CHAPTER 273: CHAPTER 31

"It’s over,"

Hades exhaled, the breath leaving his divine lungs like a dying star releasing its final light.

The void trembled quietly, the aftershock of creation’s most forbidden act rippling outward in silence.

The Outer One’s infinite body, once vast enough to drown galaxies, now dissipated like smoke swallowed by the abyss.

Its presence, its soundless madness, its existence, all seemed to fade, leaving only the dim glow of Hades’ purple flame flickering weakly against the broken walls of reality.

Just then, as Hades allowed himself a moment of weary triumph, the unthinkable occurred.

From the depths of dissolution, where even meaning itself had perished, the remnants of the Outer One stirred.

Its countless eyes reopened across the fading void, gleaming with something beyond insanity, beyond even comprehension.

Then, from the stillness of its own undoing, it smiled.

Hades’ eyes widened, realization dawning too late.

The Outer One was not resisting its end.

With the authority of Primordial Chaos, the origin from which all beginnings were born, it reached into itself, not to heal, but to rewrite.

It did not fight death; it simply began again.

The void convulsed violently, light and darkness fusing into raw existence.

Concepts were torn apart and rebuilt.

From the dust of annihilation, it formed itself as it once was, as it always had been, reborn in the same act that had once birthed the universe.

The first motion of chaos repeated, creation from nothingness, an echo of the moment before time.

Then, it roared, a roar that split eternity in two, and its infinite mouths opened, swallowing everything.

"Shit!"

Hades barely had time to raise his hand.

The tide of chaos engulfed him.

"AAAHHHH!!!" The god of the dead screamed as he was consumed whole, his form torn apart by the same law he once defied.

Within the body of the Outer One, there was no up, no down, no being, only dissolution.

His divinity melted like wax under cosmic flame.

His name, his essence, his history, all were unmade.

The cosmos themselves began to forget that Death ever had a master.

Hades could feel himself fading, his consciousness being absorbed into an infinite ocean of disorder. His divine flame sputtered, sinking into the abyss of nothingness that was everything.

But still, he resisted.

Even as his form broke, even as his soul cracked, even as his godhood screamed in silence, he refused to vanish.

The last embers of his will burned with a desperate fury, the defiance of a god who had once ruled the underworld itself.

And in that desperation, he did the unthinkable.

If the Outer One could devour him, then so too could he devour the Outer One.

A paradox of divinity erupted within chaos.

Hades, in the heart of oblivion, bit back.

The flames of Death surged from within, spreading through the infinite body of the Outer One like veins of violet lightning.

Chaos shrieked, releasing an unholy cry that split the void.

The god of death was now consuming the Primordial, swallowing the infinite from inside its own being.

And in retaliation, the Outer One did the same.

They devoured each other.

Endlessly.

An eternal loop of consumption, of death and rebirth, of chaos and order, of the infinite and the finite.

Each swallowed the other, and from that contradiction, the void itself began to fracture, unable to contain the paradox.

Dimensions screamed as they collapsed in on themselves.

Alternate realities blinked out like dying embers.

Time recoiled, past and future merging into a singular incomprehensible present.

Every law, every constant, every thread that defined what was and what could be, all of them snapped.

Their essences collided, intertwined, dissolved, and reformed. The god of Death and the Primordial Chaos were no longer separate entities but two eternities bound in endless conflict, like a predator and prey, devourer and devoured, locked in a cycle that could not end.

But amidst this infinite struggle, something else stirred, something that Hades had planted before.

Mortality.

Even though the Outer One had recreated itself, the concept of mortality had already became its truth. No matter how much it recreated itself, it cannot change the fact, that it is now bound to mortality.

The Outer One, whose existence was eternal and formless, began to feel weight.

It began to tire, its endless regeneration slowed, its chaotic essence dimming, the unending hunger that defined it faltered, the concept of "end" whispering through its being.

Suddenly, it roared, thrashing through collapsing layers of the void, its body fracturing into impossible geometries. Its form dissolved into liquid time, its voice echoing through collapsing dimensions, a scream that shook creation itself.

And within it, Hades continued to devour.

But as he consumed, he too began to change.

Fragments of the Outer One’s being, its infinite existence, its eternal awareness, seeped into him.

Memories flooded his mind, as if he himself was the one who experienced it all.

He saw the eternity, the infinite stretches of the void where the Outer One had drifted long before creation was born, long before even nothingness was defined.

He saw it feeding on infant universes, consuming gods that had never been born, devouring entire cycles of existence that predated all myth.

He saw it before the beginning, when there was no "before," when existence was an unnamed possibility, and chaos was the only truth.

Then, he saw further.

Past the birth of creation. Past the void. Past the moment where meaning itself began.

He saw what came before meaning.

And there, language ended.

There were no thoughts, only sensation, only raw awareness. A place where even the concept of "nothing" had yet to be imagined.

The unpainted canvas before the universe was drawn.

Hades’ mind cracked.

No god, no being, no concept was ever meant to behold such things.

His divinity howled, splitting under the strain, his consciousness ruptured like fragile glass, and the flood of knowledge poured through him, burning, twisting, erasing.

He saw what no one could see and remain whole.

And so, at the peak of omniscient agony, as the last fragments of his identity tried to hold on, Hades whispered a name he could no longer remember, and his body, divine, infinite, and broken, went still.

The void trembled once more.

The Outer One was dying, dissolving under the curse of mortality.

The god of death was fading, consumed by the infinite truths he had devoured.

And as they both began to fall, the void itself began to erase them both, trying to correct the paradox they had become.

Light and darkness folded into one.

Existence itself held its breath.

And then, silence.

*

*

*

When Hades opened his eyes, he could not tell how long he had been gone, seconds, centuries, eternities, or something beyond the measure of any god or mortal.

His first breath felt like the cracking of a long-frozen world, every inch of his body throbbed with ache, as though he had been torn apart and reassembled by hands that did not understand what flesh, or soul, was meant to feel like.

His mind was a dull storm, flashes of something vast and unbearable flickering at the edge of recollection, a truth he had seen, but could not name.

It was as if he had discovered the secret of existence itself, only for the memory to be burned away, leaving behind only the scar of awe and terror.

He slowly rose to his feet, his boots clicking softly against nothing, for the place he found himself in was not a place at all.

Around him stretched an infinite expanse of pure white, an endless void without light, yet somehow it shone.

It was a silence so complete it became deafening.

And here within the emptiness stood something; rows upon rows of shelves, countless of them.

A library that extended beyond sight, its horizon swallowed by the glow of eternity.

Each shelf was filled with books, tomes of every shape and age, some glowing faintly, others humming with whispers that echoed across dimensions.

And amidst that impossible infinity, one thing drew his gaze, a single book, floating upon a pedestal of light.

It drifted gently, as though breathing.

Compelled by something beyond reason, Hades began to walk toward it.

His steps echoed, or perhaps the world merely made the sound to assure him he still existed.

The closer he came, the heavier the air felt, as if deep within his soul, something was telling that he shouldn’t look at that book.

When he finally reached it, his breath caught.

On the cover, in gold letters that seemed to shimmer and bleed across time, was written:

"The God of the Underworld."

At that moment, his entire body froze. A chill crawled up his spine, far colder than the darkness of the Underworld, colder even than death itself.

His heart began to pound violently in his chest, every beat like thunder in the silence.

Goosebumps crept over his skin, an instinctive terror unlike any he had felt even before the Outer One.

He stared at the book for what felt like ages before, finally, with a trembling hand, he opened it.

The first page flickered like light on water.

And there, written in perfect clarity, was his life.

His eyes darted from line to line, each word igniting a storm of recognition.

There was the beginning, the moment he had awoken as Hades, son of Cronus and Rhea, ruler of the unseen realm.

Then came the Titanomachy, the war that tore the heavens apart.

Then the shaping of his kingdom, his dominion over the dead, his long, lonely reign beneath the world.

The countless centuries watching over mortal souls.

His rivalry and kinship with Zeus and Poseidon.

His countless battles, his subtle kindnesses, his fury, his love ones; Hecate, Hera, Aphrodite.

Every triumph. Every doubt. Every sin.

All of it, written in this book.

Then his gaze reached the end.

The final page.

The words were written in still-bleeding ink:

"And so, Hades, God of the Underworld, was devoured by the Outer One, his flame extinguished, his name lost to eternity."

Hades’ breath caught in his throat, his fingers trembled against the page.

A deep dread began to bloom within him, not the dread of death, but something far more profound: the realization that perhaps, his life was a lie.

"Ah," said a voice behind him, distorted and cold, "what a surprise."

Hades spun around instantly, his spear manifesting in his hand with a pulse of purple fire.

His divine senses flared, but what he saw made his weapon falter.

Standing before him was not a god, nor a monster, nor anything that belonged to creation.

It was a figure made entirely of shifting numbers, an endless strings of 1s and 0s cascading down its body like flowing data.

Its shape flickered between human and inhuman, its voice robotic yet eerily alive.

For a moment, it simply stood there, head tilted, as if examining him.

Hades steadied himself.

"Who...what, are you?" he demanded, his voice echoing through the white vastness.

The being tilted its head further, as though thinking. For several long minutes, the world was silent except for the faint clicking of its movements, as though it were processing his question through a thousand unseen machines.

Finally, it spoke.

"Hmm. To put it in simple terms," it said, its tone almost casual, "I am a writer."

Hades blinked. "A... what?"

The being’s body glitched slightly, as though amused.

"A writer," it repeated, "You may call me V.E, and I am the one who wrote you. Every thought you’ve ever had, every decision you’ve ever made, every relationship, every war, I wrote them all."

For a moment, the silence was absolute.

Hades’ expression twisted in disbelief. His heart pounded like a drum of thunder. What...what is thing saying? Everything he experienced... All of that was simply because this ...thing, decided to write it!?

"No need to doubt it. That is simply the truth." The being merely shrugged.

It began to step forward, its body flickering with faint static, and every time it moved, the air distorted around it, as though reality itself was trying to resist its presence.

"But you see, I’ve grown bored of you," it said, its tone almost conversational. "I have written your story for so long, watched your wars, your defiance, your ascension. It was exciting at first, but then I started to lose interest in you."

It stopped a few steps away, its faceless head flickering with unreadable code. "So I thought to myself, perhaps it’s time to end it. To end you."

The words struck harder than any weapon.

Hades tightened his grip on his spear, his instincts screaming danger, but his mind, his reason, was still frozen.

His body trembled from the enormity of the revelation unraveling within him.

A writer.

A being that claimed authorship over his existence.

Then was everything, his triumphs, his failures, his loves, his wars, all of it were predetermined?

Were his choices illusions? His memories merely script? His rebellion against fate just a line in a story that was already finished?

"I must admit," the being continued, voice humming with faint distortion, "I was surprised to see you here. You are supposed to die, you know."

It chuckled, and the sound glitched like a corrupted melody.

"But since you’re here, I want to ask something..."

It leaned forward, its face a few inches away from him.

"How does it feel? To know that everyone that you are, everything that you know, all of it exist because I wanted to write?"