Blessed by Night

148 Man or Avatar? Monster or Nightmare?

When Malachi's miniature sun collided with the castle, the explosion that followed looked like it was right out of a Hollywood blockbuster. Debris from the building and black fames rained down everywhere, along with the smoldering corpses of the unfortunate vampires lurking inside. Malachi didn't budge a single inch and instead stared unflinchingly into the flames as he waited for his attack to bear fruit. And sure enough, the result he was hoping for occurred. A powerful aura and a monstrous voice cut through the smoldering rubble, and traveled far into the dead of night. "INGRATES! SCUM! YOU HAVE DESTROYED MY HOME!!"

In a flash, a man appeared through the flames and made a beeline directly for Malachi. Clearly, this man was above the rest of the rabble, as he had not immediately burned to death when subjected to his powerful flames. He was a tall and powerful looking man, with deathly pale skin and short silver hair that was framed perfectly around his unnaturally handsome face. His body was covered in menacing black armor with a red cape flapping in the breeze behind his back. In one hand he held a very large great sword, and with the other he reached out to grab Malachi by the neck. His glowing red eyes were bright enough to burn a hole into Malachi's head, and his mouth was filled with razor sharp fangs. "YOU!! YOU ARE THE ONE WHO HAS-"

"Thank, fuck. It took you long enough to come out."

"WHAT!?"

Malachi placed one of his hands over the face of the vampire and set his head ablaze in black flame. After becoming a fallen angel, Mal's flames worked a bit different from normal in that they were significantly hotter and didn't go out unless he told them to. There were likely some additional effects that he had yet to discover as well, but he needed more time to learn about them. "What is this!?"

The vampire let Mal drop to the ground and started fanning away the flames on his face, but fell into a panic when he realized even his magic could not put them out. Then, something Mal didn't expect happened. Instead of bothering to put out the flames, the vampire king rushed at him while still on fire. "I'LL KILL YOU!!!!"

Raising his weapon high above his head, the vampire cleaved Malachi directly into two and split him like dry firewood. The two halves of Mal's body clattered onto the ground harmlessly, but the fire raging across the vampire king's face had yet to go out. The only reason he hadn't died was because his regeneration was healing his skin almost as fast as it was being melted away. 'What is this?! Why won't they... wait.'

In the next moment, the vampire realized that he couldn't smell any blood from his latest victim. His vision was slightly impaired by the flames, but it did not prevent him from looking towards the ground where Malachi's body should have been lying. It was there, but where the two halves of his body were separated, he did not find flesh and blood. Instead, he only found a swirling mass of darkness and nebulas that were entirely captivating. And against all expectations, his body started to repair itself right in front of him. "By the sovereign.. what is this..?"

Tendons of that strange darkness reached out and reconnected with each other, and they pulled the two halves of his body back together. Standing up, Malachi's skin peeled off his body as his armor and weapons sank into the ground. The vampire took a cautious step back as he started looking at the monster in front of him with a new degree of suspicion. Malachi made a stretching movement as he tried to get used to the feeling of being cut in half and put back together. "What are you...? Why are you among the livestock if you aren't one of them?!"

"Livestock, huh..?" Malachi finally finished making sure everything was properly back in place and he dropped his hands to his side harmlessly. But despite his seemingly wide open stance, he radiated a feeling of danger that caused all of the vampire king's hairs to stand on end. Huge dark leathery wings shot out of his back, and he lunged at the starry man with new purpose. Malachi remained completely motionless as he conjured a pair of dark tendrils to snatch the vampire out of mid air and restrain him. He was strong, so much so that it was taking quite a bit of Malachi's willpower to keep him restrained. The shadows latched onto the vampire king's arms and legs while pulling in opposite directions. Panic set in for the vampire as he felt his flesh tearing and being ripped apart. "Wait, what are you doing!? They said we were supposed to work together to subjugate them until it all begins, so why are you-AAAGGHHHH!!!"

With a wet ripping sound, all four of the man's limbs and appendages were liberated from his body. His head and torso dropped to the ground like a sad sack of potatoes, and Malachi raised an imaginary brow in surprise. He knew that he had become significantly stronger after becoming his mother's apostle, but was it really enough to overwhelm a SSS rated boss like this?

A sneaking suspicion started to form within his mind, and he placed a foot on the chest of the fallen vampire. "Are you the boss of this gate?"

"The.. what??"

"THE BOSS!!"

"I-I don't know what any boss is, but if you are asking if I am the ruler here then, no! Our ruler awaits in-"

Mal didn't need to hear anymore as his already terrible mood became even worse than before. "Useless, fucking useless..."

Malachi stomped on the man's head so hard that it exploded like an overgrown watermelon. Since the vampire was already having trouble regenerating the other grievous injuries he'd suffered at Malachi's hands, his regeneration was finally starting to fall behind, and his body was immediately enveloped by the black flames. It only took a few moments for his entire being to go up in smoke. Standing over him, Malachi was unconcerned with the magical items that sprang from his corpse and instead expanded his senses to a wider distance. What he found almost made him cry out from sheer indignation. There were five more castles located a few miles from here, with a distance of twenty miles between each of them and a few thousand presences inside. 16:47

The sixth castle was the largest and farthest away, and even from here Mal could feel a pressure that nearly made him want to run and hide. "The fuck is this... This has to be a fucking joke..!" he said madly. All of a sudden he felt like he was having a hard time breathing, even though he had no more use for oxygen anyway. His chest began to hurt terribly, even though he no longer had any organs inside of his body. "Babe!"

"Darling, are you alright?!"

Bianca and Luna finally wrapped up their efforts to cut down the initial welcoming party of vampires and ran to Mal's side, finding him in a terrible condition. He was doubled over clutching his chest like he was having a panic attack, even though such a thing should have been impossible. "I have to get out of here, but I can't...! And that boss... It will take me forever to kill him on my own..!"

"Let us help you! You don't have to do everything by yourself!" Bianca cried. The thinking lights within Malachi's body started to go out before he slipped farther and farther into his paranoia. "I love you girls, but you can't fight that boss...! He could kill you in an instant and I would lose you too... just like I..."

It wasn't of his own volition, but uncomfortable memories began to surface from Malachi's subconscious. He replayed the deaths of his mother, his father, and even his contracted beast over and over within his mind. But the tipping point was when he recalled those last images of Anna. A girl he loved to pieces was somewhere hurt, and he couldn't even get to her despite being able to run fast enough to break the sound barrier and teleport anywhere on the planet he was standing on. What the fuck was the purpose of having powers if he was always too late to save the people who mattered?! And the highers wanted him to save the whole world?? Why should he give a shit about something like that?!

If the world was going to keep taking everything that he loved away from him, then he should just destroy it himself!

The negativity racing through Malachi's mind reached a never before seen level. While on his knees in front of the girls, a dark, egg-like casing swallowed up his figure. "Mal?" "What's happening??" Bianca asked worriedly. The two girls placed their palms against the egg containing Malachi and tried to gain a glimpse into what was going on inside. Unfortunately, all they could feel was Malachi's swirling emotions and the cool feeling of the shell on their hands. 'Girls... get away from him, right now..!' A jolt ran up Bianca and Luna's spines as they heard a very familiar voice in their minds. 'Miss Nyx??'

'What's happening to Mal??'

'Girls, listen to me right now!! You have to get away from him, it's not safe!!' crack. A small fracture appeared on the eggshell enclosing Malachi's figure, and the girls could see a red light starting to shine through the egg. Finally, the girls backed away hesitantly as they waited to see what would become of the man they loved. As more and more of the eggshell fell away, they gained a glimpse upon his figure but... he was not in a way that they had ever seen him. In their entire lives, they had never seen something that fit the definition of a monster so well. My stepbrother had his baby the other day and his lil boy got a chin like a cash register AnathaShesha

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