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Kaniel neared his bed and sat on it in a lotus position, resting his hands on his knees, breaths slow. Painful. Agonizingly painful.

The semi-transparent screen floated before him.

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Nails dug into the flesh of his palms. The heart hammered to burst outward. His eyes burned brighter than his lungs and darker than the abyss all the same.

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But it was nothing. In comparison to everything he’d gone through, such pain was but a joke. And even greater pain beheld still. According to Emperor Constantine, the founder of the empire who had freed humanity from the enslavement of other races, the true hardships only came after 99%.

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Yet even all these hardships seemed insignificant considering the rewards. He had to persist. For if he could, he would obtain Emperor Constantine’s inheritance. A treasure so invaluable it would most certainly lead to a war between the four empires.

He just had to—

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Blood began to pour from every opening in his body, rivers from his nose, pools from his mouth, oozes from his ears. In a short while, his white shirt was stained full red.

Blood was the first deadly agony.

The spilling of blood could be seen as intrinsic to life's struggle for survival and represents the predation cycle where life feeds upon life to survive. As such, the first sin is the inherent necessity of bloodshed, not a human construct but a fundamental part of existence itself. Every being, whether knowingly or not, commits violence to sustain itself.

Memories coursed through his mind, one by one, from every sin he’d committed to every sin committed against him. The downward spiral had begun from the very moment he’d taken his sister’s life in his mother’s womb. Blood continued to flow fervently, seemingly endlessly. A few minutes passed by.

Yet Kaniel remained stoic. He had long stopped caring about his past and couldn’t care less for the future. Present mattered only. If he died, so be it. No amount of pain could kill him, both inner and outer. He shook, sweated, and bit his lips, and yet, his expression was unmoved.

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Kaniel saw a literal devil stand in front of him. It laughed at him ridiculously and pointed a sharp finger at his neck. It looked horrific. Too tall. Too wide. Rotten meat, shambled bones, cutthroat veins. Its distorted body barely held together.

Fear was the second deadly agony.

Someone who fears failure may never pursue their ambitions and choose to remain in mediocrity rather than risk the sting of rejection.

Someone who once longed for greatness may shrivel into apathy and convince themselves that nothing is worth the risk.

Someone who feared pursuing their passion may look back and wonder what might have been.

Someone afraid of loss may withdraw from relationships to avoid the pain of separation and only end up lonelier than they ever feared.

Fear forces them to experience the worst possible outcomes before they even happen. A death without the finality of it. Fear keeps a person trapped in an unending limbo between desire and paralysis.

So, when the spirit of an archdemon looked at the mortal and tried to devour his soul, it was assured that the mortal before him would easily succumb. After all, even if one didn’t fear pain, all feared death. Yet the devil saw a devil in him. Kaniel locked eyes with the figure. He grinned, crazily.

How could a puny mortal not fear him? With those thoughts, the being slowly returned to the Astral Plane.

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Kaniel began to lose his sight. The pain in his eyes amplified to an unbearable extent. He blinked repeatedly, only setting it on more fire. Burning was the greatest and most grievous torture humanity has ever come up with. Simple yet effective in its purpose. At that moment, Kaniel felt not only his body burn but his mind too. His thoughts got jumbled up.

Kill! Kill! Kill! Thousands of voices spoke over each other the same exact words. Those were vengeful souls of the deceased from the Soul Realm. Let go! Let go of everything! They all attempted to take over his body amidst the excruciating pain.

Wrath was the third deadly agony.

By eroding empathy, kindness, and compassion, replacing them with bitterness and hatred, over time, wrath makes one see everything and everyone as enemies, depriving them of any form of peace or joy, leaving them empty and directionless, their only purpose to sustain the ever-growing rage. Thus wrath burns everything in its path, including the soul that carries it.

Kaniel’s lips shook. Yet his grin deepened. Tears flowed down his cheeks. Yet they weren’t his. He slowly but thoroughly destroyed the foreign souls trying to take over his body with pure will. They would see no more afterlife. Once a soul descends into the physical world, its only end would be destruction.

After wrath came lust, then greed, then envy, then pride, then gluttony, accordingly.

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Breaths didn’t feel like breaths. They just felt like another moment he had to live. Life was such a crude and rudimentary, fragile thing. Why did he live? Why did he even bother? Wouldn’t all the suffering end at once once he gave up on his worthless pursuit? Darkness. Feelings were none. There was no path, no direction, no destination. Complete nihility.

He forgot. Forgot why he had to persist. Himself. Everything.

Kaniel lost his sight. He was trapped in an endless black void for what felt like an eternity. Preserving his cognition while persevering through the sea of nothingness was the greatest hurdle in his life. The allure of sleep had never been so sweet. The passage of time was unforgiving, and as the count of time had long been lost, at times, it only appeared to be but a fleeting moment. Though it had been an eternity, hadn’t it?

Sloth was the ninth deadly agony.

People are creatures inherently driven by aspirations. Without any intelligent purpose beyond instincts, a being becomes a slave driven by those very instincts, an animal. Emotions collapse into numbness. Thoughts fade into nothingness. The longer one stays in this paralysis, the more one sinks. Eventually, the soul becomes a hollow shell stripped of any will to engage with the world or oneself. A bland, blunt blank.

There was no spark of hope, fear, or even wrath. Numbing agony. Oblivion.

The black liquid flowed from his eyes. Kaniel couldn’t see it. He could only feel the scorching of the dark flames scatter on his cheeks. Then came the deadliest agony.

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Curiosity.

Suddenly, Kaniel could see once again.

Yet, he saw everything and nothing. The things that were not meant to be seen.

The King in Yellow who presided over the corners of the universe, and conversely, The Demon Sultan who lay in sleep at its very center.

He saw the beings of the void. Many. And although mirages and mere reflections of them, he was driven completely mad, on the brink of the precipice. His mind barely held together, on the verge of destruction.

Those consumed by curiosity sacrifice anything. Relationships, sanity, safety. All for the sake of discovery. The seeker spirals deeper into obsession. Blind to their destruction, they keep digging deeper, deeper, deeper, and deeper, ignoring all warnings because they cannot stop. They jump even when they see the edge of the abyss. What’s on the other side? Yet, once they’re on the other side, they still keep wondering what’s on the other side. Questions generate more questions. The pursuit of knowledge breaks down the boundaries of sanity.

No matter how hard Kaniel tried to hold, his consciousness started to give way.

The last vision. He saw a large megapolis. Mages flew in the orange air in crowds. Demons and humans coexisted in peace, happily going about their everyday lives. It was out of fantasy. There were golden houses, buildings the size of mountains, and many flying islands.

At the very center of the city stood a building grander than any other. Within lived the most prestigious and privileged individuals of society.

Deeper, at its basement, there was Tartarus, a place where most heinous criminals were kept.

Even deeper yet, there was a mystical domain.

Therein, a small pond lay.

At its center, a human figure.

Kaniel couldn’t make out their face clouded in a nameless mist.

Something within him said he was looking at neither a mortal nor an immortal. A god neither good nor evil. A being whom no words or concepts could describe.

It was fear that told him. Terror. Kaniel’s thoughts crumbled. His breaths ceased. Then, he started hyperventilating, dark tears falling ceaselessly.

“We meet again,” the being said with a calm, gentle voice.

Kaniel could feel the gaze plastered on himself from across the universe.

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Initialization complete.

He lost his consciousness.