CHAPTER 243: CHAPTER 244: WELCOME TO HELL

Thud!

Maybe because this was his first time experiencing a form of love. A form of affection. Something he had never achieved in his past life.

Maybe. That’s why. He could not bear to imagine, if something would happen to them.

Not after all this. Not after letting them believe in him.

"...haaaa..." he sighed.

He stood by the balcony, half-shadowed by the dying light. Merlin and Aurora still debated, their voices weaving around the arcane tension in the air.

The circular formation drawn in thick, clotted crimson glistened with unnatural sheen. Sigils—etched in strokes too old for even time to remember—writhed on the surface of the blood, forming new meanings with each passing moment.

Symbols of a demon language, forbidden and forgotten.

Yet Atlas could read them.

And that disturbed him more than the blood itself.

"Oh... you just used the demon summoning circle as a catalyst," Merlin said, eyes narrowed, half-impressed, half-afraid. "...after you caged the demon, you used him. Made him summon people from the human realm... quite simple but also... Genius."

His tone held reluctant admiration—seasoned with caution, like a man watching his prodigy become something more dangerous than himself.

"Simple is always best, master," Aurora said, turning slightly. The edges of her eyes glowed red. "I always told you that... but you and your over-complication astound me all the same."

She smirked, her voice flicking like firelight. "Ohh...The playboy’s here....Said your goodbyes?"

Atlas nodded with a guilty smile—tight-lipped and weary. "...It was hard. But it had to be done."

He didn’t say the names. Didn’t dare. Claire. Eli. Lara.

Each name throbbed behind his ribs like a fresh bruise. He had kissed each one like it was a goodbye letter. Because maybe... it was.

Merlin walked to him. His hand settled on Atlas’s shoulder, fingers heavy as stone. The warmth was fatherly, but the words were colder than any curse.

"...We know you’re strong. Stronger even. But Hell..." His voice cracked. "There’s a reason I chose Heaven’s route instead."

Atlas didn’t respond at first. His eyes lingered on Aurora, then on the red-stained sigils.

"...But your disciple didn’t," he finally said, nodding toward her. "She chose fire."

"She’s just crazy," Merlin said. "She spent her entire life’s luck surviving there. But now—"

His voice dropped. "...I want to say it again. Don’t. Do. This."

Atlas shrugged Merlin’s hand off, not in anger, but with a finality that hurt more than violence.

"Your words... they’re just making me want to go more, old man," he muttered, bitter smile tugging the corners of his mouth. "...So thanks for that."

He walked toward the blood circle. Toward Aurora. Toward Veil.

"...So. Our guide?" he asked Aurora, his voice lighter than he felt. "Let’s jump in."

Aurora nodded, her smile feral, familiar. The Book of the Damned hovered beside her, pages flipping without wind.

Her eyes went red—burning, not glowing—as she began to chant.

Words that shouldn’t exist spilled from her lips. Language that made the bones in Atlas’s body itch. The sigils flared.

He smelled sulfur. It scratched at his throat like barbed wire.

It grew thicker, stronger. Too real. Too fast.

His lungs recoiled. His spine twitched.

The circle began to gurgle. Molten heat pooled at its center. The blood melted. A hole yawned open in the floor like Hell itself exhaled.

It wasn’t just a hole. It was hunger.

Atlas peered down. The depths had no bottom—only red shadows that pulsed like breathing wounds.

"...Should we wear masks?" he asked, trying to joke, but coughed mid-sentence. The sulfur burned him from the inside out.

"Hahahaha..." Aurora smiled, teeth bared like a wolf. She stepped to the edge, no hesitation, no fear.

And then—she just fell.

The echo of her laughter spiraled downward. Mocking the silence.

Atlas turned to Veil. Veil turned to him. Neither spoke for a moment. Just the heat. The rising pressure. The weight of what they were about to do.

"You can go first," Atlas said.

"No... you first," Veil replied.

"No, ladies first. I humbly insist."

"I’m a fucking male... Go. Why are you acting like a pussy?" Veil growled.

"...Me? Pussy? Fuck you. Who’s the pussy here? Wait, you don’t even have a gender. You’re just a shadow... creature."

"Huh... It’s my choice. My right. I have the right to choose my gender. Excuse me," Veil snapped.

Push.

They both fell, limbs flailing, as Merlin shoved them with a single fed-up grunt.

"Just GO already!" he called out as they disappeared into the pit.

"FUCK YOU OLD MAN!"

"FUCK YOU OLD MAN!" they yelled in unison.

Merlin’s face lingered above the hole, watching them shrink into specks.

"Don’t... worry... I... will... be... coming... soon..." his voice echoed faintly, swallowed by the abyss.

Atlas and Veil fell.

And fell.

And kept falling.

The heat intensified.

The light vanished.

The silence was not silent—it was screams without sound.

Veil glanced at him. Atlas met the glance.

"For Loki," one said.

"For Loki," the other echoed.

DOOOOMMMM!!!

They landed.

Hell did not greet them with flame.

It greeted them with breath.

Scorching air slammed against Atlas’s face the moment his boots touched ground. Except this wasn’t ground—it was a living thing. Broken. Twisted. Pained.

Hell was not fire.

Fire would’ve been kind.

Hell was memory.

The "earth" pulsed beneath him—flesh fossilized into landscape, bone stretched into bridges, eyes embedded in stone blinked open then closed in slow agony.

Each breath he took felt like inhaling his own past regrets.

His mind stuttered. Images bled in: Lara’s kiss. Claire’s tears. Eli’s laughter. He hadn’t even said "I love you" to any of them.

And now he was here. Where everything ’remembered’

The soil whispered to his boots. Not in sound. But guilt. Living guilt.

Above them, the sky was wrong. Not black. Not red. A vast dome of cracked glass—behind which figures clawed at the barrier. Souls. Or shadows of what they were.

Lightning cracked.

But it went upward.

Veins in the ground pulsed and shot light into the sky, feeding some starving thing with agony.

Atlas stood still. A breath caught in his throat.

The air here didn’t just burn—it accused.

It dragged its fingers over his old wounds, his half-healed lies, and whispered:

You let them down.

You left them behind.

You will die here.

Alone.

The worst part?

It was his own voice.

Veil hunched beside him, gripping his shadowy arms. Even his form flickered in this cursed space.

"...I feel sick," Veil muttered.

"Yeah," Atlas breathed. "Hell’s stomach doesn’t agree with us."

Veil’s shadow warped against the flesh ground, swallowed by blinking eyes.

At the side, Aurora emerged from the fumes. Her coat barely singed. Her smile undisturbed.

She walked like this was home.

She patted Atlas on the shoulder.

"...Welcome to Hell."