Darius

A boy stood in the dimly lit chamber of the Origin Deities, the luminescent vines casting an ominous glow over the room.

"Why haven't you returned to the others? What are you hiding?" Came the voice of Evelyn in the boy's head. "I told you that if you kept up any acts of treachery and lies I would kill you."

'You have no power over me.' The boy answered mentally, removing the hood over his head. 'So stop handing out empty threats.'

"Darius, they aren't empty threats. If I wanted I could make my aura overwhelm you completely."

'You sure of that? Then try it.'

A sense of danger ran through Darius's body, Evelyn's aura rejecting him, but he was unaffected.

'Are you done?' Darius asked. 'You never had any hold over me.'

From the beginning, Darius had his own goals, even when he was allied with Akuro. He had no intentions of making an enemy of a previous companion, but if Akuro became a problem to his own goals it could become an issue. Darius never intended to attack Akuro or Inari, but he also had no reason to kill the gods. When he first attained Evelyn's powers, he had blocked off his own thoughts and memories to her, allowing only certain ones through to make her believe she had power over him, this way he could become accustomed to her aura, and now that he was he had total control over her.

'You've played the role of a puppet pretty well, sorry, but I have things I need to do. I don't have any bad intentions, I just need to reach my goal, and to do that I needed to deceive you.' Darius said.

"I see. And you also were hiding your actual power. You were immortal to begin with, you don't have the power of Loki, do you?" Evelyn asked.

'No. My power is something else entirely, but that's for me to know, not you. I apologize.'

"At least tell me what your goal is."

Darius hesitated for a moment, then sighed. 'After everything I guess I at least owe you that.' He spoke. 'My end goal... is to become the one undisputed god above all.'

"What? Why? What's the point in that?"

'Again, that's my own business. Now then, I have work to do.'

Darius walked forward, then held out his hand.

"May your souls rest, and your aura be mine." He spoke as green aura enveloped the last two of the untouched headstones.

"Wait, what are you doing?" Evelyn asked.

'I am separating their souls from their aura, this way they can rest and I can take their power without having them intrude on my mind.' Darius explained.

"Will you be doing the same to me?"

'No. You will be my... advisor, to put it. And I have grown to like you as well.'

Evelyn gave no response and instead withdrew back into her own mental scape as Darius absorbed the aura of the last two Origin Deities. As he did, his aura began to take shape around his body, his Aura Cloak taking a physical shape, a green scarf about his neck and ribbons flowing around his body while emerald plates of armor covered his frame and a hood covered his head, two thin green horns protruding from the hood. He felt the overwhelming power of the Deities flowing into him, he felt as if he could do anything, but then his heart rate began to increase and his lungs began to burn as he felt like he was about to combust, his skin blistering.

The amount of aura he had just taken in was so much that it caused his skin to literally begin to burn, while his organs and bones began to burst, blood spurting from his mouth as he fell to his knees. His limbs no longer worked while he choked on his own blood, unable to breathe.

About a minute of this suffering passed before his wounds began closing themselves and he could breathe again. Darius lay on the ground, panting, as he recuperated from the pain he'd just experienced. When he had properly recovered, he walked straight past the headstones and up to the ice that encased a massive dragon.

"That's Scillia... of course, so that's what happened back then... but why?" Evelyn spoke.

'What?' Darius asked. 'I'm confused, explain.'

"The ice on this entire continent is from this dragon's sealing magic, this place never used to be the way it is now, but the reason she did it is still unknown to me."

'Well, I might know.' Darius stepped forward and placed his hand against the ice. It was cold and his skin stuck to it's smooth surface. A pulse of green light ran through the ice, and a moment later it suddenly burst into minuscule shards like snow, falling to the ground before melting into water as the dragon's body slumped to the ground.

"What are you doing? Whatever Scillia sealed here, she did it with good reason, why would you reverse this?" Evelyn complained.

'Because there is something here that I need.' Darius answered, entering the cave of ice he'd carved into the wall. He walked around Scillia's body and up to another wall of ice, which he repeated the process from before on, a ringing sound reverberating through the thick ice as he carved a path. When he stopped, he found himself standing upon what looked to once be a cliff, where the ice seemed to have once had something held in it, a silhouette left in the ice, but whatever was once there was gone now.

"The hell..." Darius spoke. "He should be here... how..?"

"What's going on, Darius?" Evelyn asked.

'The one that your dragon friend sealed... was Azazel.' He responded. 'And now he's gone.'

•

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"And... that should be it. That should be everything you need to know. I think." Nathan spoke as Emma was slowly gaining an understanding of the outside world as it was. She now knew how to control her aura, Nathan tutoring her on it, and she also knew that, currently, Akuro was the king of hell and was at war with the Gods.

'So... let me get this straight...' Emma said, 'the world is made up of aura, and this aura is basically life essence, and certain beings have aptitudes towards aura giving them unique abilities and using these abilities they fight one another? Also Deities are reincarnations of humans chosen by the gods to basically be pawns of war. Is that all?'

"Mm, no there is a lot more but... I'm just gonna leave it at that. You should probably wake up now, there is a fox spirit working to heal you."

'A fox spirit?'

"Doesn't matter, just wake up."

'Will we ever be able to talk again?'

"I'll be in consciousness for as long as you use my aura. So yes, we will talk again. Now go."

'Thank you... Nathan, was it?'

"Don't mention it, anything for a pretty girl like you."

And then Emma woke up.

•

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•

Inari watched as Emma stirred awake, groaning as she rubbed her temple, sitting up. She looked up at Inari and tilted her head.

"Are you... Inari?" Emma asked.

Taken by surprise, Inari asked, "Yes, I am, how did you know that?"

"Umm, well..." Emma said "where to start... I guess it was when you met Nathan...? Right?"

"Nathan? What does he have to do with anything?"

"Well, I saw him in my mind. He showed me his memories and told me that I have his... aura."

"Wait... how..? Oh.." Inari said, the situation sinking in. Makane is a part of Inari, therefor she absorbed Nathan's aura when she did, so that also meant that, because she was inside Makane, that Emma absorbed Nathan's aura.

"So... I guess I have powers now..?" She said. "I don't really know what I'm supposed to do.. and I know Akuro changed up my memories... but I still wanna help him."

"What? Why would you want to help him?"

"Because, even if these memories are fake, they feel real... and so I still want to help him."

"Trust me, girl, he's not the Akuro from your memories anymore. He's changed, by a large degree."

Emma smiled. "I can't say I'm surprised, I mean, he's waging war on the gods, of course he's bound to change, but honestly that's just necessary. I imagine his emotions are still there, just hidden."

Inari looked at Emma for a long moment. She wondered how this girl could come up with a guess like that and say it out loud with such certainty. She wondered if maybe she should do the same and have hope that the Akuro she once saw was still there.

"Well, it isn't like we could help him anyway." Inari said. "He surpassed me a long time ago, he's become insanely strong now. He killed a god just the other day."

"Really?" Emma smiled. "I'm glad, that means he is able to reach his goals."

"Yeah, I guess, so long as those goals don't kill him."

"By the way... where are we?"

"Oh, umm, long story, but we are in a place called Xinoll, but it's actually just hell."

"What? Hell?" Emma asked, dumbfounded. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. Again, long story. Akuro is in the Midrealm, our world, right now setting up a base."

"A base?"

"Yeah, like a base of operations to fight the gods from. Also just so you know, New York was completely obliterated." Inari said.

Emma's eyes widened. "What..? How?"

"A demon named Lilith destroyed it, and now it's just an empty, barren land."

"Seriously? We are fighting things that strong?"

"Yeah. We are."

Emma frowned, looking down at her hands. Inari looked at her, wondering what was going on in the girls head.

"What's wrong?" Inari asked.

"My... my parents were killed a while ago when a Deity by the name of Adeline apparently went on a killing spree. Nathan told me. I thought it was just a freak accident."

Inari was silent for a moment, thinking of the evil psycho she had met before. Adeline was truly insane, that was undeniable.

"Sorry."

"It's fine." Emma answered. "It's war after all, right?"

"Yeah..." Inari responded. "Well, come on. We should go to the Midrealm to tell Akuro about you having Nathan's power."