Desire.
Something that every living creature has, something that every man is a slave of.
The enemy of desire is discipline. With discipline, we are able to do things regardless of whether we want to or not.
Without discipline, we fall into a never-ending spiral of desiring more and more items of vanity.
Is a life of desire worth the temporary joy it produces?
Is a life of discipline worth the constant hardships it takes to get to that point?
...
Raindrops clung to Michael's dirty blonde hair as he walked through the unknown district. It was mostly abandoned, with run-down, windowless buildings.
A fallen sign on the side of the road read as an ad for Beaumont plumbing, confirming that Michael was still in his own city.
He continued down numerous streets, twisting and turning as if in the midst of a maze. Unable to grasp his location or get a good sense of direction, Michael wandered these streets hopelessly.
An uncanny feeling drenched him the more he traveled, and he began wearily scanning his surroundings.
The cracked asphalt roads resembled a scene from a post-apocalyptic movie, and colorful graffiti plastered on the walls juxtaposed the muted tone of the district.
Foliage spilled out of the space between buildings, and vines crawled out of the gutters.
Lofty shadows of the city skyline stretched across the street as morning rays poured from the heavens.
The shadows seemed to form a wall of darkness that interrupted Michael's illuminated path.
His shadow merged with the ones on the street as he continued walking.
Stepping into the shadows, a deep apprehension ignited within him...
The shadows of the surrounding city began contorting and metamorphosing despite the lack of a moving light source.
He quickly leapt backward as the darkness transformed from a two dimensional plane to the third dimension.
Converging violently, the shadows streamed into a single point, balling up and giving birth to something purely indescribable.
A vague monstrous entity that contorted in ways impossible for any living creature.
Its indistinct figure emerged from the darkness, veiled by shadows.
The hazy blackness of the monster's body blocked out the sun's light, and its colorless, beady eyes glared at Michael. Bounding forward, it crushed the earth beneath it with every movement.
Turning around and booking it, Michael sprinted down the ruined street while the thunderous stomping of the black entity followed right behind him.
Michael's heart pounded out of his chest as the black monster ferociously chased after him. He gasped for air, his sluggish body stumbling on. It felt as if there was lard in his veins.
Why? He thought.
Why do I feel like this?
Michael's vision flashed a sickening blue, and he lost balance, tumbling onto the rough asphalt.
The murky monster pounced onto him and launched a shadowy skewer aimed towards his heart. Michael barely managed to roll away as the attack pulverized the pavement below.
Scrambling to stand up, Michael's vision flashed a nauseating blue once more.
He hacked up a yellow bile as vomit spouted from his mouth. Desperately trying to get away, Michael stumbled through the streets, covered in his own puke and dripping sweat.
I don't want to die like this, he thought.
While attempted to regain his bearings,
the monster grasped his whole body in its overbearing clutches.
He squirmed and thrashed violently, trying to break free of the black fiend's grasp, but to no avail.
It held him up in the air as it squeezed his body in its giant fist, crushing his bones and compressing his innards.
"AARRRRGGGHH!"
The unbearable pressure built up as his internal organs burst and blood profusely streamed down like red rain falling from the sky, creating a horrid image.
Michael's vision flashed blue once again, contrasting the red of his entrails leaking out of his abdomen.
Fight back, a vaguely familiar voice in Michael's head urged him.
Do you want to stay weak? Do you want to let fate have its way with you?
Michael raised his sluggish arms from their slumped position to meet the fist that bound him. Gritting his teeth, he strained against the monster's grip as he slowly attempted to jar its fist open.
No, he answered.
I can't allow myself to live like this anymore.
If I'm to end this dissatisfied life...
If I'm to gain the things I truly desire...
I have to fight now.
He pushed himself past his limits, and an agonizing puncturing sensation covered his body as his broken bones pierced his skin from the inside out.
What do I desire?
The abandoned district faded from Michael's sight as the streets around shifted to a pure powdery white and the surrounding buildings began resembling lifeless trees. A familiar scene, a continuation of a dream.
You said I can only wish for one thing, right Weisenburg?
Instead of the monster's grasp, Michael was trapped in his subconscious prison of ice once again, his dream leaking into reality.
His burning muscles quivered as he strained against the frigid cage.
Then I wish for strength,
Michael thought, playing out the events of the white city through his head.
And as if a switch had been flipped in his mind, the dreadful blue invigorated him as it radiated throughout his body, mind, and soul.
Because if I become strong...
Right outside the confinement of the ice, a raging blizzard stormed. Michael no longer sheltered himself in the ice or cowered from the violent winds.
He now sought out the freezing unknown.
THEN I CAN GRASP THE FUTURE WITH MY OWN HANDS!
The ice shattered into millions of pieces, with light reflecting like kaleidoscopes off each fragment. Michael dropped to the ground as his dream world dissipated...
It was as if a door had been opened to a new, unseen world.
The same abandoned city and ruined streets appeared before him as he snapped back to reality.
But he now saw the city through a different lens. A lens of strength.
No longer would he be shackled by the chains of fate.
No longer would he run away, letting weakness reign over him.
He charged at the foul entity, his heart drumming the rhythm of battle.
Balling his hand into a fist, his veins coursed with a new courage.
And without even willing it, as if his mouth had a will of its own...
"Noble Chroma: Blue."
The wounds all over his body mended, being bound by ultramarine bandages.
Reeling his fist back, he thrust it into the enemy's abdomen with all the strength he could muster.
At that moment, a deep blue rushed through Michael's arm and was released from his knuckles.
Color flooded the streets around him as ribbons of navy streamed through the open air.
The enemy was knocked backward as it struck his body.
Savagely sprinting forward, Michael leapt a dozen feet off the ground, meeting eye-to-eye with the black brute before dropkicking its skull in.
Falling to its knees; the power of the strike cracked the asphalt underneath.
While the monster was stunned, he bombarded it with a flurry of azure punches, the color following directly behind his fists.
A surging force emerged from the cascading blue as the enemy was launched into an adjacent building.
Its body slammed through the concrete wall of the structure as it caved in. Dust from the wreckage scattered into the air as debris fell from the upper floors.
Now trapped under a heavy pile of rubble, the black fiend stayed unmoving. Michael slowly approached the heap of destruction before readying an attack on its center.
But before he could unleash his strike, the heap erupted in a burst of darkness, and the fiend emerged, storming towards him in a desperate, last-ditch assault.
Michael spread his body out wide as if to embrace the monster, and as it charged into him, he wrapped his arms around its wicked body.
Using the momentum of the attack, he leaned backwards and suplexed the horrid black man, brutally smashing its head into the pavement.
It contorted as the darkness of its figure twisted from the impact.
Embedded in the concrete, it squirmed forcefully to free it itself to no avail. Michael nimbly jumped atop a nearby building and he deviously smiled as he looked down on the enemy.
Die.
Plummeting from the sky, he braced himself; jutting his arm outwards. Gems of sapphire glimmered along his path as Michael ferociously dropped his elbow onto the enemy, sinking his entire body's weight into the attack.
The ground split as a ripple of rumbling shook the surrounding buildings. An explosion of cerulean waves that crashed and flowed throughout the streets thrashed the monster.
A raging torrent formed coupled with a whirlpool that consumed the enemy and annihilated anything caught up in its tide.
...
The aftermath was unthinkable, as if a storm had run through the destroyed street. Silence filled the air as not a single trace of the monster was left behind...
"That's pretty impressive; I've been hunting that thing for a while," a deviant voice broke that silence.
Michael looked back to see a vaguely familiar face. A man with messy black hair curtaining over his piercing eyes.
He wore a draping black garment and stashed a dazzlingly white sheath in its waistband.
"Alan?"
...
During his high school years, Michael kept a close knit group of friends that consisted of four people: Juan, Alan, Matt, and himself. An arrangement of very different individuals that got along well nonetheless.
Although when the group graduated, they split up to chase their own goals in life respectively.
Juan became a world-renowned scientist using his intelligence.
Matt became an influential priest using his charisma.
Alan's accomplishments were hidden from the public eye.
And Michael had yet to become what he truly wanted to be; his destiny still unknown.
...
Back in the present, Alan cautiously said, "Yeah, long time no see... It's been what? Seven years now?"
"Seven years?"
Alan watched Michael's confused expression carefully before speaking his next words, which carried copious amounts of weight: "Yeah, it's the third of April, 2030. You were stuck in Limbo for almost three years."
"What?" Michael's eyes widened as time slowed and his breathing stopped. The air around him was nearly tangible with its thickness.
"That white city where you met Weisenburg is called Limbo; it's the place people go after they die if they're unfit for heaven or hell."
"So... what does that mean... I died?" Michael fidgeted as the reality of the situation set in, leaving him in shock.
"Yeah, but Weisenburg brought you back and granted you an Akashic power. It's those blue waves you can summon."
"But why? Why did he grant me power? Why was I stuck there for so long?"
"I don't know; he never tells me much."
A light breeze blew, picking up the dust that had settled from the wreckage. A telling wind of ambiguity.
Alan slipped his hands into his pockets as he leaned against one of the many deteriorating buildings. Michael gazed at him, unable to read his expression or body language.
"What am I supposed to do now?" Michael asked.
"Well, you have a choice... Although you don't know him that well, do you want to fight for Weisenburg?
"Fight for him? I don't know..."
"He did save your life after all."
Michael didn't know what to think. Alan made a fair point, but there was so much unknown about Weisenburg that he couldn't commit.
"What would I fight against?"
Alan mischievously smirked, resembling a certain off-brand scientist, and answered
"Godfried, the man who murdered you."
A vivid flashback of the incident shook Michael as he reeled from the memory. His newfound strength meant he was no longer scared of the murderer, but Michael was still unsure of battling someone like that.
"I don't really have a reason to fight him though; I don't seek revenge or anything."
"Even though he killed you?" Alan asked curiously.
"Yeah, I don't feel the urge to fight him."
"Hahaha, that's a funny way to think of your murderer...
Isn't that weird, though? You don't feel gratitude for the man who saved your life, but you'll let your murderer run loose. Are you feigning selflessness? Or are you too scared to face reality?" The tone of Alan's voice changed mid-sentence from warm and friendly to serious and interrogative.
"I-" Michael didn't know what to say; he had never seen his own thoughts from such a perspective.
Am I being selfish? Am I still weak and running away? I gained strength for what? To not do the right thing? He questioned himself.
Michael knew that he owed Weisenburg a great debt. He also knew that Godfried was likely to kill again if left unchecked.
But a voice in his mind questioned whether it would be the right decision to get involved with them.
If I'm fighting for Weisenburg... Is that really my own destiny? If I'm hunting for Godfried despite not wanting to, am I not just letting fate have its way with me?
"I need some time to think about it," Michael said anxiously.
"Unfortunately, life doesn't slow down for you to choose the right path. You make a choice once and deal with the consequences afterwards. That's just how it is."
Sunlight broke through the clouds, illuminating Alan's silhouette. The outline of his figure left an imprint on the deep blue sky behind him.
"You have two days to choose, before it starts...
The War of the Akashic Records."