Dawn Walker

They had not brought him near Leaf’s growing Bloodlands. They had not brought him near Auri’s house. They had not brought him anywhere close to the area where prisoners were breaking stones and preparing the ground for the future city.

Instead, they had taken him deep into one of the empty regions where the Void Land still looked almost exactly as it had before anything began growing inside it.

Rock. Dry earth. Broken hills. Nothing else.

The ground stretched outward for a great distance without a single building, prisoner, plant, or ghouls in sight.

Dickoff stood near the centre of that emptiness.

Or at least he tried to stand.

His condition had become much worse.

The black lines covering his body had thickened until they looked like cracks running through dark stone. His right arm was almost completely covered by the rough armor-like growth. His chest rose and fell violently. Every breath sounded painful. His mortal body had already been pushed far beyond what it had been made to endure.

The artifact inside him was still producing power.

But that power had become unstable.

Black chaos energy leaked from the cracks in his skin and vanished into the strange air of the Void Land.

Sofia stood several dozen steps away.

Natasha stood on the opposite side.

Sekhmet had entered the Void Land after them.

The gate closed behind him.

The moment it disappeared, all connection to the outside world was cut.

Sekhmet looked around.

No one.

Exactly what he wanted.

Dickoff lifted his head.

His face had become difficult to recognize. One side was covered in black stone-like growth while the other side remained pale and human. Blood ran from both nostrils. His left eye had gone almost completely dark.

Still, he laughed.

"You think moving me here... into a strange place will save you?"

Sekhmet ignored the question. His Blood Eye remained active.

The System countdown continued dropping.

[External Energy Remaining: 01:37]

But another warning had appeared beneath it.

[Warning: Target’s body has exceeded safe containment. The external chaos energy has entered critical instability.]

Sekhmet looked at the black energy leaking from Dickoff. It was no longer simply power being used badly.

The vessel was failing.

Natasha noticed the same thing without needing a System.

She looked toward Sofia.

"We are far enough."

Sofia studied the empty land around them and nodded.

"Yes."

She looked toward Sekhmet.

"If he explodes here, it should not reach the prisoners or the growing territory."

Natasha added, "But we should not stay together when it happens."

Sekhmet looked at her.

She pointed toward Dickoff.

"The energy is unstable. We do not know how large the explosion will be. If we remain in one place and the first wave catches us, all three of us will take it at once."

Sofia nodded.

"We should move in different directions. Force him to choose one target if he can still think clearly. If he cannot, we simply put as much distance between us as possible."

Dickoff heard them. His expression twisted.

"You are talking as if I am already dead."

Natasha looked at him.

"You are."

Dickoff shouted and rushed toward her.

His speed was still frightening, but it had become uneven. One step carried him forward with enormous force. The next nearly caused his leg to collapse because his mortal bones could no longer keep up with the artifact.

Natasha moved sideways.

Dickoff passed her and struck the ground.

A black explosion tore open the rocky surface. A crater appeared beneath his fist.

Sofia moved farther away instead of attacking. There was no reason to continue trading blows.

Sekhmet looked at the countdown.

[External Energy Remaining: 01:09]

The remaining time was falling faster than before.

Dickoff forced himself upright. He looked around at the empty world. For the first time, he seemed to properly understand where he was.

There was nothing familiar here. No Iron House. No Slik City. No Mihos. No servants. No gates. No roads. Only endless unfamiliar land.

He looked toward Sekhmet.

"Tell me... Where are we?"

Sekhmet answered simply.

"My world."

Dickoff stared at him. Then he laughed. The laugh became coughing.

Blood and black fluid came from his mouth.

"You think this belongs to you?"

"Yes."

Dickoff looked toward the empty horizon. His remaining confidence finally began breaking. He understood something now. Even if he killed Sekhmet, he did not know how to leave.

The gateway had vanished. There was no visible exit. His ten minutes of strength had become useless inside a world he could not escape.

He looked at Sofia. Then Natasha. Then Sekhmet. His breathing became faster.

"No."

Sekhmet said nothing.

Dickoff looked down at the black growth covering his chest. The power inside him was changing again. He could feel it.

The energy no longer answered cleanly when he tried to move it. It was collecting instead. Compressing. Pressing against his organs from every direction.

His eyes widened.

"What is happening?"

The black seed inside him pulsed.

Once.

His body jerked. Then again. The second pulse made several cracks open across his chest.

Black light came through them.

Sofia immediately moved farther away.

Natasha did the same in the opposite direction.

"We need more distance," Sofia said.

Sekhmet did not move with either of them.

"I will open the gate before it happens."

Natasha looked back at him.

"You cannot know exactly when."

Sekhmet could.

The System warning was becoming clearer.

[Critical instability increasing.

Estimated catastrophic release: 00:34]

Sekhmet looked toward Sofia.

"Thirty seconds."

Both women understood. They separated farther.

Dickoff heard the number. His face changed again.

"How do you know?"

Sekhmet did not answer. The same question had already been asked enough.

Dickoff staggered backward. His remaining human hand pressed against his chest. Black light leaked between his fingers.

"No." He yelled.

The black seed pulsed again. His knees almost gave out.

Sekhmet watched him carefully.

The one hundred million chaos stones had not made Dickoff a true Half-God. They had simply forced an enormous amount of energy into a mortal vessel.

Now that vessel was reaching its end.

Dickoff understood too late.

"Mihos..."

His voice became weak. Then anger returned.

"Mihos said I could kill you."

Sekhmet answered, "He gave you something he did not want to use on himself."

Dickoff froze.

That sentence reached him more deeply than any attack had.

Mihos had called him worthless.

Mihos had handed him the object.

Mihos had told him to wait for Sekhmet.

Mihos had never said what would happen after the ten minutes ended.

Dickoff looked down at his own body. The cracks were growing. His right arm no longer looked human at all.

More black light poured from his chest.

He understood this in the end.

"No..."

Sekhmet saw the countdown.

[Catastrophic release: 00:18]

He opened the Void Land gate. The dark opening appeared behind him. On the other side was the interior of Iron House.

The broken central hall. Dust still hung in the air there.

Sofia saw the gateway.

"Now."

She disappeared from her position and reached Sekhmet first.

Natasha arrived a moment later.

Dickoff saw what they were doing.

"You cannot leave me here!"

He tried to run toward them. But his right leg was broken. It was not from an attack. It was from his own borrowed power.

The bone snapped beneath the pressure and pushed through the skin. Dickoff collapsed onto one knee, but black chaos energy immediately held the damaged limb together enough for him to move again.

He crawled forward.

"Wait!"

Sekhmet stood at the gate. Sofia entered first. Natasha remained beside him.

Dickoff’s chest expanded. The cracks across it widened.

[Catastrophic release: 00:08]

Sekhmet stepped backward through the opening.

Natasha followed.

Dickoff screamed.

"SEKHMET!"

His entire body became black light. For one final moment, the shape of a man remained visible inside it. Then it disappeared.

Sekhmet crossed completely into Iron House.

Natasha reached the other side immediately after him.

The gate remained open for less than a heartbeat.

Inside the Void Land, Dickoff exploded.

There was no small burst.

The empty landscape turned black.

A sphere of compressed chaos energy expanded from Dickoff’s body faster than sound. The ground beneath him vanished first. Then the surrounding rock was lifted and crushed into powder. A shockwave spread across the empty land, throwing mountains of dust into the strange black sky.

The explosion reached the open gateway just as Sekhmet closed it.

A narrow burst of black light escaped through the shrinking gap.

Then the Void Land was sealed. Silence returned to the broken receiving hall of Iron House.

Sekhmet stood there with Sofia and Natasha beside him.

For several seconds, none of them spoke.

The mansion still creaked from the earlier damage. Broken pillars leaned at dangerous angles. Gray powder from the consumed chaos stones covered the floor. The ancient black wooden box remained where it had fallen earlier.

Dickoff was gone. He was not defeated or left wounded. He was gone forever.

Sofia looked toward Sekhmet.

"Will the Void Land be damaged?"

"Yes."

Natasha looked concerned.

"How badly?"

"I will check later."

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