Family system

Jack wiped the dust from his hands, golden eyes flickering in the dim torchlight. The two fallen guardians lay in ruined heaps behind him, their once-imposing forms now reduced to smoldering remnants of their former power. But Jack was not naïve.

This was only the beginning.

His gaze shifted toward the end of the corridor where a pair of titanic obsidian doors loomed, inscribed with writhing runes that pulsed with the eerie blue fire that lined the hall. The door stood sealed, ancient chains coiling around it like a massive serpent, glowing with residual power. Whatever was behind it had been locked away with intent.@@novelbin@@

Jack took a step forward, his senses fully sharpened. The abyss pulsed around him, its presence thickening as if reacting to his actions. The air was no longer still—it shifted as though unseen eyes now watched him with renewed interest. Something deeper had awakened.

Jack grinned. "Good. Now let's see what you're hiding."

Jack lifted his hand, channeling pure divine force into his palm. The chamber trembled as he struck the chains with a crushing blow, sending ripples of power coursing through the obsidian. Cracks spiderwebbed along the bindings, the seal visibly weakening. But it didn't shatter.

Instead, something resisted.

A sudden gust of abyssal energy erupted from the door, lashing out violently. Jack barely had time to brace himself as the wind-like energy struck, carrying with it the force of countless screams—tormented, layered voices that clawed at his mind, each one filled with agony and madness.

For a moment, a vision flashed before his eyes.

A great war. Fallen gods. Betrayal. The abyss swallowing divine flesh.

Jack growled, shaking the vision off. He was no mortal. Whatever tried to invade his mind found only defiance and strength.

Golden energy erupted from his body, dispelling the abyssal attack, shattering its whispers, and pushing back the weight of the abyss. The runes on the door flared—one final, desperate act of resistance—before the chains exploded outward, disintegrating into nothingness.

The doors groaned, then swung open unnaturally, revealing what lay beyond.

Beyond the doorway, the ground fell into a vast, spiraling pit, deeper than the mortal eye could perceive. Floating platforms of jagged black stone lined the descent, suspended in midair by unknown forces, leading downward like a fractured staircase into the abyss.

At the very center, an enormous throne of bone and metal sat atop the lowest platform. Its occupant had long vanished, leaving behind only remnants of a presence too great to be forgotten. The air carried the scent of ancient power and decay as if time had refused to erase what once dwelled here.

Jack stepped to the edge, his divine aura glowing faintly in the overwhelming darkness. He could feel the raw energy that had fueled Xel'Kazur's rise, the residual essence of something beyond divinity, an echo of the forsaken gods that once ruled the abyss.

And below…

Something moved.

A deep, guttural growl rumbled from the depths, reverberating up the pit and shaking the floating platforms. Then, a flash of movement. A shadow surged upward, something massive, something ancient, shifting in the dark like a beast waking from its slumber.

Jack's grin widened. "Well, it would've been boring if nothing was guarding this place."

With a sound like the rending of reality, the entity burst from the pit, sending an explosion of abyssal energy outward. Jack leaped back just in time as a colossal, twisted abomination landed on the nearest floating platform with a bone-shattering impact.

It was monstrous in form, a fusion of shadows and sinew, its massive frame wrapped in blackened tendrils that dripped with raw abyssal power. It had six arms, each ending in curved, serrated claws long enough to cleave through mountains. Its head bore no eyes, only a writhing mass of teeth and tendrils, and when it let out a roar, the sound warped the air, sending violent ripples of energy cascading through the chamber.

Jack laughed, his golden aura flaring. "Finally, something that might be a challenge."

The beast lunged.

Jack reacted instantly, vanishing from its direct path and reappearing on a nearby floating platform. The monster's claws struck the stone where he had just stood, splintering the entire slab into dust. Jack countered, unleashing a wave of golden fire, his divine energy roaring to life as he hurled it directly at the creature's chest. Explore new worlds at My Virtual Library Empire

The attack struck true—but the beast did not fall.

Instead, it absorbed the energy, twisting and consuming it, its body shifting as if reshaping itself with the power it had just devoured.

Jack's smirk faded slightly.

"Oh. You're one of those."

The abomination howled, its form expanding, abyssal energy erupting from its body. The air distorted, gravity shifting as the pit became a battlefield of floating debris and collapsing platforms.

Jack cracked his knuckles. "Alright, let's see who breaks first."

The monster attacked again, its claws swiping through space, rending the air as if slashing through the fabric of reality itself. Jack dodged with impossible speed, leaping between floating platforms, each movement perfectly calculated, each evasion precise.

He retaliated with a concentrated burst of divine force, wrapping his attack in layers of compressed power—something that couldn't be absorbed so easily.

The beast screeched as the attack struck its core, its tendrils recoiling in agony. It stumbled, momentarily weakened.

Jack saw his opening.

He descended upon the creature with a flash of light, his hand igniting with a spear of divine destruction aimed directly at its heart.

The abyss shook.

As he drove the spear into the monster's core, the air tore apart, unleashing a cataclysmic power surge.

The beast let out a final, agonized howl—and then, silence.

As its colossal form collapsed into the abyss, Jack landed lightly on a remaining platform, his golden energy slowly fading.

He exhaled, shaking his head. "Not bad. But still not enough."

Then, he turned his gaze downward.

The throne remained.

And whatever power had once sat upon it…

Was waiting.

Jack stood on the crumbling platform, the remnants of the abyssal beast dissolving into the void below, leaving nothing but lingering energy behind. The pit was eerily silent now, save for the distant, distorted echoes of something that felt too large for this reality, a presence beyond the veil, slumbering, waiting.

But Jack's attention wasn't on the abyss itself. His gaze was fixed on the throne.

A structure of immense scale, the throne loomed at the bottom of the pit, carved from something older than stone, something twisted and unholy. Jagged, fused bones of long-forgotten creatures formed its base, their surfaces covered in glowing, shifting sigils that pulsed with an intelligent, insidious hunger. The armrests were forged from blackened steel, the metal veins pulsing like it had a heartbeat of its own.

This was not a seat of power meant for a mortal ruler.

This was a monument to something ancient that had once reigned over the abyss.

Jack took a slow step forward, then another, moving onto the final platform leading to the throne's base. The air here throbbed with an unseen force as if the void was breathing, responding to his presence. His golden aura flickered in contrast, divine energy pushing back against the oppressive darkness, unwilling to be swallowed by it.

Then, as he drew near—

The throne spoke.

Not in words. Not in a voice. But in a wave of raw, overwhelming knowledge, crashing through Jack's mind like a tsunami.

Images flooded his vision.

He saw a time before gods, before mortals. A time when beings beyond comprehension roamed the infinite dark, nameless things too vast and too powerful to be understood. They were not life, not as it was known, but forces—manifestations of entropy, destruction, and hunger.

The abyss was their domain.

And then, the war came.

The first gods, later known as divine, descended upon the abyss, seeking to seal away what could never be controlled. Titans fell, pantheons were shattered, and the cosmos bled as celestial beings battled horrors that should never have existed.

One of these primordial forces—the greatest among them, the one who once sat upon this throne—was defeated, sealed away in a place beyond time, never to rise again.

But the throne remained.

And so did the abyss.

The vision ended, and Jack exhaled sharply, his mind snapping back to the present. His hands clenched into fists, his heart pounding, not from fear but from the sheer gravity of what he had just witnessed.

He now understood why the abyss called to those who dared tread upon it.

It was not just power.

It was the memory of a war that had never truly ended.

Jack stepped closer to the throne. The pulsating sigils reacted, glowing brighter, the air thick with an ancient resonance that seemed to recognize him.

It wanted him to sit.

To claim what had been left behind.

To take the place of the Forgotten One.

Jack grinned. "Tempting."

But he was no fool.

This was not a throne of kings. It was a trap, a prison meant to ensnare the next foolish god who sought the power of the abyss without knowing its cost.

Jack wasn't here to replace a fallen entity. He was here to take what was useful and burn the rest.

He raised a hand, his divine aura flaring bright enough to banish the darkness around him.

Breaking the Abyss' Hold

The throne shuddered, as if realizing his intent, and the abyss itself reacting violently. The pit trembled, and the floating platforms cracked and collapsed, pulled into the void as the throne's sigils flared in defiance.

A deep, guttural howl erupted from the abyss's very core. Something furious and hungry was awakening beneath him, recognizing his rejection of its will.

Jack's golden energy surged, a radiant force crashing into the throne's magic, disrupting the abyssal seal. The shifting sigils flickered erratically, struggling to hold onto their ancient bindings, but Jack's power overwhelmed them, unraveling the abyss' claim.

Jack struck the throne with a final surge of divine energy, sending a shockwave of pure destruction through its very core.

The throne cracked.

The abyss screamed.

And then—

It shattered.

A blinding explosion of abyssal and divine energy ripped through the chamber, sending shockwaves through the entire ruins, causing walls to crumble and platforms to collapse into the void.

Jack stood firm at the storm's center, his body surrounded by golden fire, his smirk never fading.

The abyss had lost its hold.

The throne was destroyed.

And whatever power had once been here…

It was now his to take.

As the dust settled, Jack felt the lingering traces of abyssal power coiling around him, uncertain, waiting.

This was the energy Xel'Kazur had once stolen, the remnant power of something far older than the gods, something the abyss had hoarded for millennia.

Jack extended his hand, commanding it.

The abyss hesitated as if resisting.

But Jack was not one to be resisted.

His divine aura flared once more, and the abyssal remnants yielded, merging into his presence and intertwining with his already vast power. It did not change him—it did not consume him as it had Xel'Kazur.

Instead, it became his tool.

Jack opened his eyes, feeling the shift within himself. He had not taken the abyss's throne, but he had claimed its secrets and strength, bending it to his will rather than the other way around.

He clenched his fist, energy crackling between his fingers.

"Well. That was fun."

The ruined chamber groaned, the walls fracturing, the abyssal energy no longer holding this place together. The time to leave had come.

Jack turned away from the destruction, stepping onto the last stable platform. A single portal of golden light appeared before him—his way back.

As he stepped through, the ruins behind him crumbled, swallowed by the void they had once housed.

The abyss was finished.

And now, it was time to return to Aetheria.

Stronger than ever.