Chapter 376: For the Sake of Survival

Chapter 376: For the Sake of Survival

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Limbo. A realm of nothingness. A prison that traps your consciousness in the deepest reaches of your soul in a desperate attempt to preserve who you are.

It was a realm that only existed in one's mind, was only accessible through death, and was only escapable through reincarnation.

It was the highway between lives.

However, while I listlessly existed in that realm with nothing but my deepest subconscious to keep me company, I was calm. -How many times have I been here...-

As a wave of familiar memories endlessly flooded into my mind, I closed my eyes and attempted to focus on them.

But before I had that opportunity, I felt a cool, crisp breeze blow across my face, and with it, a smile surfaced. *Woosh*

*inhale* "Haah..." Taking a deep breath of the fresh, scented air, a monstrous wave of nostalgia washed through my consciousness, and I comfortably opened my eyes.

I was in the middle of a field of multicolored flowers, beneath an endless, unfamiliar night sky populated by countless nebulas and nearby galaxies. -What a beautiful sky...-

Gently sitting down as I looked up into the stars, I found myself in a shrunken, white-furred version of my fenririan form, only two meters tall, with rounded features and nubs for horns as if I were a child.

But rather than startle me, it made me comfortable.

"There you are! How many times have I told you to not come out here alone?!" Hearing the voice of a woman speaking a language I hadn't heard in millennia, I gently looked over my shoulder to find a normal, white Fenrir at least thirty times my height looking down at me.

It was a being with no face, but I recognized it instantly. "Mom, do you ever look up into the stars and wonder what's out there?" Looking back up into the sky, I smiled, letting myself fall into a trance.

"Haha," Her laugh was clear and warm. "Of course not, sweetie." Gently lowering herself next to me, she nudged her nose into my side. "Haven't I told you, I already know everything that's out there!"

She spoke with confidence, but at the same time, it was a line that made my smile fade. "R..right..."

Knowing what was coming, I closed my eyes and lowered my head.

*crackle* Almost instantly, the faint crackle of a fire met my ears, a wave of heat blew over me, and the scent of burning flesh flooded my nostrils.

Eventually opening my eyes, I found myself in a field of fire, now in a body that had matured immensely, with the mutilated body of my mother laying at my feet.

No matter how many times I experienced it, I couldn't get used to it.

Looking back over my shoulder, I found a white fenrir, only slightly smaller than me, staring past me with a look of despair painted on his face.

"You.. WHAT DID YOU DO?!" Bolting up to me, his jaws clamped onto my leg, immediately fracturing it.

But I let it happen. "Nothing... I did nothing..."

Biting even harder, I felt his teeth cutting through my flesh as tears streamed down his face.

"Stop... If you don't control your aura we'll be next." Looking up into the dark night sky, I found myself peering into an endless abyss devoid of stars.

But that was when a sudden growing ring of light appeared, starting from the center of the sky, before expanding over every horizon in a matter of seconds.

It was a ship so large it could disrupt planetary orbits, and so powerful it could effortlessly split planets in half.

Its presence alone was enough to ruin worlds.

However, while they were our enemy.. we weren't theirs...

We were simply an obstacle in the direction they were running.

*Zip-CRRRRAACCKK* A deafening shockwave blew over us as the ground turned molten and a line was drawn through the 'sky'.

*FLASH* Everything was instantly washed in a sea of light as I lowered my head and tried to block out all sound.

But it did nothing. *CRACK-BRRRRRMMM* As a heat wave so intense it burnt off my fur blasted over us, all I could do was grasp my aching heart.

"KIDS, WHAT ARE YOU STILL DOING HERE?!" Father's voice pierced the deafening mixture of sounds with ease. "I'LL BUY SOME TIME, SO GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE!"

As the visualization of his body melting away filled my mind, I could only cringe, desperately wanting it to end.

But the more I studied, the less hopeful I became...

Space mana devoured everything, and the only way to keep it away was with more space mana. Even with a perfect mana shield, it would still seep through, squeezing through unfathomably tiny crevices, not between imperfections, but between particles of mana.

My only solution was to emit so much space mana that it pushed the rest away, effectively shielding me. -But I must have complete control over it for it to work...-

However, that was something far easier said than done. Even with the most efficient space rune I could craft, I simply couldn't control the space mana it emitted.

It was like an intangible cloud I could only control in clumps, forcing myself to rely on the control of runes rather than my own mind.

But there was only one thing I could do to change that. -I need to make myself an attribute node...- Not artificially, but through the study and manipulation of my genetics.

Using runes wasn't enough to make the mana 'mine', so I had to take extreme measures, using the void to damage myself so I could alter my own genetics, destroying and reforming my reserve dozens of times to shred my organs, and begin sculpting a new body in its place, modifying more than just the genetics related to my attribute node.

But none of it was enough.

No matter how much I destroyed my body, the attribute node I wanted my body to create wouldn't appear.

I needed something more...

I needed to evolve...

It was a concept familiar to many creatures on my old planet, where they would hibernate in order for their body to repeatedly destroy itself, and reconstruct everything.

But we, as fenrir, didn't have that, so I had to take to more extreme measures.

"Dagr, I need to die." Looking him in the eyes as I interrupted his training, his expression darkened.

"Have you given up?"

I gently shook my head. "I need to evolve, and in order to do that, I need you to kill me."

His bitter expression did nothing but darken the longer we stood there. "Find an alternative then, I'm not going to kill-"

"Brother." My voice and gaze firmed in an instant. "I have already tried every alternative... We only have a hundred years before we go careening into the Abyss Eater's territory. We don't have time to find alternate routes."

"But.. what if you don't-"

"I have everything set up, I just need to die." Glancing over my shoulder, I looked back toward the cloud that had formed on the horizon, over a rune the size of a continent. "That rune gathers mana and souls, I made it using the rune of reincarnation Dad showed us when we were young as a reference..." Turning back to him, I saw him staring at the horizon with wide eyes. "If my theories are right. I can reincarnate myself, and the genetic imprint on my soul will reconstruct my body."

There was a long silence as his expression morphed between awe, despair, and anger.

But eventually, he grit his teeth. "If this is your twisted way of abandoning me, I will never forgive you..."

Finally standing up, I turned around to look at the cloud on the horizon. "What do you think I've done for the last two thousand years?" Walking ahead, my calculative expression lit up slightly. "Have some faith in me this time."

But while I said that.. the pain of getting your skull caved in by your only family and companion, hurt worse than anything I had ever experienced, and for him, the pain was only multiplied.

It was for the sake of our survival, but to this day, even in memory, that pain lingers.

But the worst part was.. it was only the beginning...

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