The squelching soil clung stubbornly to every step Zerin took, resisting his progress with each arduous footfall. His heart pounded in his chest with an unfamiliar malevolence, matching the unbridled rage of the Priest earlier. As he struggled against the muddy decline, he slipped leaving a trail of disrupted earth down the slope. He pushed himself from the earthly mud, his hands mixed with the wet earth, as mud trickled down his clothes and clung around his boots. Rising to his feet, Zerin’s gaze locked onto the figure of the elderly man ahead.

The Old Man turned away from the sheer cliffside, his eyes widening with the realization that he was cornered, with nowhere to escape. The crimson grass around him was displaced further as it climbed up his knees. Below the cliffside, the sea roiled in a blood-soaked hue, waves crashing with a violent, unsettling rhythm against the jagged rocks. As he faced Zerin, he opened his mouth to speak, though zero care or empathy was shone on his weathered face.

"Are you going to kill me?"

What an asinine question.

Zerin’s exhale summoned the needle; rapidly, the scarlet runes materialized, leaving behind fading sparks of light that vanished as soon as they appeared, until the tool was fully formed.

"Everything has gone to hell. I’m just making sure you get what you deserve and don’t slip through the cracks"

Zerin tightened his grip on the needle, his tension mirrored by the distant rumble in the sky. Soon, the roar of seething crimson waves would drown out the sound, bringing with them the familiar, iron-rich scent of blood.

The Old Man's eyes flickered at the hostility before he spoke.

"My daughter is alive..."

Though the news was briefly reassuring, ultimately, if the prophecies maintained its accuracy, it wouldn't matter—she would be as good as dead.

"If we don't contact the goddess, we will all die."

A partial truth, Zerin's fate was the only one seemed to be undetermined.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"Do you even know the offering that is needed? because if you did you wouldn't consider something so foolish!"

The Old Man appeared genuinely agitated—a rare display of real emotion from someone Zerin had only seen as a cold, unfeeling figure. The sadness on his face was unexpected, and Zerin found a certain satisfaction in it.

"So what? We will give whatever is necessary."

Zerin found himself on the verge of grinning, but he quickly reined in the strange discomfort stirring within him.

"Would you offer Wisteria?"

"Don't think you can weaponize her against me."

Zerin stepped forth grasping the staff firmly in his hands as he approached The Old Man.

Zerin recalled seeing the depiction of the boy crowned with serpents—symbols often associated with betrayal and deceit. To avoid being swayed by his emotions, he knew he had to focus on higher ideals, setting aside his personal desires for the greater good of those he had already failed, hoping to restore some way. He was not that boy; he was not the deceiver or the betrayer.

"I only care about my goal, the restoration of the lands and the lives of those that were lost, one person could never be worth that many, that is my place as lord of these lands."

The Old Man's eyes blazed with anger as he clenched his fists at his sides.

"You are heartless! She loves you!"

"Heartless? You have no room to talk, you killed your own son!"

The Old Man pointed a crooked finger at him, his weathered face contorted with a look of entitled anger.

"What the hell do you know? You don't even know yourself!"

What? Am I supposed to believe that you had a reasonable explanation?

The Old Man stepped forward gesturing with his hands out.

"It was to bring you two together… do you not understand?"

"You senile bastard!"

The sky crackled behind Zerin, causing him to reflexively cast a glance at the sky where shortly after another streak of red lightning lit the sky across the darkened clouds.

"I will fulfill my purpose; it's selfish actions that brought us to this point..."

He casted a brief glance at The Old Man before turning away and starting to climb the slippery, mud-streaked hill.

At last, he clawed his way up the muddy hill, struggling to hoist himself over the steep incline. A jagged streak of red lightning burst across the sky, momentarily illuminating the ground below and slicing through the distant clouds, which began to spiral in a menacing dance, drawing Zerin’s gaze. The deafening roar of thunder drowned out all other sounds, creating a relentless white noise that seemed to drain the life from everything it touched, muting the grim vibrancy of his surroundings.

A persistent sound of ripping and stabbing reemerged from the fading crackling thunder that emanated from the swirling anomaly. Beyond the gate, within the sacred grounds, the leviathan's enormous carcass lay gruesomely cleaved in half, its severed halves resting atop a heap of the deceased. A grotesque, flesh-covered spear was relentlessly driven into the creature's head, its monstrous face marred by an expression of sheer brutality and deep-seated hatred. With a final, savage thrust, the spear was plunged into the leviathan’s eye.

Zerin's gaze tracked the sharp tip of the spear, climbing up its length to where a shadowy hand gripped it with a vice-like hold. His eyes raced up the shadowy arm, taking in the dense, dark opacity of its form.

The shadow was an abyss, refusing any entry of light. It turned its head slightly, casting a penetrating gaze over its shoulder, its attention fixed entirely on Zerin. Each second stretched into an eternity as he found himself trapped in the unblinking stare of the entity

His fight-or-flight response surged to life as he summoned the [Crimson Needle], adrenaline coursing through him. The shadow reacted with a bone-chilling shriek that echoed through the air, its entire form abruptly swiveling to face Zerin.

Suddenly, from behind the shadow, fragments of flesh were being violently ripped from the scattered cadavers on the floor. An unseen force began to draw these pieces together, accumulating into a growing mass. The flesh coalesced into a grotesque, pulsing sphere that swelled larger and larger, eventually becoming colossal in size.