Chapter 35- Chains of Damnation
Grim’s eyes snapped open.
The first thing he felt was the cold, unforgiving earth beneath him, rough and soaked with blood.
His body shook, not from the cold, but from the weight of the death surrounding him.
He was on his knees. His arms, trembling from the strain, dug into the dirt, as if trying to anchor himself in a world that had already crumbled.
His head lifted, his eyes blurring at the vast, horrific sight stretching out before him.
Blood. Corpses. Thousands of them, twisted and mangled beyond recognition.
The earth itself seemed to weep, a sea of red that swallowed the horizon. Beneath him, beside him, behind him—everywhere—he was trapped in a graveyard of his own making.
He forced himself to stand, his legs barely obeying, and looked to his left.
There, standing amidst the devastation, was a young man, his clothes drenched in blood.
In one of his hands, a severed corpse dangled by the hair, lifeless and limp. But it was the shadow that caught Grim’s attention—towering, monstrous, the shape of a serpent-like creature stretching out behind him.
It wasn’t a man at all. It was Leviathan. A creature out of nightmares, with massive coils and writhing tendrils, eyes burning with the intensity of hell itself.
Above him, a massive, glowing circle of otherworldly power hovered ominously, ancient symbols etched across it, glowing a fierce purple. The darkness of the symbols seemed to twist, pulling at the very fabric of reality, hungry, impatient.
To his right, another man stood—calm, untouched by the bloodshed. No corpse in his hands, no blood on his skin, yet his shadow was as chilling as the depths of hell.
A great winged creature, vast and looming, its form ever-shifting—Belzebub, the flying devil, with wings that spanned the sky and eyes that gleamed with malice.
Another circle above him, this one radiant green, glowing fiercely with dark veins pulsing beneath, rippling with power that seemed to distort the air itself.
And in the center, standing as if untouched by the horror around them, was someone Grim knew too well yet couldn’t recognize.
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Ash. She was smiling, but it wasn’t the familiar smile he had come to know.
It was twisted—too sharp, too knowing. And behind her? A shadow. A demon. A three-headed monster, each head crowned with horns and eyes that burned with eternal hunger. Asmodeus.
The creature from the deepest pits of hell, its massive form a nightmare made flesh, each head snarling, its jaws dripping with malice.
“Ash…” Grim whispered, a tremor in his voice.
She turned, that smile still etched on her face, but now it felt wrong. Too wrong.
"Who the hell are you?" Grim’s voice cracked, fear crawling up his spine.
He staggered to his feet, his body betraying him, and he fell back, his hands just barely keeping him upright.
“Asmodeus,” she said slowly, savoring the name like a poisonous wine. “I told you when we first met, didn’t I?”
Grim’s heart skipped a beat.
The world around him seemed to vanish, leaving only darkness. The hope, the one thing he had clung to, slipped from his grasp, like it was never even there.
He looked around, the weight of the silence crashing down.
Blood. Corpses. The land, the country—exterminated.
The lives snuffed out, gone. “Did you… did you do this?” he asked hoarsely, his voice almost a whisper.
Ash didn’t flinch.
She just nodded, her smile widening. “No,” she paused, “You did all this for us,” her words sharp and final, each one a nail in his coffin.
The words hit Grim like a tidal wave, crashing over him, drowning him in despair.
He remembered every second he had been possessed, the rage, the madness.
The chains of damnation had wrapped themselves around him, invisible, suffocating, dragging him to this hellish moment.
The weight of his guilt bore down on him, leaving him hollow inside.
He was nothing. A puppet, nothing more.
Grim’s fists clenched.
He tried to stand, to shout, to fight, but his body refused him.
His legs buckled beneath him, his voice caught in his throat.
He fell again, and his body screamed with failure. Why? Why? He screamed silently inside. Why did she do this? Why now, when he thought—he thought it was changing.
“I loved you,” Grim whispered, the words heavy, soaked in the pain of a thousand lost possibilities.
The three demons around him remained silent. Their eyes, glowing with inhuman intensity, didn’t waver. The weight of his confession fell flat, ignored.
“We could finish you now if we wanted to,” Leviathan said, his voice low, rumbling like thunder. “But we’re leaving you for now. It wasn’t part of our orders.”
Ash raised her hands, and at her gesture, thousands of souls rose from the blood-soaked earth. They were crying—no, wailing.
The air itself seemed to choke under the weight of their agony, the despair so thick it pressed on Grim’s chest, suffocating him.
The cries of the damned filled his ears.
Grim gagged, his stomach churned disgust and sorrow mingling in a nauseating cocktail.
And then, unable to bear it, he vomited.
His body heaved, but nothing came except the bitter taste of defeat.
Finally, his vision blurred, and the world faded into darkness.
A thud. A final, deafening sound.
And then, the scene cut to black.
End of Chapter 35.
