With a bronze sword behind his back—corroded into a bluish color, clothes torn and body adorned with cuts and bruises, the champion pressed two of fingers together to point at the wounded demon in the distance. Specter—the god responsible for the near extinction of the human race, extermination of the gladean knights, and absolute devastation of the world, now found himself at death’s door with a dying body and a missing eye—fissured with the shape of blade.
Large hordes of specters approached him from all directions, from small gaunt creatures to colossal armored dragons flying in the sky. Their desperation to protect their god could be heard from miles in the distance, roars and screeches combining to form an intimidating rumble that could shatter the will of any warrior.
The knight inhaled deeply through his nose, and in a mere blink of an eye, he vanished from the sight of every beast that lunged at him with murderous intent. A cluster of azure particles remained where the champion once stood, turning into a trail of light that danced around the aggressive assault of the specters while charging towards it objective.
No demon was capable of stopping the gladean knight’s advance, leaving Specter defenseless against the azure ray. The god’s eye widened in shock for the first time in history, as the unexpected power of the common knight had bested him in a way that not even the goddess’ chosen could. He kneeled on the ground with no strength to support him, his glowing crimson eye fixed on the approaching trail of azure light in front of him.
Feared as an immortal, even the gladean knights struggled to find a solution to Specter’s terrific durability. However, his first defeat against the one revered as Gladea’s champion had caused his body to crumble, severing his eternal body beyond repair. Any chance to survive the knight’s attack had reached an undeniable conclusion, as at that very moment in time, the god’s many thousands of years of life finally came to a swift and definitive end.
Specter’s chest was pierced by the ray of azure light, shattering his weakened armor into pieces to emerge from the other side. The light that punched through his heart erupted into a cluster of particles, which rematerialized the champion as he slashed the dirt with the tip of his blade, concealing its steel back into its old dried out leather sheath.
The crimson glow of Specter was absorbed to completion by the azure light of the gladean knight, crawling through the insides of the demon’s body to crush him from within. A painful and terrifying roar escaped him as he convulsed aggressively on his knees, watching as his arms crumbled into chunks of black scales, followed by his legs, torso, leaving only his head to roll on the floor, and eventually vanish like the rest. Not a single trace of the immortal god remained to be regenerated, as not even his core was able to survive the powerful attack of his foe—forever ending the god’s reign on earth.
Every demon under Specter’s command collapsed in an instant, their cries and screeches fading away alongside their bodies. An army of millions met its timely demise at the hands of a single knight, having no god to will their power into existence any longer. The barren fields of the Deadlands opened a path for the flowers to bloom, the trees to grow, and the bright blue sky above to shine light on the rich fields of grass under its care—announcing the absolute defeat of the specters to those who survived their reign.
That was the tale of a forgotten knight, whose retold and rewritten story should’ve meant the end of a demon believed to be indestructible. However, as obscurity absorbed the god’s vision, his consciousness still remained. There was no explanation to such phenomenon, as nothing of him remained to be resurrected. His core—alongside his physical form, thoughts and memories, were completely erased from existence by the corroded bronze of the gladean knight’s blade.
The final strike that pierced Specter’s heart meant the complete erasure of his entire being, yet somehow, the demon had escaped his own demise once again. He accepted the darkness that surrounded him, unable to see, hear, or feel anything, trapped within the unknown void of nothingness. Though as time passed without meaning, a faint sound would echo in his mind from time to time—distant, yet somehow familiar. The quiet sound eventually turned into a voice—soft and warm to the ears. However, with no understanding of human language, there was no word that Specter could decipher from the gentle voice that spoke inside his own head.
He listened to its words for what could’ve been ages, and as his mind recovered from the trauma that the gladean knight had caused, a realization among the shadows suddenly struck him. The voice that started as a distant sound became an echo of his own thoughts, with those very thoughts transforming into their true nature—a memory. Specter’s entire being was tied to his core, the source that gave life to every specter on the planet, and granted the god his immortality and demonic powers, yet despite its destruction at the hands of the gladean knight, some of his thoughts and memories did not fade away.
The answers he sought within the timeless void of nothingness would suddenly reveal themselves in the face of a woman, as a sudden flash of blurry expressions crossed his vision at great velocity. Foggy and unrecognizable, the blur of images eventually settled to allow Specter a clear view of the memories he had just recovered, and while their return signified the reclamation of his own strength and power, the face of the woman that stared without fear into his eyes took the god’s sole attention.
Her long straight hair was as black as his own armored scaled body, and her intense amber eyes glared at him with a mix of anger and fear. In her right hand, the woman wielded a strange bladed gauntlet that resembled the appearance of his specters—a black armored structure, and glowing crimson veins running through its fissures. Wrapped around the fingers of the same hand, she carried a common sword that exhibited a faint light of azure around its steel—the face of a roaring lion crafted at its guard.
Familiar to the god, the woman’s appearance sparked a fire within the demon’s chest, a hatred he himself would deem irrational towards a mere human. However, as their gazes met from only a few feet away, the sharp sensation that suddenly struck him would awaken the demon’s memories all at once.
It was her blade that had taken away his missing eye, which despite his powers as a deity refused to heal itself. The woman thrusted her blade deep into his face with all her strength, drawing an agonizing roar out of him as he to stumble away in pain—staggered by the burning sensation that no human had ever inflicted upon him before. Specter fell to his knees before tearing the sword from his broken eye, watching tiny particles of crimson fly out of the fissure left on his face.
Rage took over his mind at the thought of being injured by an insignificant being, yet the damage that the woman had caused him was undeniable. His fractured eye never returned to its original place, leaving a permanent black hole in the god’s face with the shape of the roaring lion’s blade.
Within the empty void, Specter patiently waited for his visions to continue, though the events of what unfolded after losing his eye became a blur once again. However, a small detail about his lost memories suddenly flashed within his mind—a faint glow that camouflaged itself with the sword that pierced him during the woman’s attack.
It was wrapped around one of her fingers, a tiny jewel that proudly displayed the azure light of the gladean knights. Answers about what should’ve been his ultimate demise, but resulted in a peaceful slumber within a void of shadows suddenly became clear. His lost eye, diminishing power and broken memories, signified the loss of an important piece of himself—a piece that the woman had robbed him of with a single strike.
“Lionheart…” He called her name, embedding it deep within his mind to never forget the woman that had stolen a crucial piece of himself.
Lionheart, an amber eyed woman of black hair, wielding a supernatural weapon of spectral appearance, and a ring of pure azure, became the savior of the immortal god of extinction known as Specter. Her swift strike against him robbed the deity of not only one of his eyes, but a miniscule part of his own demonic power, a tiny fragment of an evil heart that sought refuge within the azure jewel around her finger. Like a parasite desperate to survive its impending doom, the small shard of Specter’s core assimilated with the woman in an attempt to save him from certain death, becoming a part of her instead of the demon—undetectable to the knight, the specters, and even its previous owner.
Though fate would have her perish long before Specter could restore himself to completion, as her human lifespan meant an early death compared to the god’s eternal life. However, with the powers that she had unknowingly stolen from him, he would preserve her soul safely in a place not even the goddess Gladea could reach. Lionheart would remain frozen in time, waiting for the return of the god she had foolishly chosen to anger.
Specter would slumber for many generations, protected under the embrace of an amber eyed woman of name Lionheart—waiting for the day where he’d finally ripped his core out the girl’s cold and lifeless body.
END OF CHAPTER
