The Big Boss of The Crystal Tower

He didn't know if everyone experienced the same after death. Sitting on a rock in space, he contemplated the mysteries of the universe. The cosmos stretched out before him, countless stars twinkling in the distance. He wondered if other souls felt as lonely and uncertain. Silence enveloped him. He had witnessed the vastness of planet Earth: its oceans, continents, and mountains left him in awe.

However, his perspective was about to change drastically. The Earth began to shrink rapidly before his eyes, as if in a time-lapse. Continents drew closer, oceans receded, and mountains became mere specks.

"So this is what happened at the end of the simulation," he thought. Ah yes, it was good to be able to think even after death. He was glad to be able to think.

He gazed peacefully at the distant galaxies. They seemed two-dimensional, unlike the planet Earth he had left behind.

"I think I'm going to miss it," he said with a sigh.

As his departure accelerated, he formed a tear from the last of the wetness in his eyes and let it fall. The drop floating in the void of space was the last thing left of him.

The next step was to be swallowed by a black hole that suddenly appeared in front of him.

The black hole took on a red color after it had swallowed him up. A moment later, the hole turned into a mouth and closed.

A hand covered the lips and a belch was heard.

"Bwaaaap! I'm sorry," Ru said. He felt embarrassed as if someone else was in the chamber he was in.

"What am I worried about? Is it a shame that I burped in my billion years of loneliness?"

His hands rested on his abdomen. Somewhat the last Ru he had eaten burned his stomach?

"Yep."

When The Big Ru's meal was cooked—when the meal (he) died—he was only fifteen years old. But come to think of it, he had eaten the much younger Ru's.

"Ew, teen! It smelled like testosterone. I knew it would burn my stomach," Ru muttered.

"I'd better go for a walk to absorb the soul," he thought.

It was difficult for him to have any kind of movement. This was due to the magic surrounding his body. He tried to get up, moving slowly, very slowly. He was afraid that the magic strings would hurt him.

His hair, as long as the red carpet on which movie stars walk, hung taut in the air. The strings that stretched his hair hurt his scalp. It wouldn't have been a problem if the strings were only in his hair, but they were also tangled around his horns. Moreover, these things were embedded in every single pore of his skin. As a matter of course, the magic strings were the chains that bound him.

Sometimes he tripped across them. Fortunately, it was not this time.

"I respond to this nonsense by exercising my right to remain silent. So what? I just fed on a soul."

Thousands of strings vibrated with his tiny movements. Wave after wave of vibration created music. The music struck the crystals, causing colorful radiations.

The crystal tower, composed of countless intertwined spirals, danced, spreading and flapping its wings. The dimensional sphere in which the tower floated was transformed from a prison into a disco, sending the stars inside the sphere flying like confetti.

Ru, the creator of the colorful symphony, pouted. "Poor me," he said, hugging himself. He looked at his hundreds reflected in the crystals.

"You keep me here, but can you stop me," he asked. Suddenly, he lifted his head and stabbed the fury that burned in his eyes at the distant stars and answered, "No!"

Then he lifted his silk robes, as long and flowing as the theater curtains, and walked barefoot across the floor, which was as thin as glass and fragile. Despite the weight of his hair and the presence of his horns, Ru was as light as a feather.

"Look at this place, glass everywhere, crystal everywhere. I can't see anything but myself in this fucking place, and you expect me to be the in-quotes, a good guy. As if I'm responsible for every apocalypse in all parallel universes. Phew!"

He talked to himself, hoping to be heard. He often did, for time hangs heavy. Luckily for him, they had built a balcony into the building, surrounded by a magical barrier. Every now and then Ru would go out and curse the 2222 stars that covered his eternity with their glow. He wanted to do the same on this three-hundred-hour day, but he gave up. He noticed some small movements in the reflections.

"My daughters, where are you?" he said sweetly. He had seen small red sparkles in some of the crystals. They faded quickly, but Ru knew the daughters were still there.

"I promise, my dear daughters, I won't be mad at you for that last idiot," he said, continuing to search the crystals.

A small red light flashed on the crystal and faded. Ru suddenly placed his hand on the crystal.

"I said I wouldn't be angry, but I will be angry if you hide a little longer."

"Daddy," a tearful voice said.

"Speak, my pretty child," Ru said in a creepily sweet voice.

A white-haired, red-winged, fanged girl appeared on the surface of the crystal where Ru had placed his hand. The girl had a lollipop that was as big as she was.

"We're sorry," she said in a shaky voice.

"We didn't know he could be so stupid," said the girl with the ponytail who appeared next to her. She was sitting on a clock face.

"Maybe we distributed his stats wrong," said the chubby little girl with curly hair who had found her place between them.

"The stats weren't bad, except for the luck. For a cursed person, zero luck is an advantage if you know how to use it," Ru said, looking very pensive.

"We are dark beings, so the slightest interference from us must be a curse on all the little Ru's," said the Lollipoper girl.

"No, it's because of the demons," the girl with the ponytail sitting on the clock face disagreed.

"Not at all," said the Lollipopper girl with the ambition to create a controversy.

"He was an idiot because he was human, it's okay, girls," Ru said with an unnatural sense of maturity.

"You're right, Dad, they are idiots," said another little girl, she had short hair and was on the back of a skeleton rat.

"Humans are not stupid, they are evil," said the little girl with the royal crown who had appeared at the top of the images in crystals.

"Are they evil than demons," The Lollipopper asked.

"Yep," the crowned queen said and continued: "At this rate, all humans will turn into demons one by one, and they will destroy Planet Earth before the apocalypse."

"How much time do we have before the apocalypse," Ru asked.

The girl with the ponytail started walking fast on the clock face. With the movement she provided, the hands of the clock began to turn."Three weeks in our time, eighteen years in planet Earth time," she said.

"Hm, so the countdown to the apocalypse has begun," Ru said. A sinister grin appeared on his shadowy face.

As the glow of the crystals faded with his ominous expression, the girls shuddered and fell silent. It was as if their father held some secret knowledge, the key to the impending apocalypse.