Becoming a Monster

Chapter 386: Chapter 386: Judged and Weighed

Anubis stood motionless at first, his jackal head tilted slightly downward as though weighing the worth of every soul gathered. He hadn’t spoken a word, yet his presence spoke volumes.

As he gazed in silence, his stare lingered on a man beside him. It was the same man whose thread was no longer visible. Anubis didn’t look down on the man with pity, in fact there was no emotion at all. He was merely making a mental note of someone that he would be seeing again shortly.

It was then that Anubis looked to the one that had intrigued him the most. The creature whose chest burned with the flames of fire that contained an authority over which he had spent his entire life serving.

"Wḥmw n pꜣ ḥr tp Dꜣwt, dỉ=k m-ỉr n=j?"

(Herald of the highest underworld, what is it that you wish from me?)

Anubis spoke without the use of moving his mouth. Neither the people around him, nor the drake nor any of Noah’s creatures could hear his voice. However Noah heard him clearly. Yet he couldn’t understand the language.

Despite the language barrier, Noah could still understand him, because Anubis wasn’t speaking directly to him, he was communicating to his soul.

Noah felt he had misunderstood. A herald of the underworld? The drake believes he’s a demon, angels call him a devil, and now a literal god that lives in hell titles him as a herald of hell. He couldn’t understand, ’Am I really a being of Hell?’ The thought felt more of the truth than anything else he could think of.

That truth didn’t weigh him down, it didn’t sway his goals or demean his resolve. But he believed that he needed to fully get to the bottom of the truth. What about him was from hell? Was it his soul? His aura that had been tainted after merging with so many creatures? The mysterious, powerful being within him? Or...

His eyes flickered down to his chest. Deep down he knew. He felt it the moment Amara erupted into flames. And it was further confirmed after tracking Anubis’s gaze.

The Nexus Eye.

The flames that allowed him to tamper, temper, and bestow the souls of the dead. He remembered what led up to him receiving such a gift. The title, ’The Fallen’.

There was only one Fallen that he was aware of. The first Angel that had fallen from Heaven’s grace, Lucifer, the first Devil.

He always had a deep suspicion that his eye had something to do with the fallen one. But now, that suspicion felt closer to certainty than ever before. And that made his senses deepen. Because if it was true, what would that mean for him?

His gaze pensively looked to Anubis who waited patiently, disregarding the fact that Noah was making him, a god, wait.

"There’s a lot that I want from you..." Noah spoke calmly, speaking without fear towards a god and without pride or arrogance. "I want information, information about you, the other gods like you, Hell, this eye... Or simply power."

Noah paused for a second to see the being’s reaction. Anubis’s posture remained the same, his breath was the same. And when Noah tried to use his eye to read him, he received no feedback, as if Anubis prevented the eye from reading his soul.

"But I’m not asking this freely," he continued, his gaze remaining locked onto Anubis. "I’ve never expected anything without returning intentions in kind. Whatever it is you’re willing to give. What can you give me for protecting them?"

Anubis reacted for the first time. His eyes glowed faintly, within them, one could see the wisp of souls. And for the first time since his arrival, he moved. The staff that was once that of a jackal’s head was now even larger than before. Its mouth was open, in its jaws was a flame that was more like a star than an open flame.

The god didn’t speak, but before Noah could understand what was happening, a scale suddenly manifested in front of him. The scale was large in size, making him seem small in comparison.

One side of the scale sat empty. The other side burned with the same flame within the staff’s jaws, only now it was larger, its light was even brighter than before, yet no one else was affected by its luster.

Noah had only a brief moment to scrutinize it, first noticing the weight tilted toward the flames.

Then, Noah found his worldview turned upside down.

On the other side of the scale, a projection suddenly appeared.

It was him.

Not the shadowed figure he presented to the world, but the version of himself where his human face was revealed.

Noah’s body shook. Inwardly, he inspected himself, his consciousness ventured into his soul realm. Only after vigilantly inspecting everything did he finally begin to calm.

When he saw himself on the scale, his first thought was that Anubis somehow was able to retrieve his soul without his knowledge. That the power of a God, despite his real body not being here, was able to easily manipulate his soul without being able to put up a fight. The very idea had his instincts screaming to tear the being apart, god or not, before Anubis could finish what he had started.

But inside his soul, nothing had changed. Not even the entity residing over him had taken action.

This made Noah look at "himself" again. He thought about the concepts Anubis was the god of. And as he looked back at "himself" his Nexus Eye was able to uncover the truth. What stood on the scale was his soul, and it wasn’t at the same time. It was a reflection, a mirrored image cast straight from the truth of what he was.

He looked between the scale and Anubis. Despite his volatile instincts, Anubis didn’t waver in the slightest. Noah couldn’t tell if Anubis already judged that he wouldn’t attack or if he didn’t see Noah as a threat even when the body he was using wasn’t his own.

Noah’s feelings calmed down, and his caution eased. He refocused his attention on the scale so he could understand what Anubis planned to do.

He noticed that, despite his ’soul’ being placed on the scale, it remained tilted toward the flame. Whatever was being judged, his soul was apparently not enough.

But then the flame, as if having its own awareness, began to become smaller. With each passing second, it shrank until the scale began to show a response.

Ever so slowly, Noah saw the scale level. And by the time both sides were completely equal, the flame was nowhere near the size that it was before. Barely even a tenth of it was left.

Noah didn’t know how to react to such a scene. Did his soul amount to so little? His pride at least made him think yes. But reason told him that it was much deeper than that.

First, he had to understand what exactly was being measured. They spoke about an exchange, so the scale should have something to do with that transaction.

"That means... it’s not about my soul being worth enough. But maybe it’s balancing my soul to what I’m asking for based on what I’m providing." Noah firmly came to a decision. If his thoughts were correct, then he no longer minded the result.

His thoughts were interrupted when what was left of the flame floated gently across the other side of the scale, disappearing into the soul that was his reflection.

The soul’s eyes flared, igniting with the same color fire. For a moment, Noah felt those eyes staring directly into him, not as a copy, but as if it was truly him. Then, the soul vanished.

The scale faded from existence. But Noah couldn’t focus on that, he no longer cared about anything or anyone else that was around him. His eyes tightly closed, the eye in his chest pulsed violently, its pupil shifting back and forth as if it was registering a surplus of information.

It was déjà vu.

Noah had felt this before. It was the same feeling he had experienced countless times when he still had the system. Information was being ingrained into his soul.

His continued silence began to make the creatures worried. Even the drake felt that something wasn’t right.

The humans weren’t any different. They didn’t know what Noah had experienced, nor did they know whether Anubis and the monster had come to an understanding. Noah was still processing the information when Anubis’ presence began to recede. Flames erupted once again around his body, leaving the sleeping figure of Amara to lay on the grass.

What Anubis granted appeared insignificant. What he had granted Noah was too much for his vassal to allow him to give, forcing the end of his emergence.

Noah opened his eyes at last. Within a small frame of a second, the glow in his eyes showed a faint glow of the green flames within his soul before it blinked out of existence.

He looked to where Anubis once was, the god’s body was replaced again by the woman that he finally decided to protect for now.

What he gained was just that significant. What he learned was neither a skill, nor the identity of his Nexus Eye, yet it was enough to grant his wish for power.