Chapter 751 - Peace and Quiet

Zeke sat next to the pond, staring across the placid water as the sun set over the mountains.  The twilight interplay between light and darkness had always soothed him.  There was just something about dusk that reminded him of summer evenings at the ballpark, back before the weight of expectations had changed the meaning of the sport he’d once loved. 

Simpler times.

Simpler, childhood goals.  Back then, all he’d ever wanted was to have fun.  To hang out with his friends.  To win a game.  But then he’d established himself as someone special.  Someone to be cultivated.  Trained.  The next great ball player. 

He was only eight years old when his father had recognized that he might have a future.  That he was ripe for exploitation.  That he could live his life vicariously through Zeke’s successes. 

After that, Zeke’s enjoyment of the game had shifted.  No longer was it just about winning, losing, or having fun.  It was about the goal.  It was about taking baby steps toward realizing his potential.  Fun rarely even came into the equation.

That wasn’t to say it didn’t exist.  It did.  But it was a byproduct rather than the point of playing the game in the first place. 

Ironically, that shift had prepared him for life after being reborn.  Zeke could remember waking up in that cave, knowing nothing about what was going on.  And before he could wrap his mind around his situation, he was attacked by what he thought of as croco-rats.  They’d turned out to be juvenile trolls, but he still thought of them by the first name he’d given them.

From the moment he’d gained his first dose of experience, Zeke was hooked.  That euphoric feeling, that tangible evidence that he’d overcome his opponent – it was addictive in the best way possible.  But more than that, the dogma of constant improvement had been drilled in him for more than a decade by that point.  His new existence slid right into that old and familiar paradigm.

But now, Zeke couldn’t help but wonder what the point had been.  After all, he’d reached the top.  Only three people in the entirety of their reality could challenge him.  The Creator, for one, but Zeke didn’t really count him.  He existed outside the established hierarchy.  The same was true of the Waymaster, whose power, while extensive, was limited by its non-sentient nature. 

And then there was Shar Maelaine, who’d been a thorn in his side since the very beginning.  Could she truly rival him?  Zeke wasn’t sure.  His instincts told him that she couldn’t.  After all, like the Creator, he existed outside the Framework.  His power wasn’t quantifiable. 

Yet, she was the oldest of the greater gods.  The most powerful.  Her influences stretched across multiple realms.  She was the pinnacle.  Zeke could only hope that he could stand on her level and put her down. 

Because that was his latest goal.

She needed to die, and not just because she had opposed him at every turn.  She had also made the mistake of harassing Talia, and there was enough of Zeke’s old self remaining within him to take offense at that.  Were there tangible benefits, though?  Would she assist him in his climb to the top?

Perhaps.

He’d not destroyed a greater god since transcending the system, but before that, he had gained power from killing them.  Maybe the same would be true now, though he had his doubts.  His newfound power wasn’t about stats or skills.  Those were lesser expressions of true might.  Instead, he remained focused on the threads that comprised reality as well as the negative strings that filled in the gaps. 

But there was a chance that he was mistaken.  For all he knew, killing Shar Maelaine would grant him even more power than he’d already accumulated, and that might be the key to understanding what was going on with the threads. 

Or that might’ve just been pure hope.

Zeke had been sitting on that rock for the better part of a day.  It’d been a week since he’d massacred the guards in that fortress town, the name of which he’d never bothered to learn.  His progress through the wilderness had been deliberately slow.  So far, he had taken his time, mostly because he found trekking through nature to be cathartic.

That was what he told himself, at least.  The reality was that a part of him didn’t want to reach his destination.  Once he got there, he would visit untold violence upon the Radiant Host.  He would kill all their soldiers and destroy the very institutions upon which the group maintained their power.

And plenty of innocents would die along the way.

He sighed, remembering a time when that would have bothered him quite a bit more than it currently did.  When had he grown so callous?  He remembered feeling devastated to discover that he’d inadvertently destroyed a quarter of a city.  Just a handful of people compared to the incalculable numbers he’d slain since.  But even now, he felt a pang in his heart when he thought about Jariq.  About the innocents who’d died, not because he wished them harm, but because he’d been careless.

Did that make him less culpable?

Maybe.

Zeke knew just how silly it was.  A few thousand deaths were nothing in the grand scheme of things.  And yet, he felt that guilt all the same. 

When had he lost that?  When had he moved past the ability to establish new regrets? 

Zeke knew the answer, of course.  Hell had robbed him of most of his scruples, but the descent had begun well before that.  It had started during the war against Adontis and events had slowly chipped away at his sense of morality.  Hell had only pushed him further along that road. 

It was fitting, really.  After all, Zeke didn’t follow a path of creation.  He wasn’t a man who valued love above all else.  He didn’t care about family.  About leaving a better world for everyone else.  His was the path of destruction.  Of death.  Of overcoming an enemy in battle. 

Of progression at all costs.

Some of those other things had snuck in there from time to time.  He wasn’t blind to suffering, and he’d taken steps to prevent it when possible.  The justification for the war against Adontis had been to end their practice of slavery, after all.  But those were all temporary stops along the winding path that was his true purpose.

Finally, he pushed himself to his feet and took one last look at the pond.  At the light reflected along its still surface.  Then, he just shook his head and stepped off of the rock.  His feet hit the ground, and he resumed his journey.

From what he’d seen, he only had a couple of days’ travel left.  He could have gone much faster, but aside from a desire to savor the experience, he also worried about damaging the world.  Even with his power constrained by the woven lattice he’d created to allow him to safely traverse the Mortal Realm, there was still a chance that his raw physical abilities could cause problems.

As a result, he held himself constantly in check.  Every step was taken with care, and even if he could rocket across the terrain far faster than the speed of sound, he chose to take his time.  Anything else would run the risk of tearing a hole in the realm.

Like that, he continued on, and along the way, he saw some places that sparked at least a measure of familiarity.  He wasn’t surprised to see how much things had changed.  A span of thousands of years was more than enough to shift the terrain, much less the manmade landmarks. 

But some persisted.

Zeke wasn’t sure if he should take comfort from that fact, especially when he confronted the memories associated with some of those locations.  Like the spot where he’d accidentally killed an assassin by throwing her into his storage space.  Due to some oddities he still didn’t fully understand, the few hours she’d spent in there had been more like months.  Or even years.  When he’d retrieved her, she had been long dead.

Another death that had stuck with him.  It had risen above all the others to represent the dangers of acting without thought.  Of hubris.  Had he listened to those lessons?  Sometimes.  But the reality was that Zeke never would have achieved the things he’d achieved if he approached every problem with caution. 

He wasn’t a thinker.

He was a doer.  His talent was action, and he refused to pretend otherwise.

In any case, he slowly worked his way across the continent.  Along the way, he saw plenty of people.  Mostly, he avoided them.  Even the members of the Radiant Host, recognizable by the sunburst badge they wore.  If he meant to kill them all, he’d have been there for weeks more.  Instead, his goal had been adjusted.  He only wanted to destroy their foundations. 

And that meant going to the city that had been built on Sanctuary’s ruins.  According to the map he’d looted, it was the central hub of the entire continent.  That wasn’t a surprising turn of events.  After all, it had been built in that location for that very reason.  That people recognized it was just evidence of good planning.

Still, when the city – with its tiered design – came into view, Zeke couldn’t help but pause.  He stared at it, marveling at how similar it looked to the city he’d left behind.  It might’ve changed its name – from Sanctuary to Phoenix Reach – but it might as well have been the same place.

It was even run by the same organization. 

Back when it was Sanctuary, it had been ruled by Lady Constance in Shar Maelaine’s name.  She’d built a powerful army that provided security and stability for the people who’d been reborn – like Zeke himself – into the Mortal Realm.  Of course, it was al a front to create new worshippers for the Sun Goddess, increasing her power. 

The trickle they provided wasn’t terribly impactful.  Not individually, at least.  But when it was the entire realm worshipping her, the divine energy started to add up.  And that wasn’t even considering the ones who ascended to become champions in the Eternal Realm. 

No – Shar Maelaine had created something truly astounding.  And the fact that it had once been destroyed didn’t seem to matter.  She knew what she was doing.  She knew how to manipulate a populace to get the most out of them.

The evidence loomed in the distance.

And Zeke wanted to destroy the whole of Phoenix Reach.  Innocents.  Soldiers.  Clergy.  Everyone.  If he killed them all, perhaps the Sun Goddess wouldn’t be able to rebuild. 

The only thing holding him back was the knowledge that once he was finished with the Mortal Realm, he would do the same to the Eternal Realm.  And when both of those tasks were finished, he intended to kill the goddess herself. 

Perhaps he should have started with that last part.  In his weaker moments, he’d considered it.  There were many reasons he hadn’t done it, but at the end of the day he just wanted to be sure of victory.  The weaker she was, the easier the battle would be. 

Because as much as he hated her, Shar Maelaine wasn’t the goal.  She was a nuisance that, had Talia left him alone, he’d have continued to ignore.  But now that he had her in his sights, Zeke intended to make her defeat stick.  And that meant being thorough.  That meant covering all of his bases.

It meant starting with Phoenix Reach.

So, it was with that resolve in mind that he rolled his shoulders, took a deep breath, then continued along the path toward the city in the distance.  He was prepared for what was to come.  For the death and destruction he intended to inflict upon the city.  But just because he was ready didn’t mean he didn’t feel at least a twinge of regret that it had come to such a state.