Chapter CCXXVI: Kiss the Sky, You’re Going Goodbye! ~Multehx

Pseudo leapt gracefully from rock to rock, quickly making his way across numerous mountains. As he came to rest on a ledge that overlooked the plains below, he crossed to the edge and surveyed the terrain. Looking out at the night sky he chuckled darkly to himself. There truly was nothing quite powerful enough to stop him, and soon enough he'd retake the Genesis and make his total revival known to the farthest reaches of eternity.

There was the crunch of gravel under someone's boot behind him. Pseudo spun, clenching his teeth slightly. The area was free of another. All that he could see was the night sky, the stars above, and the desolate mountains. Then, quite abruptly, a distance of not ten feet away, another landed on the large rock protrusion.

As this figure stood, the moonlight illuminated his features. He appeared to be wearing flowing garments of vibrant colors, not too loose or tight-fitting, that seemed burned away badly in spots. His singed blond hair hung in a tattered mess on his head, and smoke still wisped from his body.

Brushing aside a lock of hair casually, he glared at Pseudo. "Well, that one was quite a spot. Almost made me a bit late." He snickered and folded his arms, assuming a cocky battle stance. "Too bad for you I'm punctual, old man."

Pseudo scoffed, summoning the Noch Thalt into his gloved hand and holding it ready. "Maybe so, boy, but I'm not about to go down easily."

Nictem sneered, cracking his neck with a movement of his neck. "Not have it any other way."

The two then lunged for each other, Nictem dodging the blade of the kama and landing a hard punch to Havering's chin.

Pseudo stumbled back, holding his jaw and groaning in pain. He retaliated, with slight hesitation, with an explosion of shadow energy, hurled from his palm and near totally engulfing the red Twilighter.

Nictem retreated to the mountain range, kicked off and launched himself back at Pseudo, trying for a hit to the torso with his arm engulfed in blazing flames. But the purple-skinned demon prevented this by dodging swiftly to the side and promptly delivering a back-hand to Nictem's face in return.
Reeling more from a blow to his pride rather than of pain, Nictem staggered back a few steps before regaining his senses.

"Come on boy, stop toying around and bring out the real potent stuff!" Pseudo yelled, raising another defensive stance. Nictem throated a growl and raising his hand to the heavens. A ball of wildly leaping flames formed in his palm.

He went through an intricate series of movements, starting with that hand being thrust into the air, then lowered to waist height, a full circle spin, thrusting the hand with the flames out at Pseudo, then snapping the wrist rapidly around, hand now upside-down.

The flames in Nictem's hand flickered and vanished.

Pseudo Havering blinked in confusion. He glanced around, quirking a brow.

"...That...that it? Hrm...you didn't even cause a magik disturbance in the air..." Pseudo shook his head and sighed. "That was quite a well-pronounced failure, I must say."

Nictem felt flush in the face. "Grrrhh-SILENCE!!" he growled in anger and indignation. "So I wasn't skilled enough to pull that one off; be glad, it would have melted your darkness loving skin right off your body and melted away your soul in the light of its flames!" Thinking for a moment, his evil smirk returned. "No matter, I can follow through with a simple add-on."

With a slight upward flick of the wrist, the red demon instead caused the earth under Pseudo to crack and be torn asunder as a raging geyser of molten lava erupted forth and took its victim into its entirety. It continued spewing forth molten rock and still unmelted fragments for a time.

Nictem began to snicker, but was abruptly cut short as Pseudo appeared directly in front of him, threw out an open hand and a blunt-ended shadow projection shot forth, striking him with the force of a jack-hammer launched out of a colossal cannon.

Quite un-stylishly, Nictem spun head over heels through the air rapidly enough to give a mortal man whiplash from the wind alone and crashed front first into the rock wall. It took him a few minutes to get up the strength to force himself free and to return to being right-side-up on the ground.

Pseudo snickered, waving a finger mockingly. "Stupid little boy, you're not half what you're cracked up to be like that. Stop fooling yourself with false hopes and return to the basis to which you're used to."

These words were obviously infuriating Nictem, but Havering seemed to be sheerly loving the anguish and agony he was causing, so he continued on.

"Why, what were you hoping to prove anyway? Still think you can attain that great rank? Pah! Not even I, the great and mighty Time Bender have been able to! Stop being such a damned fool and come to your senses so you aren't a total waste of creation."

Nictem clenched his fists, growling loud enough to cause most elderly an earache by this point. Steam literally hissed from the rocky ground beneath his boots and fire danced in his eyes. Then, slowly, the black of his pupils faded to an almost purely clear "glass" hue. "Power? You want power, old coot? I'll surpass you in every way!!!"

His laugh echoed over the land and the ground began to quake as well as smoke. Nictem's singed, messy gold locks then underwent a change. They became longer, glossier, and finally...green.

A headpiece formed on the Twilighter's head and his skin changed color as well. He exhaled a gust of black mist, grinning devilishly at Pseudo. "Well then, pop, prepare to meet your maker."

Pseudo frowned, grinning back evilly. "We'll just see about that, you little miscreant."

And the battle resumed. But now, at quite a more ferocious intensity than before. As I am still not yet of age and mastery of words to describe just how frighteningly intense it was, I shall not go into tremendous depth. It was a tremendous conflict, darkness versus darkness, father versus son.

The storm clouds abruptly gathered overhead and the sky planet-round fell to pitch darkness. Lightning leapt wildly in the clouds, striking haphazardly at the planet far below.

Some of the scholars of the wizard schools fled their rooms, students ran, terrified, from their classrooms, people flocked to their places of divine worship, convinced the end was at hand. At about the twenty-four-minute mark of the fight, following the awakening of Mayhem Grimael Havering's true abilities, Caelum began to rumble and tremble violently. Then, a great pealing bolt of lightning split the sky and two brilliant lights could be seen in the mountains.

One was the sphere of dark hatred, repulsion at insurrection to his great schemes and divine plan wielded by Pseudo. The other was the sphere of burning hatred, an unmatched thirst for vengance and vindication, held in Mayhem Grimael's hand. Over the roar of the energies, Pseudo yelled out, "Fair thine journey to hell goes well, my son!" as he released the orb he held. Mayhem shouted back "Same to you, oh sagely limited father!" as he released his.

What happened was not affirmed until much later on, as C.R. explained to Multehx one day what exactly caused this odd turn of events. It was noted that the two spheres empowered with their creators' emotions and desires collided with one another. The two locked in collision in mid-air, neither gaining the advantage without losing it a moment later. The two forces were too evenly matched.

The multiverse, unable to handle these radical energy imbalances clashing and refusing to give way, simply suffered a "replosion". C.R. best described this as, "When the multiverse tries to balance something out, it simply 'rewinds' time to right before the event it’s trying to sort out happened, and the energy emitted by this alone is
great enough to create a force which will cause severe displacement in the area of its occurrence, so whatever forces caused it won't cause it again."

In short, blasts too powerful, multiverse no handle, time rewinds, people go flying.

And so it happened. Across the multiverse, the Spectrum, its crew, the intrepid heroes that set out upon it, Malachai, Mel, Fanah, a Gundam Condemnation with Rebdok as its pilot, Pseudo, and Mayhem all were scattered. Each were left on different planets across the multitudes of the corners of space, some with others, some alone. But, in the subconscious mind of agent Multehx 707, the thought of danger impending on existence still lingers, and Pseudo, the Genesis, the remnants of the Twilighter council, and Lord knows how many other threats still lie in wait...

-----END ACT I-----