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  “’Twas no mean feat, my lord,” said the Dread Priest. “I am sorry to report that your grand empire is no longer as grand as it once was. In your absence, though I have striven to maintain what you built, far too many worlds and peoples went rogue. We have precious few worlds under our command anymore and even many of your followers have grown disillusioned and doubtful.”

  “I am aware of that as well,” said the Dread God. He flexed his hand into a fist. “But wipe the tears from the eyes of every Darzen, for today shall begin the rebuilding of my glorious empire. But we will not simply rebuild. We will add, expand, and conquer. We shall crush our enemies under our heels and break the wills of those who oppose us.”

  “My lord,” said the Avatar, kneeling before the Dread God like the Dread Priest. “It is my pleasure to see you alive and well again. Like the Dread Priest, I have worked hard to bring you back to life. I have used the power you granted me as your Avatar to carry out your will wherever I go.”

  The Dread God nodded. “Indeed you have. You have been an inspiration to all Darzens. Yet your work is still needed if we are to conquer the cosmos and beyond under my name. Therefore, you shall retain the title of Avatar of the Dread God, as well as all of the powers and respect that accompany that title.”

  “Thank you, Dread God,” said the Avatar. He sounded close to crying himself, which Beams found bizarre given how big and muscular he was. “I shall never forget your kindness and mercy, not for as long as I live.”

  The Dread God nodded once again and his eyes fell on Graalix. “And you, small one, you are a member of the Pokacu race, are you not?”

  Graalix immediately knelt similarly to the Avatar and the Dread Priest, though Beams thought he didn’t seem nearly as eager as they. “Yes, Dread God. My name is Graalix and I am the sole surviving member of the Pokacu race, the children of the Mother World.”

  “The Mother World,” the Dread God repeated. “Yes, I remember her. She feared me greatly, but I allowed her to exist so long as she did not interfere with my path. I should have conquered her.”

  “It is too late now, my lord,” said Graalix, though he seemed to say ‘lord’ reluctantly. “She is destroyed, but I was told that you had the power to restore her and all of my people if I aided you. So—”

  The Dread God suddenly snatched Graalix up in one hand and brought him close to his face. Anger distorted the Dread God’s already inhuman face into absolute monstrosity, making Beams wish that he wasn’t even looking at him. “Does the mouse make demands of the lion after he helps remove the thorn from his paw? If not, then what gives you any right to demand anything of I, the Dread God? The Pokacu were always a loathsome, petty little race undeserving of my glory and attention, but I forgot that they were self-centered in addition to being disgusting little insects.”

  “Please, Dread God …” Graalix gasped, as if he was being crushed in a vice. “My … my apologies … I didn’t mean—”

  “I care not what your intentions were, Pokacu insect,” said the Dread God. “The Dread God does not tolerate disrespect or demands made of him. I have no equal, either in this universe or any other. I would not even tolerate such demands from my most faithful of servants, yet you disgusting Pokacu slug believed you could approach me as a partner in some kind of business deal, as if I had signed a contract bound by law stating that I would have to uphold my own end of the deal once I resurrected.”

  Graalix couldn’t even talk now. His eyes were bulging from his sockets and visible cracks existed in his armor.

  “Were this before my death, I would have smote you here and now and used you as an example to others who would dare get in my way,” said the Dread God. He shook his head. “But I am feeling merciful and kind today and, though I feel no obligation to you or any other mortal, I must acknowledge that were it not for your efforts, the Soul Crown would still be lost. Therefore, I shall merely cripple you, but not kill you. Such is my mercy, which you shall live long enough to preach to others about.”

  Without warning, the Dread God hurled Graalix to the floor like a ball. Graalix crashed into the floor hard enough to create a small crater where he crashed. He lay there very still, his legs twisted in unnatural directions and strange blue blood leaking out of his body, yet Beams could tell that Graalix was not only alive, but that he would live long enough to survive his near-death.

  That was when Beams realized that the Dread God was looking at him now. He looked at the Dread God and met his gaze, staring into the massive eyes of the Dread God. But it didn’t really feel like he was staring at another person. He felt more like he was staring at his reflection in a mirror, a grotesque, distorted reflection that made his stomach churn.

  The Dread God snapped his fingers. Beams all of a sudden found himself standing on the palm of the Dread God’s open right hand, staring up into the Dread God’s face with a mixture of fear and apprehension.

  “And then there was you,” said the Dread God. “Alexander Fry, son of Jack and Fanny Fry, employee of Dennis ‘Rubberman’ Pullman, and known to the public in your world as Beams. But to me, I know you as my savior.”

  “I’m not your savior,” said Beams. He wasn’t sure where this sudden urge to talk back was coming from, but he rolled with it. “I should have killed you. I should have destroyed you on that Darzen ship six months ago.”

  “But then you would have killed Rubberman,” said the Dread God. “And I know how much you care about him, because I’ve been in your mind for these past six months. In some ways, I am you and you are me.”

  “I’m not you,” said Beams. “You are not me. No matter how much you mess with my mind, no matter how much you pry into my deepest thoughts, you’ll never be me. Ever.”

  The Dread God chuckled. “Your words are spoken fiercely, but I can sense the doubt hidden behind them, like a frightened peacock spreading its feathers to make it look bigger than it actually is. You are nothing but a small human boy, barely able to keep up in a world of gods and monsters. Still, as with Graalix, I owe you a debt, so I will spare you today.”

  Beams blinked. “Are you … are you going to let me go home?”

  “Of course not,” said the Dread God. He nodded at Graalix. “Graalix will no longer be able to serve me, nor do I need his services any longer. But it would be … useful to have another leader of the Darzens, a third member to join the triad that currently consists of the Dread Priest and the Avatar. You shall be that third member, regardless of how you feel about it.”

  Beams’ hands balled into fists. He wanted to glance at Bolt, but he knew that Bolt was in no position to help him. It didn’t help that there was a part of him that wanted to join the Dread God, a part of him that desperately sought the Dread God’s acceptance. He knew it was just the Dread God attempting to override his free will, but it was becoming harder and harder to ignore, especially whenever he imagined himself leading the armies of the Dread God across the multiverse.

  “No words?” said the Dread God. “I understand. Your tiny human mind is still trying to wrap itself around everything that happened. No matter. I don’t need you in order to regain my empire. You will come around eventually, because all mortals who oppose me eventually—”

  The Dread God never got to finish his sentence, because Beams fired a powerful charged laser blast directly into his face.

  The Dread God cried out in surprise and dropped Beams, who fell toward the floor fast. Acting on instinct, Beams hit the floor with a roll and immediately sprinted toward the nearest exit. He could sense that his lasers hadn’t actually harmed the Dread God, who was too powerful to be harmed by mortal attacks, but Beams hoped nonetheless that the Dread God would remain distracted long enough for him to escape. He could hear the Dread Priest shrieking at him, but he didn’t care. His eyes were on the nearest door and he put all of his speed into it, hoping against hope to reach it before—

  A huge, hand-shaped shadow appeared over him suddenly and the Dread God’s hand came down on him with a c
rash. Gasping for breath, Beams looked over his shoulder and saw the Dread God’s angry face glaring down at him with pure hatred.

  “Foolish mortal,” said the Dread God, hatred coloring every word that left his mouth, “you dare … you dare attack me. Your pretty lights didn’t hurt me, but I have never, in my entire history of existence, ever forgiven anyone who has ever attacked me for any reason. It is nearly enough to make me crush you out of existence, but I think I shall instead cripple you like Graalix and then have you thrown in the dungeons for a few decades to think about what you did. Trust me, that is merciful in comparison to what I could do to you.”

  All of a sudden, the weight of the Dread God’s hand increased on Beams’ body. Beams gasped in pain. He could already feel his legs starting to break. The pain was so horrible that he couldn’t even think straight long enough to fire his lasers.

  All he could do was stare up at the ugly visage of the Dread God even as the pressure on his legs became too much to bear.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Watching the Dread God come back to life was bad enough. Hearing the Dread God speak about how he was going to bring back his empire was worse. Seeing the Dread God punish and reward his servants was awful.

  But seeing the Dread God trying to cripple Beams under his hand? That was something Bolt would not stand for. He had been quiet during this entire scene, watching with a mixture of dread and awe as the Dread God returned to life and proclaimed his plans for the future, but when the Dread God began trying to kill Beams, Bolt decided he had waited enough.

  I’m still stuck in this wall, Bolt thought. Escape seems impossible, but I’ve been stuck in far worse before and escaped. This is nothing.

  Beams activated both his super strength and super speed. He struggled as hard as he could against the wall, wriggling his hands and feet uselessly. He pushed his body against its limits, forcing his powers to go beyond what they normally could. His body strained against the stone that it had been fused into and pain wracked every inch of his body, but Bolt didn’t care. His focus was on saving Beams and nothing else.

  Come on … Bolt thought. Break, damn it. Break!

  Then Bolt started to hear cracking noises around him. At first, he thought his spine was starting to snap from the effort of trying to escape, but then he looked around and noticed thick cracks developing along the wall around his body. His limbs began to move much more freely and the wall itself began feel weak against his efforts.

  Finally, with a roar of triumph, Bolt shattered the stone wall and went flying toward the Dread God. As he flew toward the Dread God, he channeled red lightning into his fist, making it crackle and burst with electricity. He flew as fast as he could, rearing his fist back, aiming square for the Dread God’s head.

  The Dread God seemed to hear him coming, because he looked in his direction with a puzzled look on his face. But Bolt was too fast for the Dread God. He slammed his sparkling, crackling fist as hard as he could directly into the Dread God’s face. He felt skin and bone shatter under the impact of his fist as lightning and electricity tore at the Dread God’s face.

  The Dread God went flying. His massive form slammed into the wall on the other side of the room, his head even smashing through it, though the rest of his body didn’t. The Dread God was then very still, not moving even an inch as he lay there against the wall.

  Panting and breathing, Bolt stared in disbelief at the Dread God’s body. Bolt always knew he had a strong arm, but even he hadn’t expected to hit the Dread God that hard. He thought for sure that the Dread God would have reacted, yet he managed to land a solid blow nonetheless.

  Then Bolt shook his head and lowered down to the floor, where Beams was sitting up painfully, rubbing his legs. But Beams was not looking at him. He was looking at the Dread God’s still body, looking just as shocked as Bolt, maybe even more so.

  “How are your legs?” said Bolt as he landed beside Beams. “Can you still stand? Can you walk?”

  “I … I think so,” said Beams, looking up at Bolt. “That wasn’t a dream, was it?”

  Bolt shook his head and raised his fist. “Nope. I actually punched him in the face.”

  “You didn’t …” Beams seemed afraid to finish the sentence.

  “Kill him?” said Bolt. He shrugged. “I don’t know. If he’s really as powerful as he says he is, he should still be alive, but I did hit him pretty—”

  A cry of anguish and anger tore through the air. Bolt and Beams looked up at the floating platform where the Dread Priest and the Avatar stood. The Dread Priest was slamming his staff against the platform and screaming, while the Avatar was staring at the Dread God’s prone body in complete and utter disbelief.

  “You monsters!” the Dread Priest screamed. “Insolent little pests! How dare you … how dare you attack the Dread God! Death is too good for infidels like you. No, you deserve to have your souls shredded into pieces and scattered to every corner of the multiverse. Your souls deserve to burn for all eternity in the afterlife.”

  “Kind of hard for our souls to burn in the afterlife if there isn’t a god to send us there,” said Bolt, nodding at the unmoving body of the Dread God. “Just saying.”

  The Dread Priest’s face, normally not very handsome, was so distorted by anger that it looked painful. “You dare joke about your evil ways? Never in all of my eons serving as the Dread Priest have I ever met infidels as disrespectful of the Dread God as you. Both of you deserve nothing but the most painful of deaths for your wicked ways. I hate you!”

  Bolt could not help but smile. Even knowing the Dread Priest’s powers, he couldn’t help but feel more amused by the Dread Priest’s temper tantrums than anything. He wished he’d brought a camera so he could film the Dread Priest’s tantrum and put it up online. He was sure it would go viral.

  Then a voice he didn’t want to hear spoke. “Enough, Dread Priest. Your god still lives … and he burns with a righteous anger against the infidels who tried to kill him.”

  Bolt turned to see the Dread God wrench his head out of the wall. The Dread God’s face was bloody and covered with ugly burn scars, but otherwise functional. The Dread God touched a trickle of blood leaking from his forehead and looked at the small amount of blood on his index finger with a hard-to-read expression.

  “I bleed …” said the Dread God in a low voice. “I have forgotten what it feels like to bleed, as I have forgotten so many other physical sensations. This body is clumsier than I expected.”

  The Dread God looked up at Bolt and Beams. “But no matter. You should have hit me harder, infidel. Now I will kill you both and use you both as examples to those who would oppose my righteous will.”

  The Dread God slowly rose back to his feet. Bolt took fighting stance, as did Beams, but deep down, they both knew they couldn’t defeat the Dread God. Bolt was convinced that if that attack couldn’t finish him, then nothing could. At least, nothing they could do, at any rate. Yet Bolt also knew there was no point in running, because no matter how far or how long they ran, the Dread God would catch them eventually. That much was certain to him.

  The Dread Priest gasped in delight. “The Dread God rises again! Oh joyous day! Oh—”

  “Enough, Dread Priest,” the Dread God interrupted again. “Once I am finished with these two, I shall call together an audience of all of the people of Jinkopa to inform them of my righteous return. I will need your aid in organizing the people.”

  “Yes, my lord, of course,” said the Dread Priest, nodding eagerly. “The Avatar and I live only to serve you. Nothing more, nothing less.”

  “Very well,” said the Dread God. He turned his rage-filled eyes toward Bolt and Beams. “It is time I end both of you. Even you, Beams. I thought you could serve me in some way, but it is now obvious to me that no matter what I do to you, you will never serve me. Therefore, I shall eliminate both of you from existence.”

  The Dread God raised his hands and pointed them at Bolt and Beams. Powerful beams of black and white
energy exploded from his hands, but Bolt and Beams immediately fired back with their own attacks. Bolt sent out a continuous stream of red lightning, while Beams unleashed a continuous beam of orange energy. Their attacks met the Dread God’s energy beam head on and there was a huge explosion which covered the whole room in a bright light. Bolt and Beams went flying from the impact of the explosion and crashed hard on the floor, rolling to a stop against the wall where Bolt had been fused to. Bolt had to close his eyes to protect them from the light of the explosion, but once the light faded, Bolt opened his eyes.

  The explosion from the collision between their attacks and the Dread God’s lasers had left a smoking crater in the center of the room. The platform upon which the Avatar and the Dread Priest stood had been blown away and the Dread Priest had nearly fallen off, only being suspended in midair by the cuff of his robe by the Avatar, who had caught him at the last minute. Graalix had been blown away, too, toward the base of the slab upon which the Dread God’s body had rested. It was hard to tell if he was still alive or not, though Bolt’s eyes were drawn to the Dread God.

  The Dread God looked no worse the wear for the explosion. His hands were slightly sooty and smoking, but other than that, he seemed completely unaffected by the explosion.

  Bolt wished he could say the same about himself or Beams. His body hurt all over from the blast, which was in addition to the pain he still felt from being fused with the wall. Beams looked even worse, lying flat on his stomach without even looking up.

  “Beams?” said Bolt. He coughed. “Beams, are you okay?”

  Beams stirred and raised his head. A portion of his visor had snapped in the blast, revealing more of his face. “Barely. You?”

  “I’ve been better,” said Bolt. He sat up. “But enough of that. The Dread God is still around and—”

  A large shadow appeared over them and Bolt and Beams looked up to see the Dread God towering over them. Bolt’s heart failed him at the sight. He struggled to get back to his feet anyway, but then the Dread God glared at him and he froze, unable to move even his pinkie toe. Somehow, the Dread God had paralyzed him, and seemed to have done something similar to Beams, too, based on how still Beams was.