An encounter with the darkness [IO][NK][Altar]

Ren rushed forward as he saw his opponent move to attack one of his clones only to see the man move to deflect the kick of one of his clones into the other clone. It would have been a devastating attack if they were real clones, too bad for him he- the man managed to not even notice the intangible nature of the two clones and in a flurry of speed had spun around to catch Ren by the throat. 'How-?' Ren suddenly felt a strong sense of vertigo as everything flickered out of existence. Ren struggled faintly, trying to kick at the man; or pull away his hands, but that grip was stronger than anything Ren could muster. 'Is this really how I die?' Ren thought in a panic as his vision began to fade.

As the two faded from existence, Altar's smile would only widen.

Altar would take the time before Ren awoke to construct himself a throne, a seat obviously made for one of godly status. For here, he was a god. To his right sat Nekoda, her blonde hair billowing in an absent breeze. She gave off a glow that looked divine, yet did little to actually light the pitch black surrounding them. To his left, stood on the ground, was Kalamity. Kalamity looked like a living shadow, complete with purple eyes and horrifying claws. His form constantly flickered and waved, the demon caring little about abiding by metaphysical laws.

And of course, atop the throne sat Altar. The throne was made of pitch black stone, the mark of the Abyss etched into the backrest of the mighty seat, glowing a faint purple. Altar's cloak was longer, draping down to where the throne met the ground. A small black crown was sat atop the ANBU's head, the crown constantly shimmering like Kalamity's body.

The floor here was stained glass, like Altar's mindscape. The image of a cross was depicted. On one side of the cross was the image of the atypical devil, and on the other side was the opposite, the image of a godly figure with no face. And beneath the cross was a set of scales. Outside of the stained glass circle, there was nothing. An inky, pitch black void. If one where to try to reach their hand outside the circle, they would meet an invisible barrier.

The throne sat at the top of the cross, and directly opposite it was an unconscious Ren, sleeping at the head of the scales. Resting his head on a closed fist, Altar would sigh and begin counting the seconds to Ren's awakening.

Ren slowly opened his eyes, his vision slowly returning though small flashes of white light. Standing up Ren found in his hand, a giant key, as a voice bellowed around him "you are the chosen warrior of light. 'Fuck I really must have died... and I guess death is just some cheesy video game scene'

Ren opened his eyes again, this time rather sharply as he breathed in before letting out a ragged cough, rolling over as he pushed himself up on all fours. "Ugh, where am I?" Ren said aloud before looking up only to see Altar sitting on a throne of deep black stone. As Ren looked at it his vision seemed to shift and blur, as if the object refused to be looked at with anything more than a passing glance. Ren was just about to let out a witty quip before he glanced at the two figures seated next to the man. The woman, seemed rather beautiful and almost seemed to glow with a fervorous light, but that wasn't hard to achieve with a few jutsu; it was the second figure who caused Ren's words to catch in his throat. A figure wreathed in... or rather made of, shadow. A figure who the mere sight of screamed chaos and death. "A-Altar, what is this?" Ren said, struggling to mask the terror and confusion in his voice as he raised his hands into a fighting stance instinctively from looking at the demon.

Altar would sit straight as the youngling awoke, understandably groggy, confused and most likely afraid. Hearing the boy's question, the latter was confirmed, and quite obvious.

Hearing the fear in his voice, Kalamity felt nothing but intense joy. This was what he lived for! Fear led to violence, violence led to carnage, bloodshed, and inevitably death. Death led to fear led to...it was a vicious cycle. The shadowed figure would disappear and remanifest behind Ren, tracing a claw across the boy's shoulders, slowly reaching around to his neck, digging in a little deeper to-

"Kalamity. Enough."

A voice, quiet and somewhat reserved, yet carrying the power of thunder and demanding the demon to heel. Stopping it's action, Kalamity poofed out of existence once more, this time reappearing at the very top of the throne, sat above Altar's head.

"Allow me to be the first to welcome you, Ren, to Void. A place beyond existence." Altar would say, hopping down from the throne to the floor below, taking small paces towards the boy. As he left the stone chair, Kalamity would appear in the seat, sitting upside down with his legs skyward on the backrest. Nekoda rose from her position and walked down with Altar, taking a place by his side.

"This is my world. A realm of my own creation, where I control everything." the ANBU would say, smiling gently at the surely confused boy. He could only hope to answer the questions Ren had, and that Nekoda would prove just as calming to others as she was to him.

The demon disappeared in a blink; Ren yelped and jumped a little when, quite suddenly he felt a claw trailing along his shoulder before reaching around to his... Ren swung around to face where the demon would be, only to see it disappear as Altar's voice echoed throughout the vast emptiness of the realm. Ren swung back around to face the man, now striding down from his throne, the golden lady following only a step behind him. Were it not for the insanity of the shadowy daemon sitting on the now vacant throne... although siting was not the most accurate of terms, the daemon defying gravity and logic to sit on the back of the throne? Ren was at first confused, the figure striding down from the throne spoke with altar's voice, and yet he looked nothing like the young man Ren had been fighting until just a moment ago. "A-altar? is that you?" Ren said now more confused and curious as he began to comprehend the marvels that were around him. Waiting a moment to see if the man responded Ren would continue "W-wait, did you say a World beyond existence? You created your own world?" Ren asked, with exuberance beginning to bleed through his fear "Tha-thats amazing! How did you do it???" Ren said, gears in his head beginning to turn at all the things that could be possible within a space like this, though his eyes never ceased keeping the daemon in his view.

At the boy's confusion, Altar would cock an eyebrow, looking down at himself, checking his hair to make sure it had not changed yet again. Then it dawned on him. He had been under transformation for the entirety of their fight. "Yes, it is me. I'm Altar. I was using transformation to keep my identity a secret, but I don't particularly see a point to wearing second skin here of all places."

Ren went on to show excitement in the place of atypical confusion, asking how Altar had managed to do something like this. With a wave of his hand, three chairs would appear. One behind Ren, one behind Altar and one behind Nekoda. The latter two would take the seats, a small glass of golden liquid appearing in his right hand, a pack of cigarettes and a lighter on the left arm of his chair. After noting the boy's concern about Kalamity, Altar would chuckle and put his worry to ease.

"Don't fret over Kalamity. All bark, no bite. He lacks physical form, for the time being. What you felt was him driving false sensation through your nerves and into your brain. He can make you feel pain, but not experience it. And he's under my whim anyways. Kind of like a disobedient dog in that manner. If he gets unruly, he gets thrown...outside." the ANBU would say, gesturing to the pitch black void with his left hand, a grim look on his face.

Altar would take a drink, pull out a cigarette and light it, inhaling and exhaling the creation like it was second nature, though there was no smoke to cloud the air. There was no nicotine, no real taste. Less risk that way. He did it purely for the sensation, which to be fair, could be considered addictive in it's own right.

"Now, to start telling you how I did this, I must first know where you stand. How much background information you need to fully understand how this is actually possible. Tell me, how much do you know about spacetime jutsu, Ren? The ability of a ninja to manipulate and even change the two fabrics of reality."

Ren shuddered a little when he heard the man say the creature lacked physical form for the time being. What would that creature do if he was allowed to manifest in a physical state. The man said the creature was like a disobedient dog... but disobedience in such a creature, what was to stop it from simply killing altar once it got what it wanted? Ren kept these thoughts to himself of course, he didn't know enough about the creature, and terrifying though he was Ren was still far more interested in the space around him for the time being.

Getting a whiff of the smoke in his face Ren stifled a cough before he answered the man, his voice a little horse for a moment. "I... have a rudimentary knowledge of space time theory, I can even fold space together into a minor pocket dimension for storing small thing" Ren said, Demonstrating his ability with the storage displacement technique by pulling a small Kunai from the space before returning it from whence it came before he continued; "but something on this scale? its absolutely incredible! I couldn't do something like this with a hundred years" Ren said, turning around and marveling at the grand space around them, before looking back at altar.

Altar would smile at the boy's demonstration. Good, then this would be that much less painful to try to talk through.

"Good, good. But, before I tell you about the dimension itself, allow me to give you insight on it's reasoning and design. That way you know not just how, but why as well." Altar would say, shifting his gaze to Nekoda, sat beside him. As he took a breathe in, Kalamity would appear to his left, sat cross legged on the ground, facing Ren.

"The Shinkou hail from the long gone Abyss village. The Abyss bestowed upon us two gifts. One being our dojutsu, the Meigan..." the ANBU would say, lifting his hand to his crimson right eye. "The other was Yuumei. Yuumei is...well, for all intents and purposes, it is an anti-chakra. It circulates in our chakra system and feeds off of it. However, it's incredibly unique as it can take form and sentience. It can communicate with the user, and even appear visually in a mindscape during meditation. Furthermore, every Shinkou's yuumei is different. They're unique to the person they inhabit."

"My original Yuumei appeared as Nekoda. And certain...life events spawned the monstrosity I refer to as Kalamity." Altar would say, motioning first to the girl on his right, then the demon to his left. "That is why they are here. They exist within me, and as such transfer with me to this realm. It's also modeled after my mindscape, something I knew like the back of my hand."

Taking another drink and another drag from the cigarette, Altar would breathe out, exhaling a cloud of smoke. The cloud this time, however, would smell of vanilla and citrus. "Now, you know a little about Spacetime jutsu, and seeing as you can fold space for a pocket dimension, you know how this works. Void is simply on a much larger scale. Instead of abusing a small fragment of space, you tear it wide open and create an entirely new one. In a way, space and time, reality as we know it can be viewed as a room. It's confining, and we know it's limits. But, through careful application, one can learn to step through the walls themselves, in order to exist somewhere beyond our reality, somewhere incredibly malleable. Infinite. And not constrained by walls."

"And the best thing about it? This is my space. There are no longer certainties of reality. Here, I operate independently of space and time themselves. I operate independently of..." the ANBU would trail off, looking past Ren to the void surrounding them.

Ren sat down, listening to Altar's explanation, his story. The Abyss sounded like an interesting place, if altar was to be believed then whatever existed there could bestow upon people a power capable of negating chakra, of feeding off of it... that in and off itself seemed like an incredible thing, even more so that Altar could host that force within his body without it consuming his own chakra... It was too much for Ren to process all at once, even more so when Altar continued onto his explanation of Void itself, and so Ren sat there, and listened to his story, for the most part sitting and attempting to memorise his words as best he could. Even so when altar explained that he had created this space by tearing open the fabric of space rather than folding it in on itself Ren couldn't help but comment "That... sounds incredibly dangerous... Brilliant yes, but I'm amazed you didn't kill yourself." Ren said interjected "Was there a trick too it? I would have thought you would have simply created a... void that would devour the reality around it..." Ren continued, pausing at the last few words as he wondered if that was what this space actually was. A void in reality that fed off of Altar's chakra in order to cease its state of non existence. "All the same what is it that allows just you to control this space?" Ren asked, making a subtle attempt to flow his chakra and see if he could exert any control over the realm himself. 

Eventually Altar came to the end of his explanation, trailing off and staring into the vast space in the distance. There was something there, that the man had been about to say, perhaps something important; Ren struggled with himself trying to decide whether it was worth pushing the man, but eventually his curiosity and enthusiasm for the current situation ran out. "Operate independently of what?" Ren probed gently, shooting a glare at the strange creature that now stood to Altar's Left wondering if it had something to do with altar's hesitance to finish his sentence.

At Ren's interjection, Altar's face would hallow, the ANBU wearing a vacant expression. "As am I. It's in the loss of reason for self preservation that our true genius shines. But it becomes a coin flip as to whether the mad scientist in us makes our lives fulfilled again, our causes our death. Should I have died, there was no one to miss me."

"No trick. Hours upon hours of work to understand how most nin worked with space. After that, it simply became a task of doing everything they said not to. Making a space that exists inside reality would confine what I could do, what this place would be capable of. So, I had to learn to create and make use of space existing outside what we know." the boy would say, his expression returning to normal as he explained.

As Ren tried to flow his chakra into the realm, he would experience an intense jolt of pain, along with the gravity around him becoming heavier and heavier, forcing his body to the floor. "That is what ensures only I control this space. This realm exists and thrives purely on my chakra. It was my chakra that constructed everything here. Thus I have absolute control over everything here, as I would my chakra." Altar would say, before rising from his seat and extending a hand to Ren to help him from the ground, the gravity returning to normal.

Assuming Ren took Altar's hand, the ANBU would place a hand on Ren's back and guide him to the edge of the platform they stood on, looking out into the inky blackness beyond. Turning, Altar would motion Nekoda over. "Nekoda. Lights?"

The girl would look to Altar, motionless, crossing her arms and cocking her head to one side, seemingly awaiting something. "Ugh...lights, please?" the ANBU would say, rolling his eyes. Nekoda would let out a small giggle and smile, placing her hand against the barrier. As soon as her hand made contact, the void outside would light up. Beyond the barrier were hundreds upon hundreds more of creatures that looked like Kalamity, shifting masses of shadows. Jagged edges and teeth, maniacal laughs and haunting eyes. The now lighted exterior seemed to stretch forever, eventually sinking back into pitch black. However, among the demons one could see and hear things that were specific to them. One could see things that made them sad, that made them angry. Things that horrified them and haunted their nightmares. One could see their worst fears and their most hated enemies, alongside their loved ones being slaughtered time and time again.

Keeping a firm hand on Ren's back, forcing him to look out, Altar would speak with a grim tone, his face pale and his expression empty.

"Tell me, Ren, what do you see?"