"I don't remember." I answered, knowing that giving my real name isn't going to help.
The man looked me in the eyes for a good moment before eventually sighing and saying in an apologetic tone: "Look kid, lying to me isn't going to help you at all, I'll give you one more chance to tell me who you are before we start playing a different game."
"My name is Ethan Knott, but it's not like you're going to believe me this time, are you?" I replied as I resigned myself to my fate.
"See? It was not that hard. Now tell me, Ethan, how did you end up in here?" the old man smiled and put the knife down as he asked.
Surprised, I said: "I don't know. I was taking some kind of trial and I suddenly woke up in here. I don't even know where I am."
The man nodded with a pensive look: "A trial. You could call it that indeed."
I finally thought he was going to believe as I closed my eyes for a moment and let out a sigh of relief, but before I opened my eyes again, I felt cold in my stomach and when I looked down I noticed that the old man stabbed me out of nowhere.
"Why?" I asked in a faint voice, feeling my consciousness slowly drifting into darkness.
The last words I heard before passing out were: "Because I can't stand liars."
I opened my eyes and heard Ai's voice:
[Regarding what?]
'Huh? What is going on?' The pain in my chest was gone and I was back inside the cave, tied to the wall.
[I don't know. You stopped mid sentence.]
'Ai, I don't know what is happening. I keep waking up inside some kind of prison on Earth. Getting tortured and now I was even killed.'
[That is impossible. You are just imagining things. Your soul is fused with the Nexus and no one can do anything to it…]
Before I could hear the end of her sentence, I was back inside the prison cell. The same events repeated and I got killed once again since the old man didn't like my answers. Once I awoke in the cave again, Ai's voice continued.
[…without me knowing about it.]
'It happened again.. Ai, it keeps happening. Please, Ai, you must find a way to help me.' I was actually begging. The whole experience was slowly driving me crazy.
[No one can help you.] replied Ai as I appeared inside the prison cell again.
Terrified, I started struggling against my restrains, even breaking one of my hands, but it was of no use. The guards picked me up and I ended up getting tortured the whole day. Once the torture was done, I passed out as I was being carried back to my cell and I woke up in the cave.
'Ai, wake Senna up.'
[What for?]
'Please, just wake her up.' I said again, despair obvious in my voice.
[…She's not waking up.]
'What do you mean she's not waking up? That's impossible!!!' I screamed inside my head. Senna was my last hope.
[She can't help you either.] was the last thing I heard as I woke up inside the prison cell again. The cycle kept repeating as I was slowly drifting into insanity. Sometimes I died, sometimes I struggled and just get tortured. I even managed to bit the ear of the old man once, which ended with me getting whipped until I passed out.
Ai was of no help either, telling me that I was imagining it, that there was no way to help me and so on.
After weeks, months and even years of continuous torture, I ended up just wishing for it to end and for me to die for real. I became completely numb, until one day I asked Ai:
'Ai, take me back to the Nexus.'
[Negative. You are not in any danger.]
'Huh?' I lifted my head and said:'No danger? Are you blind?'
Before I could get an answer, I was sent back to the prison cell. After the usual torture, which was routine already, I woke up inside the cave and said to Ai:
'You always said that me returning to the Nexus was my fail safe. That I was in barely any danger and could always return. I'm telling you, I quit. I want out. I give up on this world. Just send me back, to the Nexus, to the spirit pool, wherever you want, just get me out.'
[Negative.]
A bit of clarity came to my mind due to the sudden refusal with no explanation.
"Nothing makes any sense." I mumbled as I raised my head and looked into the distance. After I finished my mumbling, I was taken to the prison cell once more. The guards carried me to the torture room as usual.
As I was waiting for the old man to come in, I fixed my eyes onto the light bulb and mumbled silently again: "Who am I?"
A deep voice sounded in my head: "Eternal. I am Eternal."
Startled, I looked around around but saw no one.
"Who are you?" I asked, hoping to get an answer again from the voice, but what I heard was the sound of a door opening. The old man walked inside and said:
"That is what I was going to ask you. Who are you?"
"Just go on with it. I'm not even going to bother.." I replied to the old man as I closed my eyes.
After getting tortured for refusing to speak, I woke up in the old cave and asked Ai with a pensive look:
'Ai, who am I?'
[Ethan Knott.]
For some reason, I felt she was lying to me.
'Is this the reason the old man always says I'm lying. But, if I'm not Ethan, who am I?' I asked myself with a dazed expression. I felt like I was really going insane as thoughts that I was not myself started taking root inside my head.
As I was mulling about everything, I appeared into the prison cell again. After being carried to the torture room, the old man entered and asked:
"Who are you?"
His question made the words I heard before appear in my middled mind again, compelling me to repeat them. I absentmindedly answered:
"Eternal. I am Eternal."
The room walls, the bulb, the table, my chains and even the knife all slowly turned into mist and I was left inside a foggy space, floating around with the old man from before. He smiled at me and said:
"Congratulations challenger. You have passed the fifth trial. Trial by Soul."
Clarity started returning to my fuzzy mind, like I was just waking up from a long dream as I said: "So it was indeed the fifth trial, but what did it test?"
"Not all trials are tests. The purpose of the fifth trial is a journey to discover one's true self. It will push your soul's endurance to the limit, forcing it to remember it's origin."
"I don't understand. What is a soul origin? What is Eternal? Wasn't that just the difficulty of the trial?"
"I can't answer that for you, only yourself can. How did you reach that answer? That you are Eternal."
"I don't know. It just sounded in my mind, like I was being compelled to say it."
"There's you answer. As your soul was close to breaking apart, it sought solace in it's origin."
Since I couldn't understand anything, I just decided to ask Ai later and said: "How many points did I get?"
"There are no points in the Soul trial. People either pass or go mad. Are you ready to get sent back?"
"Yes, please." Since the trial was over, I didn't want to stay here for a moment more than necessary.
As soon as my words ended, the guide disappeared and I woke up inside the passageway of the trial grounds. Looking at the ethereal ball in my hand, I heard Ai speaking.
[Sorry Ethan. I couldn't follow you inside this trial.]
I nodded absentmindedly. The whole experience now felt like a bad dream, but there was something still crystal clear. The voice that said 'Eternal. I am Eternal." After taking a while to calm down, I asked Ai:
'You're saying that you were not with me since the beginning of the trial?'
[Yes. As soon as you passed through the trial door, that ball entered your body and you fell into deep slumber. Even I couldn't observe what was going on. I abstained from waking you up forcefully since I figured you must be taking the trial.]
'I see. Ai, does Eternal mean anything to you?'
[Isn't that the highest level of difficulty of a trial?]
I proceeded to explain everything that I could remember from the trial and then asked: 'Can you make sense of anything?'
[..]
'Ai?'
[No, I'm sorry Ethan. I was trying to find any clue in my database but I couldn't.]
'Well, it's all right. At least I passed the trial, but now I'm scared of finding out what the other trials will do to me..'
[You can always decide to retreat.]
'I'll just sleep on it. I really feel like I haven't had a good sleep for years.' As soon as my words ended, I closed my eyes and fell asleep.
When I woke up, Senna's voice sounded in my head:
[*Good morning, Ethan.*]
'Oh, why are you up Senna?'
[*Your soul kept fluctuating throughout your rest. Since I inhabit part of your soul now, it also woke me up from my slumber. I kept asking Ai what happened but she won't tell me anything so I could only wait for you to wake up*.]
'I'm sorry..' I then proceeded in explaining what happened during the trial.
[*Oh, a soul reflection. So you called yourself Eternal. Interesting…*]
'Do you know anything about what this Eternal is?'
[*Not really. Anyway, now that you're awake, I'm going back to sleep. Good luck on the next trials.*]
After saying her piece, Senna didn't wait for me to answer and went into slumber immediately. I knew she just avoided answering my question, but there was nothing I could do about it. Sighing, I said to Ai:
'I'll take the other trials as well. I don't think anything worse than the last one could happen.'
Ai didn't say anything else and I proceeded towards the next door. Once I reached the door, I slowly walked in and my vision blurred instantly. After my sight cleared, I looked around and noticed that I was at the entrance of a small town back on Earth. Looking at my hands, I noticed that they were slightly transparent, just like my soul form.
I felt the whole scenery looked familiar, but I couldn't remember where from, then I saw a small boy carrying a wooden stick walking out of it. As I looked at the boy, I finally realized why I know the town. It was my home town, and that little boy was me when I was about ten years old.
My body involuntary followed the boy as he left the town and went into the forest nearby. A look of nostalgia appeared in my eyes as I watched him play with the sword and fighting imaginary monsters through the forest.
'Ai, can you hear me?' I tried speaking to Ai, but no answer came. With no instructions on what to do and no Ai to speak to, I just kept following the boy. Once the sun started to set, I saw him returning home. Once the boy reached home, I managed to see my parents again, the parents that I already lost once.
I looked as they kept scolding the young me for going into the forest alone. Unbeknown to me, tears slowly falling down my cheeks. I never really realized how much I missed them until now.
My vision blurred again and this time I appeared at the gates of my high school. I watched as my fourteen years self was getting bullied by some of the kids of higher grades. I never knew why they always loved to pick on me, but I knew I never had the guts to stand up for myself. I watched as a petite girl walked up to my younger self and extended a hand to lift him up after they were done as she said: "Are you all right?"
"It's fine. They will get tired of it eventually." My younger self replied as he lifted himself up, ignoring her hand.
"You should report them to the teachers."
My younger self got mad at her and said: "Mind your own business." Before turning around and walking away. The girl also got mad and said to him: "I was just trying to be of help. There was no need for you to yell at me.". After that, she also turned around and walked away with a sad look.
An old man appeared near me and asked: "Why did you reject her help?"
I looked at the old man for a moment, before turning towards my younger self as I replied: "I was ashamed. Ashamed of being so weak and getting pitied by her."
The old man nodded before my vision blurred and I heard a cute voice.
"Are you all right?"
Confused, I lifted my head and saw a hand reaching out to lift me up. The hand belonged to the little girl from before. Sighing, I grabbed her hand and let her help me up as I answered:
"I am. Thanks for the help."
For some weird reason, I seem to have returned into my fourteen years old body.
"No problem. You should go to the teachers and tell them what's going on."
"If I do that, they might get suspended for a while before the bullying will get even worse."
"But you can't let them beat you up like this. How about you go and take some self-defense classes then?"
"That's a good idea." I said in a joke as my vision blurred and I appeared in my soul form again. I slowly saw episodes of my life after that incident. I saw that the girl started hanging out with me more and soon she started getting bullied as well. I saw as I started practicing self defense so I could stop her from getting bullied, eventually ending up beating them back and even dating the girl. I transferred into her class and after high school we even got married. The scene changed from the wedding to an old man that was kneeling besides a fresh grave with tears on his eyes.
The old man appeared near me again and said: "Do you think this iteration of your future is better than the one you are currently living?"
I looked at the old man crying at his wife's grave and said: "Maybe. It looks like it was peaceful at least."
"For you." Said the old man as my vision blurred again. This time, it saw the bullies venting their frustrations on another kid after I have just beaten them. That kid had a health condition and ended up dying from the beating. I saw his parents crying at the kid's funeral and the bullies being hauled to a youth detention center, their life also ruined forever. I also watched a scene of my younger self laughing as the bullies were taken away.
The old man appeared once again and said: "You might have experienced some pain, but that pain helped you shape your character. Your empathy is a result of all the bullying you received."
I nodded at his words and said: "The bullying only lasted for about half a year anyway. Once I started hanging out with my best friend they never dared to try and mess with me anymore."
"Indeed, but that period of half a year was enough. Without it you also wouldn't have met your best friend, or many other people. It might have left some regrets in your heart, but it was an important part of your life."
"Regrets?"
"Didn't you regret not being able to stand up for yourself for quite a while?"
"Maybe. Is this the sixth trial? Me facing my past regrets?"
The old man smiled and disappeared again, together with the scene around me.
I woke up in the body of my fifteen years self as I was sitting in a classroom chair and chatting with a friend. I was honestly happy to see him again, but these thoughts disappeared from my mind as I saw a girl approach my chair and say to me:
"Hey, Ethan. Can we speak alone for a moment?"