The Only Game In Town [Adventure]

Lillian knew what it felt like to be a god. She was the one true god of her own mind, and her gift had allowed her to bring her godliness into the real world.

She had given David a taste of her godliness when she fought him earlier in the week. However, the two titans had begun truly facing off and she felt powerful.

All of Lillian's fears, loves, hates, and joys were given shape and pitted against David's desires. Lillian's entire being manifested into the world and battled against everything that David wanted.

And it was not enough.

Everything that Lillian stood for was nothing in front of the naked desire of David. Before Lillian's own apotheosis she had thought that David was simply summoning mouths into existence and using them like any regular gift. But her new perspective let her see more deeply into the tapestry of the world. The mouths were everything that David wanted in life, given form.

His desire was consuming Lillian whole.

Lillian brought forth armies of belief and it all fell to the gnashing teeth of David's hunger.

The difference wasn't noticeable to the mortals below. Lillian thought that it looked like a standstill from their point of view. But for her, she was losing. Maybe it was slow, but it was a loss, nonetheless.

It was like a forest fighting a fire. The fire would eat the forest alive no matter what because the forest itself gave the fire more fuel.

When Lillian had taken her eyes off her impending doom, she had seen Theo arrive on the scene and freeze everything for a moment. She was so happy to see her friend that she directed one of her personal minions to pull him up into the air with her.

However, this distraction had let David's mouths start pulling closer to her position in the sky. Her loss was impending, but she still had enough time to speak with her oldest friend.

When Theo arrived next to her, Lillian said "I am losing." Her despair was embedded in the words and yet Theo still smiled when he heard her voice.

"I am sorry for not coming with you when you woke up. I regretted it as soon as you left, and I got Joy's parents to take me to where I knew you two would go."

Lillian chuckled a little bit at that. A blind man and her friend's parents travelling across the continent together must have been a good story. Too bad there was no time to truly listen to it.

"What can we do?" Theo asked.

"I think there's nothing. All I am doing is holding back the tide. But he is too strong. We waited too long to fight back. Or maybe, we lost as soon as he consumed the god and he deposed the previous king."

Theo paused for a pregnant moment. "Do you trust Joy?"

"Yes." Lillian answered quickly. In the grand scheme of things, she had not known Joy for too long. He wasn't a friend like Theo, but not every friend needed to be like Theo. Joy was brash, rude, and inconsiderate, but he was also a friend who gave so much. Maybe he would drag her into insane plans and hare-brained ideas, but it was always with a love that permeated his every moment. So, yes, she did trust him.

"He has some sort of plan where he is building his house of cards, like he did in the knight tournament and on the Frozen Continent. We just have to stall for time."

"That shouldn't take too long though?" Lillian asked. It was never fast, but Joy was pretty good at building that house of cards.

"Maybe, but he just got his hand cut off fighting with Dahlia, so he is a bit slow."

"We are really getting maimed and injured left and right. I get eviscerated, you get blinded, and now Joy lost a hand. We should start a travelling circus or something."

"I know you're hiding your fear for Joy with humor, but that was a little insensitive. People with severe injuries are not a sideshow you see at the circus, Lillian."

"You are absolutely right, and I apologize."

Lillian looked at her friend to share a smirk but realized he wouldn't be able to see any of it. They had so easily fallen back into their old banter, but there was something missing.

But Lillian was a god for a moment, so she could add things to make this moment a little sweeter.

With a force of will, Lillian imagined that Theo's eyes grew back. She imagined that he had never lost them in the first place and that their fight against Ian had never gone so badly.

For one brief and shining moment, Theo's beautiful blue eyes came back into his head. They glowed with all the emotions that eyes were supposed to carry and he stared at Lillian as she continued to orchestrate the battle in the sky.

"You are so powerful." Theo's words touched something in Lillian.

"But with limits. These eyes would only exist while I was awake. Your sight would forever be tied to me and that would be inexcusable. Too bad we won't have the time for you to get mad at me for giving them back without warning."

Lillian could see David's body swelling above her. It was like his spirit was trying to break free from the confines of his body. It was like he had grown too large to be held by his mortal host.

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The End approached, one step closer.

___

Rose had always felt weak. Life had been far too kind to her as a youth and that had not prepared her for the brutality of adulthood. The pleasures and joys she had enjoyed with abandon no longer tasted as sweet.

In Rose's mind, only the strong could ever truly enjoy life. And she had been declared weak. So, while others could bully and abuse their power, Rose had to needle and connive at every turn to get every scrap of power that she had.

Her weakness had allowed her to work with David to create this hare-brained scheme. It was the plan of two angry teenagers that had only grown more elaborate as time passed.

In every other version of reality this plan would never have been more than idle dreaming, but with the assistance of Sam and an incredible amount of luck, they were going to succeed.

Rose had never even entertained the possibility of succeeding until a few months ago when David had succeeded in his apotheosis. The entire situation had become so much more real than their dreams.

So, why was she scared to jump into one of David's mouths?

Was this not what she had dreamed of for years?

Maybe the process was much more gruesome than she had anticipated, but how could she be letting herself down like this? Was she not betraying everything that she stood for by being scared of what was next?

She had been terrified when Dahlia had been using her life to threaten David, but the decision had been out of her hands during that entire issue. She was a bargaining chip against David, so her choice was meaningless. No matter what she said, David was going to try and save her, and Dahlia was going to have to kill her. That was simply the way it was.

But then that fool Joy had freed her and made her finally have to make the choice herself.

Did she want David to succeed?

She wanted the gods to pay, but was she truly doing "the right thing?"

Rose watched as her friend and Lillian battled with the powers of gods in the sky. It broke her mind to see their conflict. Colors beyond comprehension exploded every which was as mouths and dream-demons collided.

What did her perfect world look like?

Rose wasn't sure. But she knew that she wanted it to look very similar to this one, just without the looming presence of those foolish gods.

David battled in the sky and Rose looked at him. Would David be satisfied when he created the new world? Would she?

These fears ran up and down Rose's spine, but she had come too far to give up here. There were years upon years of schemes and plans coalescing right now and she refused to let her own inadequacies and fears break her at the final hurdle.

"David, I know you can hear me." Rose looked up at her dearest friend. He looked down at her with a smile. "You have been waiting for the final domino to be set up so that you can begin the great collection of souls." David's eyes narrowed. "I know you were hoping to do it benevolently, but it is time. Eat me and then eat the world. You have been waiting for someone to give their permission because you are a good man. So, here it is - finish the job, David."

Rose couldn't read the emotion going through David's face as he glided down from his perch in the sky. The battle never really needed his presence as long as his hunger kept powering his army.

He hugged her tightly. She felt small for a brief moment, but then she felt large for the sacrifice she was making. This was the end, and she was ushering in the new age. There was no turning back.

"Be kind, David." Rose said with a sad smile as a mouth opened beneath her feet, and she fell into the endless black of David's hungry soul.

___

David had been feeling everything around him. He felt the waves of power emanating off Lillian. That had been a surprise, that another human being had stepped onto the threshold of godhood. However, gods were not created equal, and he could feel her powers waning while his were waxing.

He could feel Theo being given back his eyesight during this slight reprieve. He could even feel Joy uselessly creating his stacks of cards in a desperate bid to try and save the world.

Most of all he could feel that power he had been edging on for months finally crest over the final hill.

He had spent months pushing the metaphorical rock up the hill by accepting soul after soul into himself. And with that final soul from Rose, he was allowed to let the rock roll down the other side of the mountain.

With a single breath, he released all of his hunger. Hundreds upon thousands of mouths erupted from every inch of his skin. His every want and desire was subsumed, he became the hungry mouth. There was no more David, there was only the need to eat the world.

The mouths were no longer so limited that they were contained by Lillian's feeble powers. Instead, they spread over the entire world. Every gods-forsaken continent, every stretch of water, and every forgotten jungle was slowly but surely covered in David's mouths.

His mouths ate the grass under every person's feet. His mouths ate the fish from the sea. His mouths ate the homes around each and every person. No walls could protect someone from his hunger.

His mouths stretched across every inch of the world and ate everything that stood out from the ground other than the humans; that would come next.

Nothing was left in this world except for people after the flood of mouths had done their job.

___

Theo marveled at being able to watch the end of the world. He had lost his vision, only to be given it back at the final moments of his world.

David's mouths had consumed the land and destroyed the soil. Theo didn't understand what was happening on a spiritual level, but he understood that David was gearing up to eat the rest of humanity.

Lillian was no lo longer able to stop him, Theo had seen evidence of that. Therefore, there was really only one option left to him.

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Inside of Theo's soul space, he felt the single tear that represented all the ice he could ever make in his life. All the freezing he could ever accomplish.

The terror of growing up is realizing that everything in the world is finite. There is no forever involved with humanity, instead what we are and everything a person can ever be, must come to an end someday, else they would be gods. Theo's gift was terrifying because he could see the end of his usefulness. If he used too much of his powers, he would become a giftless slob, doomed to a painful death of poverty and drunkenness.

Theo let one single tear drip from his eye. It was all the power he had left in his life. He had barely used any of it throughout his tenure as a member of the prince's cohort, but now he was going to use everything for one final gambit.

The tear sparkled in the sunlight and Theo let himself enjoy the sights. His eyes were temporary, but so was everything else, so why not enjoy it?

Theo looked at Lillian one final time and then aimed his tear towards Joy who was still doggedly making his house of cards.

He flicked the finger that contained that single drop of dew and focused on freezing everything around Joy. Time, Space, and Fate all got brain freezes as Theo entered their domains and stopped them from affecting his friend for a while.

It wasn't flashy and there was no true ice. But a bubble of something surrounded Joy and Theo knew that he had bought his friend at least a few extra moments.

Theo gave Lillian a final hug as they prepared for the end of their story.