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Meta Knight seldom experienced anxiety like this. He believed himself brave– He was brave. He was the boldest knight on Dreamland… The whole galaxy, even.
But it would have mocked him, and that stung. It mocked him now, laughing at his efforts to escape. It was pathetic.
He stumbled down a flight of white, marble stairs… or what he thought was marble, anyway. They stirred slightly beneath his sabatons, breaking into amorphous bursts of color. He was blinded with every flash, and eventually, he tore his cape off to fly above them.
It was a downward spiral, all too fast and seemingly endless. Though a part of him wondered if this was somehow linked to the Jambastion's terrible magic, a wiser half knew this was completely beyond his comprehension. Foreign… Divine, perhaps.
Definitely divine, he thought. The sky was a fiery-red hue, churning like flesh.
He couldn't stop thinking of flesh, come to think of it.
He'd watched the Aeon Hero dissolve before his very eyes. His blade had clashed against the Knight of Yomi's, or whatever it was calling itself. And now, he was running, because there wasn't much of an alternative.
He felt so stupid! You challenged a god, you paid the price. He was almost ashamed of how cocky and sure of himself he'd been.
His flight came to an abrupt stop as his pursuer tackled him. Beyond the staircase was a cluster of multi-colored clouds, dyed red as a few drops of blood fell into them.
Meta's breath quickened, then slowed abruptly. His attacker's hands (they were probably hands, weren't they?) were icy cold against his wings, cutting into him with their skeletal sharpness.
The deity was pulsing above him, its breath sickeningly sweet. He clenched his jaw, trying his hardest to ignore the aroma.
This is where it ends, it hissed.
His vision began to cloud, and at once he began to wonder if the changing landscape was a result of magic or something else entirely. As his movement ceased, an awful chill crept up his back.
It laughed softly. You're not in hell, Knightmare. It pressed its mouth to one of his wings. But when I'm done with you, you'll wish you were.
That wasn't very reassuring.
And again, Galacta Knight's disappearance replayed in his mind. The soft breeze moving past the altar, the dust that had lingered from his body.
The knight's appearance somewhat resembled Galacta, but he'd never acted in this particular way. Nothing he knew had ever acted in this "particular way".
His paw reached for Galaxia, but the demon caught it before he could reach it. This time, it clawed something into it as well, drawing blood. He winced.
It licked some of it off the ground, then moved to the wing itself. It tore slowly… almost gently, and then all at once. The trickle of blood became a fountain, and he was practically drowning in it.
Morpho hummed happily.
You smell that? A meal worthy of a god! Your blood has become like ambrosia, ready to flow through divine ichor.
Meta's mind was racing. If he could only glance at the knight one more time, perhaps to discover a weakness.
He turned back, hoping to get a better look at its face. Its white, lifeless eyes stared at him in their usual eerie way, but this time with a new sort of hunger. A gaping mouth had opened on its face like a gash, dripping red and grinning at him with glee.
The knight's scarlet armor began to split apart down the middle, tugging at the skin on the sides of its face. It came apart altogether, revealing a gaping hole behind it– Though that wasn't quite the right word. More bloody spikes clashed against each other as its round body came undone, allowing pulsing organs to peek through. They weren't organs he was familiar with either… They churned and shifted in a quick, entrancing motion, seeping with golden ichor and beating louder than he could think.
And you wondered what would happen if you challenged the divine. If it could still emote, it might have smiled. You put up an excelled fight– certainly one I'd expect from a knight of your caliber.
It inched ever closer, reaching beneath his mask. It then grabbed at the edge of his mouth, tearing downwards until enough of his insides were exposed.
Any strength his vocal chords might have had was entirely gone. What little he could see was spinning, flashing all too brightly. How he was still alive was beyond him.
Powerful souls make the greatest feasts, it mused, mostly to itself. And like the other one, you will know true completion. Satisfaction, even.
It held something up in its hands, plump and red like an apple. Morpho bit into the fruit with its unearthly fangs, warm juice pouring from the core. He could feel his heart within it, fizzling into raw psyche and melting into its being.
This is a prize for the both of us.