Divine System: Land of the Abominations-Chapter 304: The Devouring (3).

The world was barely coherent now, just like a feeling or a thought.

But it persisted, stubbornly, refusing to be completely devoured by the darkness.

The creature’s heart gave a final, shuddering beat.

Then it stopped.

The massive body went still, its thrashing ceasing as death finally claimed it. The countless tendrils that had been fighting Nero’s shadows went limp, floating in the darkening water like dead seaweed.

But Nero didn’t stop eating.

He couldn’t, as the darkness was in full control now, and it wouldn’t be satisfied until every scrap of the creature had been consumed. The dark coils spread through the corpse like roots through soil, seeking out every remaining morsel of flesh. Every organ and piece of bone, cartilage, and even the stranger materials.

He ate the creature’s spongy lungs, all six of them, arranged in a cluster near the creature’s spine.

He ate its liver— a massive organ filled with chambers of toxic bile.

He ate its intestines.

He ate its brains—a collection of ganglia spread throughout the body rather than centralized in the skull.

He ate the eyes—those massive organs that had never opened, that had spent eternity closed in eternal slumber. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

He ate the antlers, crunching through bone and keratin, swallowing fragments that should have torn his throat but somehow slid down smoothly.

He ate the scales, the stone-like flesh, the shadowy substance of the tendrils.

He ate everything.

Hours passed. Or perhaps it was just minutes. Time had lost all meaning in the darkness and the hunger. Nero’s body continued to change as it processed the impossible volume of matter he was consuming.

The creature’s corpse diminished, piece by piece, until only a skeleton remained floating in the blackened water. And then Nero’s shadows consumed that too, breaking down bone into dust that the darkness absorbed.

Finally, there was nothing left.

The lake that had once held an impossible horror now contained only dark water and Nero’s transformed body.

And slowly, so slowly, the Yang form began to recede.

The hunger that had driven him lessened, not disappearing but becoming manageable again. The shadows that had manifested as solid appendages dissolved back into formless darkness.

His skin lightened from pure black to something closer to its natural tone.

His eyes dimmed, the crimson glow fading until only faint traces remained in his pupils.

Nero’s human consciousness surfaced slowly from the depths it had been buried in.

He breathed a deep sigh. He had almost lost himself.

His thoughts had muddler earlier. His sense of self and identity hung at the precipice of an abyss.

Perhaps they would remain there for quite some time.

The cold water all around him was as dark as the seed rooted firmly in his heart.

The bitter taste of bile and blood lingered on his lips.

It... was not very unpleasant.

He hated it.

He hated it a lot.

That truth sat heavy in his chest as his transformation back into his human form completed and he found himself drifting in the center of the pitch-black water, surrounded by the carnage he had done.

His body was a wreck. The clothes he’d been wearing were reduced to blood soaked threads, hanging from his frame in tatters. The wounds that covered every inch of his exposed skin, the bite marks from the tendrils, the lacerations from being crushed and torn, the burns from the toxic ichor, his broken arm and bones...

It had all healed up.

He felt filled with an impossible amount of energy.

So much energy, he feared he would ignite into flames the moment he left these chilly depths.

Nero began swimming toward the surface, each stroke sending fresh agony through his battered body. The water around him was completely black now, stained by the creature’s ichor and the dissolution of its corpse. He couldn’t see the surface so he couldn’t tell how deep he was. He could only swim upward and hope.

His lungs burned for air.

Just a little further.

Just a little—

His head broke through to the surface.

Nero gasped, sucking in the stale air and hacked furiously as he struggled to fill his lungs with as much air as possible. The dull blue of the remnant fungal glow seemed blindingly bright after the absolute darkness the lake’s depths had been turned into. He blinked, trying to orient himself as he tried to find something to grip onto on the shore.

"Nero!"

Nero’s head swiveled. Someone had called out to him.

He saw both Arthur and Jacob on the shore, both fully conscious it seemed, staring at him with expressions of confusion and concern.

He finally managed to pull himself out of the water and onto the ground.

The coarse sand felt like a solace.

’I do not have the best experiences with large bodies of water, do I?’

He in fact, did not.

Nero stumbled out of the now putrid black waters, slightly swaying, barely even able to stand. His breathing was ragged but he seemed fine, oddly enough.

Arthur and Jacob stared at him in shock.

"What..." Arthur’s voice was hoarse, confused. "What happened? What are you doing in there?!"

Nero wiped the water off his face as he tired to get his thoughts out when Arthur spoke again,

"The last thing I remember is the floor collapsing, and then—" He shook his head.

Beside him, Jacob nodded, his expression equally bewildered and grim,

"Aye, same. What sort of horrible thing happened in this place?"

He glanced over at Nero, his gaze filled with suspicious,

"Do you know something?"

Nero’s mind raced despite his exhaustion.

They didn’t know anything. Even Arthur didn’t know anything.

Which meant he could tell them whatever he wanted.

A thought formed in his mind. At first, it seemed ridiculous, but the more he thought about it, the greater it filled his mind until—

"There was..." Nero swayed, catching himself against arock. "There was something... a creature in the lake. It attacked us after we fell. And I managed to fight it off."

Arthur’s eyes widened. "You fought something... down there?" He gestured at the blackened water.

Nero nodded as he continued,

"It pulled me in," Nero continued, "Tried to drown me. I was lucky to have survived. I still don’t know how I did it."

"What did it look like?" Arthur took a step forward and asked with a grimace on his face.

Nero thought for a moment then shook his head,

"I don’t know. I didn’t have a good look at it."

Arthur huffed then turned to Jacob,

"What do you think it could be?"

Jacob shook his head,

"I’ve never heard of an Abomination like that. Unless you include the Great Monstrosity of the Black River, that is..."

Seeing the serious look on Arthur’s face however, Jacob raised a brow,

"What, you think its the same?"

Arthur hesitated then shook his head,

"No, not exactly. It cannot be the same one. After all, that one was killed millenia ago. But perhaps this is its wicked spawn, or something like that."

Jacob spat, "Unless this lake is somehow connected to the dark river, then I don’t think it is likely. But that’s not important right now."

However , as they argued, a loud thump could be heard.

Nero had collapsed to the ground.

Arthur leaned down then shook his head,

"There are no obvious signs of external damage."

Jacob clicked his tongue,

"This is strange. This kid is strange."

Arthur shrugged, "He is no kid, Jacob. And if he is telling the truth, then he might have saved our lives."

Jacob frowned, "And do you think he is telling the truth?"

Arthur said nothing.