Kyrion looked at the back of his hand and saw an 8 glowing dimly. He had been busy in the Tower of Gehenna, transforming the chaotic mess into an orderly environment. Every ten floors were now protected by a guardian, their power level escalating the higher you get.

The first floor of every sector or first floor after a boss was a lobby sector where all the creatures could mingle. The second floor held various leisure and entertainment opportunities, the third was a residence, and the fourth through ninth were free areas to explore and fight against the natives. They were supposed to be; the eighth floor was very annoying.

“I feel like I’ve been forgetting something.”

Kyrion’s current secretary was a Lepora man with black fur, pale skin, and dead eyes. He was sitting in a squat position like a frog in front of him.

“After completing the tower management aspect, my lord. Your Lordship told me that you had to deal with Abbadon next. After that, there was something you needed to do on top of the tower.

“Right, something about a priestess or something. Time to deal with that royal pain.” Kyrion rolled his eyes and thought of his opponent.

Abbadon was a fifteen-foot-tall armored humanoid with black feathery wings and a Talwar longer than Kyrion’s body. The fight wouldn’t be easy as even with the few days of soul force gathering, he was still not where he wanted to be, and chances are he wouldn’t be able to eat them. Still, Kyrion came here for that reason, and he wasn’t leaving without them quickly.

Kyrion left his tent on the seventh floor. A desert environment full of sand and heat despite there not being an actual sun. The critters in this area were creatures of flame, snakes, giant lizards, burrowing beasts, and scorpions.

As he took three steps forward, the sand around him sunk into the ground, creating a spiral as he fell deep into another sinkhole.

“Not this Pita Worm again,” Kyrion muttered as he fell, watching a giant pink worm try to swallow him whole.

With a blast of flame, Kyrion superheated the sand around him, causing it to go molten and fall as it shifted into glass on the way down.

The work coughed hard enough to push Kyrion back to the surface. From there, Kyrion ran forward. Evading traps and fighting monsters. The way to the next floor was spartan, and getting there meant that Kyrion had finally finished the last trek. He finally climbed up the final staircase, ready for the challenge to come.

The eighth floor was small compared to the seventh. It was mostly a singular room with a thirty-foot radius. Behind Abbadon, the priestess was kept in something similar to a stasis casket. Although it was kept shut by chains.

Kyrion had prepared a secret weapon for this battle and proceeded to do some stretches as his opponent slowly arrived.

“Now. Mortal. By what way will you challenge me? Combat right?” Abbadon laughed as it raised its weapon.

“A battle of wits, big guy. We will each ask the other five questions, they can be in the form of riddles, observations, or genuine curiosities. Failure to answer the question comes in two forms, the first being I don’t know. The second way is to ask a question. Answering wrong grants us zero points, being close but not right is worth one point, being right grants two. Failure to answer cost two points. As curiosities can’t be wrong they are only worth one point. Any questions before we begin?” Kyrion asked.

“A battle of wits, boy. I have been here for countless years and you want to battle me with your puny mortal intellect?”

“Yes, and you may have the first question.” Kyrion stated plainly he could almost taste the uncertainty coming off of them.

“I never truly rest, but when I am gone, people sleep, and when I’m near, people move about freely. What am I?” Abbadon asked.

The area was surrounded by a field of green mana as the game began with the rules stated.

Kyrion knew the answer but needed to play the fool for at least this question. It didn’t matter so long as his opponent looked down on him. Easier to pull an overdog victory that way.

“My dad when he asks me to pick the weeds.”

“That is wrong and nowhere near the correct answer.” Abbadon smirked.

“Boo… Fine. Why are you still holding onto the priestess?””

“I choose not to answer.” Abaddon stated.

Kyrion’s pupils shrunk. To think his opponent was too honorable to lie. It’s not like that was against the rules.

“Why are you looking for the priestess?”

“Power I believe. Someone told me that they can empower your soul.”

Abbadon seemed disappointed as the answer hit them.

“If it takes thirty minutes for three blueberry pies to cool, how long does it take nine blueberry pies to cool?”

“Thirty minutes because quantity shouldn’t affect how long something takes to cool.” Abadon seemed to catch the flawed logic quickly.

“That is correct.”

Abbadon was at zero points, while Kyrion was at one.

“Why is someone like you here?” Abbdon looked dejected.

Kyrion clicked his tongue and sighed. “I don’t know.”

“Looks like I’m up one now.”

Kyrion’s eyes looked up and scowled as he saw a creature with a Doberman face trying to mouth something toward him.

It’s time.

“Hey, can you hear updog?” Kyrion said in a monotone while a mischievous light shone in his eyes.

“What’s updog?” Abbodon stated as horror quickly donned.

“Nothing much, but I did just beat you in a battle of wits.” Kyrion smirked wickedly.

“You son of a tyrant!”

“I do not deny that fact.” Kyrion was by no means a decent dancer, but at that moment, he was low to the ground and hop-kicking the air with his arms across

“You have a devil’s tongue.”

“Why thank you.”

“How did you manage to be more evil this time around?”

“The game is over. This time around?” Kyrion squinted as his natural defenses went up. The dancing stopped as he stood straight up.

Abbadon realized that they messed up.

“Hmmm… Priestess? Is Abbadon in that box? Were you just that board and attention seeking. If you told me you weren’t that creature I wouldn’t have had to beat you.” Kyrion looked as though he saw through the giant.

“How in the abyss did you put that together?”

“I’m dumber than I look and smarter than I act.” Kyrion looked away as if he just had another gut feeling.

“Well then Kyr, do you remember me yet?” Abbadon asked.

“Nope. Not like it matters.”

“Your words are harsh. No wonder you’re still a bachelor.”

“I’m fifteen and very busy. I have no time for distractions.” Kyrion lied.

“Maybe I still have a chance if I work fast..”

“Doubt it. My standards are quite high.” Kyrion sighed as he raised an eyebrow. He recalled needing to meet someone.

Abbadon shrunk in size until they were half a foot shorter than Kyrion. As they removed their helmet, Kyrion’s left hand moved independently for no apparent reason.

Abbadon jumped to the side to avoid the blow as Kyion threw a punch capable of separating her head from her shoulders.

“Oi. Some warning Cyr. Sheesh I know I’m technically your ex but still. Lethal force as a hello? I thought we were well past that.”

Kyrion blinked twice and scowled. “Ex enemy? Ex target. Ex pain in my rear?”

“So you haven’t… Doesn’t matter.”

“Midas. Why are you here? What have you done to yourself? Answer before I get extra punchy.”

“One, my name is Marigold. I’ve been here for the last one loop, I believe. One day I was sleeping and the next I was trapped in this world with my soul bound to the guardian. I can’t leave unless the owner of the tower grants me permission. I did nothing to myself; in fact, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Ex what?” Kyrion looked into Marigold’s soul and saw nothing, as he had no idea what he was doing.

“Ex wife.”

Kyrion’s eyes rolled into the back of his head as he fell backward.

“I’m not ugly. At least I shouldn’t be.” Marigold looked confused.

“Listen. Midas. I know I did alot to deserve to be pranked back this much in retaliation. But please don’t pull that I’ve been a female the whole time, stunt on me. It’s happened twice so far and both women seem abyss bent on ruining my life. Three strikes and I’m going to another world out of spite.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time. You do like to run away from your problems.” Marigold sighed as her blue and green hair fell to her shoulders.

“That doesn’t… Meh. If you can’t beat them, run and live to fight another day. Although by the time things are that dangerous I doubt I’d be me.”

“How do you know about the other shards and not the past you?”

“Because the bastard separated his memories from mine and has been trickling things in when he felt I was ready. It pisses me off greatly, and now I have to find that coward.” Kyrion crossed his arms.

“Your personality shouldn’t have diverged that much.”

“A lot of things shouldn’t have happened, Goldi.” Kyrion pulled out a pipe and started blowing bubbles from it with a severe expression.

“Please don’t call me that.”

“You didn’t answer the gender swapping question. Speak plain.”

“Fine. As you don’t know, I am a child of Imala. Imala usually only makes daughters. I’m pretty sure someone used a gender swapping curse on me after possessing me, I was really young and weak then. I’m not sure because time has been a blur.”

“Oh boy… So… Your current form appears to frequent brothels relatively frequently. Is quite rude to their siblings and an utterly irredeemable P.O.S that caused me to end up here after I sacrificed myself to save the world from a time demon that he let inside your body.”

Marigold collapsed to the ground. “My life is over.”

“I mean, hopefully you don’t have too many kids running about. Kinda evil to do something like that with someone else’s body though.”

“I am barren or infertile until I hit nineteen regardless, it’s so I don’t get taken advantage of for that purpose alone.”

“Yeah. That’s the annoying part. Like what if you find the one when you are seventeen or something and get married only to find out, your mommy said to wait two more years.” Said the ancestor behind Kyrion’s eye.

Kyrion grumbled something about having two headaches now before changing the subject. “Shouldn’t we go to the top of the tower? Also, I need you to help me reinforce my soul.

“I could have taught you that, my silly decedent.”

“You knew why I was coming here. Wouldn’t this have saved us some days of travel?”

“And not meet my great granddaughter in-law? Hearsay.”

“How do you want to be reinforced?”

“Marigold. Please put all my soul force into endurance.”

Stolen novel; please report.

“Why endurance?”

“I don’t need power yet. I need to be able to survive holding power internally.”

“I understand. Your soul is dangerously powerful for someone so young.”

Kyrion felt a pain in his chest as the power he had gathered made his body much more solid. Aside from that, there was no noticeable change.

The ancestor clicked his tongue internally but said nothing.

“What now?” Marigold asked.

“Up the tower we go.” Kyrion said as he punched a wall hard enough to cause the area to open up to the outside.

“I’m not getting burned climbing up there.”

“The snack is dead. And If it isn’t I’ll cook ’em up real nice like and have seconds.” White flames danced around Kyrion’s form as he began to cycle the soul force through his body.

“You talk about food a bunch. I know what a blueberry is but I don’t believe I’ve had a pie. Blueberry or otherwise.”

“Is that why we got divorced? Talk about irreconcilable grievances. If it were me, you’d have tasted pie at least once. I doubt you’d have divorced him if he gave you pie. If not pie, then he should have at least gotten you a cake.” Kyrion nodded at his sage-like wisdom.

“I can’t figure you out. Why do you sound so different.”

“Listen.” Kyrion held out a finger and leaned back off the edge of the wall and out of the tower.

“You damned idiot!” Marigold looked out the window and scowled as she saw no one below.

“Above. Now let’s go. I’m burning daylight here.” Kyrion proceeds to walk up the slanted tower.

“How? Why?” Marigold followed behind, although she had to climb up the last half as it was too steep for her to walk.

Kyrion arrived at the top of the tower minutes earlier as a splatter of green sludge was now in a place where he had once exploded. He reached out and caressed it. The sludge reacted by flowing back into his body. Only this time did he feel that the power was stable.

“What now, ancestor?” Kyrion asked his eye.

“Destroy the pedestal to free her. From there, she should be able to handle the rest.”

“I see.” Kyrion gathered power into his right hand and threw a reckless punch at the right support beam on the pedestal, holding the goddess up.

The black beam cracked then as lines formed from the point of impact and crept towards the edges before slowing to a stop. The tower tilted further to the side, its slant getting more pronounced,

Marigold slipped as she ran up the tower, falling forward as she slid back down. A loud thud impacted the tower and didn’t do much as a scream dopplered away.’

“I can see why you two didn’t fit. I bet you would have killed her with your carelessness.” His ancestor stated.

Kyrion scratched his chin and sighed. “No, I probably killed her on purpose. In fact I’m positive that’s what happened.”

“Why would you kill your wife?”

“She wasn’t, but I’m sure you can combine the pieces, given you’re connected with my brain. Getting to my hippocampus from where you are isn’t that hard.”

“Thing is, we’d have to get back to your body first as your brain isn’t here.”

“Oh. Let’s say we have a bird. The first bird dies soon after it hatches. Mama bird goes insane and attempts to resurrect said bird. From that corpse another is born. This second bird lived its early life not knowing its origins and while gloomy was content. Then one day, mama bird goes out and dies. The bird’s home is set aflame and papa bird is murdered by a bird resembling the first. The small bird fled west and trained to get stronger. Many years later the bird is happy again, living with his family when the bird that murdered his father returned. They fought and the second bird won, but the murderous crow escaped with its life.”

“So they are both crows.”

“Put enough crows together and you get a murder, and that’s what happened. One day while the second bird was away hunting, his wife was murdered. Said act drove the second to madness, creating an evil the world wasn’t ready for. Then something happened and time was reset.”

“Is that so?”

“That must be why I hate birds…Anyhow, this time around by some freak of circumstances the first bird survived childbirth and lived a strange childhood. He was spoiled for the most part and left to his own devices. Kept ignorant and free for his own safety as a precaution after an incident when he was four. Said incident was caused by reading a book he shouldn’t have had access to and following the diagrams creating a zone of death mana around himself. Within that area the second entered the body of the first and its red feathers turned black from the magic’s influence. The second erased spoke to their mother and placed a seal on their memories causing the first to forget what they did while it lay in rest.”

“So you were possessed. That’s concerning.”

“Hey, I don’t have all the pieces, but strangely enough I can recall bits that were kept from me here. If you can remember this when we get back, that would help exponentially.”

“You’re saying someone placed a memory geas on your brain? Do you think it was the second or mama bird?”

“No idea…Marigold should be about three-quarters of the way up now, so…” Kyrion focused his energy into his body as he twisted backward. He rotated his torso quickly, landing a right hook and a left powered by mana and momentum. This time, the pedestal arm shattered into the soul force. Which in turn flowed into Kyrion, causing his skin to glow as it reached capacity.

The black-haired woman woke up and scowled as she looked about. Panic on her face faded into confusion as she noticed the broken pillar. From there, she noticed a human scowling up at her.

Kyrion looked at his glowing arms and scowled as both began drooping. Deciding to cycle the energy through his body, he did something. The explosive feeling that had taken him previously was returning, albeit slightly slower. He looked up at the person he was trying to save and scowled.

“Who the hell are you anyways?” Kyrion asked flippantly, his irritation present.

“I am the goddess Almira, master of…”

“None of that. Not your title or position. Who are you?” Kyrion’s question cut deep.

“I don’t know what you are asking.”

Kyrion held his head in his hands. “You know. I think I’m done with deities. Do you want me to answer the question for you?”

“What are you doing?” The creature in his eye asked.

Kyrion didn’t answer verbally, but he did throw an arm up and flex for no apparent reason. He then picked up a chain and began to pull. “I’m gonna milk me a reward. Last time I helped a goddess I felt cheated. Whatcha got?”

“A-are you asking me to make a divine oath for my freedom?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Depends on what you can offer me.”

“I can give you knowledge, power, divinity. Anything related to magic is doable by me.”

Kyrion scowled and sat on an imaginary chair. He didn’t want to get cheated again. “Hmmm…What if I asked for her?” Kyion muttered his half-thoughts aloud.

“You’re a bit young for…”

“I could ask her to join the harem…”

“Beg pardon?” The goddess looked the human over in confusion.

“Oi! What do you know about magitech?”

“Everything and then some! But…”

Kyrion stopped listening to the goddess as he thought about his words carefully. “This isn’t my request but out of curiosity, are you going back to your world when you get back?”

“I couldn’t if I wanted to. Another has taken my position as that world’s deity.”

“Oh that’s a thing? I may need to replace a few of them the first chance I get.” Kyrion muttered.

“Do you hate deities or something?” Almira scowled.

“I don’t have much trust for my native deity.”

“Why is that?” Almira asked.

“Imala tricked me. Or well hamstrung me in a most inconvenient way. I wasn’t able to use my full power because of an oath. I was supposed to get a resurrection ability from her but that seemed to be either a lie, a thing I’ll get when I get olde or well a misunderstood oath. I gained an ability that I couldn’t actually use back home, and the oath saw it as a lie, or well, it did temporarily; it’s just slackened.” Kyrion sighed.

“If it’s still there then the goddess didn’t lie. It could have been one of your spirits preventing you from making a dangerous mistake. I don’t know much about spirit mastery aside from the fact that your spirits can limit your powers.”

“Fine…”

Marigold returned to the top of the tower, coughing and wheezing. “What was all that power?”

“Nothing much. Just used a ton of power to break some chains. Now either hurry up and kill me already or stay put for a bit.”

“Beg pardon?” Marigold stopped for a brief moment before golden swords materialized around her.

Kyion raised his right foot two feet off the ground and entered a mock crane stance.

Are you the one

Marigold began to skirt around the edge looking for an opening.Her blades spinning like drill bits.

Almira stayed silent and observed the interaction. Should the boy die then she'd be slightly inconvenienced.

Kyrion didn’t move as he stayed in his stance. He didn’t need to bother turning or keeping an eye on his opponent. Afterall openings are revealed when your opponent is confident they can’t be countered.

The swords flew towards Kyrion’s back and he didn’t bother trying to dodge as they embedded themselves into his soul’s form before stopping on something solid.

Kyrion ran his power through the swords and they changed from gold to an eerie green. From there they sunk further into his body and fused with him.

“Huh. Thanks for the knowledge. Weapon arts are an actual thing. Here I’ve been cheating by flooding my strikes with mana.” Kyrion hadn’t bothered budging or moving from his stance.

“How are you still standing?”

“You literally just put all my soul force into endurance.”

“No. I put them into range. It’s a useless aspect when you're weak.”

“Eh? Kyrion did feel like he wasn’t going to explode, maybe range helped by spreading out his soul…” His concentration faded as a sword passed through his ankle. The blow caused him to fall to his side. As he did he placed a foot down and held the position as he felt a connection within his soul flare to life.

“Stay focused Kyr. We have some business to take care of soon.” Said a familiar voice.

“Yeah yeah. Don’t get your knickers in a twist brain.” Kyrion absorbed some power from the blade in his ankle before pulling it out. Only the hilt and handle seemed to exist for a brief moment before a blade of soul forced gathered and condensed over and over again. Parts of the tower around him crumbled and flew into the sword, powering the bizarre blade.

“What are you doing?” Marigold asked.

“Using my range I guess. Now, if you want to live after I turn around, take two steps to the right.” Kyrion said as he gathered all the power he had taken from that shrimp into the blade. If souls had dopamine levels, he knew that he would be dangerously high. Now that he…

The sword shot out a pulse of energy that shot into the clouds as the weapon began to grow critical.

Marigold took way more than two steps to the left before throwing another sword at him. The sword, however, seemed to get drawn towards the glowing blade and was absorbed.

“Now where is he? While it may not count, it did kind of try to eat me. I have a reputation.” Kyrion scowled as he sensed a connection with the other shard of himself. They were quite far and behind a mountain. He couldn’t take him out from here.

“Tch.” Kyrion then looked towards the giant worm that seemed to be big enough to eat a world and smirked. That creature hadn’t known that it tried to eat him but that didn’t change the fact that it did. Things that tried to eat him had a habit of ending up dead, and he wasn’t going to change that.

“This attack needs a name. Mira? Any ideas?” Kyrion turned his head towards Almira with an innocent look that didn’t benefit the explosive power he had been gathering.

She had been imprisoned for over a billion years. When time reset, the power gathered hadn’t been lost but instead contained within her guardian and the tower. She could see why her sister tried to use a monster like that. “Betrayer’s Bane is a fitting moniker given who you're aiming it at.”

“Hmmm…” Kyrion felt the sky crack and shatter as it joined the blade in his hands, revealing a sky with eight moons and a large planet surrounded by them above. He felt a connection with five of the other moons and scowled as he noticed one was turning in the wrong direction. He then felt power enter the blade from said surrounding moons as well as the large planet above.

“Ah, let's see... By divine judgment I will execute you with Betrayer’s Bane!” Kyrion brought the sword down with an absurd amount of force and sliced the worm in half from the middle. Its multitude of brains all removed at once. An explosion of raw energy exploded where the corpse should have been as an explosion incinerated everything within a mile radius, the energy moving around the tower.

“Now we just need to do that seven more times to seal it forever.“

“Seven?” Kyrion looked down and noticed that he had lost both of his arms, and a leg had disappeared.

“The betrayer has been trying to break into this universe through its seals. Regardless of our goals every deity agrees that the betrayer must not escape into this universe. Seven heads remain and only six are in this universe.”

“I don’t believe I can kill them seven more times anytime soon.”

“We don’t expect you to?”

“Great. Now, Goldilocks, are you going to kill me?” Kyrion eyed the woman.

“My hair isn’t gold.”

“So the hair was a lie too?”

“What are you going on about?”

“You can’t be Midas.” Kyrion squinted.

“My name is Marigold. I’m sure there is a logical explanation.”

Kyrion felt his eye twitch and put some power into his remaining leg. With that power, he hopped off the edge of the tower, aiming to fall to his death. Unluckily for him, he survived said fall with a shattered leg being his only injury.

“Milord? Would you like to rest in the pool of rejuvenation?” Asked his secretary.

Kyrion looked at the male rabbit-human hybrid and sighed. “I wouldn’t mind if you drowned me in that pool, if I’m being honest. Don’t have much time left.”

“Yes milord.” And thus, the Lapora brought Kyrion to the rejuvenating pool and pushed him into it.

His body dissolved into pure soul force, leaving nothing behind as his soul was transferred through the river back towards the serpent, where he could be reconstructed.

Almira looked up and scowled. “That one has a dangerous path ahead. Tell your mother that if she hopes to keep her position she should distance herself from interacting with him. I don’t know all the pieces on the board but I can tell that someone with that much innate power could be a threat.”

“He isn’t the one I need to kill. Which is a different level of concerning. I know about the eight shards a soul usually splits into when it’s created. I’ve met them on the other side of the battlefield working for that worm. What I don’t get is how someone with that much power managed to lose.”

“That's simple really. The only way to lose would be not to play. Somebody made sure to take him out moments either right before or after he was born. Doing so however can create a fateless if done to someone with a strong soul. Usually those who have potential for great power or have absorbed that potential from a dragon. This is a prison world if you haven’t noticed. Gods usually dump rule breakers, criminals, failed creations, and their enemies here instead of sending them into the cycle of reincarnation. Then there are those who send others to this realm with the intent of trapping them. My body was used to create this tower and you yourself were sent here by some with designs against either your mother or someone else.”

“Who could these other people be?

“You would have to figure that out when you get back.”

“Why do you think he didn’t believe that I was his wife in a previous life?”

“Did you tell him that before you tried to kill him?”

“Yes. I also called him by the name Cyr?”

“You haven’t figured it out, have you…”

“I feel insulted that his first response was to treat me like an enemy almost immediately.”

“Did he ask you anything?”

“He asked me about pies cooling so I thought I'd bring it up and ask him what a pie was. Then he acted like my not understanding of pies was why we got divorced. Now I think that I somehow convinced him that we couldn’t have been married.”

Almira looked at Marigold for a long moment and didn’t say anything. It wasn’t her place to get involved in mortal affairs. Nor was it her job to teach her half-sister’s kid.