Chapter 56

As she had told him, death proved to be a Non-thing for entities like Callisto.

Mikel charged and with a powerful downward slash cut deep into her shoulder. Mikel had expected her to move, to defend herself, to do something - but all the goddess had done was stare Mikel down as he charged.

He grimaced and yanked the blade back - surprised at the strength at which her body held it in place.

When freed from her, the deep gash his sword made gushed bright red blood - but then, as quickly as it had been made, it sealed itself and vanished leaving nothing but a red line on her waxy skin.

She grinned at Mikel before running a finger along the line. She shivered as she did so.

“So… Violent,” She said in a shuddering breath, “I was leery of you at first Young Raitshon, but I was so, so wrong to doubt you. If ever there was one worthy to be my champion - in this degenerate age nonetheless - you are him.”

“Damn you!” Mikle snarled, “Damn you! I don’t want to be your champion. I want to save Helsket! I can’t kill you and you can’t die - so why are we here?”

She stepped lightly towards him, her hair shifting maddeningly around her voluptuous form, bare feet leaving bloody tracks as she moved.

“Tsk tsk, Young Raithson - I am the goddess of Blood - did you really think to kill me, or even injure me by spilling that which constitutes my form?”

Mikel thought back to the talk he’d had with Helsket and grimaced. If this was truly Callisto then the form he saw was something of little more consequence than a change of clothing for her. She was Blood made form, and only contained in a hardened shell of Essentia… Or something else, to make that form visible.

He cursed himself for his stupidity - how could he think to kill a goddess? Especially when he couldn’t even defend himself against a facsimile of a the Time Demon.

She quirked her head, apparently hearing the thought echo from Mikel’s mind.

“Would you like that form better? It wasn’t me in your dream if that’s what you’re wondering - at least not in the form of The Time Demon.”

Before Mikel could respond her body turned scarlet, grew two feet, and then reformed, all in the span of a single breath - removing the beautiful blood-stained woman, and replacing her with the version of The Time Demon from Mikel’s dream.

He took an involuntary step back as the creature pointed at him with a desiccated claw and laughed.

Right away Mikel realized a key fact - this was not the same creature that had saved him from Metrike’s Paralysis Skill in Helsket’s home - this creature was… Different… Lacking.

Where the Time Demon that had saved him was tall, terrifying, and strangely majestic - this one was skinny, malformed, and underwhelming. This version didn’t have a scythe to cleave through bodies - nor did its body pulse with rabid power in tune with the ticking of a clock - it was slow, dry, and dead-looking.

No cloth covered its upper face, as had the one who’d saved Mikel and claimed his death and its robes of black material were flat and lusterless against its body.

It wasn’t anything compared to the vision of The Time Demon he’d seen and even less so when stacked against the for of Callisto he'd been dealing with.

“I’ve seen the real Time Demon,” Mikel said, raising his sword, “You took its form, but you are not it.”

The desiccated smile cracked open, revealing a mouthful of shattered teeth. When it spoke the mouth didn’t move, nor did its chest heave with breath as it forced air through broken, dried-out vocal cords.

The voice, like Librarian before and Callisto, simply emanated into his mind.

“You’re weak, Little Raithson - This form terrified you to the point of almost killing you before. I can read the scars on your mind as if they were an open book. Why do you not run now?”

Mikel choked up on the hilt and shook his head, “You’re weak, not me. I saw the real thing - the real Time Demon. It… Saved me from the assassins attacking Helsket right now - and yet, it claimed my death. You’re… Nothing, but a dried-out corpse.”

The demon’s dry mouth parted and it audibly laughed before it shifted to another form, as it had moments ago.

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The blood coalesced and vibrated, a thousand ripples covering its surface, before the tall form of the pseudo-Time Demon collapsed into a smaller, once again female form.

At first, before the blood dried and color returned to the new form, Mikel thought Callisto had taken the first body she’d shown him once more - but blood obscured all but the most apparent features.

When the scarlet vanished, he sucked in a breath at what - or who - lay beneath.

“Celine,” Mikel mumbled, his sword point falling an inch as the woman’s intoxicating beauty swept over him.

Callisto and Celine were both gorgeous women - but in entirely different ways. Where Callisto oozed danger and violence and death, the image of Celine was serene to the maximum. Her hair drifted around her head like a gauzy halo, while her robes, nearly as ephemeral as Callisto’s hair, gently rippled from an unseen and unfelt wind.

“Do you prefer this form, Mikel?” When the image of Celine uttered his name she dropped her eyes and looked at him from under thick lashes, “Does this please you?”

Mikel snarled, “I’m done with this! You play games when minutes have passed. Helsket told me he had a limited time to use his Skill - and you’ve wasted precious seconds. If you want to play, let’s play - but I need to leave here.”

She tittered at him, placing the back of her hand across her mouth, her eyes shining at him merrily and her breast heaving in a most distracting way.

In some fashion, her display cut Mikel deeper than Callisto’s had.

“You’re just so fiery. I’d forgotten how fun you mortals are. I guess there’s a reason I’m a goddess and not one of you - I enjoy looking in on your anguish and not experiencing it myself.”

Mikel charged again - sword whistling in the same arch as he’d used to attack Callisto.

Unlike when he’d attacked Callisto, this form of Celine raised her hand and turned his sword aside in an elegant block she hardly needed to move for.

Mikel grunted as the blade went wide and pulled the tip to the ground. The blade clanged against the white void and bounced, rattling his hands painfully but not enough to force him to drop the weapon.

With the nearly spent momentum, he picked up the blade, pulled back, and lined up the sword for a direct attack against the not-Celine’s center of mass.

He snarled and drove the blade point first, forward, towards her naked stomach.

Mikel expected her to block, had expected her to turn the blade aside as she’d done before - and he gasped in surprise and horror as the blade sank into the crossguard, one quillion resting against her navel and the other against her pubis.

“No!” Mikel’s eyes went wide as he looked into Celine’s eyes. He’d expected to see pain, confusion or suffering - what he got chilled him to the core.

Amusement and mirth.

“That’s more like it Champion of Mine,” Callisto’s voice purred from Celine’s lips, “That’s what a Blood Knight would do. No hesitation. No waste. A perfect killing cut, straight through that which you sought to destroy. You’ll do nicely.”

“No,” Mikel said, terror rippling through him. He knew this wasn’t Celine, but… it looked so much like her.

The feeling of his sword sliding through her as if her body provided no resistance, without a bump or tug made him want to vomit.

Blood leaked from the edges of the wound and dripped down onto her white robes - staining them red.

“I didn’t… I’m not -”

“Don’t be ashamed of what you are… Killer,” the Callisto voice hissed the last word with a decidedly sultry tone, “You’re just what I need. A killer. My Blood Knight - you’ve finally arrived - and just in time to seize your power.”

Mikel wanted to pull his sword back, but The Callisto Jewel’s chill shot through his body as blood dripped onto his hands still gripping the hilt - the now all too familiar cold seizure swept through him and locked his body up like a statue.

“You say you want to save people and yet… All you’ve done is kill.”

Callisto’s voice coming out of Celine’s mouth would have caused Mikel to shudder… If he’d been able to move. As it stood, he could do little more than breathe and that was a scant proposition at best.

He wanted to scream - but couldn’t.

He wanted to fight - but couldn’t.

He wanted to kill Callisto as blood-red rage swelled within him.

But, he was trapped in his own body.

“You know, you don't want to kill me. You want to kill someone else - the one you truly resent, the one who set you on this path - that’s who you want to turn your rage upon. How delightful. Allow me to… Assist you in your mission.”

Mikel couldn’t have reacted even if he wanted to. In the time it took for Celine’s body to melt away and reform in an all too familiar shape less than a single heartbeat passed in time.

When the blood tightened and the scarlet color dropped away it wasn’t Celine or Callisto standing in front of him - Not even the shallow image of The Time Demon - No.

Impaled on his sword was his father Erik Raithson.

“You’ve killed me,” Erik Raithson uttered as his hand trailed to the hilt of the sword sticking out of his stomach, “Was I really that bad of a father to you?”

The imitation of his father was unmistakable and Mikel shuddered through the cold seizing him.

If he hadn’t known better he would have called this his father without hesitation.

It was a perfect recreation.

Erik was taller than Mikle by six inches, broader at the shoulder with more muscle shot through his frame. He wore his combat fatigues with leather and metal plates stitched and affixed to the substrate material to both strengthen and provide additional protection in vulnerable areas. His piercing blue eyes looked through Mikel as he if wasn’t there - This was Erik Raithson returned to health and life, even though Mikel knew it wasn’t so. This was only a cruel illusion.

And yet he still felt as if he'd impaled his flesh and blood - not the goddess of Blood instead.

“You’re not him,” Mikel muttered as he tried to pull the blade from Erik’s stomach, “You’re not my dad. My dad is… Dying.”

“I am Mikel,” Erik said, eyes sad and full of something unspeakable, “And you killed me. You killed me.”

Anguish tore through Mikel and the heat from the rabid emotion ripped at the icey prison from The Callisto Jewel’s frigid expanse. He fought with everything he had - straining his inner fortitude to its limit... When something finally gave way.

It started with a single crackle and within seconds the cold shattered and Mikel pulled the sword free with a guttural bellow.

He stepped back and glared at the image of his father and shook his head, “You’re not -”

He never finished as blood began to weep from the wound and Erik smiled - his teeth coated in crimson.

“You’ve done well, Blood Knight -” Callisto’s voice said from Erik’s lips, “You’ll do nicely to usher in a new age of Blood.”

Then, the white void around them turned blood red as an ocean’s worth of red, sticky ichor burst from Erik Raithson’s chest and swallowed Mikel whole.