A few days before the Purge, having done all that could possibly be done to address his soft cap issue, John began the ascension process while alone in the room he made to train [External Energy Manipulation].
John sat with his legs crossed, his hands on his thighs, and entered a light meditation. He pictured his dantian and pictured himself standing in front of it, as large as he could picture himself. He bent under his dantian and placed it fully on his shoulders and back, much the same as the Titan Atlas was said to do with the heavens.
With a mighty heave and a yell of effort, John lifted his dantian. He immediately felt something like an insect inside his lower belly go mad trying to claw its way out, and in the real world he felt his legs spasm. He was determined to retain control of his real body and not let it fall over and kick out madly as it did during his two prior ascensions.
John continued to heave powerfully on the dantian until he heard cracking, like a large pane of glass under too much stress. The noise grew louder, and the sound of shattering glass reverberated throughout his insides and echoed back and forth. In the real world his legs spasmed mightily, and his body fell onto its side as his legs kicked out wildly, over, and over. He was not able to retain any control over his real body, and it did what it pleased.
John tried ignoring the great pain in his lower belly but that wasn’t possible either. It felt as if a volcano exploded within him every time he heaved upwards again. His imaginary legs shook in effort, and he tapped into a primal part of his mind only meant to be let loose in dire straits, as when fighting a tiger, and thoughts of safety and tomorrow had to leave the mind, and the only care was killing the beast before being too injured to do so, before the body stopped but the mind didn’t, and the tiger feasted on a living body, frozen, but still aware, what was now known as a body going into shock.
The cracking noise increased. John let out a mighty yell that echoed even over the noise of the shattering glass, and he forced his dantian upwards, and upwards, smidge by smidge, until his legs fully extended, and the weight of all the heavens bore down upon his shoulders, and he felt his dantian being bathed in the strange energy called accretion-effusion which emanated from his self-center.
In reality, John’s uncontrollable legs kicked out madly, and the volcano in his belly erupted into new heights of pain and agony until his vision suddenly cracked, and then shattered. He was looking through many, many eyes, like how he assumed a fly saw through its million eyes.
Then the world blurred by John, as it did when he entered his Mind’s Eye, but it lasted far longer, and he traveled far further. He was somehow still in reality at the same time, his legs spasming out of control, and he also still held his dantian up as Atlas did the heavens, in three places all at once.
Then all suddenly stopped. John was looking directly at the humongous, indescribable monster he feared and hated named Betrayal. The monster spoke, and its words were like extraordinarily destructive and strange trumpets meant to quake the earth apart, heralding the end of days. “GOO…”
The world blurred again as John was ripped away from Betrayal. After his vision cleared, he stood before his mother. He felt like he was in a dream. For whatever reason the sight of his mother felt normal and not odd, and he knew he saw her as she truly looked, not the false image his memories had given her.
John’s mother was dressed as everyone in his tribe dressed, in just a loincloth. She was a large woman and broad of shoulder. Her face was flat and weathered and not handsome in the least. Her breasts hung low and flat against her, the ends rounded and full of milk.
She looked her son in the eye. “Are you brave, my son?”
“Yes, Ma, I am,” replied John.
She smiled. “Are you kind, my son?”
John thought that was a strange question. He wondered what language they were speaking. His people didn’t have a word for kind. Everyone was treated well unless they gave a reason not to be. Older boys bullied younger boys, but men didn’t bully boys or other men. From what he had seen, smaller tribes like his own always treated each other pretty well. He’d guess meanness and corruption and all those baser qualities of man only started in large tribes and towns.
“I’m kind to my friends and those I love,” stated John. “I’m also terrible to my enemies. Not my current enemies. I must be kind to them until it’s time to be terrible.”
She frowned. “Are you strong, my son?”
“Yes, Ma, but not strong enough yet. My path is long. One day, I’ll be the strongest or dead. Ma…do you…what was my birthname? I’ve forgotten.”
Her eyes twinkled before she replied. “The only names that matter are the ones you’ve earned. There is a name, a name that resides within you, that can be used against you, but only if your purpose isn’t clear. Is your purpose clear, my son? What were you born for?”
John stood taller, “I was born for war.”
She laughed. “War? Are you sure? What does your soul cry out for? Is it war? Or is it love?”
“I…I don’t know, Ma. I’m only good at one of them. I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
She frowned again. “You’re never alone, my son. I am always with you. As is our Father. Will you stand beside us, in the end, when this dream ends?”
“Life isn’t a dream, Ma. It’s real. There is no Koram or Underworld. There’s one all-powerful God in Heaven. But I can’t go there. Getting there is impossible. I’ll be reborn.”
A tear trickled down her flat face. “No, you won’t, my son, and that breaks my heart. Once this life ends, if you awaken to something new, then this life sounds like a dream, no?”
John hesitated before saying, “We were wrong about a lot, Ma. Your husband shouldn’t have killed you. A husband’s job is to protect his wives and children, and to never die after them. I survived my children, and that makes me low. We were wrong. It’s shameful.”
If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
She frowned for the third time. “What would our enemies have done to me and your siblings if we were caught? The boys would be tortured to death, the girls raped, made low and servants, forced to birth sons for our enemies, bolstering their ranks. What was your lord father to do?”
“Try! Be stronger! Win! Or, at least, send you to flee as he did me.”
She looked disappointed. “Since he sent one of your younger brothers with you, you were both almost caught. If we all went, what would our fates have been? Should your lord father have put his wives in a position where it would be necessary for us to take the lives of our own children? I cannot! I would not! Not that.
“A husband’s job, a father’s job, is to always put all the lives he is responsible for before his own. My lord husband would not die a coward, leaving such burdens to his wives and children, or such fates if things took a wrong turn. He would do his duty, the duty of a husband and father, and take all that is terrible onto himself, and save us from such horror.
“I raised you better than you have lived. You must think of your responsibilities always. Those you claim to love, those that look to you for honor and safety, you must think of them. You forget your duties, only hoping your next awakening ends your suffering. Would you have taken your mother’s life to save her honor?”
John took the stinging reprimand of his mother and silently pondered her words as he looked at the ground. When he looked back up, his mother was chained to a wall, and that seemed normal to him, like she had been chained to that wall their whole conversation.
“I wouldn’t,” said John. “I would save you. You’re only half right, Ma. A husband, a father, shouldn’t ever take the lives of his wives and children for such reasons. It’s wrong. I would fight! Fight harder! Save them. Somehow. Save them. Maybe…”
John was interrupted by a loud boom in the distance. His mother looked frightened. “You must go, Son. Go! Before they arrive! Go!”
John looked around. He was in a dungeon. He heard war trumpets sound. “I won’t leave you.”
“You must. Please. This is not your fight. Leave me to my fate. I would not have my son suffer for me. Not in this dreadful way.”
The booming and trumpets drew closer. John looked at the determined face of his mother. “No. Never. You’re my mother. I love you and will never abandon you. Your fights are mine to fight, as is your honor mine to protect.”
She laughed cruelly. “Our tribe never had a word for love either. You stood aside and watched your father slay me. I want you to leave. I am ashamed of you and want you to leave. I hate you. You are no son of mine.”
His mother’s words ripped a hole in John’s chest. Still, he said, “You’re my mother. Say what you will, but I won’t abandon you.”
The door to the dungeon was banged upon loudly. She jumped at the bang. “Go! I do not want you here! Go! Now!”
John turned towards the door and drew his sword. His mother sternly said to his back, “Go now. This is too much for you. A year of nonstop battle. If you fall, and you will fall, you’ll have ten years of torture. If you break, and you will break, you’ll have a hundred years of madness. This is your last chance. Flee while you still can! Flee!”
John set his shoulders. “For you, Ma, I’d fight a hundred years of battle. A thousand. We didn’t need a word for it. I knew you loved me. You’re my mother, and I’ll not leave you, no matter what you say. Not now. Never again.”
The door banged open and giant monsters covered the field John now stood upon. His mother said, “You should have fled, fool.”
John knew he was in a dream, but part of him wondered if it was real. It lasted far longer than any dream he ever had, and the pain he was subjected to felt real.
After lasting for months in brutal combat, John finally fell. He was tortured for ten years, but the torture didn’t break him. He had endured much worse. The agony of the body was nothing compared to the agony of great betrayal. He had hoped he would break, as a hundred years of madness, a hundred years free of his own mind and own thoughts, sounded like a nice reprieve.
When the dream ended, it ended as suddenly as it began. John was too confused to do much at all for a moment. The pain in his belly helped him remember he was ascending. He shook his imaginary head to clear it. He felt as if something had changed deep within him.
There were only two Johns, and no longer three. One of him was hefting his dantian high on his shoulders, his legs quaking under the titanic strain, and the second was shaking on the ground, his legs spasming out of control.
John’s lower belly was burning with a terrible pain he had only felt twice before. He had felt all types of pain many, many times, and there was no pain like the one he felt during ascension. He was insusceptible to mundane pain, and largely hardened to true pain, and what he felt in his belly was intolerable. Unendurable. Pain that should cause unconsciousness to protect the mind from the trauma of it, yet it didn’t, so he had to suffer it.
And suffering through the pain was much easier this ascension. Easier even than during his last ascension, when his heart throbbed with pain so great that what he felt in his belly couldn’t compare.
John still failed to notice when his dantian was completely crystallized and continued to hold it aloft. He desperately wanted an end to the agony he was forced to endure.
John tried to make his world smaller, as the pain was too great, and he could only focus on enduring from one moment to the next. Just one more moment. And then just one more, and then one more after, trying to completely block out everything besides reaching the next moment.
After some point, John noticed the pain was gone. He opened his eyes. He was standing in the same position as he was in his mind, as the Titan Atlas stood. He felt more powerful, but he also felt sad. He missed his mother. He knew it was just a dream, and a very strange one at that, but it all seemed real as it was happening.
What worried John was that he was almost certain the dream didn’t come from Betrayal. Someone else had joined in the game of toying with him.
For some time, John pondered the why of it. Why would anyone want him to dream such a dream? He couldn’t figure it out.
Oh well, John thought. He needed to get the next [SupraType] [Perk] in the chain. Then he’d check the results of his ascension.
----------------------------------------
----------------------------------------
Nine cursed his lapse. He was above losing control. Only filthy organics lost control like wild beasts. Yellow were above such. But he lost Thirteen, his ward. He lost his future queen. His princess. His hope. His function. His reason for living.
Yellow, like the Peerless, were ‘skeevers’ – a race artificially repressing their Tech level. Unlike the Peerless, the Yellow were an old race and had been skeevers for a very long time. They couldn’t advance without losing too much of Yellow, the AI that was as much a part of every Yellow as they were Yellow.
The pathetic ganians thought they were powerful. They had no idea what powerful meant. If Nine could go back to Yellow, there’d be no ganians if Yellow decided it was to be so. But he couldn’t go back now. Or ever.
Nine hated the ganians. They stole his ship, stranded him, forced him to put his princess in harm’s way.
And, sitting in a cell, Nine now knew he played right into their hands. He was visited by a ganian worth talking to. An intelligent caste called Mele. Not as intelligent as a Yellow functioned for it, but clever.
The ganians got what they wanted. Info. Just info. Info on Nine’s ship, on his biology, on his tech. He was now free to go, though his ship was no longer his ship.
But Nine had nowhere to go. His function died with Thirteen. He couldn’t go back. He was no longer part of Yellow. He had to make his own reason to exist.
Nine repurposed his reason for being. His function. His soul.
Nine hated the ganians, but he hated one specific man far more. He would swear to the ganians, to their Peerless Empire. He would find John of Terra and learn everything of him. Of his dreams. Of his fears. Of those he loved. He would learn of it all. And he would use all he had learned to hurt the organic that killed his princess, that stole his worthy function.
Little by little, he would wound the organic, and long from now, once Nine’s soul sung with light knowing he had done all that he could, he would finally allow John of Terra to die from the thousand cuts inflicted upon him.