“You have chosen well,” Vulgar flattered, but his words meant nothing to Fallen as he just repeated, “I am not so stupid as to expect you want nothing in return, so just tell me, what do you want?”

“How impatient of you,” Vulgar jested, and Fallen frowned before he finally got to the point. “All right, we'll have a deal. You may roam the halls of my temple, the Hollow Temple, for fifty days. During this time, you must find my heart—a titan body of obsidian—and destroy it. Only then can you free your people and your moon, for my heart is the source of all the hollows and shadows. Fail, and you will become a Deadman, forever bound to serve me… for eternity.”

Fallen felt a cool chill run across his whole body as it shuddered almost instinctively. The way Vulgar said it didn’t make him feel any better as well; it was eerie, and his hope—no—his desire for him to fail practically laced every word.

“Well…” Vulgar snapped him from his thoughts, “Do you accept? And do not even think to contemplate, as it is more than fair; I am an entity of power beyond your every imagination, my heart more than equates to your people and moon. And according to our deal, if you fail, they all continue falling until they reach the bottom of the hollows and cease, and you become my Deadman. But if you succeed, my hollows shall cease instead, and you, they, and your moon shall be free… So, do you accept?”

Fallen went quiet, feeling the space begin to grow cold, and the shadows’ spike, fully visible, pointed at him.

A faint, broken smile appeared on his face as he thought about it. ‘How could darkness without light have shadows that appear to glisten?’ Before he spoke the words that would forever define him, Fallen, the Seeker of Light… and the Fateless One.

‘For my people… for my moon.’

He closed his eyes, and the words escaped his mouth in a faint whisper, “I accept.”

The shadows shrilled, and it felt as though the realm was moving; Vulgar was rejoicing.

Deep in the dark, right above Fallen, a chilling, blood-red grin split the shadows as scarlet eyes sharpened. Fallen’s heart of light mirrored inside their crimson hue. It glowed so brightly that the spikes of the shadows glistened and shimmered. It glowed so brightly; it was as though he held the very moon he was so desperately trying to save.

He wanted that light gone, just like the moon. Fallen was just a mere clay pot, a vessel suppressing that energy, but for how long? How long was he going to hold? He will crumble.

“Good,” Vulgar’s crimson grin widened. “Then I shall send you to my Temple.”

Fallen took a deep breath as a small tear slowly started traveling down his rosy cheek before falling to the floor, colliding with the darkness like a raindrop with a still, vast ocean.

The plop of the tear hitting the floor echoed briefly before Fallen leaned over, clutching his chest as he groaned and grunted in pain.

His flesh slowly began to mutate, his eyes bulging as the print of his heart and its fast beats protruded from his chest in a gory manner. His arms opened wide, and his head snapped back, looking to the dead heaven as crimson tears streamed down the sides of his face.

He slowly became a body of twisted shadows, his pupils dilating, losing their grey colour and blending with his pearl irises before scarlet drops slowly appeared and spread over the diluted hue.

A finger snap echoed as the crimson grin widened. The scarlet, covetous, sharp glare absorbed the darkness that surrounded them, growing in size as Fallen was bathed in its crimson glow.

The sharp grin and predatory glare became all that remained of the dark realm, eying Fallen as he fell to his knees, screaming in pain as the shadows twisted around any part of his body they could cling to. They clung to every one of his limbs and slowly began to absorb his face, and he declared to them at the top of his lungs, “I will bring my home light! I will bring light back to my moon! I WILL FREE MY PEOPLE!”

There was a pin-drop of silence before Vulgar echoed, “May the worst fall upon you in my home, Seeker of the Light.”