Capítulo 64: Naruto: The End.
*QZREEEEEEEEEE—*- With this planet-scorching bloodlust-filled wail, the primordial slime of paradoxes crumbled fully to dust. Isshiki had no choice other than to get as far away from the acoustic wall of pure energy coming his way.
He had tried to open a portal once he saw Lucian load the shriek, but it appeared that as a last fuck you, the slime had unbalanced the space.
"AGHHHH!"- About three-quarters of his body was consumed by the energy wall, 'luckily' his head, right arm, and chest survived. Not that an injury of this level mattered to him.
The eggshell cracked while Isshiki was down, regenerating, and from it a pale Madara of equally white hair emerged, accompanied by Kaguya.
Kaguya clasped and unclasped her fist, checked the flow of her chakra, opened her Byukugan, and sighed.
"How is it?"- Madara asked. Concern was evident on his face while observing Isshiki stumbling up.
"It's not good, but it shall do. Just hold on; Lucian will soon come."- Four wood clones emerged from behind Kaguya and disappeared in opposite directions. The concern about the strength of her body was apparent in her face.
"Then I shall take care of the water."- Madara said.
"I'll do the sealing and start the current. I can't believe we have to use this method."- Kuguya muttered.
"Talk about yourself, I'll use whatever method available to stall that monster even one second more, Lucian is not going to bring back the rest of the people if that monster beats us and proceeds to slaughter the planet away before Lucian arrives."- This was his real concern.
"The people..."- Kaguya said in a somber and nostalgic tone.
"What? Don't tell me you don't care anymore. I saw the memories, you care about these useless humans."- Madara shaped his Truth-Seeking Balls into a gunbai.
"They hurt my one and only friend for centuries; I have complicated feelings about them."- Kaguya, aside from Lucian, was the most intimate witness to Madelyne's suffering at the end of most of her lives.
"Just fight, you can uncomplicate afterward."- Madara jumped straight forward and it was as if he had teleported.
He swung sideways the gunbai and Isshiki disappeared.
Before the enemy could ambush him from behind, Madara spat a torrential column of water, as if the gates separating the oceans and the land had opened.
Isshiki would have normally attempted to absorb this attack, but after learning from Madelyne's attacks of how he could be located by following the siphon of chakra he decided to strike Kaguya. Besides, he could feel that this was closer to real water than chakra water so he would have to shrink it instead of absorbing it.
Kaguya couldn't sense his location and her Byakugan was having trouble spotting such a small and fast-moving target, so she took the obvious approach.
Her pale skin lighted with the previously concealed script and a force of spatial push blasted from her.
She, just like Madelyne, learned about inscribing her body with script, but she always preferred to keep the script invisible, like fūinjutsu, to conceal it from the possible analytical eyes of the enemy. Which was a valid concern during the times when script was widely spread.
The force of the spatial disruption pushed the ground, the air, and the invisible enemy away from her while bending the spatial layers.
To this, Madara had not stopped his Water Release, which was closer to a hybrid of Yin-Yang Water Release, since he was burning his vast chakra to create water.
The force hit Madara but, as if the force had selected not to harm him, it only softly pushed him away. Madara let himself be carried away while still creating water.
Soon there was about an extended hand of water accumulating under their feet and, as if timed by the gods, a barrier of script was erected imprisoning them in a perfect cube.
"And what did you gain with that? Keeping me trapped with you? What for?"- Isshiki's voice echoed inside the barrier. He had already realized that they were taking advantage of the unstable space left by the void slime to further extend the disruption and disable his spatial movement.
"Kaguya, you couldn't deal with me a thousand years ago when I was weakened by your betrayal, what makes you think you can now with that weakened body of yours?"- Isshiki's voice seemed to be originating from the entire trapped space.
"Is it normal for your kind to speak this much?"- Madara asked, flickering to Kaguya's back and getting ready to cover that side of the battlefield.
"You don't know the least of it."- Kaguya remembered those long, overbearing, and unnecessary speeches her superiors were known for.
*KSHHHHHHT*- A black spike went through Madara's left thigh and exited from Kuguya's right side hip.
She bit her lips and held a groan. Madara hit the protruding side of the spike and it went fully through and exited from Kaguya's side. Neither faltered and kept their eyes open, scanning for the minimal trace of Isshiki's visage.
Kaguya's hair extended around them, trying to use it as a sensory field.
*BOOM!*- Kaguya's chest caved in under the weight of Isshiki's devastating kick and crashed against Madara who was protecting her back.
The two rolled away in an uncontrolled mess of limbs and hair.
*KSHHHHHHT* *KSHHHHHHT* *KSHHHHHHT* *KSHHHHHHT* *KSHHHHHHT*- Black spikes rained on them as they did their best to stabilize.
"UGHH! Will Tsukuyomi work on the monster?"- Madara asked about the Infinite Tsukuyomi as they somehow defended against some of the spikes while rolling on the ground.
"The difference in power is too great for that, it might work if I boost it with script but only for a few seconds."- Kaguya used her hair to secure Madara to her, and then exploded in another shockwave of spatial disturbance.
She felt her attack hit something but Isshiki was so small she couldn't be sure.
"If only we could get rid of those black cubes."- Madara recognized that without their ability to sense his chakra, Isshiki's dōjutsu made him virtually undetected.
Kaguya released Madara from her hair entrapment and then he activated his Limbo clones and sent them away while riding the coattails of the shockwave.
Kaguya created two more wood clones and sent them away, in opposite directions, to the edges of the cubical prison.
"I'm ready."- She said.
"Ready to accept your reality?"- Isshiki's voice asked.
Kaguya's entire body was suddenly covered in script.
"[Gate of Death]"- She said and her presence altered into something wild and berserker. Her hair turned blood-red, her chakra rioted, and her Byukugan became bloodshot.
Isshiki scoffed at her foolishness. He had fought her before, and he remembered how utterly spent she was after the timer for the technique's boost ran out.
Kaguya punched forward, a simple straight punch, and space bent under the tyranny of her fist.
She pulled back her punch and then repeated it again, and again, and one more time, two more, five more. She kept going until she was filling the enprisoned space with spatial disruptions. She didn't know where Isshiki was, but she figured if she punched everything except Madara and herself, she was bound to hit him eventually.
Madara flew above the water level flooding the cube and stood behind Kaguya, he brought his hand forward and unleashed a rainstorm of lightning. He also didn't know where Isshiki was, but he figured he might as well try to electrify the water... further.
"Useless."- The voice filled with superiority echoed once more.
And it truly was useless, if had been Kaguya from a thousand years ago, he would have to be careful of her Eight Gates. Madara's lightning was so unlikely to hit his shrunken self that he didn't bother. So all he had to do was avoid Kuguya's punches and he was fast enough for that.
*KSHHHHHHT*- Madara got impaled through his chest. He hit the end of the spike with his gunbai and it was ejected through the other side, he resumed his lightning show.
Kaguya and Madara rotated to change the coverage of their attacks, Kaguya was now warping space with her fists where Madara was once dropping lightning.
"And how much longer can you hold this for, Kaguya?"- Isshiki's voice mocked, different from the previous times, it sounded muffled now as if the sound was having trouble traveling through the air.
*KSHHH—*- A black spike shot forth to impale Kaguya, but with her augmented reflexes she grabbed it before it could puncture her.
The thunderstorm revolted in intensity, leaving Madara's control, the landscape of the cube became a chaos of lightning, water, and warped space.
But even then, after long extended minutes of fighting and playing the cat and mouse game, Isshiki was having no trouble stabbing Madara and Kaguya, toying with them, waiting for Kaguya's Eight Gates to timeout, analyzing the barrier, trying to sense if the monster and or Madelyne would return, wondering what those two wood clones of Kaguya were doing by electrifying the water—
Suddenly Kaguya ceased all movements.
"You ran out of time."- Isshiki appeared not too far away from Kaguya.
Space was riddled with wounds and even the lightning was being warped around these diruptures.
"Yes, It's time."- Kaguya smiled faintly. Madara took back control of the atmosphere and forcibly canceled the thunderstorm.
Her hair grabbed hold of Madara behind her. Her wood clones sustaining the barrier made way for Madara's limbo clones to exit the cube, and her two wood clones who were electrifying the water pushed their palms forward and launched an attack in the shape of their palm. The air in front of them was displaced and pushed forward with the attack.
Isshiki took notice of this and simply shrunk himself to later emerge after the two attacks uselessly collided where he had stood.
"You're out of tricks."- He said.
"Not yet, you're too conceited."- The gunbai of Madara transformed and enveloped both of them in an eggshell similar to the one they emerged from before.
Just before it fully closed a spark mixed with the air that had been displaced by the attack of the wood clones.
*BOOOOOOM!*
The hydrogen and oxygen that had been forcibly produced through electrolysis ignited. The disruptions in space guided the explosion to the single location with no disruptions, where Kaguya, Madara, and Isshiki stood.
The barrier that was sealing the space gained a layer of script. The wood clones holding the barrier mobilized the disrupted space through this scripture to forcibly concentrate the explosion as much as possible onto Isshiki while trying to shield Madara and Kaguya as much as possible.
The wood clones that had been using Lightning Release were pulverized by the explosive blast.
Isshiki had no time to shield himself from the explosion, so he tried to shrink as fast as possible and then tried to shrink the explosion, but there was too much and everything was too sudden.
The concentration of Hydrogen and Oxygen were high enough to warrant such propagation speeds.
From outside, the cube lit in a white light, the light soon enough overshadowed all and then...
*Crack*- The barrier cracked.
*BOOOOOOM!*
The explosion escaped its confinement. On the horizon of the elemental nations—the ones remaining—an apocalyptic sunrise took place.
A bright, flaming mushroom of gases and debris took shape.
The eggshell made of Madara's Truth-Seeking Balls landed a few villages away from the explosion's origin.
It cracked open to reveal the wounded figures inside of it.
Madara coughed his lungs out, and some other pieces of his organs.
Kaguya was unconscious, she took it harder because her body had just come down from the high of the Eight Gates.
"It's all for peace... It's for peace... for peace..."- Madara repeated to himself in the form of a self-hypnotic mantra. He sat on the ground, next to the just-waking Kaguya.
Her eyes fluttered before her brows furrowed in pain.
"Ugh!"- She moaned in pain.
"When is Lucian coming?"- She complained.
"I don't know, but get ready, your part is almost over."- Madara curtly replied. He was eyeing as the mushroom cloud in the distance was starting to lose its blazing shine, he knew the parasite was not long in reappearing.
"I have to commend the will of the ants in clinging to life."- The raspy voice of Isshiki interrupted them.
His body was nothing more than a pale mass of wiggling regeneration, his Kokugan was glaring fiercely at the battered forms of Madara and Kaguya. Not because his Tenseigan was not glaring, but because it hadn't regenerated yet. Slowly, but surely, his body became anew.
"You're looking more clingy to life than us."- Madara muttered under his breath as he struggled to stand up.
"Whenever you're ready."- He said to Kaguya before flickering to Isshiki.
Madara's strike connected with nothing, Isshiki having already disappeared from his view. He appeared to the left of Madara and kicked forward.
"Agh!"- Air escaped Madara's airways.
He was bent by the kick as he flew right, Isshiki disappeared once more only to appear in Madara's flight path. He kicked forward again with the same killing intent. But before he could fully commit to the kick, he disappeared.
"Do you think I can't see through your little tricks?"- Isshiki scoffed after evading a killing blow from one of the Limbo clones.
The Limbo clone caught Madara and buffered his landing force, not before being dragged away by the momentum of the flying original self.
"Don't you get it? It doesn't matter!"- Isshiki leaned right and avoided another invisible blow from another Limbo clone.
"It's useless."- His grating voice echoed as he punched through a clone.
"None of it matters, NONE!"- He shouted and reappeared next to the original to deal a decapitating axe kick.
The Limbo clone holding the original self pushed Madara away from the blow and took his place, another Limbo clone gone.
"Accept your fate! There's nothing you can do to stop your inevitable fate!"- Isshiki shouted, enraged.
But before he could continue, a light reflected in the moon and shone on him, and only him.
"[Infinite Tsukoyomi: Sight Seal.]"- Kaguya muttered, blood flowing down her third eye, she had to burn some life force to use this modified technique.
"Didn't I say it was usel—"- Isshiki's voice was interrupted.
*BAMM!*- A fist clad in script hit his left cheek and deformed his infuriating face.
"Just fight, more dancing, less singing."- Madara's original followed after the stroked Isshiki.
"How?"- He asked, his jaw clenched in rage.
"Script can be used to modify divine techniques."- Kaguya replied while wiping the blood that dripped down the bridge of her nose.
True to his words, Madara allowed no respite. His remaining Limbo clones supported him, and they engaged in a desperate killing dance.
One clone flew from behind Isshiki and landed a sweeping hit on the pit of his knees.
The blow forced him to fall, but another limbo clone connected a deep knee strike on his chin before he could fall. His head was blown backward, his face facing the dark turbulent sky, and his eyes barely had the time to spot the original Madara falling with the sole of his feet forward.
The heel of his feet perfectly connected with each eye.
"UGH!"- Isshiki hardly had the time to grunt. Madara and his clones jumped on his downed figure and started to land blow after blow.
With each strike, some of the script that was covering his fists and legs transferred to Isshiki. Then the script migrated through his skin to his Kokugan, slowly gathering around this said eye.
The script was applied to the Limbo clones by the wood clones of Kaguya that had been sustaining the barrier. Kaguya applied the script on the original Madara when they were in the eggshell.
A fist connected on his back, a heel to his neck, a shin to his ribs, a fist to his throat, a knee to his thorax, his liver, his eyes, his mouth, not even his limbs were spared, Madara was taking everything out on him.
The depression in his heart after knowing that he was manipulated like a fool by Black Zetsu.
The unfairness in his heart after knowing how close to peace they had been if only Hashirama had supported him.
The fear in his heart after discovering existences like Madelyne, Isshiki, and above all, Lucian.
The weight on his heart after imagining how many lives have been wastefully spent due to his previous manipulated actions and the current fight.
The humiliation weighed on his heart after Kaguya had to basically piggyback him during their previous confrontation in the sealed cube.
The pain in his body after the many times Isshiki toyed with him.
The uncertainty of the future and how to move forward to guarantee that peace won't be smeared by the demons in the human heart.
Madara gave everything he could at that moment... yet it wasn't enough.
He knew it was not enough, there was no way to breach the gap, in fact... Isshiki's chakra had just recently lowered to Sayaka's level. Only just now.
*FWOOOSH!*
A repulsive force greater than everything he had felt before hit his body and clones. He used his clones to shield himself and then responded with a repulsive force of his own.
But it was all... just as Isshiki had said... useless.
His body was shot away and he rolled on the ground like a ragdoll until he landed next to Kaguya.
*Huff!* *Huff!* *Huff!* *Huff!*- Isshiki breathed heavily, not out of exhaustion, but rage and humiliation, he had let an ant toy with him. Granted, it was only for a few seconds, but that was humiliating enough.
He brought a hand to his Kokugan.
"How did you seal the light in my Kokugan?"- He demanded Kaguya.
Kaguya looked at Madara and he looked back as if saying 'Are you hearing this?', and then smiled brightly.
"Wouldn't you like to know?"- She grinned at him.
Isshiki's face lost all rage and it was replaced by a cold, unsettling calm.
He disappeared and appeared over Kaguya. Stradling her to the ground, Madara had no time to react before he found himself spiked to the ground, unable to move.
Kaguya was still too feeble to resist.
"Yes, I would like to know!"- He punched heavily on her face, and broke her nose and the back of her skull against the ground.
He didn't stop there, he punched again, and again, and again.
Madara who was pinned down could only watch as Kaguya's feet spasmed a little with each wet smack.
Kaguya tried to move her arms to her face, for shielding, but Isshiki ruthlessly ripped her arms out of their sockets.
"AHHH!"- She screamed amidst sobs.
"Tell ME!"- Isshiki demanded.
"HOW!"- He struck with his hand in a knife form and pierced through her stomach, a wet squelching sound reached Madara's ears.
"STOP IT! You pathetic parasite!"- Madara shouted. He tried to use his Shinra Tensei but the spikes were disrupting his chakra and he was missing his Truth-Seeking balls.
"DID!"- Isshiki ripped the dregs of Kaguya's attire away, exposing her bloodied chest, he shaped his other hand like a knife and sunk it straight through her sternum, he fished for a second in her chest for her heart amidst the despairing cries of Kaguya.
"Parasite! PARASITE! WAIT UNTIL HE COMES BACK!"- Madara tried to force his body to move but he was rewarded with more spikes until he looked like a porcupine.
"YOU!"- Isshiki strongly gripped her heart with one hand and with the other kept punching her caved-in face.
"PATHETIC SHIT! I WAS THE ONE THAT DID IT! THE SCRIPT IN MY FISTS COMPLEATED THE SEALING OF YOUR EYE!"- Madara shouted.
"DO!"- Isshiki drove more spikes through Kaguya's body without releasing her trapped heart from his hand. Her regeneration was battling to resist the damage but it was futile.
One spike went through her left breast and ripped through her left lung. Another sunk itself into her lower abdomen, rupturing her bladder. One broke through her knee, another her feet, and when Isshiki's own body was getting in the way, he stood up from his straddling position and proceeded to spear more spikes through Kaguya, all while clenching her heart in his hand.
"HOW CAN SHE ANSWER IF YOU SPIKE HER THROAT?!"- Madara was scared.
Not because he was sympathizing with Kaguya, not because he suddenly became a defender of the fairer sex, not because he was against torture, not because his morality was urging him to stop Isshiki, no.
He was scared because he knew what that woman meant to Madelyne... and consequently... Lucian.
"IT?! HOW DID YO—"- And the world went silent.
The oceans halted their incessant dance, no wave rippled through the glass-like surface of the oceans. The winds stopped flowing and the clouds slowly disappeared from the skies, leaving only the night sky, regardless of the hemisphere of the globe, there was only the night sky.
The birds muted their joyful chirping, they stopped moving, no matter the circumstance, if they were flying they were halted in the air, if they were feeding their chicks they stopped. Insects mimicked the birds. Reptiles, amphibians, mammals, no matter their chakra capacity, their thinking capability, the strength of their will, the years of living, nothing mattered, all equally stopped.
Rivers, lava, avalanches, and any liquid or semiliquid on the planet stopped flowing.
The tectonic plates stopped their millimetric shift.
The only place where movement was allowed was on the insides of the living beings, hearts, blood, brainwaves, and cognition, all of it still worked.
The exception to this rule was Kaguya, her body was allowed to resume its regeneration and her muscles were weakly spasming.
And in this perpetual stillness, all living beings looked above.
Two ginormous completely white slits framed by red nebulas judged everything below the heavens. And atop these white slits was an absolute white orb framed by the darkest shade of black in existence.
The two slits and the white orb locked into the battered pulp that Kaguya's body had become.
Their ginormous size slowly decreased until a crystalline three-eyed dragon with a crown of two pairs of horns and a white flame burning eternally above him stepped into the level of the world's mortals.
*Thud* *Thud* *Thud* *Thud* *Thud*- The dragon's four extremities and its tail landed heavily on the ground, and slowly the rest of the world seemed to regain its composure and life seemed to resume... chaotically. After all, it was not like they forgot what just transpired.
The dragon's crystalline form shifted until it resulted in a tall white-haired man, dressed in a three-piece black suit with a red tie.
His softly glowing pair of horns crowned his head, a white flame burning between the two horns, two draconic eyes ragefully locked in Kaguya, his third eye—slit vertically above his eyes in the middle of his forehead—was locked on Isshiki's frozen self.
The third eye was surrounded by a sclera so black that it appeared more like a hole, the white orb of this eye was so white that it looked like the creator of existence had used his eraser to remove this particular spot of its creation.
*Step* *Step* *Step* *Step*- Aragorn slowly walked to Kaguya.
When he passed by Madara the black spikes pinning him down disappeared, as if they had turned into energy and had been absorbed by the environment, or Aragorn.
"Thanks."- Madara said but received no response, and he preferred it that way.
Aragorn arrived next to Kaguya and severed the hand of Isshiki grasping her heart with the blade of his tail. Isshiki didn't react and his hand didn't regenerate.
He tried to softly place a hand on Kaguya to use his biokinesis to help her fix her body, but there was no part unmarred in the bloody pulp. So he chose to extract her soul.
Her spirit materialized outside her body.
She looked at the body that used to be hers and then at Aragorn.
"You're handsome, Lucian. Better than the white silhouette I met before."- Her attempt to ignore the psychological pain Isshiki's actions left on her spirit couldn't be concealed from Aragorn's All-Seeing eyes nor his empathic senses.
"Thank you, Kaguya."- He brought his pale marbled hand with his dark multicolor nails to her face and softly caressed her cheek.
"Can I go now? I miss Madelyne."- A single tear slid down her ethereal form, falling softly onto Aragorn's hand.
"Yes, Kaguya. Thank you so much for helping us, I'll see you in Abeyance after I'm done cleaning this garbage can."- Aragorn sent her to Abeyance with a soft flash.
... He closed his eyes, not like that would make a difference in his capability to see all.
... He took a deep breath, not like he breathed.
... He stood there in silence for a few seconds.
... He slowly got used to the feeling of having a body once more.
'If he is going to kill us, just do it.'- Madara thought, the anxiety was almost as crippling as the transhuman dread he was experiencing.
"No, I promised Madelyne not to raze this universe to the bottom spatial layer."- Aragorn said.
Aragorn slowly moved to face the direction of where the main battles had taken place. He extended his tail in that direction and the translucent blade gained a green glow.
Circles of glowing script materialized on the tip of the blade and Aragorn turned it counter clock-wise.
"W-WHAT!"- Madara exclaimed.
The world seemed to be turning back. The blazing ground settled down, and the razed vegetation returned to its previous locations. The dried rivers, the boiling lakes, the pulverized mountains, the atomized bodies, the disrupted space, the unsettled atmosphere, the rampaging natural energy, and the poisoning chakra, all returned to the way it was before.
Aragorn waved his left hand and Yama the king appeared, surrounded by a circle of purple flames. It opened its colossal maw and a stream of souls stormed out.
"Yes, I am. But not entirely."- Aragorn responded to Madara's thoughts. He had been asking himself if Aragorn was maybe not the monster he appeared to be.
Madara gulped, he had noticed how Aragorn had been replying to his thoughts.
"Don't think too much about it, I don't care enough about what you think."- Aragorn said.
So far Aragorn has been conversing by making the air shake with his telekinesis, so the unnaturalness of hearing him talk while he kept his mouth shut was not helping Madara.
"So, Parasite... You seem to have yourself in such high esteem."- Aragorn brought the severed hand and connected it to the bleeding stump.
"What to do with you... I mean... I could do so much with you... Alas, my time is limited here... I'm sad about having possibly missed the births of my two grandsons(?)... Is that what I should call Natalia's and Margaret's children?... And I miss my daughter... I hope that the time difference is not too hard on me, otherwise, even my eternal wife won't forgive me for being away for over a thousand years... Well, that's an exaggeration I know it hasn't been that long, but still."- The green glow in Aragorn's tail settled and King Yama returned to the underworld.
Now they could see thousands of troops at a distance from the three of them, they were clattering about, but the silver of Argorn's presence he was releasing kept them at bay.
"So, although I hate your soul, and I want you to understand a new height in the meaning of suffering, I feel like I don't have enough time... At least not while inside the multiversal barrier, where the time of all realities is somewhat in loose synchronicity... Yeah, I feel like there's an answer there... I wonder what The Void would do to you... Maybe I can convince my other self to help me... Yeah, that's an interesting experiment..."- Aragorn finally focused on the terrified eyes of Isshiki, and he grinned, his sharp fangs peeking over his lips.
"Rejoice! For you shall be part of this historical event in the history of all Time and Non-Time of The Void. Just picture it! There's no time in The Void, and all time exists at the time time, meaning that with a few tweaks and the help of the Void Self, you will become the first soul to be ever tortured eternally... Though I wonder where my soul stands in all of this... Uhmmm... Nevermind that, my shiny self hasn't been myself for over more than 17 billion years, I'm just rambling because I'm enjoying thinking like myself and not like that bore and emotionless husk."- Aragorn pointed at the moon, the only remaining satellite, encased it in a barrier, shrank it, ignored distance, and brought the spherical barrier with the moon to his opened hand.
"This would fall eventually, so I'm removing it now."- He opened his mouth and breathed a swat of white flames, this time he didn't need to set a barrier to prevent igniting the atmosphere.
The sphere was erased.
"Anyways, you can go and wait for me."- Aragorn said. His blade sunk into space and made a vertical cut, from the other side of the reality rupture a tentacle of something covered in eyes emerged and dragged Isshiki away.
"AGHHHHHH!"- Madara shouted and kneeled down in pain, an action imitated by the troops in the distance that witnessed the tentacle.
"Agh, how annoying, now I'm more of a hazard... Can't even use my mouth to talk!"- Aragorn complained and with a wave of his tail a huge amber script circle appeared on the skies and healed the howling shinobi.
"I apologize, I'm getting used to this whole Paradoxical Existence."- Aragorn's 'voice' rang in the ears of all the affected.
"Okay, let's get this done. Madara let's un-jinchūriki you."- Aragorn extended his hand, even though he was further away than his physical reach's capability, and touched Madara's stomach.
"Stay still, this will be fast."- Every fiber in his body told him to move away, but he was held still by Aragorn's telekinesis, and there was also the fact that you couldn't escape a hand that ignored distance.
"AGH!"- He grunted as from behind him a mass of chakra rushed out and the nine Tailed-Beasts appeared back in the world.
"Hoh? So we're back?"- The nine-tailed fox muttered.
"Yes, Kurama, but the One-Tails is merely a husk, so soon I will merge it with Madara. And as for the Eight-Tails... what do you have to say for yourself, Gyuki?"- Aragorn's voice carried an unsettling familiarity as he spoke.
Uncomfortable because he had never told his name to Madelyne. A feeling the Eight-Tails was currently experiencing.
"... I did what I thought was right."- Gyuki said.
"I see... Madara, do you want it?"- Aragorn nodded and asked Madara.
"What? The Eight-Tails?"- His question sent shivers down Gyuki's spine and made uncomfortable the other Tailed-Beasts.
"Yeah, I don't hate him, not exactly, so I'll leave the punishment to you."- Aragorn didn't care enough, he wanted off this multiverse.
Madara locked his eyes with Gyuki, the other beast looked at him, waiting for his answer.
"Given that the resulting tally of deaths is minimal, thanks to you, I will seal him in me for 500 years. That works, right?"- Madara asked Aragorn.
"Yeah, no problem."- Without delay, he dragged the remains of Kaguya's body to Madara and the husk of the One-Tails.
His hands glowed with script of several colors and he merged and fused the two empty shells with Madara.
"Given that Sasuke won't accept you in that Neo-Uchiha/Harem of his, and that your new body is closer to that of an Ōtsutsuki, I shall grant you a new name, Madara Ōtsutsuki."- Aragorn commented as Madara emerged from the fusion.
"I couldn't come up with anything better, so a bit of recycling did the trick. Besides, with Kaguya's body, you, and Shukaku's shell, I think the name does justice to your new self. What do you think?"- Aragorn smiled, clearly pleased with himself.
"It doesn't matter; it shall suffice."- Madara remarked, testing the capabilities of his new body. Physically—at least in appearance—he wasn't much different from when he had been the Ten-Tails' jinchūriki.
"What happened to the souls of our father and uncle?"- Kurama asked.
"Your father's soul should be somewhere in the Purelands. Isshiki absorbed his body but not his spirit. Hamura's soul was broken down by Isshiki, but that was his fault, not mine, not Madelyne's."- Aragorn explained.
"... How did that happen to Uncle?"- Chōmei asked, mournfully.
"He probably went mad and decided to give Hagoromo a better chance by fusing with Isshiki. I'm not privy to the details, so take my theory with a grain of salt."- Aragorn explained. Even after reading Isshiki's mind, the reasoning behind Hamura's seemingly suicidal action remained unclear to him.
"You're not going to take action on our Old Man's soul, are you?"- Kurama asked, doubtful of Aragorn.
"No, no need for suspicion. I follow through with my deals, and I also don't need to take action."- Aragorn explained, shaking a hand in denial.
"What do you mean?"- Kurama asked.
"This world is very intriguing. As you know, there's a hell, which means there's a soul-judging system in place—most commonly referred to as the Karmic Scales. The responsibility for the deaths of over a billion lives is shared among Hagoromo, Hamura, Gamamaru, Isshiki, and partially Kaguya. Now that Hamura, Isshiki, Gamamaru, and Kaguya's souls are out of the equation, their share of the responsibility doesn't simply vanish. Someone else will have to bear the burden. I'm sure you can piece the rest together, can't you?"- Aragorn said with a vicious smile, his eyes shifting between red and yellow.
"..."- Kurama's hair stood by its ends at the malice Aragorn released.
"What's left?"- Madara asked, wanting to move away from this particular topic.
He knew he would have to make amends for the rest of his life.
"Nothing much, from the jinchūriki only Naruto is returning, the rest gave up on this world. I sent a self of mine to hire a protector for this universe, and well, Mikoto wanted to attend Sasuke's wedding, but that's in a few years, nothing a bit of time skipping can't fix, so I guess at the moment there's nothing left, oh! You have to seal Gyuki, don't forget."- Aragorn replied.
Madara didn't believe he could forget something as important, but he didn't say it.
"You guys can visit your younger brother if you ever get tired of your weak selves."- Aragorn addressed the Tailed-Beasts.
"And I guess it's up to you to enforce peace. Enforcer, there you have your first task."- Aragorn pointed at the restless troops.
"Go and make sure they understand your stand about wars!"- Aragorn excitedly exclaimed.
"No, no more fighting for today... Just intimidation."- Madara slowly lifted from his gravity shackles and flew to the assembled troops.
There was a release of his chakra presence and more than half of the troops pissed themselves, a quarter crumbled to the ground under pressure, an eighth ran away, and the remaining were hardly holding it in. The Raikage and Mizukage relented and gave the order for retreat.
"How magnanimous of you."- Aragorn commented with a smile that didn't reach his red and blue shifting eyes.
"Somehow, I feel like you don't mean it."- Madara said as he landed back close to Aragorn.
"Entities like me tend to be pitty beyond common measure, and we tend to hold grudges for a long time because we can't forget nor die."- Aragorn said.
"Meaning?"- Madara asked.
"Meaning, I so want to rid this world of its inhabitants, but I know it's not right, not logical, it's not like all the inhabitants of this planet hurt my Madelyne, there's also the babies, I don't harm babies, at least not under controllable circumstances, anyway, I'm rambling again, having emotions is nice!"- Aragorn said all of this with eyes flickering between red and blue.
"... Please get out of my world as fast as you can..."- Madara said, the shaking in his heart was reflected by the hearts of the Tailed-Beasts.
"Ah, I apologize, I'm usually not like this, but you know, there's someone back home who followed a string of decisions that led to me possibly missing the birth of the first beast babies of my girls... And I am hurting for the sweet release of violence so M̴̨̙̞̟̺͔̝͕͎͇͉̪͖͖̹̗͔̙̦̘̭̗̻̦̮̹͖̼̉̏̏̀̓̓́̄̋̑̓̔̔̑̊̇͜͝Ư̴̢̧̨̡̡̪̣̲̬͖̗̫̺̻͕̰̪̻͂̂̑͒̎̎͛̊͂͐̓̿̈́̏̈́͂̈́̀̌̄͂̄̿̌̊̈́̍̅̇͒̕̕̚͜͝͠͝ͅC̸̡̲͔̲̀͌̚͝H̸̛̛̜̳͉͇̭͖́̔̀͛͊̊̆̂̆̇͐͝͝͝!"- Aragorn spoke with his mouth. {Much}
"AGHH!"
"AHHH!"
"STop!"
The Tailed-Beasts and Madara felt their souls trembling and their minds renouncing reality, suddenly they felt an instinctual need to reach for the shiny flame above Aragorn's head and to sink into Kurama's fur.
"Shit! I apologize... This will take some time to get used to."- Aragorn said, a circle of amber glowing script later and they recovered.
"Please... Just, stop."- Kurama pleaded.
"Fine, fine! I just have to bring some people out of Abeyance and revive some others."- Aragorn relented, waved his tail, and after a few soft glowing flashes of light and some white sand residue later, all those who agreed to return to the land of the living appeared.
Those who had bodies were simply spatially displaced back, those who had died had their souls implanted in the newly created bodies Aragorn had prepared.
"It's nice being in a reality without a creator, I can use my Creation without clashing domains for supremacy."- Aragorn muttered.
"Are you Lucian?"- A redheaded woman who seemed to be ignoring all danger signals her body and soul were sending her approached Aragron and asked.
"Ah, little Kushina, yes. Lucian was the first name I was given, though these days I go by another you can use that one."- Aragorn's eyes changed for the first time to pink.
His whole atmosphere changed, his presence went quiet, his demeanor went soft, and the smile reached his eyes.
"~Hehehehe!"- Kushina smiled as Aragorn petted her head like Madelyne used to.
"Should I say nice to meet you or long time no see?"- She asked.
"A bit of both is alright. How did things go with Naruto?"- Aragorn asked, eyeing the father-son duo staying a distance behind Kushina.
"He is my son! Of course, things went fine. I was a bit sad to leave behind my friends and Madi, but I'm focusing on the bright side, otherwise, I'll tear up again."- Kushina said.
"Come meet my son and husband!"- She grabbed hold of the hand that was petting her and dragged Aragorn to her family.
Madara, and the rest, observing this event couldn't help but find it discomforting, the difference between the eldritch unstable terror dragon and the doting grandfather was contrasting.
He observed with uncanny attention as Aragorn similarly petted Naruto's head as he did Kushina, he was even cordial while offering his hand for a handshake to Minato, a form of greeting, he presumed. Then a woman of clearly Uchiha blood approached them, and Aragorn warmly hugged the surprised woman.
'A monster but not entirely a monster.'- Madara thought, reminiscent of the time of his life when he was the monster to all except Hashirama, who he saw as his brother.
"Do you guys want a lift to Konohagakure?"- Aragorn asked.
"Lift?"- Mikoto asked, not understanding the word.
Aragorn pointed with his tail and made a vertical swipe, although it looked like he was cutting space he was warping it. An oval portal appeared and on the other side, the Hokage Mount was clearly visible.
"I meant this, I will return to Abeyance and prepare the dimension for transport, I will only return to this place in a few years to pick up Mikoto."- Aragorn explained. Mikoto perked up.
"Years?"- She asked.
"Sasuke should be 16 this year, three years should be enough for him to marry his harem and give you your first grandson or granddaughter."- Aragorn said. He was not going to experience the three years, he would just jump forward in time once he was done preparing Abeyance.
"That's... 19 years is a bit too young, no?"- Mikoto faltered.
"Not at all, he probably already bedded Karin Uzumaki, at least. You might end a grandmother sooner than expected."- Aragorn figured that after the thorough brainwashing Sayaka and Lucian did on Sasuke, the guy must definitely be eager to start his Neo Uchiha clan.
With these thoughts in mind, the group of Mikoto, Shisui, and the Uzumakis walked through the portal. They glanced back at Aragorn waving goodbye as the portal closed.
As soon as the portal snapped shut, Aragorn's unstable demeanor returned.
"... Well, I'll probably see you never again or when I return to pick up Mikoto."- Aragorn said.
His body glowed up in a soft light and disappeared to Abeyance.
______________________________________
Abeyance.
Floating in the vacuum of space, above one of the many planetoids, Madelyne enjoyed freedom.
Freedom in knowing her stay was almost over. In knowing her friend was returning. In knowing she would have some years to focus solely on Abeyance while her friend traverses The Void. So much freedom.
She felt—through her dimension—as an incomprehensible existence manifested behind her. She felt through her empathy the smothering affection this existence held for her. She felt through her body the reassuring warmth that embraced her from behind.
"Thank you, Madelyne."- These were the first words Aragorn said to Madelyne.
"Love, will you let me see you?"- She asked, since he was embracing her from behind she had not seen his face.
Aragorn partially freed her from his grasp and allowed her to turn in his arms.
Her eyes opened wide as she saw a face she recognized. Even after a thousand years, it was a face she couldn't forget.
Back on her Earth, Aragorn meant many things to the life of the clone that she was. Aragorn was the object of hate, fear, anger, and disgust of her creator. Aragorn was the public face of mutants like her. Aragorn was the terror of any governmental authority. Aragorn's face appeared in the news channels at least once a week.
"Aragorn Abner..."- She affirmed.
"Aragorn, the last name is just for my public persona."- Aragorn added.
"... You are the dragon as well, right?"- Aragorn was well-known for being a sort of prophet to the dragon that suddenly appeared and opened the eyes of the world to a different reality. But she couldn't imagine that her eldritch terror friend would be subservient to a run-of-the-mill dragon.
"Yes, 'Lord Alduin' is me."- Aragorn ran his hand softly in circles on Madelyne's lower back.
"How did we die?"- A mystery she and Lucian had mulled over tens of thousands of times.
"Hahahaha!"- Aragorn got into a fit of laughter.
"What? Who was right?"- They had multiple bets about it.
"Neither... My wife killed us on my request."- Aragorn's statement brought her brian to a halt and her mouth opened in an 'O'.
"That's... crazy! How did that happen? How is that even possible?"- To her it was an impossibility. Aragorn Abner's power level was openly discussed back on Earth, and she knew that even by the lower estimates he surpassed her peak, then there was the apparent fact that his wife could kill them.
"That cube Essex fused with you prepared your body as a recipient for a cosmic being known as the Goblin Force. A thing of nightmares that ate galaxies for breakfast. Essex didn't know what he was messing with and in his lunacy, he almost ended the universe."- Aragorn's eyes flashed red.
"Calm down, Love. Don't collapse my dimension."- Madelyne raised her hands to his cheeks.
"*Sigh* Well, the thing was too strong even for me, but the good news was that it was rampaging, so I took advantage of its mindlessness, and by the time it had regained its clarity, all I had to do was incite it to fuse with me. I separated your soul from it and then brought it to my wife's domain and had her kill us."- Aragorn slowly shared his memories of the clash as he narrated the story.
"Who's is your wife to be able to end this galaxy-eater?"- Madelyne asked with wide eyes.
"The abstract embodiment of our multiverse's concept of death... The gothest girl back home!"- Aragorn smiled sweetly, his pink and golden eyes glowing gently on Madelyne's stupefied face.
"Hehehehehe! The gothest girl."- She laughed in disbelief.
"Yeah, I don't think she is going to be very happy with my prolonged absence though."- Aragorn confessed.
"Will she have a problem with me?"- Her laughter abruptly stopped.
"Why? Because you wanted to spread your legs for me?"- Aragorn smiled teasingly.
"Yes, and because we have been in soul-to-soul contact for a millennium, that's got to be worse than being naked under the same covers!"- Madelyne panicked. She was considering that maybe the shinobi world was not so bad.
"Hahahahahaha!"- Aragorn laughed to tears.
"Hey! Don't be a jackass! Tell me!"- Madelyne demanded.
"Fufufu, no. Don't worry!"- Aragorn said in between chuckling.
"We didn't do anything she would consider perfidious. Soul-to-soul contact isn't that uncommon; I have over 50 maids/daughters/sisters who share a soul contract with me. While none of those are as intimate as what we shared, they're still within the same category. Honestly, even if you and I had mixed our souls to produce offspring, she wouldn't be upset."- Aragorn explained.
"Eh? How does that work? Is it an open relationship?"- Madelyne asked.
"No, no, we are monogamous, deeply obsessed with one another. It's just that what we consider 'cheating' is different, and it helps that we never had sex, nor did I ever love you romantically, neither did you, so no cheating, she might actually be happy about you."- Aragorn replied.
"Happy? Why would she?"- Madelyne was certain that if she had a partner and this one spent a millennium with another she wouldn't be happy.
"The Divinities of Souls are so rare that she is overworked most of the time. Souls are under the purview of Noona. So if you still feel uneasy about it, just make sure to advance in your divinity and she would appreciate it."- Aragorn explained.
"That's a relief. And Noona? What's that about?"- Madelyne sighed, practicing her soul-related powers was already on her list.
"It's a term of endearment, it's from the Korean culture."- Aragorn smiled, his eyes switched to pink and golden every time he spoke of Death.
"You really love her, don't you?" - Madelyne's voice was more a statement than a question.
"Yes." - Aragorn's reply was simple, yet the weight behind it was indescribable. Unable to articulate the depth of his emotions, he chose to share a fraction of his love for Death with Madelyne through his empathy.
Her reaction was immediate and visceral.
"..."- Her eyes widened as a cascade of emotions surged through her.
She shivered, her body reacting to the intensity. A wave of nausea hit her, followed by disgust, then an unexpected rush of arousal. Fear crept in, only to be replaced by ecstasy. Beneath it all, she felt a profound sense of protection, yet there lingered an unnameable feeling—one that eluded comprehension, leaving her breathless and overwhelmed.
"You... are demented."- She said amidst heavy breathing. She was profoundly confused about what she experienced.
"If you compare the way my mind operates to the human psychotype, then yes."- For one Aragorn now had four selves, Voidself*, Coreself, Surfaceself, and Lucianself, this was not counting the selves born when he splits his attention, and if you add to this how his concept (Paradoxical Existence) hereafter interacts with his mind and soul you're left with a headache.
"At least I don't have to worry about you eating children, do I?"- Madelyne said after composing herself.
"Nah, don't worry. I care for pure souls, unless having no choice I would never harm a pure soul."- Aragorn put to rest her worries.
"That's a relief... Now what?"- Madelyne asked.
"Now I'll prepare Abeyance for the journey."
"How will that work?"
"I'll temporarily affix it to my soul, sort of like storing it in my stomach for later."
"... You won't accidentally eat us all, will you?"- Madelyne raised an eyebrow to him.
"No, that was just the example, souls don't normally have stomachs, do they?"
"I don't know, don't ask me. I might be a Goddess of Souls, but I'm new to this."
"Goddessling of Souls, then."- Aragorn scoffed at her.
"So unfair! You probably know more about souls than me, what with those eyes of yours!"- Madelyne complained.
"Just observing is not the same, it's like observing millions of pictures and scans of the human body with no other information, you get good at recognizing patterns but you won't get much further than that."- Aragorn replied.
"You at least have that, I have barely gazed at maybe a few thousand souls since my apotheosis."- Madelyne pouted like a thousand-year-old child.
"Fine, maybe the example was not appropriate. Just think of my soul as having pockets, I will store Abeyance in one of those pockets. Are you clear on what you have to do?"- Aragorn asked.
"Yeah, my part is simple. Slow down the passing of time as much as possible so that we don't spend billions of years trapped in Abeyance while you transport us... or was it speed up time?"- Madelyne started strong but ended doubtful.
"No, that has to do with an observer being able to overcome the constraints of time or not, you got it right the first time."- Aragorn explained.
"Okay, so I slow down the passing of time for all of us, right?"- Madelyne asked.
"Yes, since you are bound by the passing of time, if time goes by slowly you will as well, and the rest of existence would appear to be going by faster. I will then match it to the time speed in our universe."- Aragorn said.
"I wonder what the time ratio is between this multiverse and ours," Madelyne mused.
"I know it's been less than five years."- Aragorn replied confidently.
"What? How do you know that?"- Madelyne asked, finding the precision peculiar.
"My maids are bound to me by contract. If they die, their souls are automatically drawn back to mine, regardless of the distance. Before leaving, I instructed Spark—one of my AIs—to send one of the maids my way if I remained absent for five years. After that, the interval would double exponentially. Since none of my maids have shown up, it means we've been here for less than five years."- Aragorn's explanation was both calculated and reassuring.
"Wait!... Leaving aside how cold that sounds, how do you deal with the literal Void between you and them? Maybe their souls were lost in transit."- Madelyne pondered.
"Their contract has a speck of my soul... I can't truly call it a speck, but you can think of it that way. The point is that my soul—every piece of it that I recognize as my own—is always connected. Since I'm part of The Void, the apparent distance won't matter."- Aragorn tried to explain.
"I believe you, but I don't think I understood what you explained, I may be a 'Goddessling' but I'm pretty sure that's not how souls are supposed to work."- Madelyne said.
"We can go over it when I give you a similar contract."- Aragorn stated.
"Eh? Why would I need a contract?"- Madelyne tilted her head.
"Security mostly, but there are other benefits."- Like being eternally bound to him.
"If you say so."- Madelyne didn't see a reason to deny.
During this conversation, the Aragorn that stayed outside, the one who dragged Isshiki to The Void, slowly prepared Abeyance for transport. It slithered its way around the dimension while carefully creating a barrier encasing it. It 'disconnected' the dimension from its universe and slowly connected it to him.
Eventually, their conversation died down and they moved to meet with the other residents of Abeyance, needless to say, most of the cult maniacs of Sunagakure were euphoric about meeting Aragorn. About a month later, the Aragorn outside finished securing Abeyance to him.
Aragorn then jumped forward three years in time and made a final appearance in the Shinobi World. This time Madelyne accompanied him.
Madelyne assumed what she recognized as her true form, which was the form resembling an adult Jean Grey with white orbs for eyes and silver-white hair, the first body Aragorn made for her. Aragorn was present in his draconic form and stayed outside while giving space to Madelyne to finish saying her goodbyes.
Mikoto initially thought she was going to hesitate to leave behind her son and his family, but in reality, she didn't. Too much had happened between them and the relationship they shared couldn't be called a happy mother-son bond. They were not on bad terms, and she greatly enjoyed the time she spent with her granddaughter, even with her daughters-in-law, but she could feel this distance with Sasuke that she could never overcome, a distance Sasuke was not thrilled about shortening.
"Maybe I should apologize about that, Mikoto."- Aragorn said to the ravenette comfortably sitting down on his clawed hand as they gazed at the village in the distance.
"No, I know you and Mady did what you thought was best for Sasuke... and to be honest... I don't want to return to how things were back then... I feel like I shouldn't be given such a blessing."- Mikoto took a deep breath and continued.
"I was their mother and regardless of what their failure of a father thought, I should have been there for them. Itachi is gone and Sasuke is and will do better than anything he could have done under our parenting, that's it, I don't need a different ending."- She fully leaned back onto Aragorn's palm and gazed at the sky absentmindedly.
"What about having a second try with Itachi?"- A green-glowing wisp appeared in her view.
"... Is that..."- She stammered and couldn't finish her question.
"I went fishing to the Purelands and caught this tormented soul. It took some character growth on my part not to crush it... I did wipe its 'slate' clean, though. If you're willing to mother a child again... I'm willing to create an empty embryo for you."- Aragorn suggested, his tone of voice showed how cagey he was about it.
"..."- Mikoto was silent for a few seconds until tears streamed down, she sobbed softly and reached for the soul.
Aragorn lowered the soul to her and partially materialized it to allow Mikoto to hold it.
"I-Is that allowed? Can I try again?"- She asked, her voice cracking due to her emotional state.
"Yes, Mikoto. I would normally be a bit of a jerk about it for a while—at least until the soul fully takes the shape of the new persona—but taking advantage of the fact that I won't see any of you for a few billion years..."- Aragorn said in reluctance.
"I just thought you might want to try again, this time with no useless husband nor useless village, just you and Madelyne... Well, probably Izumi and Tsunade and the rest will be in the equation, but you understand."- Aragorn rambled.
"... Thank you, Aragorn-sama. I will forever be grateful."- She returned the soul to Aragorn, and, amidst her tears, smiled brightly at him.
"You're welcome, just stay there for a moment and I'll be done, tomorrow all the hormone ordeal will hit you like a trainwreck though."- Aragorn said while using his biokinesis to impregnate her, once the recipient was made he floated the green wisp to her womb and successfully reincarnated Itachi in the new baby-to-be.
Mikoto's hands glowed green while scanning her body with medical jutsu, and at the end of the scan, she whipped a tear from her eye.
A few hours after that, Madelyne returned—tear-stricken—with a bright smile. She was carrying loads of presents that the lives she'd touched prepared for her departure.
She hugged Mikoto seeking emotional support but soon the hug turned into a joyful one when Mikoto shared the news of her pregnancy.
In a soft flash of light and leaving behind a trace of white sand, Madelyne teleported with Mikoto to Abeyance.
Aragorn let his senses expand and covered from the continent to the oceans, to the skies, to the star, the galaxy, the quadrant, and more until he covered the entire universe.
'There are 157 parasites left, they might end up arriving on this planet, or they might not. These are your responsibility now, Madara.'- Aragorn's voice resounded in Madara's mind.
'The protector I arranged for this world will shield you from invasions from other realities and timelines, but these are your responsibility, I recommend you go to Shukaku and ask him for help since I don't think you can grow your power as fast as you could under his guidance. It's just my advice, take it or leave it.'
'... Thank you.'- Madara replied, a thank you that carried more meanings than he let on.
'Have a nice life, you were not as bad as I thought.'- Aragorn gave his farewell.
He flapped his wings and exited the galaxy in a single leap, in front of him a rupture in reality opened and Aragorn exited the universe.
On the other side of the rupture, the primordial slime of void and shine awaited. He flew into it and the slime transformed into a universal size dragon. He flapped his wings once more and he exited the multiverse. Outside the multiverse another primordial slime of shine and void awaited him. He merged once more, and in doing so all of his selves—the ones in the Naruto Multiverse—rejoined.
Paradoxical Existence, this concept allowed him—among other benefits—to exist simultaneously in different levels of existence.
Aragorn gave the shiny multiverse a long look and then displaced The Void to move toward where he felt a pull, the pull of his Surfaceself.
|This is your eye, is it not?|
}{Guide/Steer/Map/Navigate/Illuminate}{
|To traverse you?|
}{+}{
This short exchange between the Voidself and Aragorn took multiple centuries. But he understood, conceptually so.
The eye on his forehead was meant as a tool to navigate The Void, to find places he had visited easily, to get a better sense of direction, to steer The Void smoothly, and to alleviate some of the problems he's been having while going from one multiverse to another.
He concentrated on the eye, and abstractly, he found the locations of some of the multiverses he had located before.
|For another time, Noona would kill me again if I delayed our reunion anymore.|- Aragorn said and focused on the location of his home multiverse.
While the journey this time was easier, it still took him an amount of time unthinkable for a mortal, about 2.000.587 years. Compared to the billions it usually takes him, it's a considerable improvement, and given that he doesn't age, other than boredom, he found no problems in the upgrade.
In no time—conceptually speaking—he found his way to the Marvel Multiverse, ever-shining and evershifting as always.
Before returning to his base universe he had to do one very important stop.
He located the Mystery, on the edges of All, close to the Multiversal Barrier, and in the Mystery, he found the House of Ideas, also known as the Crown of Creation.
His concept kicked in and a self of him was left on the outside of the Marvel Multiverse.
Aragorn entered the Multiversal Barrier and succinctly he was at the entrance of his destination. He opened the door and walked in.
"Look who's back... My employee with the most PTO."
"Aniki! I've returned and I bring presents."
"~Heh! and it's almost New Year. You're 6 days too late."
"From the first year?"
"Yes."
"Ah, what a relief, so I've only been gone for about six months."
"Though much has changed, you'll see for yourself when you return."
"I can imagine. My clash with the Goblin Force left a mess."
"So what are these gifts you spoke about?"
Aragorn sunk his clawed hand into his chest and pulled out Abeyance.
"... That's quite the gift..."
"Yeah, I shaped the dimension in accordance with the laws of reality we follow here, the problem is the souls of the inhabitants—Madelyne's aside, since her soul belongs here—I'm not that versed in soul transformation/manipulation, so I wanted to make sure they won't cease to exist when I expose them to this reality."
"I see, you couldn't ask Death for help since you would have to step into reality to get her help."
"Yeah. I also thought you might be interested in the laws governing souls in other multiverses."
"I am. Aside from that time when the DC multiverse passed nearby, I haven't seen other foreign souls."- He reached for Abeyance and then set it above a piece of 'paper'. The dimension was then absorbed by the 'paper' and it turned into a comic book, not unlike the many other comics found in the House of Ideas.
"It should be done in a couple of days, you can return to pick it up."
"That's good! By the way, when Madelyne ascended her soul behaved like they normally do in this multiverse, so I found no problems with her divinity, but there's a girl in that dimension that is also a goddess, or should be one, and I couldn't make heads from tails out of how her soul approached divinity. Can you take a quick look?"
The One Above All fliped a page in his comic and found a panel with Kaguya Ōtsutsuki as the character.
"... This is interesting... in the wrong way of interesting."
"Ah, I knew there was a problem with her divinity by our standards."
"How can you be called the Moon Goddess and have no moon-related powers?"
{A/N: The Infinite Tsukuyomi doesn't count because she could cast it without the reflection of the moon.}
"That's part of what confused me."
"Did you bring her subdimensions with you?"
"I have them here."- Aragorn pulled the core dimensions of Kaguya's Amenominaka.
"We could make her the goddess of these dimensions and probably illusions, but that's matching her powerset, if we were to match her personality then..."
"Maybe growth, progress, evolution, or development. She worked on these when she was free with Madelyne, at the beginning. I would say motherhood, but that touches a sore spot."
"There's also chakra."
"I thought there didn't exist divinities based on energy sources, only dimensional ones."- Like how there can be a god of lightning but no god of electricity, or a god of strength but no god of potential-kinetic energy, or a god with control of gravity but no god of gravitational energy.
"Chakra wouldn't be considered the source energy in my creation, Life-Force would."
"Ah, I see. Goddess of Chakra, the application of Life-Force into the body and spirit and its expression on the outside world. And what about her core dimensions?"
"I'll merge these and create a Divine Realm/Dimension for her, like what Abeyance is to Madelyne."
"Oh, that's a relief. I'm particularly fond of Kaguya."
"Oh? Do tell."
"She was like a mother to me and Madelyne."
"I don't follow, how can this girl be a mother to you, particularly with how old you are."
"I had a misunderstanding with The Void, I regressed into an emotionless version of my human self. As you can picture I lacked common sense and many other qualities needed for life. Madelyne was a fast-grown clone, raised by Essex and Hooker Lady, as you can imagine we were a menage."
"A misunderstanding? Does that have to do with your growth?"
"Yes, though my growth is more lateral than vertical."
"Peering into you—one not of my creation and high level of existence—is complicated, so I can't visualize what you mean, Aragorn."
"I've gained a concept: Paradoxical Existence. It allows me to exist simultaneously on different levels. One self of mine might be outside the multiversal barrier, another outside reality, another outside my universe, and yet another inside it. Think of it as a form of stratification. It also lets me alter the personification of an entity—for instance, assigning physical properties to an otherwise intangible soul."
"That's interesting, do you think you could give Death a mortal coil with that concept?"
"... I hadn't thought of that... Maybe, I'll try later."
"Here, you can have Madelyne back, she doesn't need any adjustment, she was one of my creations to begin with."- The One Above All pulled Medelyne out of a comic panel.
"What the heck?!"- She exclaimed. She got a feel for her surroundings and quickly spotted Aragorn plus an old man.
"Aragorn?"- She asked guardedly, she could feel something from the old man in the room, yet she couldn't understand it.
"Hey, Mady! How long was it?"- Aragorn moved his draconic face to her and flicked playfully his biforked tongue at her.
"Agh! Stop that!"- She removed the viscous saliva-like liquid from her with her telekinesis.
"It's been 358 years, how much was it for you?"- She leaned forward and hugged his face with her whole body.
"Just about two million years, it went by in a sec."- Though technically it lasted no time at all, Aragorn thought to himself.
"You and your broken scale of time. So? Who's he?"- Madelyne shook her head in astonishment and then asked about the identity of the man in the room.
"That's the Aniki."- Aragorn gave a matter-of-fact reply, offering no elaboration.
"The Aniki?"- She tilted her head curiously.
"Yep, he is my boss."
"You have a boss? What do you do for a living? Do you even need to do anything? Don't you just exist like the eldritch terror you are?"
"Hahahaha! She has a point."
"That makes me sound like Neet dragon. I take care of our home universe and try to prevent its metaphorical suicide, I would in the future work in other realities where my help would help assuage costs as well."- Aragorn explained.
"That... sounds like a nanny."
"Hehehehehe! Yes, yes, Aragorn is your universe's nanny."- The One Above All squinted his softly glowing eyes in joy at Madelyne's remarks.
"Well... Let's just go, I'll introduce you to my wife, my daughter is currently with her so you'll meet Seraph too."- Aragorn grabbed her carefully in his clawed hand.
"See you later."
"Yes, I'll return for the Abeyance."- Aragorn flapped his wings and appeared before Reality. He flew in and a self was left on the border between Reality and the Far Shore, he flapped again and he arrived outside the multiverse (The Universes).
"Was he God?"- Madelyne asked, amidst her mesmerization upon laying eyes on the tree that the infinite Universes made.
"No, YHWH is subordinate to him in this Multiverse."
"What? Who is YHWH?"
"The one you refer to as God. You can think of Aniki as the creative self of the Creator, he also has a destructive self, but you won't meet that one, you'd cease to exist before you know it if you do."
"... I'm just a Goddessling, why am I meeting this esteemed figure-sama?"- Madelyne asked, trying to apply as many forms of subserviency in her speech as possible.
"He is changing the souls in Abeyance to fit the laws of this Multiverse, since he is your creator your soul needed no fixing, so you were returned to me ahead of time."- Aragorn explained.
"... I'll just respectfully—of course—store this event in the deepest confines of my mind palace and—obviously—treasure it for eternity."- Madelyne felt that ignoring what just happened was for the best.
"So? Which one is ours?"- She asked, gazing at the tree of universes.
"That dimm one over there."- Aragorn pointed at a universe darker than the others, it had a spectral feeling to it.
"That's... Somehow that looks like the horror movie version of a universe."- Madelyne was lost for words.
"It's better now than it was before I arrived. Anyways, we are not going there at the moment, we're going to the Realm of Noona."- Aragorn looked at a realm existing outside the multiverse and flapped his wings again.
{A/N: Multiverse is the whole thing, and multiverse is like when you call a computer a CPU, the CPU is possibly the main component of it so it's accepted to call it that. In this case, multiverse refers to the main universe (616) and its counterparts, it doesn't include realms that exist outside of it.}
This was a cold realm, where no life thrived, shrouded by its mystery. Souls wandered about, and from time to time the souls of Death's servants were seen exiting and entering the realm—the valkyries. In the middle of this realm was a dark castle, eery in nature.
Aragorn morphed into his humanoid form and floated with Madelyne behind him to the castle.
Occasionally the valkyries would wave at him and he responded with a wave back.
"Are you a regular here? I had never seen so many souls."- Madelyne asked and pondered at the uncountable number of souls she could sense. Pure souls, ones without a body.
"Yes, this is my wife's place."- Aragorn ignored distance once more and found themselves in the throne room.
Aragorn's eyes lit up in visible joy and love. Death was sitting on the throne with Seraph in her lap. Seraph was looking back at Aragorn with equal joy and love, she looked like she wanted to glomp him, but Death was restraining her with a hand around her waist. Death was looking at Aragorn with a chilly gaze.
"My Love... Finally, back, it seems..."- She matched her tone with the coldness of her realm.
"Noona... I'm sorry?"- Aragorn said as he moved closer to her. Leaving Madelyne behind, she was observing the outcome with morbid curiosity.
"Are you? About what exactly?"- She petted Seraph like a cat with her free hand, her other one still firmly securing the overexcited AI.
"About forcing you to kill me."- Aragorn arrived right in front of them, towering over their seating frames.
"I see... And what will you do about it? You don't expect to be forgiven that easily, do you?"- Death glared.
Given that Aragorn could have gone to any of the other in the Cosmological Compass, she felt it was cruel of him to pass the responsibility on her. {A/N: Living Tribunal, Phoenix, Oblivion, Eternity, and the others.}
"How about a few hundred thousand years with me in one of the lower universes?"- Aragorn lifted them both and sat them on his lap. He shifted Seraph to one of his thighs and Death to the other.
Seraph wasted no time and hugged him with enough strength to bend Adamantium.
"I missed you, Father."- She whispered to his ear. He replied by sharing his love and happiness with her.
"... Okay, that sounds lovely, but how will you do that, My Love?"- Death's entire demeanor flipped and Madelyne felt like the secondhand tension she was feeling was all a lie.
"I think it's time to divinize our family."- Aragorn said and kissed intensely his Death.
_________________________________________________________
{A/N:
That's it, this went longer than expected but I'm glad it's done. I'm proofreading as I published these chapters because I won't have time to publishlater today, so if you spot anything that would be appreciated.
There's already a skeleton of the next volume, but I'm still busy with life, so although I will try to aim for a chapter-a-week release schedule I promise nothing.
This was the end the end of this volume.
I hope you enjoyed it!
}
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