Multiverse: Deathstroke

Chapter 373: Ch.372 Inverted Man

The Lasso of Truth missed its target. Nabu's magic still functioned normally, even growing stronger.

The lasso passed through his body as if through a phantom, not even catching a single hair.

"Nabu! You coward! If you want to end magic, then face me first!"

Diana raised her head, shouting for Nabu, who was floating further away, to come down and fight.

As an ancient sorcerer, Nabu knew better than to engage in close combat with a warrior—especially one like Diana, a demi-goddess armed with divine artifacts.

"No, I will not come down. The abomination is coming. Magic will vanish, and the world will be preserved."

Neither Diana nor the Justice League wanted magic to disappear. The multiverse was already on the brink of destruction.

Various crises were rushing toward Earth from beyond the Source Wall—first the Omega Titans, then the Invisible Spectrum.

In times like these, any power humanity wielded could become crucial in the future. Losing magic now could have consequences no one could afford.

But Nabu did not care. He only cared about his order.

He flew into the sky, disappearing from sight. Suddenly, before Diana, a huge rift, like a flashpoint, opened—a nightmarish figure slid out from it.

The moment she saw it, Diana remembered.

She had once told Su Ming that as an Amazon, she never had nightmares.

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She had lied.

She remembered the nightmare she had experienced as a child, the one that had made her scream in terror.

The creature before her wasn't identical to the vision she had seen in her youth, but there was an inexplicable connection between them.

When Diana was young, her mother forbade her from witnessing the "Undying Witches" ritual, performed by the Amazonian elder sorceresses.

But like any child, Diana had curiosity that matched her age. One moonless night, she secretly followed the witches.

They performed their mysterious rituals deep within the forests of Themyscira.

They lit a bonfire, stripped off their clothes, and danced in bizarre ways. Then they held each other, three by three, kissing one another while chanting strange incantations.

Diana then saw something that filled her with fear.

The women melded together like clay, forming a monstrous being with three heads and six arms. They kept chanting one name.

"Hecate!"

Diana knew the name. In mythology, Hecate was the triple goddess—simultaneously maiden, mother, and crone. She was also the goddess of magic and souls.

But when a grotesque, three-headed figure like a banshee appeared in the bonfire, Diana couldn't help but let out a small gasp.

The terrifying goddess immediately noticed the young girl.

"Seize her for your goddess!"

Hecate commanded her witches.

The witches of Themyscira, who were supposed to serve the queen and princess, loyal to Olympus, now chased Diana with their newly formed three-headed body through the dense forest.

On that moonless night, Diana tripped over a vine. The witches caught her and brought her before Hecate.

Hecate conjured a brand, formed from a full moon and a pair of crescent moons like wings. She pressed it against Diana's forehead.

The stench of burning flesh and the intense pain overwhelmed her. Powerful magic surged into young Diana's body, causing her to pass out.

After that, Hecate killed the witches and used a spell of forgetfulness on everyone on Themyscira, erasing all memory of the event.

Now, as Diana saw the inverted figure slide from the rift, her sealed memories resurfaced.

She instinctively reached for her forehead beneath her tiara, but as always, it was smooth—no scar, no mark. Everything indeed seemed like a dream.

Yet magic-related dreams were rarely simple. Diana found herself struggling to discern the boundary between reality and the dream.

The creature that emerged from the crack, while humanoid in form, was covered in white scales and had only a single massive mouth on its face—no other features.

It hung upside down silently, somehow "looking" at Diana with an unseen gaze.

The air around them twisted and fluctuated. The creature spoke in human language through its drooling mouth.

Initially awkward, after a few words, it spoke English as fluently as if it were its native tongue.

"You may begin... screaming. You may call me the Inverted Man. Individual forms are truly intriguing—the coordination of bone and flesh suggests many secrets."

It squirmed, pushing its entire body out of the rift. It looked out of place, not belonging to this world.

"I hope I correctly generated the four limbs. The concept of a body is new to us. We are still adapting."

"You..." Diana hesitated, unsure of how to communicate with the creature that barely resembled a person.

At least it was only talking. Though its appearance was horrifying, it hadn't attacked yet—perhaps there was still a chance to de-escalate.

"Oh, you aren't the one who opened the door for us. Where is that man with the shiny helmet? Did you kill him and steal his magic?" The Inverted Man looked around curiously.

"No, that's not my style!" Diana immediately denied.

"Wrong! Lies! Your kind are all assassins and thieves. You stole magic from me!" The Inverted Man let out an eerie laugh, which sounded more like weeping.

"Such a dull world. No wonder your ancestors snuck into the darkness to steal a bit of magic from me, hoping to inject some wildness into their world."

"Who are you? And Hecate—" Diana furrowed her brow, holding her weapon and shield. The atmosphere had taken a wrong turn.

"Hahahaha! The world grew accustomed to magic, then became dull again, didn't it? But you forgot about the darkness of magic. I am that forgotten fear, here to remind you all!"

The Inverted Man finally learned how to mimic human laughter, but his laugh brought no joy.

As he laughed, strange tentacles—similar to the ones Diana had seen in the theater—emerged from the portal, lashing out at her.

Since there was no hat, and Diana wasn't a smoker, there was no option but to dodge this attack.

These grotesque things couldn't be cut down. Like the mythical tree that couldn't be felled, the more branches she severed, the more they grew.

Diana found herself overwhelmed. The tentacles were too numerous, and the Inverted Man himself closed in, making it difficult for her to fend them off.

The Inverted Man soon grabbed her by the throat. She could feel the divine power in her body fading away, as if it were receding like a tide.

Divine power, it seemed, was also a form of magic—a kind of sorcery.

"Haha, stepping into this world, let's start by having you as an appetizer. But first, we need a stomach."

The Inverted Man grinned menacingly, his sharp teeth drawing closer to Diana's face. She could already smell the foul stench of an alien realm.