Ch. 45 Broken Reflection
Falling... always falling, in this bottomless dark expand with nothing in sight. How long has it been since I started to notice something was wrong? The last thing I could remember before coming here was biking to the gym, trying to make her happy.
"Her...?" Something about that thought brought shame and helplessness, but I could only remember blurry images of it. As I tried to get a clearer picture of that memory, I saw for the first time something new.
A giant wooden table was now on the path of my falling body, landing on it shortly after, light as a feather. Looking around there was nothing else but the table in this place. Suddenly I hear a giggle behind me, turning around I saw a beautiful maiden adorn in dozens of jewels.
She sat on a golden throne full of gems, staring down at me with her towering frame. "He-he, my dear Brian, look how small your getting, you should really hit the gym more often." Said the large maiden in a demeaning voice, "I-I," my voice came out like a whisper, the more I tried to talk to her the larger she got.
Noticing something was wrong I stopped talking, as she continued, "am going out with my friends tonight, but look at this," she pointed at one of her rings. The item reminded me of how much I had to save up to buy it for her, "this thing is so old now, I need a new one or my friends would laugh at me!"
A bit of fury ran thru me as I was about to reprimand her, however, the words died in my mouth. Shortly after, I felt a new presence behind me, turning around, a familiar woman sat there on a more humble throne. She looked simple and honest, and unlike the other maiden, did not wear any jewels.
Taking a look at me, she commented in a sarcastic voice, "still unable to satisfy anyone I see, color me surprise." The two ladies laughed as their vision landed at a certain spot, making me blush in embarrassment. I tried to talk but nothing came from my mouth, the gilded maiden reached her hand out asking for something.
I could remember that she needed something from me but I was unwilling to give it to her, yet afraid she would leave. Looking annoyed she said, "tsk... so much fuss for such a small amount, are you sure you love me?" Hearing those words made me subconsciously move, digging my hands in my stomach as I ripped out my guts and organs, gifting them to her.
With a shy smile, she said, "thank you, baby! I'll go shopping now," while blowing me a kiss, disappearing the next moment. Mechanically, I turned to the humble maiden as she gently rubs her hand over her belly, turning her attention to me the moment the other one left.
"You're as incompetent as ever I see," as she said that her belly started to shake and squirm, like something inside of it was trying to get out. "How are you gonna support them when you give out so little to even the so-called love of your life," said the humble maiden with a smirk.
As the sentence ended, her belly bursts open, hundreds of black, shriveled, and slimy things with both our faces slowly crawled over the table, reaching me shortly after. The creatures bit at my body ripping flesh and bones apart, fighting over every scrap.
My screams and pleads never left my mouth, as I seemingly lost the ability to speak. The humble maiden refocused on me in unsatisfaction, "stop making a show, can't you see they are hungry! Useless as a man and a father, what right do you have to deny them."
In a blink of an eye, everything went back to endlessly falling. The pain of getting torn to pieces was the only thing that remained of what just happen. The same scenario happen over and over again, very little changed each time, as I slowly grew numb to the pain.
My body was full of holes and scars that grew deeper the longer it repeated. I once again felt something in my falling path, however this time it was not the outline of a table but that of a sphere. Seeing something new brought color back to my dull eyes, as I reach my hand towards it.
The blues, the greens, these are the beautiful colors of an Earth-like planet, its familiarity drawing me like a moth to the flame. As my body drew closer a lifeless robotic voice could be heard in my head.
[Foregn soul detected. Searching origin... unknown. Detecting a large amount of Dark Element from the soul. Possibility this soul is an abyss or undeath creature... 0%. Conclusion. Mutated Lingering Will. Beginning assimilation.]
The world before me actively tried to pull me to it, my mind slowly becoming calmer and happier. As I approached the planet rapidly, I was able to see beyond the surface level all the way to the core of the planet. In the middle of the planet, a large rainbow cloud-like mist covers the spere in the middle.
As I continued to speed up my mind became calm and at peace, the last thing I saw before passing out was a shimmering quadruple-colored jewel the size of a whole country. Passing out, his soul sped up even faster, as the mist around the core suddenly turned black.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
The black mist took the shape of tentacles trying to capture the soul only to be attacked by numerous blue, red, brown, and grayish-green tentacles, safely bringing the soul towards the core.
[Assimilation failed. Searching soul... A large amount of useful data was detected. Fusing soul with the collective... failed. The soul is 95% Dark Element, 5% mixed Elements. Unable to create a Dark Element Host. Predicting a forceful fusion to a wild Dark Host... a loss of 96-99% of the soul.]
[Searching for a solution... two have been found. Cleansing the soul into mixed elements. Calculating results... complete. A loss of 71% of the soul. Second solution. Prismatic Core has a 99.99% compatibility with this soul. A total of 0.1-10% of the soul will be lost.]
[Time till Soul expires... four years. Gathering Pure Mana... failed. Assessing souls value... priceless. Beginning the search for a suitable Prismatic Core embryo. Reducing the Pure Mana allocated for converting into Mana. Dimension barrier resources distributed to Prismatic Core creation. Settings change.]
[Creating new protocol... assessing damage to the soul. Requires Life Energy to heal and bind the soul to a Host. Requires to parasitize a soul for successful integration to the laws of the universe. Requires reorganization of memories to prevent Fallen One scenario.]
[Protocol#30... complete. Changing System rules. Protocol#30 System: Host created. This system would be formed out of the soul and Lingering Will's remaining out of the base soul. Assigning as a 'Final Safety Protocol' to be used if no other solution can be found. Time remaining till forceful implantation of protocol.... four years.]
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PAIN! Unspeakable pain! This is what Brian woke up to, passing by as quickly as it came. Panicking, he searches for the source of the pain, a feeling of disorientation assaulting him. Shortly after this, something humanoid appeared out of nowhere, prompting him to ask if this was real or a dream.
Brian stared at the black and rainbow thing in front of him, while his mind was foggy and disoriented. Feeling like he would lose consciousness any second, he kept his mind focus, trying to fight off whatever was happening to him.
The last thing he remember was a planet, and a horrible dream, one so realistic he could still feel phantom pains from it. His vision slowly cleared up, whatever he was under losing effect. The humanoid creature was seemingly ignoring him, or perhaps did not understand my language.
While he waited for it to respond, Brian realized he was in some kind of white room that shimmered rainbow. He did not pay any attention when he had woken up, but now that he has a moment to recollect himself his current symptoms are similar to some drugs.
Realizing that he might have been roofied, he quickly checks his body. He was never a handsome man and can not see anyone drugging him for his looks, so this guy must have wanted his organs. What he saw made him turn pale, his body was in pieces, with chunks of his flesh missing.
He was infuriated and immediately attacked his captor, "you son of a bitch! How dare you kidnap and do this to me!" Brian attempted to run to the bastard wanting to at least scratch him, leaving his blood on his nails. Even if he died here the police could identify his murderer with the blood.
However, no matter how much he struggles to get close there distance remained the same. Looking down on his feet he finally realized he was not standing on anything while his feet are half-destroyed and full of bite marks, even if he had a footing he could only crawl.
Not having any way to resist his captor, he could only throw profanities on him hoping it would get close. After a while his captor tried to calm him down, his speech sounding like a mixture of voices, oh God! He really was kidnaped and this bastard was trying to keep him from identifying his voice.
As suddenly as he came he left, seemingly tired of trying to calm me down. Like hell I would listen to him, now alone I tried to find some way out of here but to no avail. With the source of my hate gone, I realize just what shit I was in.
Somewhere I don't know, probably in tons of pain killers looking at his body, and trap in this endless white room, panic started to set in.
Returning back to when Malpetios destroyed the Jewels projections, Malpetios could do not but helplessly look at the screaming lingering will cursing everything from his grandparents to his dog.
Deciding to ignore that problem till later, he randevu with his sidekick fusing back together shortly after putting the much smaller Muscles back on his bubble.
His body was still on the darker side, however, he was now able to move without the memories screwing him over. Not wanting to waste more time he quickly tried to log out, only to be stopped by the system.
"Mister host! You must activate the Emotional Suppressant, your subconsciousness would send two many mixed signals. The System must filter these for Host safety. The host could also destroy and absorb the remaining wills or wait for a one-hundred synchronization rate."
Malpetios thought about it and agreed, even though he felt a sense of completeness as if he no longer rented his body from the System, but was truly his. He had to agree that his mind was in a mess, all these random memories did nothing for him at the moment, and the few he cared about had already fused with him.
The rest were thrown in the back of his head, he simply saw them as movies or documentaries of some random people he did not care about. With that, the System activated, this time I was able to see just what it did.
Like a vacuum, it absorbed all the remaining wills, compressing them into a ball now resting in the middle of my body. Coming out of my soul back into the Mindscape, I was back to my pristine white body with a rainbow aura. The only new addition was half my face glowed in gold.
The mess of memories was now distant and foggy, only when I thought about them do they come to the front of my mind, clear for me to see. The System also returned to his monotone yet not lifeless voice.
[Emotional Suppressant reactivated. Assessing Host mental stability... complete. No problem detected. Scanning Dungeon... complete. WARNING!!! WARNING!!! Dangerous presence detected close to Core Room. Host, please prepare!]
With that warning, Malpetios finally activates the log out function, hoping he can make it back in time.