Lucifer didn't wait. Even before I could, they advanced together, light and darkness converging to destroy me. Every step they took seemed to shake the very foundation of Hell, but I did not retreat. In that moment, I realized that brute force would never be enough to defeat them. Not against an angel, the symbol of celestial order, and Lucifer, the archetype of absolute rebellion. But against the mind, neither Heaven nor Hell has defense.
I waited for an opening, for the moment when the very essence of their roles would make them predictable.
The angel attacked first, his shining sword cutting the air like a divine lightning. His strikes were precise, disciplined, predictable. Each blow was methodical, a perfect demonstration of the order he represented. I dodged, moving in circles, forcing him to expose his pattern.
— You cannot win, human! — shouted the angel, his voice still imposing. — My strength is not mine, but the Almighty's!
Lucifer laughed beside him. — The Almighty? Let me guess, He sent you here to die, didn't He? Just like He does with all His pawns.
The angel hesitated, but continued. He knew Lucifer was trying to poison his mind, but the point was already made.
— Don't listen to him — I taunted the angel, a cynical smile forming on my lips. — But listen to me: you never act on your own. You are a tool, not a being.
He roared in response and attacked with even more ferocity. Exactly what I expected. The angel was a creature of order, and nothing destabilizes order more than doubt. He no longer thought clearly; every strike became more impulsive, less precise.
Lucifer took advantage of the opening. As the angel advanced, he struck, his black claws trying to seize me from behind. But he too was predictable. Lucifer was chaos, yes, but a chaos that always believed itself irresistible. He acted on emotion, and emotions are easy to manipulate.
I threw myself to the side, and at the exact moment, the angel's attack passed close to me, colliding with Lucifer's claws. Light and darkness met in a brutal explosion, throwing both of them backward.
— You are so blind you can't even see the obvious! — I shouted, my voice echoing through the hall. — You are not opposites. You are two sides of the same coin, destroying each other while thinking you are in control.
The angel, panting, rose. His face was marked by doubt and anger. Lucifer, on the other hand, seemed furious, his form oscillating between human and monstrous.
— He's manipulating us! — shouted the angel. — He wants us to destroy each other!
— And you? — retorted Lucifer, his claws trembling with frustration. — Will you keep blindly following orders while the human exposes your weakness?
The seed was planted. They no longer fought me, but each other. The angel advanced against Lucifer, his sword cutting the air with divine determination. Lucifer responded with the full brutality of his essence, his claws and teeth trying to destroy what represented order.
I stood there, watching as the battle unfolded. Light and darkness collided in a dance of destruction, each strike weakening them both. And then, at the right moment, I acted.
I grabbed a piece of the angel's broken sword that had fallen during the fight. Its light was weak, but still burned. I moved toward them, silent as a shadow. Lucifer was distracted, trying to block an attack from the angel. I approached from behind and drove the piece of sword into his chest.
He screamed, a deep guttural sound that made Hell tremble. His body began to unravel, but not before delivering one last strike, his claws hitting the angel in the chest. The angel's light also began to fade, but he still managed to turn to me, his eyes shining with a mixture of pain and respect.
— You… won. But at what cost? — he asked, his voice weak.
— Nothing, and that's what gives meaning to what I did.
When both of them disappeared, consumed by their own destruction, the hall fell silent. All of Hell seemed to hold its breath.
I was alone.
Or so I thought.
The ground stretched out like a plain of gray dust, cracked with lines resembling dried veins. The sky was not a sky, but an immobile vault, without stars, without sun, only a sickly light, as if the world were illuminated by the remnants of a fire already extinguished.
I walked. Not because I knew where I was going, but because standing still was worse.
My steps sounded louder than they should have, as if the void itself amplified them.
It was then that I saw the first mirror.
It was not whole, but triangular, with worn edges. It reflected my face, but multiplied — thousands of me, all compressed into impossible angles. I touched it. It was cold.
I crouched and looked closer.
And one of them, one of the reflections, blinked.
— You took your time — it said, without moving its lips.
I stepped back. The mirror remained still, but the voice echoed inside my head, firm as stone.
— Who are you? — I asked.
— I am what you do not want to see.
I looked around. I saw other mirrors, scattered across the floor like shards of a body that never existed. I walked to another. I looked inside. I did not see myself. I saw a woman. Pale, her eyes too dark.
— Are you seeking meaning? — she asked, moving her mouth in the glass.
— No… or yes… I no longer know.
— You never wanted meaning. You only wanted rest. But rest without death does not exist.
My knees faltered. I leaned on the ground, dust rising like smoke.
Suddenly, I realized I was not alone.
Behind me, a tall, hooded figure, made of lines that trembled like poorly anchored shadows. It did not walk: it glided.
When it spoke, its voice seemed multiple, as if each syllable were repeated by invisible choirs.
— Wanderer, what do you see in the glass?
— I see fragments… I see myself… I see things I do not recognize.
— Then you already know — it replied. — There is no "I." Only fragments.
I approached it, but the figure recoiled like smoke.
— Who are you? — I insisted.
— I am just a name you have not yet invented.
I looked again at the triangular mirror in my hand. And there was another image: an old man, long beard, deep lifeless eyes.
— You are the end — said the old man, staring at me. — The end of every question. But to reach me, you will need to die many times.
I stared, as if the glass were a window to the world.
— And love? — I asked, almost voiceless. — Where does it fit in?
From the mirror, several mouths answered in unison:
— Love is the last deception before eternity.
I felt my chest burn.
— Then it's worthless?
It was the pale woman who reappeared, in another fragment.
— It matters because it hurts. Pain is the only proof that you are not just dust.
I laughed, a laughter without humor.
— Then even pain has more meaning than morality.
The hooded figure spoke again, its voice echoing like a thunder without origin:
— Moral, immoral… these are chains created by those who fear the void. You, who walk among mirrors, can no longer use these words. You are amorality.
I closed my eyes. But the mirrors did not disappear. I felt them vibrate around me, as if forming a circle.
And each reflected a version of me.
Some screamed. Others cried. Others looked upward, in absolute silence.
— Which one of you am I? — I asked, desperate.
The old man replied:
— All.
A child appeared, in a small mirror, eyes watery:
— None.
The hooded figure, faceless, completed:
— You are only the question.
I fell to my knees. I gripped the triangular mirror tightly until I felt my blood stain the glass.
The colors of the rainbow reflected in it, and for the first time, the void and light divided my body: one side white, the other black.
— What am I? — I whispered.
The chorus answered in unison, as if all the mirrors spoke at once:
— "I do not know."
— Is this what you chose? — asked a voice, serene yet powerful, as if coming from everywhere at once.
I looked around, seeking a form, but there was nothing but emptiness.
— Choose? — I replied, my voice heavy with exhaustion. — I chose nothing. I merely survived.
— And now? — it asked. — You are at the crossroads. Obedience, rebellion… or something else?
— The absence of choice.
A long, heavy silence followed. Then the voice spoke again, but now it seemed closer, more personal.
— Then you choose to be unique. A being that belongs nowhere. Neither to Heaven nor to Hell.
— I choose to be… the absence. — My tone was firm, almost defiant.
— And so it shall be.
The light disappeared, and I fell, not into Hell or Heaven, but to Earth. A place where I would be everything and nothing at once. A ghost in the world of the living.