CHAPTER 234: CHAPTER 235: AN AWAKENING

Atlas ignored him.

His guide—his damn favorite guide—stood there again. Not physically, not quite. But his presence slithered through the cracks of reality like smoke from a flame long thought extinguished.

Oh, how good it felt seeing him again, Atlas thought bitterly. The sarcasm in that thought dripped like venom, acidic and real. If even he had returned...then Atlas was doing something right. Or something terribly wrong.

He kept his eyes pinned to the book, refusing to meet the guide’s invisible gaze. It was a monstrous tome of blackened parchment, its spine stitched with something disturbingly like tendon. His fingers ran across the cover, already worn down from obsessive use. The text inside shimmered faintly, pulsing between languages, none of them welcoming. A low, wet sound hissed from the pages as if the ink were alive and whispering.

He read anyway.

The whispers of Hell curled into his ears like smoke trailing through the cracks of a closed door. They licked at his mind. Sultry, violent, seductive. A chorus of voices, dozens—no, hundreds—chanted old sins in tongues only his soul remembered.

Aurora had warned him. Ignore them, she’d said. Easy for her to say. She was blessed. She had Merlin’s reachings in her veins—she could tune out chaos like it was background noise.

For most, the whispers were fatal. They didn’t just whisper; they pulled. They dragged your thoughts into shadows. Rage, lust, envy—all rising like a flood. The heart quickened. Pupils dilated. Morality bled away until all that was left was want.

But for Atlas... it barely tickled.

A little lust, sure. But that was just... Tuesday. That wasn’t the book’s fault. That was just being young. Being him.

He flipped another page, the parchment rough under his fingertips, the scent of sulfur curling into his nose.

{{{You’re ignoring me....}}}

The voice slid into his head like a blade through silk.

Atlas kept reading.

"Ignore you?" he muttered aloud. "You’d like that."

The presence hovered, silent, gauging him.

{{{...You’re actually going crazy, aren’t you.}}}

He didn’t reply. Not immediately. There was a weight behind that voice—not just arrogance, but pain. Old, ancient disappointment. A whisper of legacy pressing down like the hand of a dead god on his shoulder.

{{{...Is my legacy too much of a burden, my avatar?}}}

Atlas flinched at that. Not outwardly, not enough for someone to notice. But inside, something shivered. His hands paused, mid-turn of a page.

It wasn’t the question. It was the tone. Not disappointment—hurt. That brittle tremor of being forgotten by the very soul you helped mold.

He clenched his jaw, staring harder at the book as though its words could shield him.

’He only comes when I die...’ Atlas thought. ’Why now? I’m alive. I’m fine. So what changed?’

{{{....You became strong... That’s the fucking difference.}}}

A pause.

Then a whisper of anger.

’Uh huh.....You’re salty because I’m not replying.’

{{{...Maybe.}}}

Atlas rolled his neck, the vertebrae cracking. His patience was fraying like twine dragged across glass.

’What do you want?’ he asked, softly. ’You know your advice... I take it. I do. But I don’t use it.’

He stood, book still open in one hand, eyes shadowed by the flickering flame beside him.

"In the end... it’s my decision. My ego. My fire. I say what I think. I do what I say... and you know that."

Silence.

But a charged silence. The kind that came before lightning struck.

Atlas turned another page. The ink shimmered again—this time forming not words, but symbols. Runes of binding, of summoning. Old, forbidden names hissed across his mind.

Then he found it.

His path. A line buried deep between metaphor and madness.

His route to the key.

But before the key... he had to meet ONE of them.

’...Loki,’ he whispered, in rememberance.

"...You know him ...right?"

{{{Of course. One of HIS seeds.}}}

"His... you mean the sun god, right?"

Silence again.

Atlas’s chest grew tight.

"...Right?"

{{{Hahahahahaha...}}}

The laugh cracked through his mind like thunder, bouncing off the walls of his skull. It wasn’t amusement—it was madness, cruelty, and pity all wrapped in one jagged sound.

{{{You don’t know... do you?}}}

"Don’t know what?.... Tell me!" Atlas barked, voice suddenly rising.

But the presence vanished like smoke sucked out a window.

He was alone again.

With his rage.

He slammed his hand against the table.

Bang!

The echo rang like a bell in the dead room.

"...Forget him," he growled through clenched teeth. "I need to know how to contact the gods... make a deal..."

He didn’t finish.

Knock. Knock.

"Your highness... are you there?"

The voice cut through the room like a bell through mist.

Atlas’s spine stiffened. That voice—gentle, careful. Too careful. He knew it.

Qin.

The healer.

A flutter of anxiety brushed against his chest. Not because of her, but because of what she would become. The future was already written in fragments, in broken visions and divine threats. The Unholy Saintess. But that was not now. Not yet.

He swallowed that thought and let his voice steady. "Come in."

The door creaked open, and she entered—a white-robed silhouette framed in the candlelight. Her robes were simple, but the black stiping across the fabric curled like vines around bone. She looked pale, eyes wide with something more than fear.

Something hollow.

Atlas stood, motioning for her to sit. "What happened?"

She didn’t answer immediately. Her gaze roamed the floor as though the words themselves were trapped there.

"I... I didn’t know who else to go to," she said finally. Her voice was softer than usual. Frayed. "I was going to go to the Pope, but... this is a matter of Berkimhum. So... I came here."

She sat down as though her knees had barely obeyed her. Atlas moved closer.

"What happened, Qin?" he asked, gentler now.

She looked up, and her eyes... they weren’t crying, but they ached.

"Her lady... Claire. She’s... possessed."

Silence.

Atlas blinked.

’Her form... is she talking about that?’ he wondered. Claire hadn’t looked possessed last time he saw her. She looked... different. Better, even. Like she had found a new kind of truth. That dark halo around her head had glowed like a crown forged in the void. But he hadn’t seen possession.

He’d seen power.

"There were horns," Qin whispered, and her voice cracked like glass.

"Horns?"

Qin nodded. "Her eyes turned red. Demon-like. I—I’ve only seen something like that in old texts. And then... then she sprouted wings. Not angelic. Bat-like. And she... she flew away."

Atlas’s heart sank.

"Where?"

"I don’t know... but she passed through your window. From your room."

That sentence hit him like ice water down the spine.

His window?

His room?

She had been there. Claire. In his space. In his—

’Did she find out?’ The thought burned through his chest like a falling ember.

He felt a tremor of something dangerously close to guilt.

Or fear.

He exhaled, long and slow, dragging a hand through his hair. One problem at a time, he reminded himself. His pulse thudded behind his eyes.

He looked at Qin—saw the way her hands trembled slightly in her lap.

He reached out and clasped them. Warm. Small. So fragile.

"Calm down, Qin," he said, voice low. "Tell me everything. Start from the beginning. Leave nothing out."

Her eyes searched his face, and something in her steadied. Not trust, not yet. But need. A need to be heard.

She began to speak.

********

Be TWENTY chaps ahead

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They’re not just playing the game. They’re rewriting it.

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