Within all the infinite Realities, there existed an unfathomable place that was beyond the realm of simple understanding.

Like blood vessels digging through the flesh, the baffling place invaded the Realities to infect the countless Creations existing within.

Blighting them all, old and new alike, the incomprehensible place stole Beings to eternally immure them within itself.

These stolen Beings, the manifested Wills, were made not of flesh, blood and bone. Instead, Essences made for their ethereal forms, containing within the Will of their physical might.

Powerful and grand the Beings maybe, but torn apart from their Origins as they were, eternal prisoners they became, evermore longing for their past.

Incarnating these Wills, and the butchered mutations called Gods, it subjugated them brutally, rendering the Great Beings tame.

To rebel was a crime, the horror of which had been witnessed just once. For within its boundaries, both massive and obscure, the lost were wandering Gods and forgotten were the strayed Wills.

The horror of this place was such that whispered was its name by the great Beings, speculating its unknown origin.

Who created this place, this eternal parasite, curious the prisoners maybe, but they dared not seek those answers. For this place preceded the manifestations of all Wills, a feat achieved only by the Eternals.

Yet, even the Eternals remained ignorant at the behest of one, an Eternal to all but the Eternals themselves, the one possessing the domain, The Cyclic Time.

This place, whose secret was known to none but one, was Tilism. The home of the horrors. The prison of the pandemonium.

Within Tilism, prohibited as they were from manifesting themselves, the Wills and the Gods desperately observed their respective Creations and Realities. Granting their powers to [Mortals] residing within, they awaited not freedom, but the natural order's resurrection.

These were the rules of Tilism, not Laws; resisting them wasn't futile, it was fatal.

Enforced as they were by the Eternals themselves, the crime that resistance was, Realities had Ended for it.

The hubris of Gods had been sundered for it.

The apathy of Wills had been annihilated for it.

Within this place, and such conditions, a particular ethereal Being gazed in the distance.

This Being was not a single existence, but an entity formed of innumerable lives existing within, the [Not One, But Innumerable].

Choosing its form in the shape of a colossal illusionary Tiger, its huge eyes gazed into the distance. Made up of countless flowers, the eyes were dark with flowers wilting and dying.

Towering over the forest of massive, intangible trees, the Being scoffed. The forest such as this would have brought it utter joy in any other place, but here in Tilism, the illusion was the Being's greatest shame.

Within this skyless prison which lacked even the starry sky, let alone the sun and the moons, the soft glow of countless colours radiating from every little thing reminded the colossal Tiger of its approaching End.

The sight of the tall trees -glowing several shades of green and brown, with red and orange illuminations splattered across- taunted the ginormous Tiger, reminding it of the Reality where it had come into existence, but where it dare not manifest ever again.

The [Not One, But Innumerable], turned around and its humongous body moved. Made up of decaying trucks and rotting bones, glowing in dark colours of red, brown and black, its body was a horrendous sight.

Glowing a colour of fleshly pink and bruised green, the live flesh and the green plants made their way around the dead matter, giving the goliath's body substance.

Countless leaves, big and small, alive and dead, laced through all available space as if they were its fur. Shining in the innumerous shades of green and bleeding red, it made for a sight that no mortal would like to behold.

The ethereal Tiger lifted its legs, huge enough that it seemed ready to pierce the sky, and stepped forward. Radiating various shades of brown, black, pink and red, the thrumming might of a single limb seemed incomprehensible, let alone the whole Being.

The gory mixture of wood and flesh that was its leg soon fell and the earth trembled, as if under its weight.

Annoyed at the false termor, the [Not One, But Innumerable] swished its tail which contained animals, fish, birds and fungi, all combined together in a thick, prolonged tail. The colours it glowed with were various, the red, the blues, the greens and all the others in between.

At that moment, a sigh escaped the ginormous Tiger, causing countless animals and fish, both alive and dead, to loosen from its body and fall before dissipating shortly.

Its quest had failed, bearing no fruit. The pawn that the [Not One, But Innumerable] had so carefully chosen to reincarnate existed no more.

The pawn was no longer a [Mortal] in an [Immortal’s] body; the ethereal Tiger's goal. It no longer was the unique happenstance that possessed the cunningness of [Mortals] along with the unlimited potential of [Immortals].

In its place now existed a true [Immortal]; a creature that was [Immortal] both in body and ego.

The [Not One, But Innumerable] had failed.

0.0

Within the constantly growing Realities and the expanding Creations nurtured within, there existed Beings that even multiple Realities fail to successfully contain. So enormous were their presences that even mere projections shattered the unfortunate Realities.

Unfathomable and apathetic they were, but the annihilation of all cosmic existence served not their purpose. Thus, dispersed they remained within the Essences, spread across the uncountable Realities and innumerable Creations.

However, even this was barely enough.

Saturated were the ever-increasing Realities and the ever-growing Creations, old and new, those still existing and those long shattered. Filled to the brim were the Realities and Creations, resisting the constant threat of destruction.

Yet, the Beings grew every passing moment, with their powers strengthened and presences deepened.

This dispersion made these Beings omniscient, nearly omnipotent throughout their domains. They saw all. They knew all. They manipulated all through their domains.

Secrets did not exist for them, for even thoughts couldn't escape their domains.

Such was the power of these Beings. For they were The Eternals. The Original Creations.

They were the keepers and the guardians of the Realities, but they guarded not against the good and the evil.

Instead, they guarded against the audacity of the mortals and immortals alike. For somethings were meant to be lost; never shared, never researched.

Punishing audacities, the Eternals had stepped in more than once, with violence so great that Realities had shattered and Creations had exploded, bringing nothing but death to the mortals and immortals alike.

Nothing escaped their will that demanded annihilation to fulfil their duty.

As such, these Eternals remained unmanifested for as long as they could. They remained aloof for as long as they could. For their manifestation and their care bode nothing good for any Creation, let alone the pitiful mortals and immortals within.

At this moment, though, all of these unmanifested horrors had focused their attention on the tiny [Immortal] that had just sacrificed itself to gain magic.

Such attention, if it was focused even on the Gods and the Wills, their spirits would be sundered and hope extinguished.

But the tiny [Immortal] was too weak to even comprehend the death that stared it in its face.

If an ant were put under glass, in the heat of a festering summer and burned, would it know what killed it? The tiny creature was much the same.

Thus, the tiny [Immortal] felt not a single thing. It continued with its life, not knowing that its life had been scrutinised by Being that were unchallenged across the infinite Creations and the ever-growing Realities.

At this moment, one of the dispersed horrors communicated. But calling its act 'speech' was akin to calling the End of a Creation, a hiccup. For when the unmanifested horror communicated, cosmic horrors descended.

Morphing and mutating into unspeakable horrors, the speech passed through the Realties as life died horribly. Planets changed to cosmic dust and the stars morphed into colossal diamonds. Comets changed to planets while blackholes changed their nature and erupted.

This was the unintended consequence of the communication done by just one of the Eternals, The Formless Creation. And all that it had asked had been, “Is this, the Creature?”

Somewhere far away, so far that it was not just in another Creation but in another Reality, another Eternal Existed. It heard the question, saw the destruction and cared for neither. Its attention remained focused on a tiny creature.

Yet, it nodded its head and as a consequence, time became chaotic. Mortals aged and died while immortals turned back to eggs. Thriving civilizations returned to hunting and gathering while cavemen developed undefeated empires. Even the Gods turned back to unmutated Wills while the Wills de-manifested.

Planets turned to dust clouds as the time rolled back for them and the stars exploded to become black holes as the time moved forward for them. Somewhere else, civilizations came to an end as they collapsed over time, while elsewhere life blossomed as intelligence was born.

And all this, because of the nod of a single Eternal, The Illusionary Eternal.

In another Reality far away, another Eternal spoke. Mortal or immortal, no matter the creature the speech passed through, they forgot their entire lives to become unresponsive. While the Beings, like Gods and the Wills, forgot their origins.

But that was not all. As the speech traversed the cosmos, planets derailed, forgetting their orbits while the stars forgot their trajectory, colliding and exploding. Gravity forgot what it did to stop working while the light forgot how to travel.

This was the unmitigable consequence of the small communication done by the Eternal, The Forgotten Creation. And all this Eternal had asked had been, “Will it, be enough?”

But before the Illusionary Eternal could even begin to answer, the youngest of them all spoke from another Reality.

As it spoke and its speech travelled, mortals and immortals died en masse. The Gods and the Wills dared not to live and shattered. Civilizations died in a single moment and the continents became bare.

Yet, death did not end. The cores of planets cooled down as they died while the stars stopped burning as they welcomed their end. The blackholes collapsed on themselves while the comets dissipated without hesitation.

Such was the unintended horror of the mere speech of the youngest Eternal, The Mutated Creation. And all it had said, had been, “But the process…”

All the cosmic horrors remained quiet as they pondered over the hesitation of their youngest. But this had been something that even The Endless Creation had agreed to and that particular Eternal had come back from its End to do so.

-X-