— Intriguing. — I snort, sinking onto the sofa and staring at the ceiling. — One question: are you friend or foe? — I shift an attentive gaze to Lilith.
— I... That depends on whether the personality of that monster replaced you or merely passed on knowledge, like it did to me, — the demoness answered, leaning over quite sexily (just noting it, nothing more!), after which she gracefully sat down on a chair.
— Isn't it obvious from my behavior? — I smirk, deftly (if you don't praise yourself, no one will) avoiding the answer. — Get to the point, Lilith. The Extermination is planned very soon, during which, according to analysts' estimates, Eve will invade Heaven. Actually, that's one of the reasons I came to you.
I decide to change the subject a bit so as not to delve into the thicket of my "personality."
— Oh, and here I thought you missed me... — Not getting any reaction, Lilith continued, growing more serious: — About half a year ago, I had a dream... A dream about another world, so similar to ours and so distant... — The woman sighed sadly. — At first, I didn't attach any importance to it, thought a dream is just a dream, but with each passing day, or rather each night, I dreamt of a continuation where I lived the life of a girl who became a "god" in that world. — Lilith gave a crooked smirk. — I have a good imagination, I have no equal in that, but even for me, such dreams are too much.
— More narcissism, Lilith, more, — I snort again, looking her straight in the eye mockingly. I don't like what she's telling me, oh, I don't like it at all...
— I agree, admiring such a wonderful woman as myself is worth a lot, — the demoness nodded importantly, making me raise an eyebrow. I slightly lost the thread of the dialogue and the meaning of her words. — There was no time to figure out what was happening to me – a few days later, She came to me. — Returning to seriousness, Lilith fell silent, taking a meaningful pause.
— She – is... — I wave my hand vaguely, waiting for a continuation. No, there aren't many options, but am I supposed to guess?
— Your second wife, you fool, — Lilith rolled her eyes. — Eve fucked my brain with some bullshit about destiny, the meaninglessness of existence, and something else like that. Well, you know...
— How would I? — I'm genuinely surprised, because I really don't understand what Eve could have been broadcasting. — Alright, go on.
I fall silent, catching Lilith's narrowed gaze. I was very familiar with that look – Lute just loves to "hint" this way that if I don't shut up, I'll have problems.
— Anyway, I told her to go fuck herself, and this crazy woman threw a ripe little apple at me and bailed in an unknown direction, promising to return...
— The Forbidden Fruit? — I almost jumped up. — You have it?
— I... Ate it a few days later, — looking away, Lilith said awkwardly, not even getting mad that I interrupted her.
— Fucking hell, — I fall back onto the sofa and forcefully slap my palm against my face.
— You're no better! — Crossing her arms over her chest, Lilith snapped back. — Eve showed up on my doorstep again after that and started melting my brain again, only this time there were specifics in her words and... Let's do this: I'll tell you what I understood from her... less than coherent speech, and you promise you won't join her army?
— That is... A very strange proposition. — What kind of wild shit did Eve tell the Mother of Demons that she seriously fears that I, the fucking First Man and leader of the exorcists, would defect to Eve's side – literally the avatar of Darkness?
— And yet, — Lilith was completely composed again. She loves "switching" like that. — Perhaps I'm slightly overestimating the information I'm ready to tell you, but after I ate that little apple, I've seen way too much shit... And you were part of that shit basically always, and in half the cases – its creator.
— "Creator of shit," — I snort at another of my titles. — Fine. I give you my word that I won't go join Eve's army, no matter what you tell me.
— Good... — The demoness sighed and fell silent.
— Um... Yoo-hoo? — When the silence lasted more than a dozen seconds, I couldn't stand it and called out to her.
What the hell is going on here? Seriously, I didn't expect this at all – some "terrifying revelations," the soul of some "little god" somehow latching onto Lilith... What is wrong with this world?
— Don't interrupt my thinking, — Lilith grumbled irritably.
A dozen seconds later, she exhaled, cleared her throat, and began to sing, but the song was not simple – listening to her voice, I literally saw what the narrative was about... And what I "saw" changed... A lot.
God and Ruu. Darkness and Light. Demiurges, creators of worlds, who spawned tens, hundreds, and even thousands of very different universes, but each of these universes faced oblivion right after the Great War between the beings of Light and Darkness inhabiting them.
The victims of these battles are countless, there are no words to express the horror of the destruction of an entire universe along with all the dead, living, and yet unborn beings.
Darkness and Light paid no attention to the stories of simple entities, they were not interested in the lives of their creations, they waged war between themselves by proxy, for they could not fight themselves... Or did not want to.
Many worlds sank into oblivion at the behest of their creators, disappointed in their children who failed to prove one of the Demiurges right, the fates of many were crossed out overnight, but one day a thought came to the minds of these cosmic monsters: to endow their creations not only with Darkness or Light, but to give them the chance to choose for themselves, to determine what is actually the Truth, to say directly which of them is right, and therefore they created the Fruit containing the very essence of Light and Darkness, being the quintessence of the experience and knowledge of the Demiurges themselves.
This was not exactly what the creators desired. They only wanted to give their children free will and an understanding of the essence of their powers, and therefore God forbade his creations to eat the Fruit of the Knowledge of Good and Evil until they could finish it.
Two lovers – Lilith and Lucifer, freedom-loving dreamers disappointed in the universe – disobeyed. They stole one of the Fruits containing the knowledge of the Demiurges, after which they handed it to one of the purest creations of Light – Eve, condemning her to a practically eternal nightmare and an awareness revealing the nature of Darkness and Light.
Eve could not lose her mind, could not go crazy, for the Light and Darkness that flared within her after consuming the Forbidden Fruit balanced each other out, allowing neither the darkest Darkness nor the purest Light to flood the poor girl's consciousness; every second she experienced thousands of lives in billions of worlds, seeing all the pain and all the happiness imaginable.
For a long time she watched waking nightmares, while her body continued to live as before – with her beloved, unsuspecting husband. Very soon she had children, who inherited the dual nature, albeit still completely unnoticeable.
Years passed, and finally poor Eve's mind was able to break free from the endless stream of visions, however, having gained incredible power due to what she experienced, the girl snapped – immediately upon awakening she turned into a monster, turning all Light into Darkness and all Darkness into Light.
She grew to hate the Demiurges, spawning universes to settle an old dispute and destroying them like boring toys. Eve, having realized the cruel truth about the impending end of everything she loved, and having survived a living Hell, decided to do everything to reshape this world, to make it unsuitable for the "game" of God and Ruu. She wanted to destroy their plans, realizing that her current powers would not be enough to kill Light and Darkness, however, Eve still dreamed of their death, and with every touch to the world, with every change to this Universe, she became stronger...
Meanwhile, the Demiurges finally finished their work on the rest of the Fruits of Knowledge and were able to perform a miracle – to tune them so that everyone who tasted the fruit could themselves, personally and by their own example, realize the nature of Darkness and Light, understand what each of the two aspects is, and either take one of the sides or maintain the balance within themselves.
Having completed their super-complex task, the creators finally paid attention to what was happening in their "sandbox," and were horrified to see how the creation of Light suddenly filled with Darkness and began to distort reality.
God, possessing greater power in the initial stages of this universe due to the nature of the world, intervened and attacked the raging monster, and it was then that Eve realized that even if she reshaped the entire universe, her powers still wouldn't be enough to kill the two most terrible monsters in all of existence. She made a different decision – to deceive them, gain their trust, pretend to be the embodiment of Darkness, serving Ruu and carrying out her will, but playing her own game. Her goal was to gather supporters, turn beings of Light into Darkness, and beings of Darkness into Light, thereby feeding her power and rising against God and Ruu.
And everything would have been fine, however, one day a third party intervened in the game of the two Demiurges. An unknown Demiurge who brought into this world six fragments of completely different dark souls. Ruu took the souls and endowed her chosen ones with them, for the hour of a new war was approaching, after which this universe would be destroyed, like many before it, and the forces of Darkness were yielding to the forces of Light, which the Demiurges could not allow.
Eve did not know what they were trying to achieve with this, but the memory obtained after consuming the soul horrified her. The world she saw differed in everything from the infinity of universes from her nightmares, this meant that there are many more Demiurges – these monsters – moreover, the entity that appeared here with six cursed souls seemed to be much stronger than Darkness and Light, for in that world the future of their world was shown.
Locking one of the obtained souls, the strongest one, containing shreds of others, into the Fruit of Knowledge, Eve came to the one she considered her strongest ally in the future, when she would betray the Demiurges – to her beloved, to Adam, and then...
— Fucking hell, — emerging from the... hallucinations, I say, unable to comprehend what is happening.
— Complete, — nods Lilith, taking a sip of tea after her song. — I don't... Never mind. — She sighed at the end, lowering her head.
Well...
I...
I don't even know what to think. All this fits damn well with what's happening, but... Fuck, this is too global! A hell of a lot becomes clear now, but at the same time, only more questions and guesses arise, and the attitude towards... towards everything, damn it! Changes almost 180 degrees!
Present time. The Extermination is approaching.
Wincing, I rub my left eye, trying to calm the nervous tic, but as always, it doesn't help.
Lately, I've been on edge. I never managed to reach Eve, and therefore I'll have to act urgently: first the Extermination, serving as bait to lure out the army of Darkness and, most importantly, Eve to Heaven, after which – returning and trying to negotiate...
I understand what Eve went through, I saw only what helped me reveal the essence of Darkness and Light, and this changed me a lot, but what is needed to understand not just the essence of these two aspects, but to realize all their versatility? To learn what the literal embodiments of these elements knew, and accept their experience?
I won't even try to guess about this.
But it does explain why only Eve turned into that creepy black thing after eating the Fruit of Knowledge, while everything was fine with us, now we need to distinguish between the Fruits of Knowledge and that very Forbidden Fruit – it was the only one of its kind, the rest were altered and received a different effect, which I felt on myself.
By the way, it seems that for everyone except me, these "stubs" of souls awakened only part of the memories, I draw this conclusion from Lilith's story, from which it turns out that she was fed fragments of the soul of Louise – the goddess of Earth from that world, but our dear demoness didn't even remember the name of this girl. And why is that?
Because one fucked-up psycho godslayer absorbed the powers of the beings he killed, including gods, and he did this by devouring souls.
From this we conclude – some terrifying fucker grabbed my soul, dissected it, took out the not yet digested fragments of "gods" and passed them to Ruu... And what for? And who was it? Apparently, the creator of my past world – a so-called Demiurge. Did he endow the "gods" with their power? And why? Was it because Ruu asked for five strong Dark souls? And why does he need this?
In short, from the day I learned all this, my damn nervous tic started.
I don't want to fight Eve, I don't want to kill – not after what I learned, but I also don't want to fight the Demiurges – these two psychos literally created everything here. What if their death destroys this universe? And what if even my powers and Eve's powers are not enough for victory? I don't want to lose my home, I don't want to lose my loved ones because of this.
Since "our" Demiurges have intelligence, they can be reasoned with, only Eve's entire plan is built on surprise, and if I drag myself to God and Ruu and start having conversations, then Eve's plan will go to shit, and now I somehow have to convince her to abandon the plan she has been implementing all this time and trust me... And this despite the fact that I myself am not sure that an agreement will even work out and I won't be sent on a pedestrian erotic journey or incinerated on the spot!
— Dad, — Abel approached me in full combat gear of the old model – golden armor and a blade on his belt. I don't know why, but all the "old-timers" didn't want to change the armor design, and therefore Sar (that's what I recently started calling one engineer-Seraphim) had to upgrade their old sets. I wasn't against it – we're in Heaven, bitch, who am I to dictate to warriors ready to give their lives for Heaven what they should wear? — It's almost time. Are you sure you can handle it?
No one needs to know how things really stand yet. Realizing the insignificance not only of our lives, but of the entire universe can be very... painful.
— Yeah, I hope this "Blue Lock" still works as it should. — I get up from the "throne," step forward to the edge of the ledge, and cast my eyes over the even rows of exorcists – both in the old golden armor and in the new, black-and-white.
— Grandpa swore an oath that it would work.
— Cough! — I choked, hearing how this... this one calls old Saraqael. — Abel!
— What? — And makes such an innocent face, only little devils are jumping in his eyes. No, I really shouldn't have given Abaddon for the weekend to his older brother – the little angel of the abyss has already started spoiling him too!
Okay, this is all an act, Abel is trying to support me like this – sees that I feel like shit, so he tries to joke. I'm lucky with my son – I'm very proud of him, to be honest.
I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and spread my wings, giving the signal for attention. Thousands of eyes immediately turned to me, the hum of conversations died down, replaced by the ringing silence of anticipation.
— The time has come! Today our enemy will fall by our hands! — At least, I hope so... Above, over the formations of exorcists, a tear in space of incredible size began to form, burning with golden Light. — Show the sinners what Hell is! Into battle!
Space exploded with the roar and rustle of thousands of wings as the black-white-gold avalanche surged forward, rushing into the yawning funnel of the portal, ready to sweep away everything in its path.
And I, watching them go, only clenched my fist tighter.
Eve, I hope you're ready to talk...