Esper Harem in the Apocalypse

Chapter 608 In The Name Of Peace

”You had the power of space and every god in your reality. In other words, you had everything... including the void. Void is a glutton; no matter how many times or how much you feed it, it will still ask for more.

And that is... you. I canʼt imagine what you must have gone through, really. Losing a loved one is indeed painful, so I can at least empathize with you. And you were absolutely right.

If I had gone through the same thing as you did, I would have become just like you. But there is a difference...

Even after losing your lover, kids, and everything else, you still had the courage to move forward and get stronger. You had that level of patience, and you went through countless reincarnations to get rid of all the gods.

Yet, you wanted to do better for mankind.” Rudy shook his head with an emotionless look on his face and said, ”I donʼt have that. I canʼt do what you did.

Patience and motivation... I donʼt have that in me. The moment I have no reason to be alive... I will... well, it doesnʼt matter what I will do. We should talk about what you want to do.”

”I...”

”You wanted the power of void, and you have it. What do you want to achieve now?”

”The first reality.... the power of time...”

”And what after that?”

”Isnʼt it obvious? I will destroy all realities and rule on them.”

”Thatʼs a lie. You donʼt actually need the power of time to rule over all the realities. You have been in this third reality for a year, and you didnʼt destroy it.

Obviously, you killed thousands of innocents, but after fighting you, I realized that you have a lot of experience and you are powerful. You can easily wipe out the earth if you want, but you didnʼt.

Why?

Sure, you tried to do it today, but you could have done it before. What were you waiting for? The full moon and whatnot? All that is bullshit, and you know it.

The truth is that you were stalling. You knew there would be a protector of the third reality, and you wanted to confront that protector. I donʼt know why, so tell me... what is it that you truly desire?”

Asura smiled wryly as tears rolled down his cheeks. With a painful expression on his face, he opened his mouth and said, ”I... want peace.”

”...” Rudy wasnʼt sure how to interpret that. If Asura truly wanted peace, he could have done it by himself.

”I want to... die...”

”Oh...”

”I am tired of living. I am all-powerful, but I am not happy. I have everything, but I canʼt do anything. Watching over the realms and races is a chore. There is no one to take care of me.

No one to hold me... no one to embrace me... no one to comfort me... no one to understand me. Therefore... I want to die and end my suffering. But I am immortal. Even the gods and universe couldnʼt kill me. Even you couldnʼt kill me.

I thought if I had the power of time, space, and the void, I could erase everything, including the universe. I thought if nothing existed... I could remove myself from existence. I thought I could die, but I failed at dying too.”

”You know why you canʼt die. Why are you making excuses? You are not giving your 100%, or rather, you are not trying your best as if you were always having second thoughts,” Rudy remarked.

”...”

”Do it! If you truly want to die, then do it!”

”But...”

”I always make my enemy suffer in the best way possible. There was one who wanted to die, so I kept her alive. You are the same, and I want to keep you alive so you can suffer for all eternity, but you are too dangerous to be left alive. So do it!”

Asura looked up at Rudyʼs face and asked, ”What about the second reality? What will happen to it without me?”

”I donʼt know. But it should function normally, with or without you.”

”What if another powerful entity is born and puts the second reality in danger?”

”If that ever happens, I will take care of the second reality.”

TING!

”Heh...” Asura chuckled softly and said, ”Liar. You donʼt even know how to find the second reality.”

Asura sat in a lotus position, closed his eyes, and uttered, ”Law-- my dear old friend. I am going to leave you behind. It is time... to use the favor. I want you to kill me, remove me from existence.

And if the second reality ever needs a protector, I want you to summon the Lord-- the protector of the third reality-- into the second reality. I hope that doesnʼt count as two wishes, but even if it does... it doesnʼt matter.

Once my first wish is fulfilled, I will die, so it doesnʼt matter how many favors you do to me after that. And as for my second wish... you have no choice but to fulfill it. After all, if the second reality is in danger... you will be in danger.

In order to protect the second reality and yourself, you will have no choice but to summon the protector from a different reality. My brother, the Lord, has volunteered, so I will trust him. But it matters not because it would be none of my concern.”

A few seconds later, Asuraʼs body slowly began to turn into ashes of energy that twinkled, and the remaining light inside him eventually faded away. Ultimately, Asuraʼs entire body had turned into the remains of energy and merged with the universe Rudy had created.

”Well then... time to return.”

Rudy placed his hand on his body and shrank his body to as small as he could. But even his smallest size was bigger than the galaxy. So Rudy combined his shrinking ability with his object time-manipulating ability and shrank his body to the size of a normal human.

Afterward, he created a skeleton, blood, and cells that formed tissues and organs and eventually turned into a human body.

He inspected his body and sighed in relief.

”I am glad that worked.”

Rudy turned around and heard a strange sound coming from his body. At first, he assumed he messed up somewhere, but he noticed that gas was coming out of his navel.

But it wasnʼt an ordinary gas, it was cosmic gas.

His powers had started leaking again.

ʼI thought it would be fine since I used up so much power!ʼ

One by one, Rudyʼs body parts began to crack and explode as his power burned his body completely and evaporated him from existence.

His powers spread across space and began a massive ball. But it soon began rotating and emitted powerful energy that could even burn the space. The energy whirled around the ball as it pulsated and released cosmic waves.

At that time, Rudy was alive, but he couldnʼt control his powers. The waves traveled with the speed of light and began to destroy the stars, planets, and galaxies of the universe he had created.

Furthermore, the power was killing Rudy, making him sleep forever, so he couldnʼt do anything. Rudy tried his best to fight back, but his powers won, and he ceased to exist.

Rudyʼs true battle wasnʼt against Asura, but it was against his powers. And he died in that battle.

In his last moments, Rudy recalled the last moments of his past life and wondered if he had done anything better.

ʼDid I use my second chance properly? Did I manage to save everyone from their bad endings?ʼ

Once Rudy died, his powers were no longer bound to him, so they went berserk and began destroying everything that existed in their path.

That was the beginning of the end and the ending of the beginning. It was an awakening to end everything to start a new beginning.

Within the next three seconds, half of the universe had already been razed completely from existence. And if that continued for even 60 more seconds, the cosmic waves would have reached the existing universe, destroying the milky way galaxy, the solar system, and the earth with it.

But that wouldnʼt have ended there. The cosmic waves would travel to other worlds around and destroy all the worth in existence. Even the debris, asteroids, comets, stars, moons, suns, and planets.

Everything would have ceased to exist. And nihility would stay for eternity.

That was the beginning of the big bang.

However, as soon as the cosmic waves reached the center of Rudyʼs universe, something unusual happened.

The cosmic waves began to disappear, and the universe began to regrow at the same speed. It seemed as though the time had reversed itself.

Suddenly, a pure black hand appeared out of nowhere and took Rudyʼs power in the palm. Even the place was so big that Rudyʼs power seemed like a golf ball in comparison.

Then, another hand came and covered the ball. After a while, the black hands began to absorb Rudyʼs power, and the body of the hands eventually began to appear.

It was the space itself.

Soon, everything calmed down/

The hands opened and revealed a newborn baby in a leech position. The body was shining bright, but its light seemed warm and weak, just like the moonlight.

The hands slowly moved the baby, and it seemed as though the baby was in the bodyʼs womb.

[Arise, my child.]

A voice spoke in a calm, sweet, and ethereal voice.

===

Thanks, @Monke232, for the gift!