Damon's Ascension

The wheel began to spin once more after the reveal was made, and everyone in the casino raised their heads to watch it move with trepidation in their hearts, not knowing how this was all going to end.

Damon was rather curious as to what virtue it would pick out for him. There was a lot that happened in his life, but nothing nearly as dark as what any of the others faced. He was not raised in a lab nor stranded in a jungle, raised by loving and strict parents in the heart of Accra, with excellence as his goal.

The wheel slowed until the pointer landed on a soft golden-orange segment, one that seemed to hum with subdued violence. The word etched onto the light was clear, though it flickered once as if unsure whether it should dare shine in this situation.

"Ambition."

The main power of the casino immediately shifted, gliding across the marble floor of the casino's grand arena until it fell on the one man whose presence had remained dominant throughout this entire exchange, Damon Arnan.

He didn't move at first.

Not because he was hesitant, or worried, but because there was something sacred about moments like this. When the world turned its eyes and said, show us who you really are, only a fool moved too quickly.

Damon stepped forward, the tailored black of his suit crisp, almost too neat. Not a single cuff was out of place, not a single lock of hair curled out of alignment. His expression, like always, was difficult to read… somewhere between composed amusement and intellectual interest.

The arena began to shift and this time, it wasn't a battlefield or a throne room, nor the ruined remnants of any familiar realm.

It was a quiet rooftop under the soft blush of evening light. The sky was stained in violet and gold, the far-off silhouettes of birds moving in lazy paths across clouds as the final rays of the sun bled across the horizon.

There were two figures on this rooftop.

One stood tall and radiant, being a younger Damon who was seventeen at most, his posture relaxed and eyes sharp, while his school uniform was fitted to perfection.

The other was a girl about the same age, delicate fingers clasped nervously in front of her, eyes darting away whenever Damon met her gaze. Her uniform was pristine, but her body language was not.

Every shift of her footing, every fidget of her hand revealed a tension that contradicted her confident and beautiful appearance.

The projection shimmered. Above them, a quiet script appeared:

[Her name was Araba, his first crush. She had humiliated him in front of hundreds a few years ago.]

The crowd stirred as the Pre-Chaos beings whispered quietly among themselves, trying to make sense of the scene. Even Nyros leaned forward slightly, one brow raised.

What was this?

The image flickered again.

This time, they saw a much younger Damon, who was maybe thirteen. His hair was a bit thicker and unkempt, his posture too stiff for comfort, his shirt a size too big and his body was significantly rounder than the seventeen year old him.

He was standing in front of a group of students on a school courtyard stage while his hands trembled slightly, not from fear but anticipation. He held out a small bouquet of flowers that was clumsily wrapped and bought from a shop near the school, but not without effort.

Across from him stood the girl from before, the same Araba, though slightly younger and radiating an air of smug superiority. Around her, a swarm of girls - her clique - giggled cruelly.

"I'm sorry. I don't date ugly boys who can't even keep their shirt tucked in." She said loudly, theatrically.

The laughter echoed as the boys upon on the rafters hooted and howled, throwing down rubber bangs from recess time towards the stunned Damon.

The image shifted rapidly as time flashed by, with scenes of mockery, hallway pranks, of notebooks torn and replaced with humiliating drawings.

No physical violence, just a slow and clumsy erosion of self-worth.

Then the scene returned to the rooftop.

The seventeen-year-old Damon was silent as he stood before her. Araba bit her lip, gathering courage.

"I… I've always liked you, Damon. Ever since we came to this school. You've changed so much, and I… I think I've changed too."

The Pre-Chaos audience - and even the enraptured Vanguard team - leaned in as this was the moment, this was where the heartbroken boy would get his revenge! The great reversal!

Instead, young Damon smiled.

It wasn't the warm smile of a man in love, or the cruel grin of someone about to reject their former tormentor.

It was a calm, quiet and slightly cold smile that should not have appeared on a seventeen year old boy.

"I'd love to." He said softly.

He stepped forward and gently took her hand, much to Araba's pleasant surprise.

The scene froze and sputtered to a standstill, coming to an end.

The Pre-Chaos audience tilted their heads, unsure if they were missing something. Nyros frowned slightly, as if sensing the wrong note in a song he should know well.

At this point even the casino seemed confused.

What the heck was that? How does this have to do with ambition?

Damon turned toward them and finally spoke. "You expected vengeance, right? You thought this story was about petty pride, about a humiliated child getting the final laugh. But that's not what happened that day." He began, voice steady, every word measured.

He walked past the frozen projection and stood beneath the sky it cast. "I didn't love her anymore, I hadn't for years. But standing there, I saw something I hadn't understood back when I was thirteen."

He pointed up toward the girl's figure. "She was valuable… back then. Beautiful, charming, socially dominant. I wanted her because she was what every boy my age wanted, and I was too raw to understand why I wanted anything at all. But I myself wasn't valuable at the time."

He gestured toward his younger self. "Messy, quiet and unfashionable. I had no power and no understanding, so i was at the bottom."

The crowd was still, listening intently now.

"So I built myself. I studied, I learned, I cultivated poise. I forged discipline. I crafted a version of myself that could never be humiliated again, and by the time I entered senior high, I didn't need her anymore."

He turned toward the Vanguard Team, who were watching silently.

"Araba hadn't changed since junior high. Her value had stagnated, maybe even diminished. She still relied on the same looks, the same tricks. But me? I came from the dirt - socially speaking - and walked into a school where the best from every corner of the country had gathered. A place where your past glory meant nothing unless it could be updated in real time."

He faced forward again.

"She came to me not out of affection, but out of survival. She saw me not as Damon the classmate, but Damon the ladder. Her ambition met mine in that moment, and she made her bet."

He smiled faintly. "And I accepted it."

The crowd murmured.

"Why?" one Pre-Chaos being asked openly, intrigued.

Damon nodded toward the projection. "Because that moment taught me the only truth I've ever needed to know: power is not about being the best, it's about becoming necessary. It's about understanding value. What you want, what others want and what you must become to make others orbit around you."

His voice grew colder.

"Araba did not humiliate me, she educated me. She was my first lesson in power dynamics, in resource scarcity and in market-driven attention."

The words echoed far beyond the arena.

"I learned then, that the world doesn't reward the just, the kind, or the good. It rewards the useful, the desirable and the powerful."

He stepped to the center of the stage.

"And that is when I became ambitious."

He raised his hand and gestured at the Vanguard Team, his 'people'.

"Why are any of you here? Why do any of you call me 'boss'? Is it because I'm kind? No. Is it because I'm fair? Perhaps, but not always. Is it because I'm lovable?"

He chuckled softly with a shake of his head.

"No, you follow me because of what I represent, because of the potential I carry and because of the abilities I awakened. Without Probability Manipulation, without Avatar, without Devour, who would I be? Just another clever strategist in a graveyard of failed leaders."

He looked at each member of the Vanguard Team, eyes heavy with something old.

"I know my value. I will never let it drop again."

Then, to the crowd, the gods, the casino itself.

"I don't desire power because I hate being weak. I desire power because it's the only true currency, everything else is a trick of perception."

He fell silent and glanced at the Pre-Chaos beings, his expression returning to one that was unreadable, but his Probability Manipulation was geared and at the ready.

There was a long, quiet pause among the crowd, both sides having a lot left unsaid that did not need to be said.