Apocratha

"What the hell are you doing?!" Inari asked as Onoma's corpse dropped to the stone. She moved like she was going to attack Gatekeeper, but Darius held out his hand, blocking her way.

"Inari. Think. What do we have that Onoma did not?" Darius said.

"What..?" She responded.

"We are demons now. That's why we have so much more power than before. Onoma was not." Darius explained. "Gatekeeper is making him into a demon, as Sedori had done to us."

Gatekeeper held out his hand, a wave of shadows churning before him. "Yes. In order for you to pass the trial you must be demons." He spoke. "Else you will die before it even begins."

The shadows began to form into a figure, knelt down at Gatekeeper's feet. It was Onoma, his body forming. He was draped in chains and short red oni horns pointed up from his head. His hair was long and her black, his eyes crimson red, and he wore black and red robes. Blood red markings stretched across his skin, red spikes protruded from his shoulders and back. His canine teeth had now grown into fangs as well.

"What.. the hell…?" Onoma said, looking down at himself, tugging at the chains.

"You are now a demon, just your allies are." Gatekeeper spoke to Onoma. "I apologize for having to kill you so suddenly, but it was the only way you'd be able to achieve this."

"Demon..?"

"Yes." Darius spoke. "And with becoming a demon you will have a super big power boost."

"Yes yes, we all know this already." Gatekeeper smacked Onoma on the shoulder with his staff, resulting in a yelp. "Get up. We've no time to waste, the Calamity Serpent is at our doorstep."

"Calamity Serpent?" Inari asked as Onoma got to his feet.

"Yes. One of the Genesis Gods, Apophus. He exists only to annihilate anything that threatens reality." Gatekeeper explained, "it is most possibly the most powerful being of all time, it took the might of all the Genesis Gods together to bring him to a stop the last time he went berserk. And now he is coming straight to this earth."

"Akuro." Darius said simply.

"Yes. That is the reason Apophus approaches." Gatekeeper nodded.

"Okay.. but what are Genesis Gods..?" Onoma asked.

"Basically the beings that created the gods and titans, who in turn created us." Darius said. "They control reality, time, space, future, everything that fundamentally creates the structure of existence itself."

"And why am I only being aware of this now..?"

"We only recently learned of their existence also." Inari spoke. "Apparently one of the Genesis Gods, Kasziel, creator of reality, wants to hard reset all realities that exist because there are so many drawing energy from him that it's killing him. He believes if he dies then everything else does too, so he plans on destroying all realities and creating only one in their place, and this one reality would be under his control."

"Do the other Genesis Gods agree with him?"

"No." Gatekeeper spoke. "But they cannot stop him. He is too powerful. But his ideals are all wrong. The realities are self sustaining, they no longer need his energy to survive, the reason they still draw power from him is because they are constantly expanding into new realities. If he were to die, the only result would be that no more realities could be created."

"And Azazel works for him too. Meaning Akuro works under Kasziel. In other words Akuro is Kasziel's weapon in which he will use to destroy realities, including this one." Darius explained further.

"So basically an all powerful being realizes he is no longer immortal and he is having a panic attack about it and decides to hard reset reality, in turn the Calamity Serpent, who exists only to destroy, is coming here because Akuro is a threat to existence of all things..?" Onoma said.

"Basically yeah." Darius shrugged.

"Why the hell are we talking about this as if it's normal?" Onoma asked. "Reality is at stake here. What the hell."

"Because there is no use in panicking. All we can do now is try to get stronger in order to stop Akuro." Sedori spoke.

"Akuro is the least of your concerns at the moment." Gatekeeper said. "Your first priority is stopping Apophus from obliterating this world."

"How the hell are we supposed to stop a literal being of calamity?" Onoma asked. "Not even the gods can stop it, and it took all of the Genie Gods to stop it last time, as you said."

"Genie?" Darius asked turning to Onoma.

"What? That's what they are called right?"

"Onoma.. I used to think you were dangerous, now I just think you are dumb." Inari sighed.

"What? The fuck?"

"They are called Genesis Gods, not Genie Gods, bright guy." Darius said.

"Oh. That.. makes more sense." Onoma spoke, scratching the back of his head.

"Did the transfer to demon mess with your head, man?" Darius asked.

"I honestly don't know anymore."

"Enough babbling." Sedori spoke. "Let's hear what this trial is, Gatekeeper."

"Finally, some sense." Gatekeeper responded. "The trial is simply this- you all shall go to Apocrathor, the deepest point of Xinoll, where beings neither god nor demon reside. You shall descend, find the Titan's Stone, and then return here."

"That's it?" Inari asked.

"That's it."

•

•

•

Moorza frowned at Akuro. He did his best to keep composure and act as though he were still the alpha here, but he knew Akuro was not the same kid from before. He was much, much stronger than he once was. He couldn't hold back at all.

Moorza raised his hand into the air, the moon growing brighter behind him, and then he lowered his hand as a gateway opened and the moon began to drop from the sky towards Akuro.

The quarts ground jutted upwards from beneath Akuro's feet, sending him rushing up to meet the moon, but when they made impact a massive shockwave blasted out, sending Moorza stumbling back.

"What..?"

Moorza couldn't believe his own eyes. Akuro stood there, holding up a single finger and stopping the moon's descent.