After barely surviving the [Test of Speed] by outrunning the GBlaster’s devastating beam, Alex stepped into yet another colossal chamber.
Unlike the previous area, this one, while still massive, had visible walls and boundaries.
He could see the ceiling stretching high above and the far ends of the room sealed by marble and darkness.
This wasn’t another infinite, ever-looping maze, the room, for once, had an end in sight.
That alone offered a sense of direction.
If even he had struggled this much so far, if even someone like him had come close to death in this place, then what chance would lesser beings have?
Even gods, should they have dared to challenge this domain, might’ve perished.
This trial wasn’t made for the powerful, it was made for the apex.
That realization came with a colder truth.
If this place had bested him several times over, stunned him, hurt him, and forced him into life-threatening corners despite his strength, then whoever or whatever was behind this domain had to be stronger than him.
Stronger than even the gods.
Alex didn’t like to boast, he didn’t need to.
He knew he could handle most threats.
He’d fought beings that could burn cities with a whisper and crush armies with a flick of the hand.
Yet here, he had been reduced to a desperate runner, barely escaping a blast that should’ve been impossible to avoid.
All it would’ve taken was one misstep, one second of hesitation, and he would’ve died.
And yet, despite knowing all that, he had no choice but to keep moving.
His eyes scanned the room.
Towering marble pillars stood spaced out around the chamber, some cracked from age, others pristine and untouched.
They almost seemed decorative, but he didn’t trust that for a second.
His gaze finally locked onto something else, something far more important.
At the very end of the room, past the long stretch of polished stone and silence, stood a massive golden door.
Alex froze, his heart skipping a beat.
It looked exactly like the golden door from the basement of the [Church of the Dawn], the one that had transported him to the [Palace of Destiny].
But this one felt different, he could sense it in his bones.
It wasn’t just a portal or illusion, it was the source. The original.
The true [Door of Destiny].
If he passed it, then he could finally claim whatever this place had been leading him toward.
Step! Step! Step!
His steps echoed softly as he advanced forward, slowly but steadily.
Step by step, he approached the door, wary but resolute.
Then it appeared.
[Final Test]
‘…!’ Alex’s eyes narrowed.
So there was one more.
He had expected more trials, but looks like the fifth was the last.
He stopped walking, thinking over everything the domain had tested so far.
Strength. Endurance. Intuition. Focus. Speed.
He had been pushed to his limits, again and again, until there was nearly nothing left to test.
He stepped forward again.
The moment he crossed the halfway point in the room…
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
All at once, every single pillar around him exploded outward in a violent shockwave of stone and energy.
From the rubble, emerging like mechanical nightmares, came dozens upon dozens of GBlasters.
“…Huh?”
Each one was identical to the monstrosity he’d outrun during the [Test of Speed].
Flame-like glows burned in their hollow eye sockets, and their twisted, skeletal frames clanked as they moved into formation, encircling him like wolves around prey.
Some matched the same size as the original, meaning they could annihilate him in seconds if they fired.
Others were bigger, and likely even faster.
Alex was surrounded.
He instinctively glanced toward the glowing message that had appeared on a floating panel.
[Final Test: Prove yourself to me, and show you are deserving of what you are about to receive.]
“…What the fuck does that even mean?” Alex muttered through clenched teeth, his voice tense as he spun in place, eyes darting to track every GBlaster around him.
Without warning, every GBlaster’s mouth began to open, a low hum growing louder by the second as their inner cores sparked to life.
The same energy beam he’d run from before, only now, multiplied by dozens.
“…Holy. Fucking. Shit.”
Panic flared in his chest.
This wasn’t a test, it was a mass execution.
He almost believed it was hopeless. But then he remembered.
The system had sent him here, the same system that had tested him, guided him.
If this was truly the final challenge, then there had to be a way to survive, even if it wasn’t clear yet.
He slapped both his cheeks, steadying his breath, grounding himself in the chaos.
Then, ignoring the growing threat around him, Alex took a calm step forward.
Then another. He didn’t run. He didn’t flinch.
As if daring the trial to fire.
Step! Step! Step!
Another minute passed.
The beams charged louder. Sparks flared. The energy surged.
But none of them fired. They held still, as if waiting.
Alex was only five hundred feet from the door now.
He kept going.
Step! Step— FWISH! BOOM!
Suddenly, a ripple of black energy exploded in front of him, knocking him back with such force that he skidded along the floor, dragged by the pressure alone.
He landed on his feet, barely, breath short.
The GBlasters didn’t move, but now, their mouths glowed darker.
Their beams turned pitch black, energy pulsing with a far more sinister aura.
The pressure in the room doubled. No, tripled.
But Alex didn’t waver. He steadied himself, then stared into the dark mist ahead, and saw it: a figure.
“…Oh,” he breathed out, narrowing his eyes, “…You are…”
[☟︎♏︎●︎●︎□︎📪︎ ⧫︎♒︎♏︎❒︎♏︎📪︎ ●︎♓︎⧫︎⧫︎●︎♏︎ ♒︎◆︎❍︎♋︎■︎]1
“…What?”
The voice that came from it wasn’t human.
It was warped, distorted, spoken in a language that made the air itself ripple.
Words that sounded ancient, as if they came from a time before even gods existed.
The figure began to become clearer.
[✌︎❒︎♏︎ ⍓︎□︎◆︎⬧︎♍︎♋︎❒︎♏︎♎︎?]1
Alex couldn’t understand it, but something about the tone sounded… curious.
As the mist finally faded, he saw the entity fully, and for the first time in a long while, Alex took an instinctive step backward.
It was tall. Humanoid only in shape.
Its head was like a polished white skull, smooth but cracked with a jagged black fracture running over one empty eye socket.
It wore a long, dark coat that shifted unnaturally, as if it wasn’t made from cloth but from shadows.
Its hands were gloved in white, but holes opened in the centers of each palm, black voids that pulsed like dying stars.
The thing didn’t breathe. Didn’t blink. It just was.
[♒︎♋︎♒︎♋︎♒︎♋︎♒︎♋︎]1
A laugh, if you could call it that, drifted from it. Chilling.
Then, the figure raised its right hand and snapped.
From the black hole in its palm, a dark aura surged toward Alex.
He didn’t dodge. He knew he couldn’t.
The aura seeped into him, cold and ancient, like something crawling into his soul.
And then, the voice came again.
[👍︎♋︎■︎ ⍓︎□︎◆︎ ◆︎■︎♎︎♏︎❒︎⬧︎⧫︎♋︎■︎♎︎ ❍︎♏︎ ■︎□︎⬥︎? (Can you understand me now?)]
“!!”
Alex’s eyes widened.
This time… he could understand.
“Yes…” he muttered. “I can hear you.”
[Good,] the figure replied with a wider, more unsettling grin, [It looks like everything is set now.]
Alex tensed. “Who… no. What are you?”
The being tilted its head, and the grin twisted unnaturally, too wide, too sharp.
[My name is… Vexum.]
DING!
[Vexum, The Shattered One]
[Level: ???]
“…Oh shit,” Alex whispered, instinctively taking another step back.
…
Author Note:
Fun fact, Vexum talks in WINGDINGS (reference to W.D Gaster and they actually translate to sentences) and pretty much looks like him as well, just want to say it!
Translationn: H︎e︎l︎l︎o︎,︎ t︎h︎e︎r︎e︎,︎ l︎i︎t︎t︎l︎e︎ h︎u︎m︎a︎n︎.
A︎r︎e︎ y︎o︎u︎ s︎c︎a︎r︎e︎d︎?
Hahahaha