BOOM!!!
Asher's arms burst with massive balls of black fire as he started throwing his fists into the air randomly.
'Not there. No. No!' His eyes were closed while he kept trying to look for Nova's soul thread. But this time, no matter how much he tried, he couldn't even find a trace of it.
"Kid, you need to stop."
BOOM!!! BOOM!!!! BOOM!!!!!
Asher paid no heed to the voice in his head.
"You haven't rested for more than thirty days straight, your muscles are literally unraveling!"
"So?!"
"So quit it! Or the girl won't be the only one dead—"
"What do you know?!!" A black tunnel of black flame suddenly rose up from the ground to engulf Asher's body. This phenomenon was a result of Asher activating his most powerful Void Flame skill, [A Thousand Year Flame].
[Warning: Your EP and Stamina are too low to sustain this skill.
Your life force is being eaten away.]
"Kid! Stop! You'll kill us both!" The Old Man yelled as Asher's body suddenly started to disintegrate from within the black tunnel of wreathing fire. But using this skill soon turned out not to be vain as the whole sky everywhere in the desert turned blank, or more precisely, into a massive rift in space.
"Just a speck. That's all I need to find!"
———
Apocalyph put down the car in his arms. "This is why you should never help a girl with her homework."
"So... you couldn't get the measurements?" Apocalyph didn't answer Yenn's question and just walked away.
"Hey Yenn! Where'd this sweet ride come from?" Jiten's eyes sparkled as he ran over to the vehicle.
"Ooh!" He lifted it up and asked the man inside the car. "Hey guy! How much for the wheels?"
Neven however, was caught up in his own silly imaginations. 'These three dudes look hotter than I am. Hm... Bingo! I'm in some alternate dimension full of handsome creatures. And since that's the case then I guess that girl is also hot, although, I can't really tell.'
Make no mistake, the fact that Neven couldn't figure out if the lady in front of him was beautiful, but could for the boys didn't mean he 'swung that way'. The confusion from knowing how beautiful a girl looked came from his immense ego, self confidence and obsession with his own self. With how much time he had spent looking at the mirror, he only knew how a man should look, and none of how a woman should since he practically paid attention to no one.
So seeing that the manly features of the three men below, bested his, his prideful mind concluded that he was no longer on his Earth, but some alternate dimension where everyone was made to look good.
"Damn. Earthlings sure are ugly." He held his head with his palms as he thought out loud.
But when the people around, mostly Enzo noticed that he was looking at Yenn while muttering those words of blasphemy, their eyebrows went up.
"Jiten, back away from the vehicle." Enzo's darkened face was pointing to the ground with his fist held out beside him.
Jiten slowly put down the car and backed away from it. "Sorry bro." He whispered to the boy in the black car. "You're pretty screwed."
"Hm? Why are you angry?" Neven deactivated the car window.
"Shut up, pest." Enzo threw a punch at the vehicle.
"BOOM!"
But to their surprise, he hit a mound of sand instead.
"Woah woah woah! Do you know how long it took me to build this baby?!" Turning their heads to the left, the three of them saw Neven's perfectly fine car, driving on the soft sand.
"What the—" Enzo blurted. Although he hadn't use all of his strength in that blow, he was sure that it would connected to the black car. But as soon as his fist was an inch away from the vehicle, it suddenly turned into sand.
"Never underestimate an opponent. That's why I always use full force while fighting." Apocalyph suddenly spat out a lie as big as his energy pool. It was exactly because he couldn't hold back that he fought away from the rest of his team.
Not moving from where he stood, Apocalyph rose his fist to throw a punch of his own.
"I don't care who any of you are." Black mist suddenly started flooding out of Neven's car. "Touch my car and the sky falls down."
Apocalyph paid no heed to his threat and pulled his fist back, ready to thrust.
"Stop." But Yenn came to the ignorant boy's rescue and grabbed Apocalyph's hand. "We should ask him how he got here in the first place. Maybe he'll be able to get us out."
Seeing logic in her words, he dropped his fist.
"What? Didn't you hear him? He called us humans, which means he's probably an Animat who just came here to eat our brains."
"Please Enzo, I don't think he'll eat your brain. It'll probably be as useless to him as it is to you." Jiten said absentmindedly as he trudged towards the black car.
"Yeah! But I thought you guys were from an alternate dimension or something, and that this white haired guy was me, but from this reality. You know? Cause we're clearly both the most handsome from our dimensions." Neven pointed at the group with his two index fingers and clicked his tongue.
"..."
"..."
"..."
Everyone else stared at the man with the bigger idiotic theory.
"On second thought Enzo, I think your brain might be able to take him really far." Jiten laughed as he started to poke the black mist surrounding Neven's car.
"Haaa~" Yenn sighed wearily. "Okay mister, how did you get here?"
Neven took his eyes off Jiten and answered, "Well, looking past the pesky guy's diss, I guess, through a spacial rift."
"Hm?" Yenn rose a brow.
"A space crack. Huh? I guess they didn't show here."
"Wait." Enzo suddenly remembered seeing that strange man earlier. He had vanished into a crack in the sky. "This crack, was it like a black hole?"
"Yeah, but it looked more like a crevice than—"
BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The ground suddenly rumbled, almost making even the black ranks fall on their faces. The sky soon broke, revealing a deep, black void above their heads.
'The barrier...' Yenn's eyes opened wide at the scene. 'Is it being removed? Like this?'
"Everyone! Hurdle around Jiten!" She ordered.
———
"Wonderful! I take three measly children and the whole sky disappears! Can this place get any worse?"
Gold. That was the main and dominant colour of the cella this unknown voice echoed in. There were golden figures of animals and plants close to the walls, unmoving. They were all lifeless statues for now.
And at the farthest wall of the room was a tall throne with crisscross patterns drawn all over it. There were a couple of words written over each other to form an 'X' behind the seat.
The letters that formed the 'X' seemed to be randomly written, with the line pointing downwards right having, 'S', 'R', 'N', 'R', 'S', and the other diagonal line spelling, 'R', 'P', 'N', 'P', 'R'.
But these letters were unimportant, as although they formed some sort of sequence, had no true meaning. What should be noted though, were two crucial things.
One was the fact that behind the throne was a chained down humanoid skeleton, three hundred feet tall on its knees, and second, was that it wasn't the one who had spread noise throughout the room.
"But what does this human seek so badly? Hm..."
"Ah Ha!" The only living being in the desolate room jumped, rubbing his bare feet on the large throne.
This unknown man had the figure of a good bodied, young teenager. His skin was dark and had a shiny lustre, on par with the golden objects that were spread around the room, and the unclear English tattoo written in gold on his flesh.
But weirdly (not as weird as it should be) enough, he looked transparent. The boy wore a large golden bowl over his head, no top wear and had on a thick cloth around his waist, over his puffy brown pants.
But enough about his well thought, beautiful, and hot looking appearance. 'Who was this man?' should be your question. Well check the title of this chapter or wait.
"Oh? This buffoon is going to kill himself for another dying person. The problem already handles itself." He sat back down on his throne, resting his leg on one of the seat's arms.
However, as he waited for the man to finish his own life force, he gradually begun to notice something amiss.
One minute...
Five...
Fifteen...
Thirty...
One hour—
"Curse this goat! How big is this boy's life force?! Each time a colour disappears, another shows. Is he...? But how many souls must he have devoured? The lives he has taken? No! I must have him!"
Changing his initial plans to let the young man die, he stepped forward, his bare feet sinking into space itself, followed by the rest of his body. It was just like when Asher tore through the artificial space barrier of the island, except his way was more fluid and natural. He soon stepped into a completely dark environment, the empty void in the artificial space wall.
"I'll need this to bargain then."
…Well, almost empty.
Just as Nova's life force was about to fade away completely, he snapped his finger, surrounding her and the owl in a golden bubble. The bubble wasn't there to heal them, but to keep that tiny thread of life they had intact.
"Now, stop making a ruckus kid." As he snapped his finger again, the worn out body of Asher appeared in the void with him, making the tunnel of black flames instantly disappear.
Asher's body was floating lifelessly in front of him, but with a slap from the bowl-hatted man, he rose his head groggily.
"Salve! Eh ehm, I mean, sup... guy?
Huh? What a weird way of greeting." He said to himself.
"Who... Who are you?" Asher's body ached like crazy, however, he couldn't show weakness in front of an unknown person, so he forced himself to stand up right.
"I... I am god!"
"The Core?" Asher frowned.
"Core? No man, that dude's more of a slave to you mortals. But since you think I'm them, then it means they've perfected the Pyramis Infinitus huh?. That should explain why you're too strong for your age."
"What are you talking about? And where am I?"
"I'm talking about the thing that... Wait, you see their message after vanqui— offing a mortal, don't you?"
"You mean the ECS?"
[A/ N: ECS: Earth Core System or The Ol' 'System'.]
"I guess...
Whatever, I am... was a god, till I woke up one day trapped in this damned desert. But since I could still use a little of my powers, I created little pets to watch and ease my boredom.
But then those three brats came over and killed them all! I enjoyed the girl's puppet show though, till I realized she was still killing my babies! I mean, what the heck man!? —"
"What, what exactly do you want?" Asher sighed. The man who was calling himself a god, talked so fast and too much, it only brought Asher further exhaustion.
"Ahem. Sorry I got carried away there, it's just been a long time since I've spoken to an intelligent life. You see, because my powers are limited I can only create... Uhh, I mean, I, am Sator Maelstrom, and I wanna trade—"
"Not interested." Asher tried to activate the black flames again, however he was really out of energy, and he was down to his own soul, so he couldn't even regenerate his wounds because of this.
'I just need to rest here for a little while till I get back a little more energy.'
Maelstrom snapped his finger, making a golden sphere appear between them. "Are you sure you don't want to trade? Not even for this?" The sphere soon turned translucent, and Asher was able to see the inside of it.
"Nova!" He leapt for the ball, however his body froze just before reaching it.
Maelstrom rose the ball above their heads and moved his face close to Asher's. "I could give you the girl and the birdy, but they'll die if they get pulled out of that time bubble."
"What do you want?!"
"Hm. Now we're talking. I want... your relic, that face mask on your—.
"Take it! Just please... don't let her die." Asher's voice sounded a little shaky as relief slowly and sneakily seeped into his brain. He would pull off his face mask himself, but he couldn't move.
"Wow, so fast? Is it not important to you? Do you have more of it?"
"No! This is the only one I have, It's..." 'the only possession I've had since I woke up.'
"You know what'll happen if you don't have that artifact? Don't you?" The Old Man warned.
"What do you think?"
"Your soul to body regeneration, your multiple ability usage, you'll be taking a big nerf, boy—"
"Are you going to do it or not?" Asher said, this time to Maelstrom.
"Uh... Okay." He thought it was weird that Asher was having a debate with himself, but he went ahead and pulled the mask off anyway. 'Now that the obstruction is gone, let's get to the main objective.'
He placed his thumb on Asher's head.
"Don't worry mortal... Asher. Don't worry Asher, I want to establish a contract between us. We both can help each other soar to extraordinary strength and break free from this prison of a place.
And with how many of them I had already sensed from the temple, we're going to need a lot of that power."
"What are you doing—"
A golden coloured screen suddenly appeared in front of Asher's face to answer his question. Looking closer, he noticed that it was a mutual contract. Asher would have never accepted to be bound by any random contract for his own life, but Nova was the most important link he had to his late mother. Besides, Maelstrom's contract seemed profitable.
Along with other conditions, the self-called god would slowly help him fix his soul so it would naturally hold more abilities, and in the meantime, use one random ability at a time.
While Asher would bring him souls to consume, as the seal on him made it so he couldn't interfere too much with the lives of the people in the desert and none with those out of it. He was practically left with no means of sustenance, so Maelstrom needed the deal they were about to make.
However,
"I can't agree to this." Asher suddenly said.
"What?" Maelstrom panicked. He couldn't force Asher to comply to his wishes because of the island's restraint, so the boy was his only ticket to one day break out of the golden temple. But now that Asher was disagreeing—
"You come along to feed your own self."
"But I can't! Weren't you at all listening to my constant rambling?"
Asher looked calmly into his eyes and said,
"This form you're in is a phantasm, isn't it? Then I think I have a new skill that would suit you perfectly."