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Chapter 107 - Four Pillars

Chapter 107: Chapter 107 - Four Pillars

At first, Lucius hesitated. The silence was oppressive. Even with his newfound power, the sheer emptiness of the canvas unsettled him.

He remembered Chaos. The pain. The madness. The darkness within.

Now, he had to do the opposite—channel light, purpose, and life.

He closed his eyes and reached inward, not for power, but for vision.

A spark ignited.

The blank space before him shimmered. Mountains grew from nothing. Oceans poured in reverse from the clouds. Forests sprang forth, each tree different, some bearing fruit shaped like music, others glowing with hidden thoughts. He sculpted glaciers that breathed mist and deserts that whispered riddles.

He crafted a sky—layered with three suns that rotated like gears in a great clock, and a moon that whispered dreams to the creatures below. He infused starlight with memory, ensuring each constellation had a tale to tell.

Then came life.

He began with small things—creatures of fur and glass, birds that wept ink when they sang. Then he shaped people. They emerged from the rivers like stories, born not just of flesh but of metaphor.

He gave them villages. History. Culture. Language. They were not merely alive—they believed. In each other. In the unseen. In something greater.

He watched as they built temples in his name. Songs were composed in his honor. Children were named after him. Statues rose.

He didn’t command any of it.

They chose to love him.

And with that love, the world flourished.

Days passed—or perhaps years. Time was irrelevant here. He learned to walk their roads. To read the texts of their philosophers. To dance with their children.

Lucius began to see their flaws. Some grew greedy. Some cruel. Wars began. Kingdoms collapsed. Entire continents fractured under ideology.

He watched a man betray his brother for power.

He watched a woman sacrifice herself for love.

He saw beauty. Tragedy. Triumph.

"This is what creation becomes," the Guardian whispered. "Can you bear its imperfections?"

Lucius said nothing.

He stepped into the world.

He lived among the people. He took on the guise of a mortal. A traveler. He spoke with kings. Shared drinks with poets. Slept beneath the stars.

He watched his creations grow—and decay.

He saw cruelty.

But he also saw courage.

He saw hope.

He saw a child with nothing give his only meal to a stranger.

He saw a dying soldier hold back a flood with nothing but faith.

Lucius began to weep.

He fell in love.

Not romantically. But deeply. Completely. With what he had made.

And that was when the Guardian returned.

She stood over him beneath the moon he had shaped.

"It is time."

"No," Lucius said, voice trembling. "They’re not perfect. But they’re mine."

"Exactly."

She held out her hand.

A single dagger. Forged from his own will.

"End it. Or walk away. But know that to take the Pillar, you must let go."

Lucius held the blade.

He walked the world one last time.

He visited every village.

He kissed the forehead of every child.

He watched the sunrise.

Then, standing atop the mountain he had first created, he stabbed the blade into the heart of the world.

It resisted.

The world screamed.

His people cried out.

Reality cracked. Winds tore through the mountains. Oceans turned to fire.

Lucius screamed with them.

He tried to stop. But he couldn’t. The blade moved on its own, powered by the truth he had accepted.

He felt every death.

He watched every building fall.

He held the hands of the dying, even as the ground burned beneath them.

He destroyed the cities he had raised.

He silenced the songs written in his name.

And when the silence returned, he stood alone.

The Guardian was beside him.

"You have passed the test. Creation is love. And love is sacrifice."

She held out the Pillar of Creation.

It pulsed with the warmth of everything he had lost.

Lucius took it.

His soul burned.

His eyes opened to new colors. His breath carried seeds of worlds.

He was becoming something more.

Three Pillars now orbited him.

And ahead—one last trial remained.

***

The moment Lucius accepted the Pillar of Creation, he vanished in a storm of golden embers. There was no falling, no flight. Just heat.

He reappeared amid flame.

The sky was black iron, the ground molten and cracked. Volcanoes pierced the clouds like spears of wrath. Ash rained from above. Great chains hung in the heavens, connected to unseen forces that groaned with weight.

This was not merely a realm. This was a furnace.

The Forge of Destruction.

The final Pillar waited here.

Lucius stepped onto obsidian stone, his cloak catching fire before extinguishing itself with every step. His boots hissed against the ground. Around him, ruins of worlds floated—entire planets broken and drifting through lava seas. Weapons larger than cities lay shattered, swords rusting in the bones of dead gods.

A voice rose from the smoke.

"Destruction is not evil. Destruction is truth."

Lucius turned.

A figure emerged. Massive. Towering. Made of armor forged from the remnants of dying stars. Its face was hidden behind a mask of cracked obsidian. Its chest burned with a heart of supernova flame.

The Guardian of Destruction.

"You have come for the last Pillar."

"I have."

"Then you must burn."

Lucius stood taller, the Pillars of Time, Chaos, and Creation orbiting him like suns.

"I’m not afraid of fire."

The Guardian drew a weapon. Not a sword. Not an axe. A hammer. Huge. Cracked with ancient runes. As it hit the ground, the land split.

"You misunderstand. The fire isn’t what kills."

He raised the hammer.

"It’s what reveals."

Phase One: The Breaking of the Body

The Guardian swung. Lucius barely dodged as the hammer smashed into the obsidian. A shockwave erupted, tearing up a canyon behind him.

Lucius summoned the voidblade, infused with the Pillars he now possessed. He slashed upward, sending a spiral of temporal chaos and creation toward the Guardian.

The blow landed.

It did nothing.

The Guardian did not bleed. It didn’t even stumble. It raised the hammer again and brought it down.

Lucius raised a shield of light and chaos. The impact shattered it instantly, launching him backward into a wall of burning crystal.

He stood. Blood leaking from his mouth. His bones creaked. The heat was unbearable.

"You have power," the Guardian said. "But no burden."

Lucius attacked again. He fought with skill, fury, and intelligence. He unleashed time warps, chaos storms, threads of creation.

Each attack was caught. Broken. Crushed.

The Guardian struck again—and this time, the hammer landed.

Lucius was driven into the ground. Bones broke. His lungs screamed.

His vision dimmed.

The world pulsed red.

"You will not win with strength," the Guardian said. "Only when all strength is gone will Destruction begin."

Phase Two: The Unmaking of the Self

Lucius awoke in darkness.

His body floated in a void filled with fragments of his soul. Shattered memories drifted past.

A younger version of him screamed from a cage. Another wept over a fallen friend. Another version—one he didn’t recognize—laughed while standing over the corpses of his harem.

"This is who you could become," the Guardian’s voice echoed. "A tyrant. A destroyer. A god of loss."

Lucius reached for the memories, tried to reclaim them.

But the Guardian’s voice stopped him.

"Let them go. Destruction demands sacrifice."

He resisted. He couldn’t let go.

These memories made him Lucius.

And then he saw it—an image of Lilith, smiling at him.

"If you carry us as burdens, we’ll fall."

Lucius clenched his jaw. He screamed. He let go.

The darkness collapsed.

His soul was unmade. Reforged.

He stood once more in the furnace.

Phase Three: The Trial of the Flame

This time, the Guardian stood aside.

"Create nothing. Use nothing. You are nothing."

Lucius walked forward, stripped of all power. His body, still cracked and broken, stepped into the heart of the Forge.

The flames wrapped around him. Crawled into his skin. Burned away all comfort.

He screamed. Not in pain—but in acceptance.

He burned.

And as he burned, something within him changed.

Not a god. Not a monster.

A truth.

That to wield Destruction was not to erase, but to understand what must be erased for something better.

He emerged from the flame, glowing.

His body healed. His soul reforged. The three Pillars pulsed behind him. And in the sky above, a fourth—wreathed in crimson fire.

The Pillar of Destruction.

The Guardian knelt.

"You are worthy. You are tempered. You are whole."

Lucius stepped forward, reached up, and claimed the final Pillar.

Fire coursed through him. Worlds ended and began in his breath.

And then, silence.

He stood alone.

Not a man.

Not a king.

A force.

A future.

The Multiverse itself stirred.

Lucius had claimed all four Pillars.

And now—the Throne awaited.

The only thing in his way was now a woman who stood alone on the throne.

It was time for Lucius to take over and make her realize who was the real king.