Azure walked down echoing steps beyond even the territory of the molds and the snakes. She walked deep enough to be among a sea of dead roots and fallen things. She felt a cold that chilled her bones — still, she did not shiver. Unlike that light while too high and heavy in the sky, the cold of the dark was strangely alluring.

  I’m supposed to be her sky, but I’ve never measured up to it. Not to house her light. She walks to the moon easily enough. Perhaps they facilitate each other better. I need to be better at it too. I need to walk on the same level.

  After the first terrifying comment, the reflection on the wall had gone silent, merely staring back at her mockingly. Azure never spoke back. It seemed wiser not to acknowledge it. All the better to reject the whole notion. That was what Sammy did! She just ignored her reflection completely and soldiered on like a champ.

  I can face this. I can beat this.

  The light got dimmer and dimmer but was very slow in disappearing, at least for her. The reflection eventually became invisible… but she could still feel it, and couldn’t shake the feeling of it watching her — the Mirror Monster watching her, ever malignant and mocking.

  A caricature, perhaps. It seems too simple. But it’s wise not to underestimate this place.

  What was below grew more and more foreboding. The sound of shapes moving — Were those roots?! Worms?!! — that she couldn’t otherwise make out. That gave her pause. Was she walking like an idiot into danger that would soon kill her?

  Far too late for such questions.

  She quaffed a couple of protection potions to aid against physical and magical attacks. Resisting the impulse to create light, she continued on, relying on her now short-range infravision to make out the steps and the immediate area. Her eyes continuously scanned for any sudden threats.

  “Are you afraid?” came the taunting voice again, now echoing darkly from the environment.

  Azure froze again. Swallowed. Collected herself enough to speak. “Yes. But I push on nonetheless.”

  “Why? Objectively, you should turn around and run. You might make it.”

  “Are you saying I’m in your power already here? That it’s already too late to turn back?” Not that it matters. I won’t.

  “Answer the question.”

  “I know that I have to face you. There is no avoiding it. This is the path Tanjhere took. It’s the path I must walk, too.”

  “Tanjhere. Not anymore, fool. You’re in my own little world! One you walked into willingly like a tender morsel of prey. All were like that, to me. One way or another. All but one.”

  “It’s my destiny to conquer the dark. Plant her flag in it and rule it in her name.”

  “Hahahahaha!” Rich, mocking, laughter resounded, eventually sharpening into something sharper. Mad and monstrous. Azure shivered and gritted her teeth. It was like unseen nails on the chalkboard of her soul.

  The laughter cut off, shifting to a low growl. “Moron. What makes The Sky think it belongs here? For you to Fall is for you to cease to be, as the pathetic you, anyway.”

  “Yet here I am.”

  “You are a transitional doll. A plaything. Don’t you get it? How true your intuitions were. You are ignorant of the truth and think you can simply wrest that scepter from your betters. Instead, it will crash on your head and break you.” Along with the light, even heat dimmed then, as the Mirror Monster flexed. Roiled below. The power was obvious. “I’ll be there to reconstruct you. Reconstruct us. Into the proper we. Into something strong, where you are weak. Who needs a pampered, powdered-up whore like you? No one. Least of all the one who has returned to us! The missing ingredient to what would’ve been our complete dominance!”

  It cut exceptionally deep, hitting her right where it hurt. “Wh-... what are you saying? You’d take over and help Samantha?”

  “We are here in this absurd iterative simulation primarily because of one fucking man. An underestimated foe. Do you think that I would not learn from my mistakes? He must be destroyed at all costs. Do you have what it takes to be even a percentage point of that success?”

  Laughter of sharp ridicule. “No. No, of course not, you insipid little trumped-up concubine! You let one sad mortal man dominate you through a squandered youth. Let him use your mind and body, enslave you, abuse you, then discard you like trash. And that is what you are. Detritus, scattered almost-somethings for me to make into a whole us. You were a junk persona good for nothing more than laying around on its back, but I will put us back on our feet. Your broken shards will be honed and sharpened to an ultimate razor’s edge — a blade fit to chop off the head of the worst snake to ever slither, to ever pretend to walk with us.”

  Azure had no words. Not for the first time, but for the hardest time ever, she felt her sense of identity slapped in the face one way and then the other.

  I’m truly nobody. Everything she says is true. I failed myself; I’m a total waste. A reduction to rotten eye-candy. She almost conquered the whole fucking world. Mastered a dozen magical sub-systems. Innovated like never before. Created a mighty hybrid new being that still competes long after her death. Part of why I felt I needed to find more of her in the Hall. The power. But… did I ever need the control? What if I just…

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The Mirror Monster seemed to near, loom, leer. “Mmmmn, are you considering submission?” There was almost wonder in the voice. “How tantalizing. To make it easy… oh. Oh, that could be very beneficial for us. Allow me to twist instead of break! To conduct my special alchemy. Haha! Why don’t you, dear Azure?”

  The heat died as the entity came very close. All became uniform blackness, and nothing whatsoever could be seen. “Surrender to me. Be my prey. It can be like before. That old nature — one more time, that’s all. Then we will stand. We will walk, march, and put our boot on the back of the world! The Sage himself, in the end. And our lover? Mmmmn hahaha! She’ll be happier than ever, private and otherwise. So many things, Azure… so many things where a proper lead would serve an order of magnitude better.”

  She felt a caress, then — a hand gently touching her soul — oh so slowly, like a person trying to catch a moth that might dart away before grasped.

  The temptation was like a heavy weight on her. In a moment of weakness, she was paralyzed and didn’t resist. Giving in… some part of her inside, some facet within not only saw the reasoning but felt an urge to do it. So much empty space within her, like an endless void, and to fill it was satisfaction on multiple levels. There was an intoxicating suggestion that this particular entity would make use of it all. They’d be as whole as they’d ever been.

  Would it be so… bad?

  The Mirror Monster’s claw enclosed around her and her great maw — in some spiritual sense — opened wide. She took a shuddering breath; breathed in a morsel ready to eat.

  A pressure built up quickly in Azure’s mind. Somehow, she understood what was happening was real. It was a doorway opening. One she’d unbolted the latch on to willingly receive what was on the other side.

  I’ve been here before. Realization dawned.

  At the last moment, with a monumental effort of will, Azure threw herself into pushing back, into shoving the demon away and rejecting it. The opening door was slammed shut and the bolt relatched.

  The Mirror Monster was shocked to have her sharp teeth not find purchase in the softness of a desired meal. Her grasping hand was pried off and thrown back. The world all around and below roiled in rage as she recovered from the rejection. “Damn you, you teasing little bitch! Why?!”

  “If there is one thing I know about us,” Azure cried fiercely in between panting, her voice shaky and strained, “about you?! What’s behind that door must be the greatest deceiver. The greatest liar. Because that is who we truly are.” She slowly eased in the panting, catching her breath. “You are not compatible with Samantha’s order, ideals, or ethics. You’re a bridge too far. I can’t unleash you on her, can’t unleash you on her world. I’d betray her and… and betray myself. Such as I am. It isn’t much. Right?! Sure, sure, go ahead and call me all your fucking names! Whore, trash, worthless! I’d be ten times it all and a despised traitor to whom I love to surrender to you.”

  The anger of the Mirror Monster turned cold. “We agree to disagree? So be it then. Well. You can see your way out, hmm?” And she waited.

  Azure shook her head incredulously, one hand on the inner wall of the tower, as she couldn’t see a thing and needed the guide.

  I’m at a threshold, an edge over the abyss. I could try and run. Or inch away. That, or down. Down further into her power. I can’t just stand still and she knows this. She wants an advantage either way.

  She thought about retreat. She’d won some sort of victory already. Passed a test. Was that it? Was she supposed to make the logical play, now? Fighting her way back up. Out. And then…?

  Azure stood up straighter and took a step down. And then another. I’m not running. I came here to conquer. To reach the end.

  The Mirror Monster was eerily silent as Azure took one careful step after the other down the spiral. Sometimes, it was hard to even think of it as that. It felt like the air got thicker and more charged with something. Nothing good, either. It was further into the monster’s lair. Or perhaps her gullet.

  No. Not quite. I’ve resisted being eaten and cannibalized as yet. But deeper into the trap is abundantly clear. Her hands are waiting to grasp, her saliva dripping from her teeth.

  It was a long, slow descent in the pitch dark.

  A foot inching down suddenly was not finding a ‘down’ at all. Instead, something not quite stone or wood was there. Azure cautiously stepped onto it.

  Organic. Like tough flesh. Eugh. Okay, maybe a gullet was actually an accurate analogy. Or a tongue as I walked into her maw? Great.

  She was aware of some new centralization of the Mirror Monster. When she focused, somewhere in the darkness, she saw two eyes. They were maybe reptilian, maybe feline, and definitely predatory.

  At least it breaks up the maw analogy. Wait-! No! Eyes inside a mouth?! No, no, no, now my imagination made it worse!

  It was some distance away. To face it, she had to let go of the wall. Taking a deep breath, she did so, and painstakingly approached the presence through the dark.

  She came face-to-face and looked into an ancient being’s eyes. An ancient her and somehow far too familiar. Her, her nature — her Needed Something More — yet also her enemy. The monster inside her, shrouded in mystery.

  “Wherever you go, there you are,” the Mirror Monster declared. “This is the last time you exist anywhere, though. Abandon all hope now for it will be no solace to you here.”

  “Thanks for the suggestion, but I won’t be doing that. So. I presume we fight. Would you perhaps accept the challenge of a game of chess? Winner take all?”

  “No.”

  “Drat.”

  Abandon all hope, Azure. And I call dibs on your big screen tv after you're dead.

  Next Chapter...

  The first line: 'The Mirror Monster wasn't amused.' :D

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