Oh, hello again. I would say some sort of greeting, but… you're not really here for that. You're to watch Ran get eaten alive, aren't you? Aren't you!?
Well I've got just the thing for you.
Welcome to my (Max's) world of… nothing!
***
Ran opened his eyes. At least, he felt he did. But then, why cant he see anything? Why is everything black? He was puzzled. Was this the illusion-being cut off from everything? No seeing, no hearing, no smelling, no… feeling.
Well, technically, he could see and feel himself, but that was pretty much it. It was so quiet, he could hear his soul heart beat and his blood rush through his body.
"Just me, myself, and I." Ran could not help repeat that phrase when put in a situation like this; one that perfectly fits that phrase.
Except… Ran couldn't take it all! HE HATED IT!
HE COULDN'T… stand it….
Yep, not even thirty seconds had passed before he started freaking out! He who cherished intimacy above all else had now suddenly-and abruptly-lost all of it.
This feeling of unknowingly being thrown into a solitary environment left an indescribably detestable taste in his mouth. As if he was alone! He's been surrounded by people ever since he was born! He totally has the resources to pull through this… right?
Thus, he frantically searched through his memories and recalled everyone he knew to occupy himself from his rapidly ascending loneliness. Anything that could distract him was good enough, truthfully. Then, he would just have to wait for the adaptation to take effect.
His mother and father. Ann, and Bob. Fluffy and even Queenie. He remembered the people he had met in the streets back home. Especially the bakery where he'd get all of his favorite pastries. Every single face he had ever seen provided some level of comfort to him. But, soon enough, he ran out. Hundreds, no… thousands of people, strangers or not… it wasn't enough.
The loneliness began approaching him again. He kept sifting through his memories, desperately looking for something… someone to come and help him. But… it didn't work.
If people didnt work, he had nothing left. Nothing! That's what he thought.
He spent what felt like hours trying and trying, crying out to the world. Solitary confinement definitely isn't something to be taken lightly and easily qualifies to be one of the worst kinds of torture out there. And Ran seemed particularly vulnerable to it. Worst yet, the adaptation didn't seem to be working!
He panted heavily. Sweat was trickling down his face before disappearing into the void. He… weeped. He was stuck. Here. Forever. Max, the creator of this illusion, had long since escaped from his mind he was being consumed from the inside out.
He put his hands to his face and wiped away his tears. Then he did something. He ran his fingers through his long, ginger hair.
This was his last "last hope". Technically, this was his coping method for whenever he felt lonely; which, especially during his childhood, was a common occurrence.
He often did this when Ann left to train with his family, leaving him behind to himself. Or when he was with his parents as they never really spent much time with him other than dining or other small matters. Things such as family time and playing games with each other were non-existent.
The maids and servants acted much like his parents, cold and distant. Maybe they knew something about him as well.
As for the citizens at home, most of them only treated him as their "savior" or whatever that meant and never truly knew him. Or what he was. A freak.
Recently, he was always with someone, so he hadn't done it in several months. Even when he fled, he hadn't done it, though he didn't know if it was because he had Ann with him or he never truly liked being home.
And even if he didn't like being home, he never truly knew how much he relied upon the presence of other people until now; even if they didn't like his presence.
Thus, he found himself combing his hair as he questioned that last sentence. His curly hair wound around his fingers as he ran it through for extended periods of time. But ultimately, he couldn't tell what the answer was and he didn't like that.
At this point, he was sure at least a day had passed. And the only thing he knew now were his own chaotic thoughts
He couldn't help but question his sanity now.
He couldn't help question… himself. The fact that he was crying was just another sign to Ran that something seemed off about himself. He just… never questioned it. This was just who he was; all the things that happened when he was a child, as well as when he awakened his sigil… all the mysteriousness were all just who he was.
That's why when weird s**t happens around and to him, he seemed oblivious to it. He knew what he had to do to figure everything out… and that was to get stronger.
Yet, as the tears dropped, he couldn't help but catch them with his hand as he couldn't bear to let them leave him as well. As they puddled on his hand, a handsome figure had shown itself; the two figures looked at each other with worn faces.
As Ran saw himself, he realized he wasn't wearing his hood. But now he couldn't stop looking at himself through his own tears.
Ripples spread on the puddle as new tears dropped into it, causing distortions in the figure in the puddle. The distortions caused the figure to warp and become unrecognizable before returning to normal. And then, only then, did Ran realize something.
Yes, he had found a lead. Himself. But why was it that he looked at himself and yet he found no comfort in that mirror image?
All he saw was a person who was lost and alone. In the darkness.
"Alone." He muttered out loud. He hated that word. If one word described the pinnacle of all of his hatred, then that would be it. Heck, if he could, he would vow to erase that very word and all the suffering it causes off the face of the planet. Off face of the universe! But… he knew better.
But why, why oh why, was it that even though he saw himself suffering, he chose to do nothing about it?
Why was it that it took this long to even consider himself?
Could he do something about it?
"Alone." He ended up spending hours repeating this single word as he watched himself in his tears while mindlessly combing his hair. Eventually, he could no longer hold it in. He was the last one! Truly, there's no one left. Why wait for someone else to rescue him?
Why couldn't he do something about it?
"Alone!" He shouted.
"ALONE!!!" His brown face turned completely red from the blood rushing to his face, his eyes glistened from the leftover tears.
Ran gnashed his teeth in frustration with an eerie sound as he balled his tear-soaked hand into a taut fist of "LONELINESS"!
He was so frustrated. Frustrated to the point of anger. He then decided to put his fist into good use.
And what were fists good at? Smashing things! Well, Ran wasn't really expecting anything-he just wanted to vent his anger.
But that's when things start to happen. After all, doing nothing wasn't in Rans vocabulary!
He threw his fist onto the only thing he could, the ground, or at least whatever he was standing on.
There was nothing there, yet, as he punched the ground, ripples appeared before disappearing. The punch didn't work. But that didn't stop him from doing it a second time though. Or a third time.
But as he punched and punched, he grew increasingly angry and incoherent of his surroundings.
Why did it even matter if he knew nothing of his non-existent surroundings? After all, there's nothing there. Well, yes your right, except… you forget there is one thing. Ran himself!
More specifically, the very arm he's punching with. Why?
Oh, I don't know, maybe it's because his sigil was freaking the f**k out right now!
He punched, It flickered. He punched again, it flickered again with more vigor and it sounded like a flickering lightbulb that was having trouble lighting up. Eventually though, it started flickering multiple times before it started up like a f**king engine. Yeah, an engine that's about to explode!
As soon as it activated, it shone a red-pink light so excited, his fist seemed like a red-pink flame from hell!
As he punched one more time, the sigil increased in vibrancy yet again before it flickered; the runes began doing all kinds of s**t. Yet, one stood out. Especially since it was a god damn chain!
Boom! The flaming sigil shined brilliantly like a pink sun before it just poofed. It poofed into a small puff of smoke when the punch landed, leaving not even a ripple on the invisible ground.
Then, Ran saw something.
The tears that had soaked his hand hadn't fallen through the void like the others, but instead were somehow embedded in the invisible ground.
Yet, that's not all. They were glowing that same red-pink brilliance as they began spreading outwards like a torrential wave of red-pink luminance!
But it wasn't the tears, it was instead the ground! The ground was glowing and spreading.
The ground quickly succumbed and turned completely red-pink with light rays being emitted from its surface. Yet, wherever the light ray hit, it would leave a mark in the darkness; the void.
Those marks quickly grew and soon enough, the entire place was filled with a vital hue as Ran basked in its beauty. It sparkled incessantly as Rans mood instantaneously brightened; as if mirroring the very void itself.
"Shiny!" Ran saw a light ray and booped it, his finger went through.
But, as if that wasn't enough, it began shaking. Shaking like the belly of a beast; hungry! Angry….
"ROAR!!!"
The shaking quickly erupted into a resounding roar as the illusion that was barely holding up until now began shattering.
Ran didn't know if the roar was a result of the shaking gaining it's current magnitude or if it was the roar instigating the shaking to increase. But what confused Ran the most was the roar itself. If you consider the roar as one then what made it? A beast? No, not that it didn't sound like a beast, just that Ran found it vaguely familiar. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but he could've swore it sounded slightly melodic?
The fact of the matter was, he was getting a really strange feeling from it.
As the illusion shattered around him, he suddenly found himself falling into yet another abyss.
And as he fell, his vision began darkening as he closed his eyes. Yet, he no longer felt that loneliness clutch his heart in a vicious vice.
No.
His senses closed off one by one as he felt the reverberations of the roar course through his body; it was as if it was meant to be heard and felt by him. He felt extremely at ease and he no longer worried about where he is, where he's going… or anything else for that matter. A smile was raised
"Am I alone?" The smile curled up even further. "Who said I was ever alone."
***
"Ah?" Rans eye twitched; he blinked. He opened his eyes only to see Max on one knee, panting heavily. A sliver of blood trickled from her lips.
"S**t!" He hastily got off the chair before picking up Max and carefully placing her on it. Then he quickly activated his sigil.
A projection of his sigil shone on his left palm as he healed Max's fatigue. As a result though, Ran found himself in the very same predicament she had been in just a second ago.
He began panting heavily as he tried to catch his breath. That had taken all of what's left of him!
That illusion had been produced for rank-7 individuals, so it was reasonable to say it also had the same force of one. Now, he also healed the fatigue from an illusion of that caliber, so it is safe to say Max had done it. She sucked him dry alright, dry of his juice!
Max, who was busy trying to breathe, found herself free from her fatigue. She saw the blood on her lips turn into sparks of white-pink flames; embers fluttering in the air before quickly dying out.
"Hey! Are you okay?" Ran asked, worried.
"Uh…." Max just looked at the hooded figure in front of her and blinked several times. "How did you do that?" She asked, but she immediately understood upon seeing the sigil dissipate from his palm. But she was even more befuddled by what happened in the illusion just now.
After all, she had seen everything! Well, her vision was over-arching, so she didn't see his face (thank god, I need that for another scene), but she did see his desperation as well as the illusion being destroyed. She chose not to dwell on or pry into Rans life so she refrained herself from it, but she
Would have found it weird if she didn't question what she saw.
"I-I could've swore he had-" Haha, no need to get ahead of yourself there, Max. There's no need for such useless thoughts, right? RIGHT!?
Haha, don't worry about her you guys, she just has an overactive imagination and thinks up weird conspiracies sometimes; pay no heed.
"Right. Let's not do that again." Ran said with a grim tone as he patted whatever non-existent dust that existed on his clothing.
"Oh! How long was I in there for?" Ran asked. He felt as if at least a day had passed in there.
"About ten minutes." Even Max was astounded by such statistics. Usually, a person would stay in there until they completely broke down, or they forcefully broke the illusion.
There's also withstanding the illusion until the attacker runs out of energy, but that would require the mental fortitude of… of… s**t, I can't even think of a scenario where someone would have enough to accomplish.
Yet, the truly astonished one was actually Ran. If he had been in there for a day and only ten minutes passed in real life, then… Ran didn't want to experience such a thing again.
Hiss! Ran inhaled sharply as he thought that maybe he was fortunate to have only stayed in there for ten, real, minutes and not a second longer.
"Well, I've still got plenty of time, so let's do one more." Anything that put Rans mind off that illusion was good. Though he would never truly forget it.
"Right." Max conceded, except she did one thing.
She stayed sitting!
That ba***rd! That seat was reserved for Rans bum only! Not your bum. At least say thank you for letting him warm the seat for you… alas.
***
Though they had agreed to never use that illusion ever again, that doesn't mean they can't try another one.
And it turns out that Ran had only been in there for about ten minutes; though at least a day had passed by in there.
But… which one will they use next?
Well, I'm about to tell you. What they chose to do next was a… maze! I know, it's kind of cliche, alright. And if you read the title, congratulations, you know how to read.
Ran stood there and eventually blinked. When he did, he suddenly found himself in a different location.
He looked in one direction. Walls. They were made from a smooth stone, aged seemingly by time.
He looked in another direction. Walls again! Walls walls walls! Walls were in every direction; except for one.
He looked directly in front of himself. There, a path greeted him, calling out to him.
Thus, he started moving.
***
Outside, Max watched Ran move about the maze in a random manner. As it turned out, he was moving in the opposite direction of the exit!
Aw, come on Ran! How are you supposed to beat a maze that way? I gave you this OP power and this how you do it!? You're squandering my street cred! Oh, my rep, my precious rep. See, my viewership is going down due to me talking too much! After all, nobody cares about the author's opinion!
It was like that for the first ten minutes or so, which was also a decent but expected surprise. She had originally estimated for Ran to have been in the maze for about twenty to thirty minutes before any sort of adaptation or resistance happened. But again, it happened a full ten minutes earlier than she had thought.
The maze itself began to shift slightly with Ran in the center.
And as the maze slowly began shifting, the exit began to creep ever so slightly closer to Ran; and at a pace that increased with each passing second. It began picking up the pace again at the twenty minute mark and was now only a couple of layers of walls away from him.
But this was training! Would things be this easy? Of course not! Or else, why are you even reading this right now!? That's right, I'm going to interfere! Well, Max is going in my stead.
Suddenly, the exit, which was steadily heading towards Ran, started what seemed like a rewind sequence as it began receding back to its intended position.
Ran, who was just leisurely walking around curiously, began feeling tense. His body tightened as he felt a resistance at his very core. He tripped over and fell flat on his face.
After another ten minutes, it lessened a bit as he found himself able to move with great difficulty; the exit, which had headed back to its original position, had started shaking before shifting slightly. It shifted slightly towards Ran again, also with great difficulty.
Max looked on as the exit began moving towards Ran again. Her expression said exactly what was on her mind; uh….
yep, an uh expression. What does that look like? How the f**k am I supposed to know!? Look, just because I write the story doesn't mean I know everything… wait, can I take that back? No? S**t!
She had limited her power to rank-7, so while she still had some rank-7 strength left, she decided to wait a bit longer. Except, this time, the exit seemed to be super charged as it "ran" (Haha see what I did there) towards Ran like a dog who saw their owner.
This process had only taken ten minutes of the original twenty to get to the same distance away from Ran. But Max still had some juice left in the tank. She went full throttle as she unleashed all the power a rank-7 could have. She could have begun using rank-6 power, but she thought that would be going too far for now. And honestly, she had subconsciously begun having very high expectations for Ran, considering his past achievement.
Yet, it seemed it wasn't high enough as the exit which was eagerly heading to Ran had now stopped fully in its tracks.
It was like a dog that had a leash and was suddenly tugged on and restricted. That's what leashes do after all. But the exit had tasted Ran and it wanted more. It began shaking vigorously as the whole maze shook along with it. The walls slowly made way as the exit forcefully continued its arduous journey.
Max gritted her teeth as she wanted to keep the exit from fleeing from her grasp, but she also had to keep her power in check, so she was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Well, not really, though it could be said that she was taking her job much more seriously than she had thought previously.
As Ran began moving, he felt the restriction less more and more as time passed. Eventually, after five minutes, he found the walls were shifting about and he could hear them scrape against the stone floor.
And then it happened, the wall in front of him moved out of the wait to reveal a shaky wall with a door-shaped hole that was filled with a glowing white light. The exit!
Both Ran and the exit neared each other before Ran was consumed by the glowing white exit.
Mmm, tasty! The exit smacked its lips as it ate Ran whole before popping into non-existence along with the rest of the maze.
Outside:
"Hey!" Max shook Rans shoulders vigorously with an irritated expression on her face.
"What," Ran asked.
"One more time!" She refused to believe that he could just negate her power like that. After all, she had used the maximum strength a rank-7 could have come up with. She had some of her pride, as a mental force user, shaken and she wouldn't just stand there and do nothing.
And so, Ran re-entered the maze. Except, the exit, which was now right in front of him, seemed to want to flee! Flee far away! Of course, because of Max. But would Ran let that happen? Well, he didn't really do anything, but the answer was no!
The exit that was ready to scramble right on out of there now shook intensely. It shook more and more as Ran neared it, but it couldn't escape! Pssh, as if it wanted to escape in the first place.
After all, if Max found out about its affair with Ran, what would she do? She had already eaten Ran once after all! There was no going back. Oh, the joy's of love….
Gulp, Ran was soon consumed by the exit he willingly walked into and he opened his eyes.
"That's it?" Ran asked with a slight frown on his face. He thought something new would happen.
"T-that's it!?" Max repeated his line with an incredulous expression. She felt her face go red as she could only swallow whatever insult she was going to spout from her mouth. He was right! She felt as if tears were already streaming down her heated face.
She had not anticipated for things to end so quickly and in such a fashion.