Chapter 2033: Traps Within Traps Eos eyes tightened a bit as he looked at Nyxara on the floor. Her appearance had changed, and she took a form that combined all the best features of the women he had known in his life, from past lovers to his friends. Walking over until he was directly standing over her, Eos began to slowly look at her from her head to her toe, there was no desire in his eyes; instead, it was as if he was taking her apart with his gaze. Nyxara shuddered, her heart beginning to beat fast as a thrill of fear shot through her spine, but she remained still, her beautiful multicolored eyes widening like a startled deer in front of a thunderstorm. "Where are they?" Eos finally said, stretching out his hand to the Primordial lying in front of him, "My family." Nyxara smiled, "Look closer, Eos." Blinking, Eos changed the method he used in looking at Nyxara. He was previously looking for weaknesses in her defenses, and if he had found them, then he would have thrown away the plan and struck to kill her. However, although he had found several weaknesses, they were not true flaws, but traps set by Nyxara. The trap she had set for him was particularly wicked. If he were aware of the true power that Nyxara was gaining from the fusion of Soul and Light, then the weaknesses he was seeing would lead him to directly strike her, since she was presently revealing glimpses of the ongoing fusion of power inside her soul. It was a good thing that Eos knew that Nyxara might test him if he knew the true might of her powers. She was going to give him free rein to kill her siblings, and she knew Eos would not be foolish enough to strengthen her if he knew how much power she was bound to gain from this act. So she had shown him glimpses of this true power, and if there was any recognition in his eyes, she would have called in her brethren, and they would have slaughtered him. There were two layers to this deception; the first layer was the power she had shown in the fight, and then beneath that layer was her true strength. Eos was only supposed to see that first layer, but if he had, for the briefest of moments, glimpsed the second layer, Nyxara would kill him. This was the real test here; it was why she was naked, and she made sure she took the features of all the women he knew from the past, inviting his gaze. Eos had passed the first trial, but it was not over. Nyxara had told him to look closer at her body when he asked for his family. If he had hesitated, it would have been a sign of his knowledge, and Eos changed the way he was looking at her, peering deeper into her body. At the moment, he and Nyxara wore the smaller forms of lesser immortals, which meant that Eos stood at twenty feet tall, and she was around fifteen feet in height. Without them deliberately shrinking their bodies, this was their smallest state naturally. Their bodies were humanoid, but that was only what they wished to show to the world. An Old One would go insane just looking at them, not because they had any eldritch features, but they would notice that just one strand of Nyxara’s hair was longer than what they would consider to be infinity. Eos began to look at Nyxara in a different manner, tearing through her shield until he saw the countless realms on her skin and the countless more swimming inside her body. In all those realms were scenes of horror and slaughter as her abominable creations butchered countless lives on a scale unimaginable to most immortals. Looking through quadrillions of realms, Eos finally found them... his family, and he froze. He slowly knelt down and placed his right hand gently upon Nyxara’s left breast, over her beating heart. "Have you seen them, Eos?" Nyxara smiled, raising her upper body a bit so Eos’s palm could press against her body more directly, "I did not lie, your family is here, but you do not have to give me the Primordial Record, you can... oh." Her call of surprise was because Eos’s hand, which had been resting gently on her chest, had suddenly applied force, and his palm had pushed into her body, tearing past her skin and plunging deep into her beating heart. She gasped in pain, but instead of pulling back, she pushed her body forward so his head could travel deep into her body. Eos’s eyes were filled with focus, and Nyxara seemed to be transfixed by his eyes as she brought both of her hands up and slowly approached Eos as if she wanted to hug him. However, it seemed as if Eos had gotten what he wanted as he drew out his hand from her body with a wet sucking sound, and Nyxara sighed in disappointment as he rose to his feet. His hand was covered with blood, they were black like oil, and it screamed in pain, before the black blood collpased into dust. This cry had emerged from a trillion realms dying after they had been severed from their source of dependence, Nyxara. Eos could have saved all of these realms; they were filled with innocents, but he knew that this innocence was a sham. They had all been tainted by the corruption of End, and they would spread its infection inside him if he were to make that mistake. This was the second trap that Nyxara had laid down for him. He would have to hear the cries of countless innocent dying, and he would have to allow it to happen. Eos slowly opened his palm, and there were three individuals here: the Soul Origin of Andar, Maeve, and his mother, Elura. Unlike normal Soul Origin that appeared like orbs of light, these ones appeared like completed souls, but their eyes were closed, and they were no sign of life on their bodies. Eos could see them, could sense their souls, and yet he could not feel them, "What did you do to them?" he growled, and Nyxara felt a brief flash of intense fear flash past her mind, and her eyes widened in surprise and pleasure, and she giggled. "Silly boy, I did not do anything to them; you were the one who did all of that," she gestured to the three souls, "when you decided to sacrifice them to kill my body. That your act was a ritual that triggered the power of End I had placed inside their soul Origin." Eos closed his eyes as his mind returned to that moment in the fourth layer of Soul as he battled the remnant of the Primordial. With his current experience and knowledge of the power of End, Eos had seen as Nyxara had baited him with her words, asking him repeatedly if he was willing to sacrifice his family to kill her, and he had foolishly accepted. He had no idea that there was another greater power in Existence that could use your own words to bind you in Agreements that you had no true knowledge of. Nyxara walked to Eos and placed her hand gently on his chest, "You know, you can bring them back. I placed a clause in that Agreement; you just have to willfully give up your life, and they shall return."