Deimos Develops Darkness

After scouring the vast reaches of the Interweb, searching through countless forums, review sites, and social media threads, Deimos finally sensed a faint flicker, a whisper of mortal chatter, a fragile echo of his creation stirring in the digital abyss. His divine senses sharpened, homing in on the faint pulse of mortal voices.

A particular voice caught his attention: crude, unrefined, but unmistakably alive.

He descended, unseen and silent, into the dim glow of a cluttered room, a universe of its own chaos. The air was thick with the scent of stale coffee, burnt toast, and the faint hum of an aging fan. Shadows danced across walls cluttered with posters of forgotten bands, torn notebooks, and tangled wires.

In the corner, hunched over a battered keyboard and an aging monitor flickering with static, sat an unkempt, overweight man, Mark. His face was gaunt, eyes bloodshot, rings under them like dark moons. His clothes hung loosely, the fabric strained over a belly that had seen too many nights of frustration and too few proper meals.

Mark talked to himself, voice raspy and tired, a weary echo of someone who had long given up on hope.

"What the hell is this garbage?" he muttered, eyes fixed on the screen. His fingers hovered over the keyboard, trembling with fatigue.

He was one of many government-appointed game reviewers, tasked with sifting through the endless flood of new releases, most of which were cheap knockoffs, recycled ideas, hollow mechanics. His job was a thankless grind, a cycle of disappointment. Every game blurred into another, no plot, no depth, no character, just empty mechanics and hollow aesthetics.

His eyes, bloodshot and unfocused, glazed over as he clicked from one game to the next, an endless loop of boredom.

Finally, his cursor hovered over Deimos's Terror Tavern. He hesitated, a flicker of curiosity crossing his face, then clicked.

Mark — "What the hell is this garbage?"

His screen flickered violently like a glitch in the fabric of reality. The title appeared: Terror Tavern. No image, no trailer, no description, nothing but the stark, silent name.

Mark's brow furrowed, frustration bubbling to the surface. His voice rose in contempt.

Mark — "What the hell is this? A joke? Are they seriously wasting my time with this pathetic excuse for a game? No art, no trailer, no effort, just this bland, meaningless title staring back at me like a slap in the face. This is what they call 'creativity' nowadays? A lazy, half-assed effort with nothing but a stupid name? Honestly, it's an insult to anyone with half a brain."

He leaned back, rubbing his eyes, voice dripping with disdain.

"God, these government contests. They want slop, slop, slop – anything that doesn't require a single ounce of real thought or effort. This… this is barely a digital afterthought. I should just... I should just pulverize it. Send it to the digital void."

He moved swiftly, clicking on the 'delete' option, a dismissive flick of his mouse. The cursor hovered over the game's icon, ready to wipe it from existence forever.

In that instant, Deimos's divine fury erupted.

His form shimmered with terrible, dark light, a supernova of wrath that tore through the void. His consciousness roared with primal rage, a fury so intense it threatened to shatter the fabric of reality.

"How dare this mortal, this insignificant fool, cast aside my divine creation as mere trash?! Do you know who I am? I am Deimos, fear incarnate, whose wrath can raze worlds! And yet, you dismiss my work with contempt, as if it were mere GARBAGE!"

His divine energy surged, incandescent and violent, trembling with fury beyond mortal comprehension. Every fibre of his being burned with the need to punish, an urge rooted in eons of torment, a hunger that fed on screams and chaos.

"I OUGHT TO FILL HIS MIND WITH GARBAGE... OR BETTER YET, MAKE HIM SO PARANOID HE KILLS HIMSELF! YES, THAT WOULD BE PERFECT," he snarled, trembling with wrath.

His divine perception flooded Mark's mind, visions of chaos, nightmares, and madness swirling into a storm of torment. The divine fury threatened to spill out, infecting the mortal realm, twisting Mark's thoughts into a labyrinth of despair.

But as he prepared to unleash this divine punishment, a sudden, invisible pull yanked him back, like a broken string snapping under tension.

Deimos's awareness snapped back with brutal force.

He found himself re-inhabiting Jack's battered body, flesh trembling, heart pounding, divine presence flooding into the fragile vessel. His vision cleared, and he was back in the cluttered room, walls lined with posters, the hum of the city outside filtering through cracked windows.

His anger still burned, but now, it was tinged with frustration.

He clenched Jack's trembling fists in his mental grip, voice dripping with venom.

"I'LL SHOW YOU WHAT GARBAGE IS… BY TURNING YOU INTO IT," he hissed, voice distorted with rage.

He was about to set his plan into motion, another nightmare born from divine fury, when something unexpected caught his attention.

His divine senses flared with confusion. The rage simmered, but beneath it, a strange sensation prickled, an odd, persistent whisper of interference.

Why had he been pulled back so suddenly?

What divine force had intervened?

His senses sharpened, probing deeper into the room's mundane chaos.

Was this a divine interruption? Or was there something more?

Deimos's fury simmered momentarily, his senses prickling with a strange, unfamiliar sensation. For the first time in eons, he sensed something elusive, a faint heartbeat within Jack's subconscious, fragile and battered but undeniably alive. Beneath the chaos, something else stirred… Hope, stubborn and resistant to his divine invasion, defying his understanding.

His brow furrowed, a flicker of confusion breaking through his rage. "What, is this?" Deimos growled inwardly, eyes narrowing as he tried to grasp the inexplicable presence disrupting his divine perception, an anomaly that didn't belong in his perfect chaos.

End Of Ch 5: The Madness Of a God