Against The True Gods

It all went black. Then it all returned.

Reality blinked.

Caine stood over Autumn's dead body. The wound in his chest slowly faded, leaving behind only a scar.

The world was absolutely silent. He was the only one left.

Caine looked up to the skies, his lips parting, and his chest heaving as he let out a roar that shook everything around him.

RUMBLE!

His True Will towered and split everything in its path. Veins erupted across his body as his vocal cords tore, and blood filled his throat.

The emotions he had sealed and contained in his heart for years erupted all at once, fueling his Will and forming a mantle of manifested aura around him.

His roar was so primal, it seemed akin to a primordial dragon's final cry, like the lament of a god.

He had fought. He had conquered.

He had battled. He had dominated.

He had decided to live. And he had lived.

His roar was one of victory—uncontested victory.

WHOOSH!

Caine's mind blanked, and he fell onto his back, unconscious, as his roar echoed and shook the air.

[You have conquered the Field of Carnage.]

The skies above split open, and a gigantic pillar of golden light, as wide as the sky itself, descended upon Caine, granting him blessings upon blessings.

Simultaneously, all the cursed runes etched onto his forehead sunk into his body, devoured by his Cursed nature.

Impurities burned from his body as his muscles began to restructure themselves, along with his veins, organs, and flesh.

Countless years of prolonged stress and hidden injuries melted away, and his true power began to soar.

His body rippled, slowly beginning to change.

***

Hours passed, and Caine's pupils fluttered open. For a moment, he lay confused, but his memories rushed back in full force.

He remained lying on his back, ignoring the newfound power flowing through him and simply basking in the comfort of his own existence.

It had been too long—so long that he had almost forgotten what it felt like to exist without the cursed runes, without constantly feeling his body teetering on the brink of death, without being suffocated by the terrifying killing intent of the countless enemies that swam around him.

He took a deep breath and exhaled.

'I am alive.'

He stood up. Looking around, the world wasn't much different. He glanced at Autumn's corpse, still intact. Read new adventures at My Virtual Library Empire

"…[Nameless Call]…"

Without paying further attention to the body, he picked up his torn robes, spending a few moments stitching them back together before draping them over himself.

These robes, bathed in the blood of so many powerful entities, had essentially become a Godcraft of their own—just like his fractured spear.

With an unhurried pace, he walked toward the gate. Reaching its foot, he spent a few moments admiring its beauty before touching its surface and vanishing.

The Fields of Carnage were left empty.

***

He reappeared in a garden full of bloody roses. Above, the skies were dark, directly reflecting the cold lifelessness of the void.

Beyond the garden, an all-encompassing, endless ocean of gold stretched far and wide.

Caine felt the soft winds of this place brushing against his face. Moments later, a set of runes appeared in his mind.

[Conquer the Heart.]

Caine nodded and sat down cross-legged, storing his spear away. Across from him, tendrils of darkness gathered and coalesced into a shadowy figure with piercing scarlet pupils full of hate.

Caine's Heart Demon.

But behind it, thousands of other shadow figures, just as full of hate as the first, appeared. They stood silently, calmly staring at Caine.

Caine didn't flinch. He was mildly surprised to see so many Heart Demons but, upon reflection, found it unsurprising.

His gaze locked onto the shadowy figure seated across from him—the Heart Demon he knew the most.

"I told you, did I not?" it hissed, its voice serpentine, dripping with malice. "That heart of yours would allow me to eventually take over."

Caine sighed and shook his head, directly ignoring the Heart Demon before him.

This trial would be too easy for him, for the simple reason that he had already devised a plan for his Heart Demons.

He had been waiting for an opportunity to confront them again, and now, this was perfect.

His plan was simple: not only would he evolve his current Dao Heart, allowing it to reach its true and absolute state, but he would also forge a second one.

This second Dao Heart would be forged from his Heart Demons, allowing him to birth a Demonic True Will—one that perfectly mirrored his original True Will.

These two hearts, together, would encapsulate and strengthen one another, enabling him to take the final step forward.

WHOOSH!

Caine's chest slowly split and opened, revealing his radiant silver Dao Heart.

The Heart Demons screeched in horror at its light. Beams of strange, chaotic energy erupted from them, crashing into his heart.

But Caine remained indifferent.

His Dao Heart, the Hopeless Dao Heart, was unquestionably powerful and true to who he was. But it wasn't enough.

In the Fields of Carnage, he had encountered countless enemies, each wielding True Wills as strong, if not stronger, than his own.

Through these battles, he encountered countless types of Dao Hearts, each teaching him what a Dao Heart truly meant.

His Hopeless Dao Heart was built to sunder fear and abandon needless hope.

But what did this truly mean?

It meant defiance. It meant control. It meant ascension.

It was a path where all ahead was beneath him and nothing could stop his steps.

But, indirectly, wasn't it also a Heart that challenged the very essence of Fate?

Caine had spent a long time studying his stars of Fate, Karma, Destiny, and Totality.

Fate was inevitability—the hand that moved the pieces across the board.

He had experienced it firsthand. Without fully understanding how, Fate had wound him in its countless strings and trapped him here.

Fate was supreme, inevitable, and absolute.

It was said that at the highest extremes, opposites converged. If Caine took defiance to its ultimate extreme, would it not circle back to Fate?

To defy all things was to allow none to defy oneself. To control all things was to allow none to control anything.

But this highlighted a glaring flaw in his Dao Heart.

His heart was one of absolute results. It was a heart without fear or hope.

But what if Fate chose a path where fear was all that existed? Or one where there was nothing but false hope to grasp at?

Could he truly claim he would resist Fate? No. He couldn't.