Father and a younger version of me. Even with the light on, I .. my father and I had no real features, but were like floating, faceless shadows.

My father had legs, but my younger self did not.

A quick turn back around confirmed that I did indeed have legs. For some reason, this made me exhale in relief."Inadequate?... whats that mean?"

"Enough talk! Now, be silent and let the doctors do their work." Father screamed at me and I nodded, my younger self seemingly unfazed by the raised tone as the older man stormed out of the room. I saw myself laying back down onto the other bed. The sheets upon it started to burn as my younger self laid down completely.

Then the doctor came in, his body also wreathed in shadow.

He did not have legs.. but unlike my younger selves, his appeared to be sawed off, bleeding endlessly onto the ground. He quaked in momentary terror as Father slammed the door."W-well.. h-here's to-todays do-dose! Lets get this over with quickly."

Almost managing to appear strong, he began to inject me with nameless syringes and feeding me dozens of pills. More than enough for me to overdose, yet somehow they managed to keep me alive.

A blink and I noticed that the room we were in was only halfway manifested as its entire left side, which was supposed to be a teal wall, was actually an infinite black void... Also, there were tentacles grasping the room, almost as if desperately holding onto it.

A charred black, gigantic raven stood watching me from the beyond. It was perched on a branch-like tendril of darkness, looking directly at me with six crimson eyes."Lu." I said without actually wanting to.

The raven nodded and the room began to disappear as I felt myself being thrown into the abyss by an unseen force.

I did not scream.

For there was no air left around me to breathe.

I felt myself slamming against something soft.

Squishy.

My eyes widened as I took in the changes. I was no longer in a dreary room of grey shades.

I was now in another realm entirely.

An intricate garden spanning endlessly, filled with great arching gates, wondrous fountains whose liquid flows reached the skies and innumerable flowers of varying, splendorous colors. A plethora of life, a valley of singular beauty and glory.

Or it would have been.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Was the ground not made of bone.

The flowers growing from corpses.

Gates forged out of viscera and spines.

And the fountains spewing blood, adopting vein-like, ever-beating protrusions, like oversized, misshapen hearts.

The worst part is that this place felt so much like...

"You." Lu's voice echoed, but not through my skull. No.. it was closer.

I turned around to see his raven form on a pillar made out of limbs."So this is my soul then?"

"Soul? No. This is what you could call your... mind." He casually explained before shrinking in size and flying over to land on my left shoulder."Notice anything, new?"

Asking me with a tone of absolute amusement, I felt my head turning around, to watch the flowers. Only to find that the ones closest to me were ... growing on the Rakers I killed just now. I looked around and suddenly, the corpses all seemed familiar. All the animals I've hunted, everything I've killed... ends up here."But why the flowers?"

"Don't know, ask yourself."

...

I have no idea.

Respect for the dead?"Ah, but if that is the case, then explain this."

The raven pointed towards my front and the ground seemed to shift in place."I was wondering why you gained almost nothing from the murder of those poor animals. Turns out, you've already accomplished a far greater sin."

A lone, giant flower rested in the middle of my garden and I approached it, despite knowing what I'd find below it. A young boy, perhaps the same age as my younger self from before. Maybe... four or .. six, years old at best?

What was his name again?

David.

Yes, that's definitely it.

The scenery before us shifted and twisted upon itself once again, adopting the same grey coloration that my memory had before.

Two young boys were playing on an empty street, chasing rodents and the occasional dog or cat with smiles on their faces on some nameless rimworld. Then the boys stopped dead in their tracks as they notice a withered old cat, carrying her newborn kittens into a dark, muddy alleyway.

It was raining heavily that day, much like it had been for the past week.

The boys followed after the cat, wondering what it was doing there...

They found the animal standing atop a puddle in the mud, something red filling the brownish waters. The first boy charged at the cat, causing it to flee from the sudden action, but he stopped the second he reached the puddle.

And within it, the boy found a drowned kitten. He fell to his knees before the puddle and vomited, tears forming in his eyes.

Behind him, the other boy writhed in his own mind.

He witnessed death for the first time. A mother, abandoning her own child, drowning it in the rains gift.

Crying broke the boy out of his unmoving state and he looked towards the other one, who was cradling the dead kitten in his hands. The boy wondered....

How would it feel to kill?

It happened in an instant, an impulse unlike anything other that the boy had ever felt, a rush of burning, infernal blood through his very core. His veins boiled as he leaped onto his friend, grabbing him roughly by the neck and pushing him down into the mud. The crying boy was startled by the act and found himself too weak to resist, the kitten flying out of his hands and catching within his open, vomit-riddled mouth.

He made no more sounds as he struggled, the mud and the water and the hairs filling his body as he desperately tried to breathe.

It did not take long for him to breathe no more.

....

The memory ended and I felt myself empty.

No sadness.

No regret.

But no cruel lust.

Or blood thirst either.

Neither a mistake, nor a good deed."They never found out who was the killer, you know? I wasn't known for having friends so nobody suspected me and the torrential rain did the rest."

"Hmmm..." Lu's voice echoed and rumbled, like a dragons."A murder as beautiful as this... it will be difficult for you to... surpass it."

"Surpass it?" The raven on my shoulder nodded as we switched back to my garden of carnage."Yes. In order for your powers to awaken, you need to commit a murder. One which surpasses any other murders you may have committed previously."

"So I can't use this or any of the animals I've killed over the years?" He shook his head in negative."No. Not yet. The essence gained from their killings is stored somewhere deep within you, but such things are impossible to reach without you becoming more powerful first."

"I see. Like a treasure chest one finds at the start of a game and only manages to open it at the end. How annoying." I let out a massive sigh and looked at my right hand.. only to find that I seemed to have no skin whatsoever."Huh?"

Not waiting for any absolutely-amused reply from my eldritch benefactor, I rushed towards the nearest fountain of blood and looked at my reflection. Wait, does blood even- Ah.

This is my mind.

Reality is an afterthought.

I could make the sky reflect me if I wanted to.

Anyways, looking at the blood, I noticed how I was currently entirely skinless and had six eyes on my head... four of which were closed. I touched them and felt immense pain, causing me to throw my hand back down.

I was completely and utterly naked. On multiple levels.

Suddenly, the sound of a heart-monitor could be heard beeping loudly. The echo traveled all across this infinite garden of slaughter and I turned towards Lu."Let me guess, times up?"

"Correct." His voice appeared to twist itself from the modified version of my voice he usually uses to the abhorrent, submerged voice I heard from the phone.

Much like how I got here in the first place, the world around me seemed to slowly lose all of its color until I saw no more.

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Sorry for the somewhat short chapter.

Been busy job-hunting recently... Here's to hope I manage to find something soon.

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Anyways, read and review! And Good Morning/Day/Night to you all! ADIOS FOR NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!