Chapter Thirty-Two
Demon Soul
The chapter begins with Gabriel running in the midst of a skin-rending storm, desperate to escape this strange place he found himself in—a place as alien to him as our world once was. His flight mirrors our daily attempts to escape the monsters of boredom, sorrow, and loneliness by engaging in meaningless activities that waste our time. Gabriel, too, was engaged in a futile endeavor: trying to flee this island. His body had become emaciated, his mind weakened, though still sharp. But that was the problem. He had come to realize there was no escape from here. Hallucinations and obsessive thoughts plagued him. He had been on a long journey, shivering in the cold, his beard now so long it reached his feet, his body reduced to skin and bones. Gabriel embarked on this wretched journey in search of the shore of freedom and salvation. He muttered to himself, "I must have been here for years, but I can no longer distinguish time or the meaning behind my decisions. I thought I was trying to escape this world, but perhaps I was searching for meaning. Or maybe I was almost certain that intelligence was the meaning. But it doesn't matter how smart or brilliant you are. As long as you're unlucky, cursed, and alone like me, intelligence has no limits. The more it grows, the closer you get to the sun, the more you uncover the truth, the more the lies are exposed. You must use your intelligence before it crosses the boundaries. Once it does, you won't care about success or immortalizing your name in history. You'll see the world as a place without names. Your soul will become like that of a demon that doesn't exist. I understand now. I didn't fall into the void; this island is the void itself. All I do now is walk, with an indifferent smile on my face, waiting to see what happens."
Gabriel's steps were heavy, but his expression remained smiling—a smile reminiscent of a man high on cocaine, indifferent to what was to come. The environment around him began to erode.
The sky… disappeared.
The trees… evaporated.
The fleshy ground… dissolved as if it had never been more than a mirage.
The skin-rending winds… turned into a deadly stillness.
It was as if he was no longer walking on anything. There was no "where," only "nothing."
With each step, the dark void around him expanded until nothing remained but emptiness, a void where he couldn't tell if he was still moving or if time had stopped.
Then… he saw them.
Before Gabriel, in the heart of the darkness, stood a scene the human mind could not comprehend. Two massive entities floated in the void, like trumpets of eternal nightmare, creatures born from the depths of primordial chaos before the stars existed.
Their bodies were neither solid nor liquid, but a grotesque mixture of rotting flesh and slimy, writhing matter that seemed to breathe. Their forms were covered in eyes—countless, massive eyes. Their skin was entirely eyes. The eyes… or rather, the crystalline masses covering their bodies, glowed with an eerie blue light, as if they were observing reality itself, as if they were aware of Gabriel's presence in a way that transcended human understanding.
Their mouths were rivers of teeth, layers of twisted fangs, and in the mouth of one, there was a single purple eye emitting a violet light that shone on Gabriel. Between the teeth were long tongues saturated with a glowing pink substance, dripping threads of unnatural light, as if they were absorbing the essence of the void itself.
The space around them transformed into massive clouds, like a cave made of caves, with nothing emerging from its depths but the light of hellfire.
There was no sound, only a sensation of vibration, as if the void itself was whispering into his mind, as if the emptiness was trying to communicate with him in a way that didn't rely on words, but on a tone of primal hunger, on waves of pure terror.
But this time, Gabriel wasn't afraid. The entities spoke to him, moving their mouths in a horrifying manner, their eyes fixed on him. They said:
"Do you wanna feel like you felt last night?
Do you wanna feel like you felt last night?
Or shall I say… all nights?"
Then Gabriel continued speaking, walking with his head down, his arms dangling like a zombie. He looked like he knew the tune emerging from the void. He spoke as he walked away from the monsters, their infinite eyes still shining their light on him:
"I don't wanna feel like I felt last night.
I'll be naked when I leave, and I was naked when I came.
Out of reach, out of touch, too numb, I don't feel no more.
Toast up, so what? Street small, but everything goes both ways.
So you'll run, yeah, but you'll never escape.
Last night the moon was red, or maybe it always was."
His smile didn't change. But something inside him shattered.
Gabriel walked through the void. There was no ground, no sky, only nothingness. He didn't know if he was actually moving or if his steps were just an illusion, but he kept going, his head bowed, his eyes half-closed, his arms swinging carelessly like a zombie exhausted by time.
Then… everything changed.
Without warning, he found himself floating in space.
It wasn't a fall, nor was it flight. It was as if he had been left to drift in this infinite expanse. The killing cold of space wasn't there, gravity had no meaning, his body no longer felt heavy, but he was still present.
Then, before him… he saw it.
The sight that should never be seen.
There it was, surrounding a small, blue, familiar planet. Earth.
But it wasn't alone.
Something massive, something larger than anything he had ever witnessed, was coiled around the planet like a living nightmare. It had no definite shape, but was a moving mass of chaos, a living fabric of rotting flesh and slimy matter that pulsed as if alive.
The skin covering it wasn't skin, but a mixture of living darkness and organic matter that multiplied, twisted, writhed, and changed.
And it was covered in eyes.
Eyes of all shapes and sizes—some round and gleaming like planets, others oval and cracked like shattered mirrors, and some glowing with a hellish red light, pulsating as if they were staring directly into his soul.
Then there was the great eye.
A single, massive eye at the center of this entity, embedded in its distorted body like a cosmic black hole sucking in reality itself.
Its iris wasn't normal, but more like a vortex of conflicting colors, shifting between dark blue, deadly yellow, and blood red.
And its pupil… it wasn't just a black dot, but a gateway, a window to something else.
Something that didn't belong to this existence.
Something that was watching him from the other side of reality.
Gabriel didn't move.
There was no sound, no speech, but the void itself was screaming.
He could feel it—this entity, this cosmic beast, wasn't just a creature. It was a will, a force that transcended the boundaries of time, a force that devoured universes as easily as a human breathes air.
Gabriel's mouth opened in shock, and a great shiver ran through him. He was sweating profusely, despite the lack of heat in the void. It seemed the feeling he had spoken of was inescapable. In that moment, Gabriel realized that this feeling was the only thing that directly punched his philosophy in the face. It was the only thing that wasn't nihilistic, nor could it be said to truly exist. It was the undeniable truth: fear. He turned his head and saw Zolish the Leech sitting majestically on the red moon, eating a sandwich made of living alien children. Gabriel exclaimed, "Ah, the mortal! Still as mad as ever!" Zolish replied, "Why are you here, Zolish? Surely, I can use you for something useful."
Gabriel said to him, "You know, I once trusted someone who claimed to be my brother."
Zolish replied, "Kill him. Brothers are a disaster—ask me about it."
Gabriel: "At least two of them are cooperating with you now."
Zolish: "I doubt that. They're probably spies, but that won't stop me."
Gabriel: "Despite your intelligence and your cosmic power, you're chasing the impossible, like anyone else. Defeating the Shadow Demon is impossible. Why do you keep going?"
Zolish: "Because I carry a soul. Even if it's the soul of a demon, any being or creature that carries a soul will keep trying. Unlike you."
Gabriel: "Hah… maybe you're right."
Zolish: "Do you remember that seal your father gave you when you were a child?"
Gabriel: "How do you know about that? I lost it in a mysterious way when I was a child. I searched for hours in the room but never found it. It's the only thing I had left of my dead father."
Zolish: "That's right. Go and fetch it."
Zolish threw the ring into space, and Gabriel, like a madman, leaped after it, desperate to grasp something that held meaning…
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Far away in space, the Shadow Demon sat on his majestic throne, reclining and bored. ĤĚ said, "You useless slaves, why haven't we received the green blood wine from Galaxy 97645-F?"
The guards replied, "My lord, it's an export issue. We'll resolve it immediately. Don't trouble yourself."
Then, one of the hidden entities approached. Only its voice was heard as it said, "Father, did you know that my brothers, Zolish and Arkhantha, have freed the Demon Lord and are preparing to wage war against you?"
ĤĚ replied, "I know, and I couldn't care less. Their attempt to overthrow me is like an ant trying to swim to the deepest point in the ocean."
The Shadow Demon then glanced at the entity. He didn't attack or take any action—he simply looked at it. That was enough. The powerful cosmic entity, capable of destroying galaxies with a single glance, began to evaporate.
It screamed, "Whyyyyy, Father? Whyyyyy?"
ĤĚ replied, "Because you annoyed me with trivial news that held no meaning. Instead of bothering me, you should have gone and solved the blood wine export issue, you fool."
End of Chapter