I looked at the old , feeble , helpless woman , waiting for her death , one last time . Perhaps it was possible that I could make her make me stay with her ? The moment I went out , the door of the hut shut close , blocking entrance . Of course , it wasn't locked because Nate always left an opportunity for us to go back the wrong way but thankfully , I didn't .
I walked in a whole different direction , completely away from the hut . I had no idea where to go to . At times , I doubted my own decision . What if I was supposed to sit right there with the old woman and see her die ? What is that was the solution for me to die ?
I wasn't very much away from the hut so I was quite startled when I heard a long , horrifying shriek from behind me . It was coming from the hut . I knew I wasn't supposed to , but curiosity took over me and I ran over to the hut to make sure that it was indeed coming from her .
I was right . I wanted to go in and calm her down . The woman must've felt that I would come back because she shouted in between at me . "Please don't come inside , my child . This is how I'm supposed to die . Do me favor . Survive this place and kill that bastard who left me in this stage ."
I had almost opened the door to her house when she talked . I trusted her now . Something told me that she was right , that I wasn't supposed to see how she died , unless I wanted to die the same way . "Yes ma'am , I will make sure to do that.... If I survive . But let me ask you , what's your name ?"
It was not an appropriate question to ask to someone who's at the verge of death but I needed to be able to describe her when the time came . Yes , I wanted it to happen . This was not a matter of 'if' , but of 'when' .
"Maria . Rene , I'm Maria ."
What ! This was not possible ! Maria was my age . How did she turn out like this ? "No .. This can't be true .... You're just another illusion , aren't you ?"
"Rene , believe me . I'm real . I knew that you were going through a really hard time so instead of asking what was wrong , I decided to solve it myself . I should've turned my back long ago . I should've remembered that you were dealing with supernatural people . " She took some long deep breaths . I wanted to help her , but I couldn't .
"I found out about Nate and went to see him . I didn't know that he was a Morkoth so my memories weren't erased , Nate had explained to me . I was trapped here . I found a same old lady , lying just like me , who warned me not to watch her die and stay to away from her for at least two days . I didn't-"
She took really short , yet strong breaths now . It was as if someone was choking her and she was struggling to breath . Except , the murderer was a psycho and was allowing a very few amount of air enter her lungs , not killing her , or keeping her alive .
"Time flies very fast here , I guess . But it was a very long journey for me . So please just stay away from me , never come back here . Survive and make that B-"
I waited for the very short breaths to come . It never did . Instead , she started screaming in pain . I wanted to go to her , that urge never went away . Knowing that she was my friend made it even harder to walk away from her . My heart started weighing more with the guilt that grew . My shoulders , heart , head , everything felt heavy . The deafening screams made me feel like I was I had never known what hearing meant .
I walked away , taking one step after another , feeling heavier than the last second , until I passed out . I passed out on to the floor , straight into a trap . That bastard had planned everything , hadn't he ? I was going to make it out alive .
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The sunlight never hit my face but I woke up from thirst . I was in a cave . I didn't know where I was , but it didn't matter . I just had to survive for two days . What could be a thing even worse than having to see your friend die be ? I had other close ones , but my heart felt numb . I must've cried myself in between my sleep because my eyes felt like they were burning . I had no idea whatsoever about who bought me here because it obviously wasn't me .
There was a pair of silver boots , a yellow and black jacket , and a plane white shirt . Who would leave outside after REMOVING all of their clothes . I didn't want to meet another person right then , so I took the jacket to keep myself warm the upcoming two days . "You should ask the owner before taking something from them."
A tall , muscular man , similar to Ben stood in front of me , wearing nothing but shorts . He was shirtless but I was mostly shocked because of how much identical he and Ben looked like ."OOh-! It's nothing ! I was just going through what all was here ! You know , considering the fact that I don't know you !"
"I get it . My name's Clad . You don't trust anyone here because of that old man , right ?"
I corrected him with a wavery voice , "I'm Rene . It was an old woman . She was also my friend for your information . "
"Well , it isn't my fault that I saw an old man than a woman ! It was human when I came . That's all you need to know right now. Anyway , I didn't want to meet anyone else right after that too but another lady bought me here . It seems this a loop hole of a story that Nate had created ."
Of course he knew Nate too . It was no surprise to me . "I see . So when do we get out of this illusion ? Do you know what to do ?"
"Well , yeah . I've seen the lady who helped me get out of here . Sadly , she didn't get to the real world ."
"Huh ? What happened ?"
"Well , you see , there's a way you have to move to reach the real world . There's the last illusion , which will probably get you killed instantly , and the other , to the real world . She couldn't move to the way to the real world properly and was turned the other way . She died in front of my eyes ."
His eyes were dreamy when he talked about that lady . "You had a crush on her , right ? I 'm sorry for your loss ."
A dozen tears rolled down his cheeks . "Is it that obvious ? Sorry ." He said with a noise and took a deep breath in with his filled up nose .
I waited for some time before asking how to reach that two way path again to move from this illusion . We didn't speak to each other during the whole time except for asking about stuff we needed to ask to be able to adjust with each other.
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The sun was setting now . We had found some really good , thick branches and kept it in order to make some kind of a barrier . The sky was filled with rainy clouds and we expected some heavy rain . And so we stored some fruits from trees that were scattered around the whole forest , leaving branches vertically to mark our ways . We had food , juicy water to be used as something to quench our thirst . It was enough for the both of us for a few days , if the rain didn't stop . We also had kept our eyes on a larger , more higher cave that was one the slope of a mountain . If the rain was too heavy , we had planned to move there .
The sun stopped giving out it's beautiful orange-red light and we got into the cave. I was sitting down peacefully when a huge spider started crawling onto my leg . I shrieked and tried getting up , forgetting that the cave was too short for me to be able to stand up . Clad pulled my hand to keep me from having a bump on my head the next moment .... and I ended up on his lap .
I didn't pay much attention to him staring at me and started shouting at him . "Clad ! Please get this out of here ! I can't stand spiders !"
I didn't get any response so I looked over to him . "Hey ! This isn't something you're supposed to enjoy . I'm SCARED ! Get this out of here you psycho ! This isn't funny at all , you know ! "
Clad laughed lightly and took the spider my two of it's hind legs . Then he let the spider climb on to his hands . "Watch this ? I was scared of spiders too but now , I don't mind them ! Come , let me show you !"
I pushed myself to the furthest corner of the cave . "Don't you dare come near me! I'm never touching your hand again ! "
He chuckled at me and let the spider go out after taking two of the branches out . Rain was getting heavier and heavier by each second . We were both worried for ourselves tonight . I tried changing the mood that had grown between us . "So ... what should we -"
I didn't get to finish my sentence because Clad's lips were on mine . I pushed him away immediately . "What are you doing ?! You think that I'm a joke to just kiss me after just meeting me !"
"I like you , Rene . You yourself assumed that I the liked that lady that I was talking about but in reality , she was my sister . I lost my sister . It has been a few months she died and I've been coping with it . I like YOU ."
I scoffed . "You may like me but why didn't you consider my feelings when you did what you did ? That was such a jerk move ! I'm leaving !"
Clad tried to persuade me into staying . "I'm sorry Clad . But I have someone that I love in the real world . I don't want to to return a cheater . I love him so much . Sorry ."
He sat where he sat a moment ago and did nothing when I left the cave . The rain was at it's highest peak now and it felt like I was being bombarded with rain drops that weighed a lot .
Ben wouldn't move on from me , right ? I kept that painful thought away from my mind and started walking towards the cave on the mountain . The mountain was sloppy . I kind of wanted to go back and call him because I had a feeling that it was going to fill the cave that he was in up . Should I go back ? No , he'll come when he feels like it . It's not like he's going to kill himself over something this silly !
I kept on walking , almost slipping and falling here and there . Gradually , I found a way to find whether a part of the mountain was slippery or not . Using my own trick , I finally reached the cave . The cave's base ground was having rain water enter it but since I saw a slightly higher ground inside the cave , I got in .
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The water level had increased even more now . I went outside near the entrance of the cave and looked for any kind of movement . None . Was Clad okay ?
I waited for quite some time . Finally , I lost my patience and went down the mountain . The rain had decreased but the water level wasn't in good shape . I cursed Nate for imagining stuff like this . I stabbed my own leg on the ground because I was unable to see properly with the water and leaves covering the ground . The water was up to my ankle . "Clad ! Clad ! Where are you ? Are you okay ?" I shouted at the top of my lungs . No answer .
I finally reached the small cave that I was in a moment ago . The branches that we'd kept as barriers were broken in half . I was more worried about him now . Will he be okay ? I started running aimlessly , trying to find movement again .
I finally DID see some movement in the darkness . I wasn't sure what it was , but I followed it anyway because it was the silhouette of a human . I grew closer and closer to it , and realized that it was skinnier and shorter than Clad . Then who was this ? "Hello? Who are you ? Are you lost or are you with someone ?"
The silhouette turned towards me and started screaming at the top of her lungs . I recognized those screams almost immediately . It was Maria . Maria ! II though that she was dead ? I was confused , scared , and had a blank space in my head . As soon as I regained composure , I turned backwards with my hurt feet and started running away from her . One thing that I had believed was that Mara was dead . She couldn't be alive . This must be some other illusion that Nate had planned for my survival . I was running away from her , whereas she was following me like a maniac . While I struggled to move around through the water filled ground , she ran like it was only hovering over the water .
I did not want to look back anymore and ran toward the mountain . I did not know what I was doing , I only knew that I had to stay away from whatever she was . I slip and fell from the mountain when I almost there , desperate to stay alive because I knew how cruel Nate could be when he imagined through experience . I knew now that he wouldn't care if I was killed in his illusion . I didn't want to see if I would be bought back to the real world or not by killing myself in a situation like this !
I thought that my life was over when I fell from a pretty high area . I hadn't got anything to hold on to and I was falling backwards . What do I do ? Am I going to die ? I didn't have to think about it , OR answer that because the next moment , I saw Clad coming forth from the cave on the mountain , and he caught me in time.
I looked back and was also relieved to see that Maria was no longer following us . I hugged Clad tightly . "Thank you so much ! I'm so grateful !"
"What were you doing down there during this rain ? I thought that you would be here !"
"I WAS here . I didn't see you coming up when the water level was increasing way too much and I was worried about you . I came down to check if you were okay , AND to bring you back . "
He blushed at me . Perhaps I should stoop acting like I act to keep himself from liking me more . I didn't want to hurt anybody's feeling when I get out of this place.
Both of us sat inside the cave , contemplating what to do next when a bright light entered the cave . What was that ? I had no idea anyways and I was almost too sure that Clad didn't either but I was wrong . "Come on Rene ! That's the way to get out of this hell of a place ! Let's go ! "
He held his hand out to me . I took his hand and and the both of us walked in together . It felt as if the air was vacuumed out of us when we entered the way . I felt a tug to my right side and looked over , only to see the next illusion . It wanted me to go in there . I tried to move towards the real world , slightly , but then I noticed that Clad was pulled towards the dangerous looking illusion . It had two pine shaped gates that were closing and opening at regular intervals . The inside showed a dark red light , everything was bloody . I could see my hotel room in the other side . I decided to move towards the next level of illusion . I didn't want to live a life full of guilt for choosing myself to be saved when Clad was the one who saved me .
I was almost into the illusion when Clad pushed me out and jumped in . I watched in horror as Clad barely managed to miss the pine gates . He went inside amazed at himself , and waved at me . "Go . Go and have a great life . I don't have one there anyway . "
Tears fell from my eyes and I sobbed . I didn't know what to choose . I needed to help the others . I could see dad looking at me with hopeful eyes . No . I wasn't going to let him die just like that . "You're not going to be alone in your last mission! "
Putting on a bright face , I jumped to the last level of illusion . "No Rene ! Don't!"
I barely got out alive . My thigh was scratched . My smooth fiber pant was torn apart from my thing to my knee . Blood started coming off roughly . Both this injury , as well as the injury that I received that night was on my same leg . It was painful , but bearable .
Clad helped me get back to my feet . "What the hell did you do ? Are you crazy ? Why did you think I came here instead of you ?"
I only shrugged my shoulders and started walking forth , where an extremely long bridge was present . I was already limping but it was ok . This must be it . II could see the bright light coming , telling us that the exit was there . We just had to cross this bridge first .
I took a deep breath . "Clad , follow my lead ."