He dreamed of the end. The end of everything. It came like a tidal wave of darkness washing everything away in its path. A rippling earthquake that reduced planets to dust in its wake. A wind that blew out the light in every star. Even the gods, strongest of all, did their best to flee.

  But it was too late for even those great and ancient and arrogant beings who claimed to be the creators and masterminds of the universe and beyond. It was their arrogance that had been their downfall. It had been time that had won out even over the immortal.

  For all things must come to an end eventually. Even gods. And even those being far older and eldritch in nature.

  For a primordial being that had been there since the creation of everything had grown into its destiny. What had once started out as a mere speck of energy amongst elder gods and eldritch horror abominations on a cosmic level… had turned into an all encompassing and ever growing insatiable void of destruction.

  It was only a dream. He knew it was only a dream. How did he know it was a dream? He wasn't sure. He just knew that it was a dream. A nightmare. The final nightmare.

  “Viren Eclipse.” The Nightmare spoke to him.

  He turned his gaze and watched a single figure in the center of that endless abyss. A figure that had been nothing more than a speck… grown into a reincarnation spirit… grown into a king… grown into a God… grown into the end of everything that existed.

  “Yes. I know you child. As I knew your mother. And your grandmother. In fact your grandmother was a tremendous help in bringing about this calamitous outcome sooner than anticipated. Ironic. She who feared her own inevitable end so greatly… brought about her own end through her greatest fear.”

  “...you know my grandmother?” Viren's throat felt tight. An oppressive feeling began to press down on him at all sides. He found himself beginning to kneel to this powerful being. “...of course you did… she created one of your vessels didn't she? …oh great and terrible Lich.”

  “Lich.” The being of shadows and empty emotions smiled. “That was the title mortals granted me. In truth I was never given a name… not by a creator or anyone else. “Taboo magic… dark magic… necromancer… lich. All nothing more than titles. Not a name. It's fitting. For the end of everything that exists… to have no name. I am simply… the end.”

  “...why have you come to me?” Viren curled up into a ball, floating in the void as darkness swirled around him. Cold fingers poked and prodded, searching for a way in deeper.

  “Are you certain this is real?” There was amusement in its voice. “If this is real… then it's already done.”

  “I'm afraid… you will not find what you seek.”

  “Is that so?” More amusement. “Tell me, child. What is it that I am seeking?”

  “...” Viren kept quiet that time.

  “Could it be a link to your grandmother… or how a young man miraculously manages to slip between realities… without even the gods noticing.”

  “...”

  “Imagine that… if I could miraculously travel as easily as that… I could bring about the end of everything much sooner. Take a page from your grandmother's book and take me out of reality. Take me…” Cold bones trailed up Viren's back, dead fingers curled around Viren's neck and squeezed. “Take me to the door to every universe and reality.”

  Viren's throat tightened even further. That cold and powerful pressure found its way inside of his body. His own body heat was stolen away… his beating heart pumped nothing but ice cold blood throughout his veins.

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  “Come now. Viren. Be a good child now… oh very well.” The cold grip loosened before vanishing. “I have waited since the dawn of everything. I can wait longer. Death comes in many forms. Sometimes it is impatient and swift… sometimes it takes eons. But you know this well. You know death… you know me. That is why I come to you. Viren Eclipse. You are a brave child. You’ve seen the darkness that I am. I am your destiny. I am everything’s destiny. I am destiny in the purest form. For there is nothing after me. I am simply, the end.”

  Viren shuddered. Fear and death held him close. The greatest monster and evil of all creation had its gaze upon him. An unstoppable force of nature full of emptiness and death. How had it ever come to this?

  Viren knew. Viren had seen the many different realities of the next reincarnation of the lich. Viren had beheld the destruction of the world many times.

  “Yes… how interesting… you are like your grandmother… but different. On a first glance one would assume you were weaker… more insignificant than that wrinkled magical cockroach. …but that’s the secret isn’t it? You are much more than what you seem to be… traveler. Observer.”

  Viren shuddered again.

  “Then observe this… behold your inevitable conclusion. Behold… the true fate of everything that exists.”

  It was then that the dream shifted. Viren remained curled in on himself. But he lifted his gaze to see the end of all things. The scene played out before him… a small green creature full of determination and buried resentment. He was small… smaller than the rest of his species. A monster too. A goblin.

  Viren watched as the goblin was ripped away from its home. How it endured survival in a harsh land. He watched the little survivor as its resentment only grew with every experience. Until the day the creature discovered magic… dark magic.

  The rest of the world had not been paying attention. Not until it was too late. A foreign kingdom was having a goblin uprising? No big deal. Goblins were weak and pathetic little monsters.

  Did you hear? There are more monsters attacking the kingdom… true evil is aiding the goblins. Tales of walking corpses…

  Can you believe it? People say an entire kingdom has fallen.

  People laughed and chuckled. It was a joke. It was all… just some joke. Magic wasn’t real. The dead did not walk. And goblins were weak little creatures…

  The first Goblin King of the world- this world, was the next reincarnation of the lich. A goblin king? What was that? Nobody even knew what a goblin lord was… it had been so long since the last Goblin Lord had made its presence known to the world. The lore of the most pathetic species in the world had been forgotten. One kingdom didn’t even think that goblins existed.

  That had been the kingdom Viren had been born into. A kingdom that had well and truly forgotten about magic faster then the rest of the world. The only kingdom in the world that had forgotten a monarchy too. They had a president and elections. Democracy. The most advanced kingdom in the world and the only one that had cars and cell phones while everyone else in the world still used horses.

  Only one kingdom realized the magnitude of the growing threat. …however infighting would be their inevitable downfall. As a wave of the undead and goblins stormed across the world taking kingdom after kingdom… They were the last bastion to hold out against the threat.

  A great and terrible battle of survival between the last of humanity on the planet fighting back against endless waves of the undead…

  Then it came.

  It walked across the snow covered ground towards the last of humanity. A goblin with a golden crown adorning his head forged in blood and genocide. His once bright and vibrant crimson eyes that had been full of life… were empty black holes. To meet his gaze was to look into that hungry abyss that was coming for… everything.

  The snow melted beneath his feet. Any hint of vegetation withered and crumbled into dust. The cold and windy northern air grew still and silent. The cold remained… but it was not the same biting cold that came for the skin of the living… it was a cold that ate at the hearts and souls of the living.

  To the monster’s sides; goblin lords marched, goblin armies marched, armies of the dead marched, horrible abominations and undead creations marched and flew.

  The battle was over in less than an hour. Buildings crumbled in the monster’s wake. People choked and died. Death and destruction came for the kingdom. Death and destruction marched onto the very last city. Death and destruction conquered the world.

  At long last came the people of the moon. The last of the living people in this planet system gazed down upon the world in disgust. Futuristic cannons and lasers shot down towards the world… and the bombs disintegrated. The light from the lasers faded.

  And death glanced up and beheld the moon and its people who had been there since the dawn of their species. And death came to bring about the end of their species.

  The people of the moon came about around the same time as the people of the world. Only they were different… the people of the moon were more beautiful and elegant… their hair glowed like halos around their heads. They considered the humans of the world to be people made of mud. And the humans of the world considered their moon counterparts as living angels.

  The people of the moon became more advanced. When the people of the moon started using cybernetic implants and holograms the people of the world were merely making wooden wheels.

  They were arrogant. They looked down on the world as if it were inferior. All other species as well… so when death truly came knocking on their front door… for the first time in their existence they felt fear.

  The lich had his armies float up to the moon. Their futuristic buildings and technology began to crumble and fall apart. People died like dominos as the lich merely walked to the rulers of the moon. The Queen of the most advanced civilization for the first time in her life felt afraid as death approached her, as death looked into her eyes and she looked into death’s eyes.

  And then it was over. The last of the living in this system of planets was extinguished. The last light went out… and the moon and world turned dark.

  The lich glanced up from the moon palace and the abyss starred up into the universe with a cold smile.

  What more was there to tell? What more was there to see? Viren certainly didn’t want to see anymore. But he was made to watch it anyway. Made to watch as death soared across the known universe and the unknown, to every galaxy, to every planet. The lich was like a moth to a flame. Only death’s flame was the living. And it wasn’t the moth that was extinguished upon each arrival.

  “Now you see it? My universe is already gone.”

  Viren shuddered fearfully as something squirmed around inside of his stomach.

  “I know you exist… I know other universes exist… other realities. I will find my way out. So wake up and enjoy your day. I will be there soon.”

  Viren shuddered one last time before waking up and throwing up all over his bed.