Chapter 158: Your Fall Is Over
Death of an old life.
And the start of a new one.
The true start of his new life.
He had become beyond what his family knew, beyond what even he had known of himself.
More than a Sultan. More than a Stranger.
He was Malik, Sultan of Sultans.
And the world, for everything it had thrown at him, still hadn't broken him, not this time, not again.
Not Mariam, his mother's betrayal.
Not Mahdi, his guardian's death, a mercy killing done by his own two hands.
Not Sinbad's half-death.
Not Huda being taken from him.
Not his mad quest for ascension.
Not Jasmine's death, another loved one sent to the river by his own hand, freeing her Soul before Corruption could claim her.
Not that smile she'd worn at the end.
Not his maddening time in the dungeon.
Not his cruel fall into Depravity.
Not his war against the impossible.
Not his acceptance of a father's sacrifice.
Not his tragic farewell to the one he loved.
Not his pilgrimage through the unseen valley.
Not that conversation with IT.
Not his want for a "break."
Not his meeting with the one he'd "abandoned."
Not his war with an even greater impossibility.
Not his continued sacrifice.
Not the loss of parts of his own Soul.
Not that one accursed second.
Not the truth.
Not his failure.
Not revisiting his old complacencies.
Not their goodbyes.
Not her poisoned love.
Not a life cut loose from its chains.
A life freed of mountainous weight.
Yet still burdened with countless more.
Somewhere in all of it, Malik had grown a... beard.
A small, strange detail, but a real one. It was proof that time had passed and that his body had resumed its human business of aging, even while his Soul had been dragged through millions of deaths that were only his own to carry.
'I'm... tired. So tired.'
And yet he had so long to go.
Malik was truly too kind for his own good.
But that was the joke of it, wasn't it?
Throughout the world, all men were measured by justice.
Only Malik had justice measured through him.
Blink.
A slow one this time.
When Malik opened his eyes, it was like nothing had happened at all.
He was back in Hell.
The bottommost layer of Hell.
Malik realized that almost instantly.
Only Zamharir had such frozen fire.
Black flames beneath his feet that burned cold instead of hot. But even this layer had the same starless sky pressing down overhead.
There was no doubt about it.
That nightmare, that endless carousel of death and failure and betrayal, had been meant to shatter him.
A mental execution. Or maybe more accurately, a slow slaughter of the Soul, one life at a time, one grave at a time, until nothing was left standing.
Well.
It didn't work.
It didn't even scratch him.
The Origin of Corruption had failed completely.
So Malik simply stood there, feeling... empty.
Yes, he felt hollow, in the particular way a man could be hollow without actually being dead.
Once, maybe, thoughts like that might have gotten to him. Might have found a crack somewhere and worked their way in. But now, they were just...
Meaningless.
Yeah, meaningless.
He saw no reason to dwell on them, and even if some of it turned out to be true—which he didn't believe—it wouldn't have mattered.
He was selfish enough to stick to this timeline. This one. The one where his life hadn't been lost, where the world hadn't quietly moved on without him in it.
And now, in his world, he had to move.
Move towards the graves before him.
Yes, the same ones he saw behind IT.
Somehow, they had followed him down here.
The Sultans that came before him, those who sacrificed their lives to give Devil's Maw a future.
Those who had helped build the path Malik walked on to save his people, the path of fire and blood.
For that, he... looked at them all.
He read the names of the tombstones.
Names that weighed heavily on him.
But there was one that stood out.
A grave he couldn't ignore.
One that marked the end.
Malik knelt by the grave.
Upon it lay a scroll, brittle with age but somehow still legible, the ink holding on stubbornly against the passage of however many decades had crushed this man into the ground.
He picked it up and read.
[To whoever finds this,
I'm of the seventy-seventh expedition.
The seventy-seventh Sultan to make it this far.
To those who came before me… thank you.
Your words helped me survive.
They gave me tens of years.
But... I failed you.
I failed.
I failed. I failed. I failed. I failed. I failed.
You gave me your legacy, and I couldn't carry it forward. I couldn't figure it out.
I've lasted longer than most, maybe all. A hundred cursed years. But my body's given in; my healing's gone.
I can't stand.
And still, I did not find the obstacle.
I thought maybe it was hidden, maybe buried, maybe locked in a puzzle...
But there's nothing, just fire.
A damned fire.
So... to those after me... I'm sorry.
I'm sorry I couldn't help more.
I'm sorry I couldn't find a way through.
I'm sorry I disappointed you.
My people.
My kingdom.
My fellow Sultans.
Myself.
All I can do now is keep my body whole.
Keep this scroll safe.
Maybe it'll help.
Maybe... maybe it'll keep me remembered.
That's all I can ask now.
—Sultan Xerxes al-Nāmurād]
His words hinted at a most tragic history.
One that Malik already knew.
The Sultans... none of them were able to reach this layer, at least not while they were alive.
All that tried had failed in one way or another. The obstacles separating each layer of Hell had stopped them.
Only Malik... only he was able to do it before.
And now he did it once again.
But there was a difference.
This time, he wasn't alone.
His predecessors came with him.
"You're wrong, Xerxes."
Malik smiled gently at the grave.
"You haven't failed. None of you have."
It was as if he could see the man buried within.
"We have all succeeded."
A Soul that remained even in death, awaiting conclusion.
"Your Fall is over."
One that was bitter yet sweet.
For they, thanks to IT's attempt at breaking Malik, have finally achieved what they so wanted to achieve.
Only they did so after death had claimed all of their lives.
"Rest now."
Truly... it was bitter.