Omniscient Awakening: Journey To Ascension

Two Weeks Before

Crazy Skull wasn't done yet—far from it. Things were only just beginning.

The small town of Ryuzen was as modest as it got. Its population barely reached a hundred. Strangers' footsteps rarely touched its worn cobblestones, and poverty gripped the town like a sickness that refused to let go. Yet, somehow, the people endured. They always had.

The only thing that stood out about Ryuzen was the ancient castle that loomed above it—once home to a long-dead royal family, now nothing more than a crumbling ghost of its past.

Hidden deep within mist-covered mountains, Ryuzen's cobblestone streets echoed faintly beneath the weight of time. The air was cool and damp, carrying the scent of wet stone and aged wood. The silence wasn't peaceful—it was fearful, as if the town itself was holding its breath.

A handful of lanterns flickered weakly in windows, but most homes stood empty. The ones still occupied were sealed tight, their owners unwilling—or perhaps too frightened—to speak to anyone beyond their doors.

High above the town, the Lost Castle of Ryuzen rose from the fog like a memory carved in gray stone—grand, cold, and eternal. Its spires vanished into the mist, and its gates had not opened in centuries. Locals whispered that it watched over them from the mountainside, both protector and curse.

No visitors came anymore. The narrow paths leading to Ryuzen were long overgrown, swallowed by the forest. Only those allowed by the mist itself ever found their way here.

Life went on, quietly and without joy, among the remaining townsfolk—farmers, monks, and wanderers who'd never left. To them, Ryuzen wasn't just a home; it was a vow of silence, a place that refused to move forward with the rest of the world.

They said madness once swept through the castle like wildfire. The king, the queen, the knights—every noble within its walls turned on one another until no one remained alive. No one ever learned why it happened, or why the madness had stopped before reaching the town below.

Perhaps it didn't matter. Ryuzen had been dying long before that day.

But everything changed when an unfamiliar traveler arrived.

The townsfolk watched him from behind closed shutters and half-opened doors. He came alone, cloaked in black, his footsteps echoing against the cobblestones like whispers from another world. He didn't speak, didn't ask for directions, didn't even look around.

And to their disbelief, he made his way straight to the castle.

The gates that had been sealed for centuries creaked open at his touch.

No one dared to question him. They told themselves it wasn't their concern, that whoever he was, he'd leave soon enough. And so, the town chose silence once again.

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They went on with their days—plowing fields, mending roofs, pretending not to notice the faint sound of movement that drifted from the mountains at night.

But deep down, every villager knew something had changed. The air had grown heavier. The mist thickens.

Even the birds had gone quiet.

Inside the ruined castle, Crazy Skull worked.

The corridors were filled with the low hum of unnatural energy, the sound of chains dragging across stone, and the faint crackle of magic seeping through the walls.

Skull's skeletal hands moved deftly over the fallen knights who once served the royal family. Their armor lay cracked and rusted, their bones yellowed and brittle with age. Yet, piece by piece, they began to move again.

He wasn't just raising the dead. He was remaking them.

From within his cloak, Crazy Skull produced shards of energy—cores, pulsing with dim crimson light. Each one was different, shaped by a chaotic fusion of Constellation fragments he had stolen or forged from memory.

"This time," he rasped, voice echoing through the hollow hall, "they will not fail me."

He pressed a core into the ribcage of a knight. The bones convulsed. Light flared beneath the armor.

The knight moved.

Its eyes—if they could still be called that—glowed with a fierce, eerie blue.

Skull grinned, his skeletal face splitting into something too wide, too human to belong to a corpse.

He called them his Army of Free Will.

Unlike his earlier creations, these undead knights possessed a mind of their own—bound to him, yet capable of thought and action. It was a dangerous experiment, one that blurred the line between creation and chaos.

And as the ritual progressed, the castle began to change.

A fog, thick and heavy, spread from the walls and spilled down the mountainside. It crept silently into the streets of Ryuzen, coating every roof and doorway in a damp gray veil.

The air grew colder.

The people grew slower.

At first, no one noticed. They simply woke up later than usual, moved slower than they should, forgot what they were doing halfway through the day.

Then, the apathy set in.

The laughter of children disappeared. The sound of conversation faded. Farmers left their tools in the dirt and never came back for them.

Within days, Ryuzen was silent once more. But this time, the silence wasn't chosen—it was forced.

The fog had taken hold.

Inside the castle, Crazy Skull stood at the highest balcony, staring down at his work. The fog swirled around him like a living thing, coiling around the base of the tower and stretching toward the town below.

"Beautiful," he murmured. His hollow voice reverberated off the stone.

He raised one clawed hand, examining the glow between his fingers—the energy of his new core. It pulsed brighter than any before, unstable and alive, but his.

"With this," he whispered, "the real work begins."

He turned back to the room where dozens of armored figures knelt, motionless, awaiting his command. Their cores shimmered faintly, each one burning with an eerie light that reflected off their blades.

"Now, come forth."

The sound of metal scraping against stone filled the air as his soldiers stood in unison.

Their movements were clumsy at first, stiff from the long sleep of death—but soon, they marched with precision. The floor trembled beneath their weight.

Crazy Skull threw back his head and laughed—a distorted, rasping cackle that echoed through the empty halls.

"Now," he hissed, "this creation shall be my first debut."

By the time dawn came, the castle was silent again.

Crazy Skull was gone.

Only the fog remained—thick, toxic, and alive. It wrapped around the once-forgotten town like a curse, seeping into the soil, the air, the hearts of those still clinging to life.

Ryuzen, the quiet town that once refused to die, now stood on the edge of true death.

And the one who caused it had already vanished, his grin carved deep into the darkness he left behind.