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Bargain Infernal Episode 91: Flicker of Fear
The ground shuddered violently as the fissure widened, spewing tendrils of black smoke writhing like living serpents. A bone-chilling wind swept across the battlefield, carrying with it the stench of ash and decay.Alex Mercer stood firm, flames dancing up the length of his arms, smoldering with exhausted fervor. Beside him, Helena's grip on her sword tightened; her knuckles were stark white. Lucifer's eyes, gold, stared hard, shining with a rare flicker of concern."This isn't just the Abyss, huh?" Lucifer muttered, his voice low and grim. "It's waking up."Helena threw him a sharp glance. "Waking up? What does that even mean?"Lucifer's lips spread into a grim smile. "You'll learn soon enough."A guttural roar rent the air out of the opening. The darkness writhed and churned, taking the shape of an abomination. Towering over them was something like a gigantic, living incarnation of darkness that rippled in raw, mad energy. There were two vacant voids set where eyes were meant to exi
Bargain Infernal Episode 92: Voice of Lucifer
He towered over them, his form shrouded in swirling darkness. The air was heavy with his malevolent presence, and every breath Alex Mercer took burned like ash in his lungs. Tendrils of shadow writhed around the monster, slashing at the scorched earth and sending cracks rippling across the ground.Lucifer's golden eyes shone like an unsettling spotlight. He stepped beside Alex, his smirk flattened into a hard line."This isn't a fragment," he muttered. "This is the Abyss incarnate."Helena gripped her sword, white-knuckling it. "Fantastic. So what's the plan?"Lucifer smiled humorlessly. "Don't die."The abyssal beast let out a roar, sound echoing through the battlefield like an aftershock. The momentum of it carried Alex back on his heels before he caught himself, his boots sinking into cracked earth."We've faced worse," Alex said, though not even he really believed that statement."Sure you have, Mercer," Lucifer said with an easy smile as shadows curled and uncurled around his fin
Bargain Infernal Episode 93: The Mark
The light from the crack streamed across the battlefield, bathing all in an uncanny red glow. The air thickened with the smell of sulfur, each breath a battle against the sweltering heat. Alex Mercer stands at the edge, his battered body trembling, unyielding resolve.Beside him, Helena wiped blood from her brow, her sword glinting in the crimson light. Her eyes were fierce despite the exhaustion etched into her face.Lucifer's expression was grim as he surveyed the chasm. "Whatever lies down there is ancient, older than even the Abyss we just fought.""Great," Alex muttered. "More ancient nightmares. Just what I wanted.""If you think this is bad," Lucifer said, his tone biting, "you'll love what comes next."The fissure widened with a groaning creak, sending tremors through the ground. Jagged rocks tumbled into the abyss, swallowed by the endless void below. The malevolent energy pulsing from the chasm made Alex's skin crawl."We can't let this thing fester," Helena said. "It'll spr
Bargain Infernal Episode 94: "The Shattering Abyss"
The cavern's walls trembled, chunks of rock crumbling into the abyss below. Rivers of molten lava hissed and churned, illuminating the chaos with a hellish glow. Alex Mercer gritted his teeth as he steadied himself against the shuddering ground.Helena was already moving, her blade slicing through the air as she charged toward the towering beast. Its form writhed with shadow and fire, each movement shaking the very earth."Helena! Wait!" Alex shouted, but his voice was lost in the cacophony.The creature reared back, its massive claws swiping at her with terrifying speed.Helena ducked and rolled, narrowly avoiding the lethal blow. Her sword found purchase in the beast's flank, black ichor spraying across the ground.The monster howled, its roar reverberating through the cavern.The air itself seemed to warp under the force of its rage."Nice hit," Alex muttered, sprinting to her side. Shadows coiled around his arms, pulsating with raw energy. The abyssal power within him was volatile
Bargain Infernal Episode 95: "The Rise of Shadows"
The stifling, warmed air inside the cave grew thick as the newcomer stepped forth from the darkness. Its tall form shimmered like liquid metal, obsidian armor reflecting the flickering light of molten rivers below it. Crimson eyes burned with ancient fury, and a crown of twisted black horns framed its face.Alex Mercer clenched his fists, his body thudding with raw energy from the abyss still coursing through his veins. Victory, which they had fought for moments before, didn't feel like anything anymore, a fleeting illusion.Lena stood beside him, holding up her sword as its blazing light flickered wearily. Her breath is harsh but does not break her resolve.Lucifer's features shifted from humor to cold calculation. He observed the figure, irritated and interested in equal measures. "Isn't this just lovely?" he grumbled.The voice was a deep, guttural rumble through the cavern. "You've sealed the wound, but the abyss is eternal. You can't kill what's out there."Alex stepped forward.
Bargain Infernal Episode 96: Sanctuary
The scorched earth still shook beneath Alex Mercer's boots as he gazed across the horizon. Thick clouds churned overhead, streaked with crimson and obsidian, as if the sky itself had been rent apart by the mayhem below. The air smelled of ash and something far older a lingering malice that scratched at the peripheries of his senses.Helena stood beside him, her sword sheathed but her hand never far from the hilt. Her face was taut with worry, the faint light of the horizon casting shadows beneath her eyes.Lucifer, never bothered, straightened his spotless coat and let out a long, bored sigh. "Such theatrics," he murmured, eyeing the smoldering embers of the cavern they'd barely escaped. "Malakar certainly knows how to make an impression.""He's not done," Alex said, his voice low but determined. "None of them are."Helena's sharp eyes jumped to him. "What do you mean?"Alex's fists clenched as shadows curled around his fingertips. "When I was in the abyss, I felt. more than just Mala
Bargain Infernal Episode 97: "The Siege of Shadows"
The fight broke out in a swirling storm of light and darkness.Alex Mercer stood head-on to the first warden's onslaught. His shadows clashed with the hole's abyssal energy with a deafening crack. The warden shrieked, a sound that cut through the air like jagged glass. Tendrils of black energy lashed toward him from its skeletal form.He twisted, avoiding by mere inches the scorching caress of the void. The earth cracked and splintered as he hurled hellfire, ripping apart the creature's defense. It shrieked in pain before disintegrating into a cloud of ash.Helena moved in a blur beside him, the shining blade cutting through two wardens with deadly arcs she made inside of a few seconds. Her face showed fierce determination, sweat on her brow."They'll never end!" she shouted above the mayhem.Lucifer laughed over the noise. "Ah, but that's the reason it is exciting, darling!"He moved with elegant precision, his hands flickering with golden fire. Every step he took left a trail of sco
Bargain Infernal Episode 98: "The Abyss Strikes Back"
The great warden roared, the guttural cry of its voice shaking down rocks from the cliffsides. The air seemed to tremble under the weight of its fury.Alex Mercer stood firm, shadows curling around him like living serpents. His chest heaved, every breath filled with acrid ash and void energy. The abyss inside him pulsed, ready to be let free.The warden charged, its massive claws tearing through the scorched earth. Each step sent shockwaves rippling through the ground, cracks spiderwebbing in its wake.Alex clenched his fists, hellfire igniting along his arms. "Come on," he growled. "Let's finish this."The creature lunged, claws as long as swords swiping through the air. Alex ducked, feeling the air above him slice through with lethal force. He countered with a blast of shadowfire that struck the warden's chest, searing through its abyssal flesh.The warden let out a howl, but it didn't stop. It brought back its hand in a wide, arcing swipe that Alex didn't see coming. It sent him fl
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Episode 224: One Final Strike
The world fractured.At the moment the boy lunged towards him, his sword clashing against the Hunter’s blade of shadow-steel, reality shattered like glass.His feet were no longer standing on solid ground.The battlefield the stars, the ruined earth pulsed, tremblied, shifting like an unënded painting.For one terrifying second He felt himself being torn in two.Not by a blade.Not by the Abyss.By time itself.He staggered back, gasping, his vision going double, reality fracturing into two separate lines of incident at once.One he stood here, fighting, existing.In the other he had never been born.Never consumed mermaid flesh.Never imagined, never suffered, never fought.Just gone."This is the correction."The Hunter’s voice remained steady, uemotional."Your existence is an error."Kaiza bared his teeth, pushing forward, screwing his sword back alight."You talk too much."And then he attacked again.The Impossible DuelThis time he moved faster.He could still taste the Abyss
Episode 223: The Last Throne
It was no longer their place of battle.The sunless sky was now a filthy mirror of a world that had perished before history.”Under Ethan and Asha’s feet, the ground shook, not with ruination but with something trying to rewrite existence itself.And the whole thing revolves aroundThe light wasn’t from this world, and now it burned behind their eyes, finally exposed by the broken perishable mask.They weren’t human.They weren’t divine.They’d been something before all of those things.And the closer they got, just their walking warped the air next to them.“You have walked too far, Hollow King.”“You’ve shattered too many chains.“And now you will see what should have been forgotten.”Ethan’s hands made fists.Asha inhaled slowly and deeply.They had no time to think.Because the First King moved.And the final battle began.Before Ethan even had the time to react, he found the First King in front of him.Their move defied space itself—not teleportation, not speed, but the here and
Episode 222: The Ones Who Devour
The sky was breaking.Helena became the epicenter of the battle that should have never been.The Firstborn were no more, their sacred monarchy rent asunder, their celestial kingdom fallen to ruin.But the universe had no love for vacant thrones.And now.It had been supplanted by something else.Reality tore, the sky splitting open like a wound that wouldn’t heal.Out from the void, they came.Not Hollowed.Not firstborn.Something else.Older than war itself, something.They did not have names.They did not have faces.They were churning, writhing aspects of the consummate void, their nacreous flesh contorting into a thousand forms at once—humanoid, monstrous, holy, forgotten.And when they spoke.It wasn’t with voices.It was with thoughts that did not belong to Helena, curling into her thoughts, unwinding her like leaves of an old book."You do not belong here."Helena’s entire body tensed.The Hollow King did not move.The Old One merely watched.Silver fire sizzled along the edge
Episode 221: The Thing That Should Not Wake
The Silence Before the EndThe battlefield was quiet.Too quiet.Helena found herself in the ruins of a war that had rewritten history. The Firstborn's God-King was vanished, their form crushed into void, their heavenly horde blown away like dust.The Hollowed had won.And yet.The heir was wrong.Heavy. Tainted.Like something was waiting.“Yup,” Cain gasped, running a bloody hand through his hair, his silver eyes showing some signs of uneasiness. “Please tell me it’s not just me that feels this.”Helena gripped her throbbing fingers, the black-fire dagger still buzzing in her hand. "You’re not."The Hollow King hadn’t budged.They froze there, their shape like a void, their head cocked slightly, listening.Helena stepped forward slowly, the ground crackling beneath her boots. The Firstborn were disappearing, their godly light blinking out like red stars in the firmament.They had lost.So why did it seem like something worse had just begun?Then.The world shifted.The Veil Splits O
Episode 220: The Forsaken vs. the Divine
Helena did not kneel.Not to kings.Not to gods.Not to the Firstborn, who had cut history to shape and made it fit.She had stood against death.She had stood against fate.And she would stand now.Even as the God-King of the Firstborn loomed before her, his celestial fire coiling in the air like an executioner’s blade.As the burden of their command bore down upon reality itself, compelling everything to bend.Helena stood tall.Her dagger blazed with black flames, oscillating between the Hollow King’s strength and something more ancient.Something that was hers and hers alone.The battlefield was silent.Even the Hollow hesitated.Because no one had ever disobeyed the Firstborn’s command and survived.Until now.The God-King’s expression did not change.They took a slow step forward, their silver eyes calm and infinite, burning with cold.“Then I will break you.”The world shattered.A void pulled inward, the air itself ripping apart as the God-King began his assault, faster than l
Episode 219: The Forsaken Queen
Helena felt everything.The Hollow King thrummed through her as she surged forward, a scintillation of wicked pleasure that burnt in her blood like a fire that would never run soft. Not only did it fill her, it transformed her.No longer was she Helena, the fighter who had resisted destiny.She was something more.Something that never was meant to exist.And as she stood at the very center of the battlefield, surrounded as she was by another ruin crumbling around her, one of a war older than time itself, she understood.The Firstborn knew it, too.They had expected a rebel.They had expected resistance.But they hadn’t expected this.They had not believed she would survive the Hollow King’s might.And they did not expect her to turn it against them.”His silver eyes, previously flooded with naught but icy apathy, now sparkled with another emotion.Fear.And Helena?Helena smiled.Then she attacked.Her movements were like a storm, her new blade slashing through the Firstborn’s ranks.
Episode 218: The Moment When the World Picked a Side
The battlefield froze.Helena’s voice still rang in the ruins, suspended in the air like a blade poised to fall."I will fight for the truth."And just like that.She had chosen a side.The Hollow King turned its void-like eyes to her, unreadable.Cain gaped, his breath ragged, his silver eyes bouncing between disbelief and something else. Something closer to fear.The Firstborn did not speak.They didn’t scream in rage or throw accusations of betrayal.Instead.They smiled.And Helena learned something a little too late.She had walked into a war older than she could understand.And each side had been waiting for her to make a choice.Now.There was no turning back.The Gods Strike FirstThe Firstborn moved first.Helena didn’t have time to react before the sky itself lit on fire.The clouds parted, hurling javelins of heavenly fire onto the battlefield. The Hollowed howled, their flesh caught alight, their bodies liquidizing beneath the assault.The pallor of the air cracked apart b
Episode 217: The Gods Must Bleed
A Sky That ShattersThe heavens collapsed.The sky literally ripped apart, opening like a wound in reality itself, and Helena hardly had time to scream. The battlefield below was engulfed in golden fire and infinite darkness, as though the universe itself was tearing in two.The Firstborn were the falling stars, their weapons blazing with heavenly fire, their silver eyes lit with righteous fury. The Hollowed howled back, their broken voices rising like a war hymn, thair void-forged blades craving vengeance.This wasn’t a battle.This was annihilation.Helena moved.She ducked, avoiding a sweep of a Firstborn warrior that cut through the air where her head had only seconds before been. The heat of their blade seared against her skin, too near, too quick.But she was faster.She spun, her dagger slicing through their divine armor, and, for the first time, she heard the sound she never thought she’d hear.A firstborn screamed.Helena’s breath hitched.She could kill them.And if she coul
Episode 216: The Ah Which Ends Worlds
A Throne of Lies, A War of TruthHelena’s breath was quick and brittle, her heart pounding against her rib cage.The Hollow King knelt before her.Not as an enemy.Not as a monster.But as a warrior awaiting a response.The gods had walked the earth before her, and the earth had been their altar. They stood behind their King, all soulless eyes on her, waiting for her to make a choice.And in the distance.Something else was coming.Something worse.Cain moaned next her, spitting blood from his mouth. “Well,” he muttered, “this complicated fast.”Helena barely heard him.Because she wasn’t looking at Cain.The throne of the Hollowed, upthrust from the ruins, split reality like a jagged wound.It was waiting for her.And deep inside, she knew.If she did that, if she chose the Hollowed, there could be no undoing it.She would not only be battling the Firstborn.She would be waging war on the very gods themselves.And it was a war no one had ever won.The Hollow King’s voice was gentle,
