Chapter 21 - Family Matters - Part 5

Wednesday 12th of May, 2021 - unknown planet:

Two days ago, Michael was disintegrated into atoms by Darkness on this planet.

On this empty planet, atoms were coming together and it started to form something.

It started to form legs and then the rest of the body.

Within a few seconds, the atoms had recreated the body of the Archangel Michael.

“How…?”

The unsure Michael looked around himself.

He saw nothing but emptiness.

As he was looking around, at the corner of his eye, he saw something.

His vision was blurry but on this forest of the planet, he could see something white that didn’t fit the surrounding area.

“Hm?”

He scratched his eyes and adjusted his vision.

After adjusting his vision, he saw a figure in white armour.

“Baros...”

Michael’s face distorted and formed a smile and relaxed his body.

“I wonder-- Hrk!”

His smile vanished.

That relaxed body tensed up once more.

He started to shake in fear.

Eyes twitching furiously in fear too.

What happened? What did he see?

“What is he…?”

Behind the white armoured Baros, a white-haired human with the power of the god was standing.

“Na...za...r…?”

Michael cursed himself.

This was the end.

The end is nigh.

Michael’s body started to shake in fear.

He thought he was done for.

He was looking at Nazar who was standing behind Baros.

“Michael...”

Hearing Baros’s voice, Michael tried to turn his gaze towards him but due to his fear, he couldn’t take his eyes away from Nazar.

“Why did you not tell me earlier?”

Not paying attention to Baros, Michael continued to keep his gaze on Nazar.

Two silver metallic wings came out of the Archangel’s back.

However, something happened.

What happened?

Michael sucked in a breathe.

“H-how?”

In an instant, Nazar was glaring him down.

Nazar didn’t use his super speed or teleportation.

But he was standing in front of Michael.

It shouldn’t be a big deal that Nazar appeared in front of him but Michael felt something. He didn’t know what it was but he felt something he couldn’t explain.

“Answer him.”

Hearing Nazar’s cold tone, Michael gulped as he felt chills down his whole body.

Nazar was standing behind Baros once more.

Michael knew that he had not used teleportation or speed. But what had Nazar used?

“Hey...”

Michael forced himself to speak.

“How did you do that?”

“Existence manipulation.”

Nazar’s fast reply made Michael freeze in his place.

“I am manipulating the existence to my will. What you saw right now was a jump between universes.”

The air in front of Michael’s eyes slashed in half horizontally.

After the slash, he could see two.

On the eye level, he was seeing Nazar standing behind Baros.

But once he looked down, he could see Nazar standing in front of him too.

Michael couldn’t explain what he was seeing.

He looked up and down and saw two different Nazar’s.

Where was the real one?

“... What?”

He scratched his eyes.

Once Michael opened his eyes, the world before him was back to normal.

“Anyway, why did you not tell me, Michael?”

This time, Michael look at Baros.

His wings were still out.

Michael could fly out of here but he wasn’t moving. He didn’t want to move.

“Why did you not tell him, Michael?”

Hearing Nazar’s question, the confused Michael asked, “Tell him what?”

“About who I am… About what I truly am.”

Michael looked at Baros.

His confused look was slowly changing.

“You are telling me...”

Michael’s eyes started to widen in surprise.

“I found a secret bunker recently in Chias. I asked Solace to open it for me and there I found it. What the Church of Michael had hidden from me. And what you hid from me for so long.”

Baros’ sword materialised in his right hand.

“We met many times before but you didn’t say anything.”

He swung the sword in his hand.

“So, why did you not TELL ME?”

Baros shouted as he shot himself towards the Archangel Michael.

Baros was holding his sword in his two hands and it was going to slash Michael’s head in half.

CLANG!!

But to no one surprise, Michael’s metallic wings had stopped Baros’ sword.

“Tch.”

Baros jumped back slightly.

“So, that’s how you want to play it... Then let me show you that I know what you hid from me.”

Baros closed his eyes.

Michael could see the pain on his face.

“Wait, don’t tell me...”

“Don’t interfere, Michael.”

Hearing Nazar words, Michael gulped.

“Aaarrrggggghhhh!!”

Baros shouted in pain as he let go of his sword.

“No, no, no, no, no,” Michael muttered to himself.

Nazar smiled thinly as Baros cried out in pain.

“You… You should have told me...”

Streams of cold sweat were pouring down Baros’ face as he lost the strength to stand up and fell to the ground.

“What I... really was...”

Grunting, Baros’ bones started to let out a breaking sound.

“Oh, it really is true,” Nazar said slowly.

“Wait, Baros, stop. Don’t do... it...”

However, Michael couldn’t finish on time.

From Baros’ back, two wings came out.

Two white wings came out of his back.

His armour was still intact.

“No!”

“I…”

Breathing heavily, Baros picked up the sword and started to stand up.

“I never knew... I had this much power.”

He took a few deep breaths and looked at Michael in the eyes.

“If you would have told me who I really was, I could have done more for my people… For your creation.”

He held his sword tight in both hands.

“Lian wouldn’t have gone through all of that.”

Baros narrowed his eyes.

“I raised her as my own… I thought of her as my own daughter...”

He shot himself towards Michael once more.

“But she had to go through all that because of a Church that worshipped you!”

This time, Michael’s wings didn’t stop Baros’ sword.

No, he tried it but he couldn’t save himself.

His body was sliced in many pieces.

“Because of you, she went through so much. Because of you...”

Baros bit his lip purposefully and stopped talking.

Nazar’s finger twitched and the sliced body of Michael came back together and he was alive again.

“WHAT KIND OF FATHER ARE YOU, MICHAEL?”

Baros swung his sword again.

He was aiming for Michael’s neck this time.

“What kind of father are you, Baros?”

“Keh!”

Hearing Michael’s reply, Baros froze in his place.

His sword stopped right next to Michael’s neck.

Slowly standing up, Michael continued.

“What kind of father are you, Baros? You let your ‘daughter’ do everything the Church asked you to have her do. What kind of father would let their child do that? What kind of father will let their young child go through constant torture, sexual abuse and much worse just for the sake of a Church?”

Michael walked closely towards Baros and he took a few steps back.

“What kind of father will let their child be used like she is a toy? What kind of father would let--”

Michael let out a sigh.

“I didn’t tell you anything because of this. You are a half angel. The reason for your power is not Darkness’ spell but because of your a half angel. Once you took that spell, it killed you and that’s what activated you. Your power was still hidden by me...”

Baros’ eyes widened in surprise.

Now he knew that he was half angel but he was surprised about Darkness’ spells. He thought some of his powers originated from Darkness’ spell.

“I didn’t tell you because you were an experiment.”

Hearing the word experiment, Nazar’s eyes widened.

He remembered his old life. Being experimented on his own parents while they were being controlled by a demon.

Even though his emotions were off, he could somehow feel fear.

“I wanted to see what you can do without your angel side. And how long the spell - which I used to hide most of your power - will last. And because I needed you for later. You shouldn't have remembered now...”

“...”

Not being able to say anything to his father, Baros sucked in a breath.

“I made the plan with the Church. We wanted to see how powerful a hybrid of an angel and a man can be. So, we created you. Then your powers were coming back, so I had to hide most of it within you. It was there, you just couldn’t access it unless you remembered your true nature - which you do now.”

“Why?”

“Why what? Why did I do it? I need soldiers for wh--”

“You are both horrible fathers.”

Hearing Nazar’s annoyed tone from a little far away, both of them looked at him at once.

Nazar was leaning against a tree and eating a fruit that was only native to this world.

“When God came down to meet his creation, he told them lies. One of them was, “pray to me and I will protect you”.”

Nazar chuckled.

“Funny, isn’t it?”

Michael and Baros exchanged confused glances.

“God is said to be all powerful, all loving and know everything, right?”

“...”

“...”

Nazar threw away the fruit and looked at Michael.

“Michael, when you originally became an Archangel, you wanted to be the God of this universe and recreate everything in your image, right?”

Michael was not sure where he should reply or not.

Walking towards them, Nazar continued, “You are neither all-powerful or all loving. And certainly, don’t know everything. If you knew everything, you would know that--”

Nazar trailed off as he felt something.

Something he couldn’t explain.

He looked up to the sky and then at Michael.

“What is this?”

Nazar felt something. Something he cannot explain.

"I remember something similar happening before..." Nazar said very slowly.

Baros became even more confused.

“Your wings… They work as a homing beacon at the moment, no?”

Nazar tried to analyse their weird thing he was feeling.

He tried to figure out its origin.

“Yes. So, she can locate me.”

“She?”

Not looking at Michael, Nazar asked a question in return.

He was looking around trying to originate its source.

No, he was not using his eyes. His eyes were closed.

He was using a higher level of power; nigh omnipresence.

“Yes. The goddess of everything.”

"Goddess...huh?"

"Let me give you a clue, Nazar."

A thin smile appeared on Michael's face.

"It all began 10 weeks ago. Another clue is the dragon."

All of a sudden, Michael vanished into thin air.

Nazar’s eyes widened as he searched for Michael instead of looking for the source of that disturbance.

However, he couldn’t find anything.

“All forms of teleportation was blocked… A barrier around the world... Who is powerful enough to do this?”

Clicking his tongue, he turned off his nigh omnipresence.

“And the dragon...”

Nazar narrowed his eyes.

"Is he finally back?"