Damn. I feel sick..
Everything was pitch black.
What happened to me?...
The pitch blackness abruptly pierced away, when Lucius opened his eyes. The first thing he saw once he opened his eyes were stary sky. In the east the sun was preparing itself to illuminate the world with its light.
Lucius was extremely feeling sick. Seeing this beautiful sight didn't stimulate him at all. Instead he looked away, and cast his gaze to his left, where he saw a girl with long pale blonde hair, sitting on a small boulder, and looking to the east.
Hearing sudden sound of moving, she turned her head to Lucius, and calmly looked at him with her blue eyes, who was looking staring at her.
Seeing that he was awake, she turned around, and said expressionlessly:
"Oh, you are a awake."
Lucius got a bit embarrassed for staring at her like a creep, so he quickly shifted his gaze, and looked at the stary sky.
"Y-Yes. I am awake. Anyway, who are you?"
"I am Levina Hillwall."
She blankly said as he rested her right leg on her left one.
She had long pale blonde hair, depressed blue eyes, wearing a rugged black shirt dress, her face is alluring but at the same time looked very sad and distant.
The night sky was retreating, and in its place a beautiful red light was descending.
Lucius tried sitting up, but his body, for some reason, won't do as he pleased. He figured it was due to his sudden illness. So, he just shifted his sickly eyes to Levina, and said:
"My name is Lucius Calvin. It's a pleasure meeting you."
As the yellow light of sun stroke her with its beautiful light, she stood up, walked near a sack, and opened it, then took out some white bread and wheat bread.
After doing that, she walked back to the boulder and again sat on it, facing Lucius. Then without offering any bread to Lucius, she indifferently took a bite of the wheat bread.
After properly biting, she chewed it down.
Then she said:
"You have been infected with curse."
"Curse?"
Lucius was muddled not understanding what she meant by 'curse'. He frowned, and asked:
"What is a curse?"
She was about to take another bite of the bread, but hearing someone ask something so stupid, she paused, and looked at him with a stupendous expression.
"Are you for real? Who doesn't know what a curse is?!"
It's not like Lucius had any way of knowing what it was. Because, from where he was from he didn't heard people getting infected by curse.
Then he averted his eyes, and nervously asked:
"I seriously don't know what a curse is?"
Levina sighed, and said:
"8 months ago this world was infected with a contagious deadly disease called "Curse". Many people got infected by this deadly curse, and among them more than half died. But here's a interesting part about this disease."
He paused for a bit, then continued:
"Those who managed to survive awakened abilities by eating the curses of others with the help of their "Curse eating system". But that's not all. They also grow stronger and gain more abilities as they consume curses of the curse infected people. This super powered humen are called "Awakened". There's 2 way for an awakened to get stronger: 1) eat the curses of normal humen. 2) defeat and devour an awakened curse..The first one is a passive way to get stronger. While the second one is an active way to get stronger."
Then she mysteriously smiled, and added:
"This is precisely why I won't kill you just yet. There's a good chance you might survive this curse. And, if you do manage to survive and become an awakened, only then I will kill you and get stronger. After all, devouring the curse of an awakened will help me get stronger even more than devouring the curses of a non-awakened."
Hearing her plan about him shocked him, and he flinched back a looking, looking mortified.
"K-kill me?"
"Relax. I said I won't kill you just yet. If I wanted to I would have done so the moment I found you."
Saying that she sighed, and looked at the rising yellowish sun.
"This is how it is with the awakeneds. When an awakened eats a curse of a normal curse-infected people, the person whom curse have been eaten will be saved. But on the other hand, when an awakened eats another awakened's curse, then that person whom curse have been devoured will die...This is how things with curse work."
Lucius tried to be as much attentive as he could even though he was ill and was apprensive after hearing her plan about killing him. He got the gist of it. So, realizing that she was an awakened, she said:
"Wait, I can still be saved if you devour my curse now. So, please do it."
She shifted her gaze at him, and rested her chin on his right wrist, then smirk devilishly.
"I already told you. I will only devour your curse once you become an awakened."
"But I will die, if you do that!"
He said that out loud as he ignored his illness and sat up.
"Like I care."
She stopped smirking. Then her face became expressionless again, and she added:
"Don't even think about veiling on me. There's no escape from me. I will wait until the curse fully affect your body and you become an awakened. But, if the worst case scenario were to arrive and the curse kill you, then I guess it's is fine either. After all, I can always find better prey."
Lucius with shockness on his face, lowered his head while being sat up.
What the hell? Why is my day keep getting worse? First I get teleported to some place I am unaware of. Then I bumped into a chick that wants to kill me!
Lucius began to shiver even though it summer. It wasn't a shiver of coldness neither it was shiver of fear. Instead, his sickness was getting even worse.
He gulped, and asked:
"Anyway, what is this place or country?"
Hearing that question made her dumbfounded. Because, no matter how much a person lived under a rock at least they should have common knowledge about the place or country they are in. But, Lucius didn't seem to possess that. So, she frowned:
"What are you? Even a kid knows about the place nation they live in!"
Then she thought since he seemed to not know about the curse disease and now he is claiming that he didn't know what nation he was in meant that he might be from another continent which is called "Rygen" Continent.
The world is divided into 2 large continent: 1) Eurome Continent 2) Rygen Continent. In the middle of these two continents is situated the forbidden sub-continent called "Death realm". Death realm is a very dangerous place since many barbaric and viel creatures roam this sub-continent. Once people enter this nation, they never come back. This is why it is called "Death Realm."
Anyway, Since those 2 continents are divided by Death Realm, people of Rygen and Eurome Continent can never travel each other's continents. This is why people of Eurome has not much knowledge about Rygen's. The same could be said for Rygen too. It is also why these two continents have no economical relationship. Only way people of one continent can travel the other continent is by sea, which is a big hassle.
The reason behind it being such a not recommendable option is because its take 1--2 years to get to another continent traveling by sea! This is why people don't dare to pick that option. Thus, they remain disconnected.
Back to topic. Soon, realizing that travel to one continent to another would be impossible if he came through Death Realm, she cast a suspicious gaze at Lucius. But then considering the possibility of travelling by sea, she asked:
"Did you came from Rygen continent?"
Though, he was perplex since he had never heard of a continent called Rygen before, he still tried to not behave suspiciously.
"Yes. I am from there."
He vaguely replied while trying his best to not act dubiously.
She stared at him for a moment with her depressed blue eyes, then she said:
"What route did you came from?"
Not understanding what she was trying to say, he frowned.
"What do you mean?"
She gave a long sighed.
"I meant did you come through Death Realm or by sea?"
Death Realm clearly sounded dangerous to him. Also, he thought picking the option sea might be the less suspicious. So, he said:
"I came by sea."
"Oh."
She then took another bite of the wheat bread, and added:
"This explains why you are so oblivious about everything here."
She instinctively assumed that the continent where Lucius were from had no curse since he was completely unaware of that disease. So, she didn't bother asking him about it. Instead she offered him a piece of white bread and proved that even she had a heart.
"Here take it."
Lucius reached out his right hand, and took the piece of bread, looking pensive.
As he stuffed the bread in his mouth, he thought:
From what I can understand, this world has only 2 continents or something like that. I had never heard of continents names such as Rygen and Eurome in my whole life. They are definitely not related to my world...Hmm.. Wait, the green light that teleported me.. does this mean I have been teleported to another world? It definitely is a possibility since I know don't know anything about those continents. Also, there's the teleportation incident. It all indicates to me being teleported to a world other than mine.
He then aimlessly looked at Levina, who was eating the bread. Then his sickly and depressed face got overwhelmed with a sudden excitement.
Teleporting to another world is really a thing!
Seeing him stare at her, she stopped eating, and asked blankly:
"What?"
"N..aaaggh"
Abruptly, his illness got even worse. There was excruciating pain in his heart, he felt as though his heart was about to explode. So, out of pain he clutched his chest with his right hand.
"Aaagh."
He began to pant intensely, and with his right eye closed, he thought.
My heart is about to explode?!
As if his intense pain in the chest wasn't enough, his whole body got hot to a point where he felt that his inside of the body was about to be melt down and his skin become as red as it could get.
He remained sat up, and clutched his chest with both hands, and screamed as loudly and piercingly as he could.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah
"
The screaming was so ear piercingly loud that Levina had to cover her ears. Now that the curse had finally began to take its full effect, Levina could only look at Lucius with a tense eyes, and wait patiently for the result of the full effect of the curse. He was beyond help now. It's not like Levina had any intention of helping him from the beginning, anyway. After all, if he become an awakened, it would benefit her the most. Her plan was to devour the awakened Lucius curse, after he got to stage 3-4. This way she would get even more powerful.
Now was the moment of truth for Lucius. It was all up to Lucius' shear willpower and luck whether he had the compatibility to become an awakened or not.
As Lucius was feeling extreme hotness from within his body and steaming a lot, he also felt that something was simultaneously tickling the inward of this body. Although, it wasn't certain, but to him it felt like the inward structure of his body was charging.
Then after a few seconds, Lucius was left flabbergasted by what had happened to him. His body color changed to gray. His black eyes turned green and black hair turned white, fingernails turned black.....