"What... what happened?" Maeve whispered, her voice quivering as a searing pain surged through her senses. She fought to open her eyes, but her eyelids defied her, heavy and unyielding, as though trapped in a battle against her will.
She took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down, focusing on her other senses, She slid her fingers along the surface beside her, she felt something cold and damp—a texture that resembled a moist stone wall covered in mold. The pungent stench of rotting flesh and decayed bones filled her nostrils, making her stomach churn. Everything she perceived suggested she was in a forest, surrounded by death and decay..
Despite the ache that consumed her entire body, the sharpest and most unbearable pain radiated from her thighs.
It felt as though something blunt had pierced through her left thigh, tearing all the way through and emerging on the other side. The sensation was coupled with the numbing loss of feeling in her right hand, each moment wracking her body with unbearable pain.
The pain was excruciating—enough to drive even the strongest of men to madness. Her mind was clouded, struggling to piece together how she had ended up in this harrowing situation. No human should be capable of enduring such an overwhelming level of agony.
However, Maeve was far from ordinary. She was secretly a Dominator—a rare breed of humans gifted with the ability to manipulate their surroundings to produce supernatural effects. Society had coined the term "Dominator" to describe individuals like her.
Little was known about Dominators, except that the first of their kind emerged twenty years after the Great Pandemic.
Aside from a few minor experiments she had conducted, Maeve herself knew little about Dominators or the full extent of their abilities.
After what felt like an eternity, Maeve's eyes slowly flickered open. At first, all she could see was a hazy apparition as her vision remained blurry, but gradually, everything came into focus. The first thing she noticed was her surroundings—she appeared to be in an underground chasm.
She noticed the environment was cramped, the space not very large, yet the thick stone walls loomed around her, nearly all of them covered in mold. Dried bones of dead animals littered the ground, their origins unclear. Maeve couldn't identify the creatures these bones once belonged to—most were far larger than any animal she'd ever seen or heard.
Some of the bones gleamed a jade white, their surface smooth and unnaturally clean, as though a mysterious force had stripped the flesh from these creatures while they still breathed. The remains were eerily intact, revealing the sharp edges of fractured ribs and jagged skulls. Maeve's gaze flickered to deeper impressions in the ground—deep, unnatural gouges and splintered bones, suggesting a brutal struggle. Some of the creatures' limbs were twisted at unnatural angles, their bodies battered, as if they'd been struck with immense force before their final breath.
"Did I cross into another dimension?" Maeve muttered to herself. The more she observed the remains of the strange creatures, the more plausible it seemed. However, after a moment's reflection, she quickly dismissed the thought. Transmigration or reincarnation only made sense in fantasy worlds. Moreover, why would she transmigrate or reincarnate into a forest in such a near-death state?
At first, Maeve had believed she was in some kind of forest, but after a closer look at her surroundings, she realized there were no trees to be seen.
She quickly assessed her condition and gasped. From her left thigh, what appeared to be dried, splintered wood protruded, the wound beginning to emit a foul odor. When she looked at her right hand, the shock intensified. It was bent at an unnatural angle, grotesquely mangled, with torn flesh barely clinging to the bone. She could see fragments of bone piercing through the damaged skin—it was no doubt the reason she had lost feeling on it.
Thankfully, she had been still long enough for the blood to clot, though she had no idea how long she had been here. One thing was certain: if she didn't get out of this place soon, she would die.
As the underground chasm received little amount of sunlight, It was shrouded in a dim, eerie light, the faint glow from cracks between the stone walls casting long, jagged shadows across the floor. Maeve's eyes strained to adjust, the flickering beams of sunlight seeping through the narrow gaps above offering the only hint of illumination. She squinted, trying to gauge the size of the chasm, but the darkness seemed endless. Her gaze darted to several winding paths ahead, each leading deeper into the oppressive shadows, their twists and turns vanishing into the unknown.
Maeve gritted her teeth, her body stiff with the effort as she tried to shift. Each movement, no matter how small, sparked a fire of agony that coursed through her limbs. Her breath hitched as she attempted to push herself into a better position, but the pain flared, stabbing through her like molten iron. A sharp hiss escaped her lips, her body trembling as the waves of torment crashed over her.
Suddenly, Maeve's body froze, every muscle locking in place as an unfamiliar sound drifted from the distance. It was low at first, like the groan of a far-off wind, but it grew louder, sharper—a disturbing creak that seemed to echo from deep within the chasm. Her eyes darted toward the source, her breath shallow, as she instinctively pressed her back against the cold stone wall. The sound... it wasn't like anything she had ever heard before.
The creature seemed to materialize from the shadows, its presence sudden and overwhelming. It was like a millipede, but far, far larger—easily the size of an elephant. Its body was armored, a thick exoskeleton covering its entire form, gleaming faintly in the dim light. Each segment of its massive body twisted and shifted with eerie precision. Jagged pincers, sharp enough to tear through metal, clattered menacingly as it advanced, a silent threat in its every movement.
As maever observe the milipid fear started to creep into her being, this was the most terrifying and grotesque creature she'd ever seen.
As Maeve watched the millipede, a creeping wave of fear began to settle over her, tightening her chest. This was the most grotesque and terrifying creature she had ever seen. Its body, massive and undulating, seemed to stretch endlessly as it moved with chilling grace. Each of its hundreds of legs shifted silently, the creature slinking closer, its every movement deliberate and predatory. Maeve's eyes widened as it crept toward her.
"What the hell am I?" Maeve muttered to herself, her mind racing. First, she'd woken up in a strange chasm that reeked of death, surrounded by the remains of creatures she could barely remember. Now, a grotesque millipede, the size of an elephant, was slowly creeping toward her, its ominous movements signaling that it was coming to devour her whole.
With each passing second, the grotesque millipede inched closer and closer to Maeve. She could only watch, paralyzed with fear, unable to move a single muscle.
The creature clicked its pincers together with a sickening noise, as if savoring the anticipation of its next meal. Its movements were slow, deliberate, and eerily silent, each step calculated with precision. Maeve's heart pounded in her chest as it drew closer, the distance between her and the grotesque creature shrinking to just a few meters.
Suddenly, the creature halted, its pincers clicking in frustration. The helpless prey it had been stalking was now gone—vanished. From its perspective, Maeve seemed to have disappeared, as though she had dissolved into thin air.
The creature continued to click its pincers, standing motionless where Maeve had once been, its head swaying as if it were sniffing the air. No matter where it looked, Maeve was nowhere to be found.
Meanwhile, Maeve was drenched in sweat, her body trembling with the effort. She struggled to maintain control over her dominion, the strain of keeping it intact pushing her to the brink.
This was the gifts her constellation had granted her. When the first Dominators were discovered, scientists around the world scrambled to understand their abilities. Despite the confusion, one thing became clear: Dominators were a gift to humankind, a potential remedy to humanity's greatest struggles.