After we had cleaned up our mess and packed up everything, I even took an empty book with me, no several. I just needed one to write down some of my thoughts. A diary of kinds. We used the crystal to get back to the city. After looking around for a few minutes, I pointed east. “That is where we need to go.”

We started walking, Funk walked beside me, “Did anything out of the ordinary happen when you were gone?”

“I got bit by a zombie.”

Funk sighed, “Of course you were, and how come, you are not undead?”

“Well, the infection kind of died inside of me. For some reason, I am immune to that the zombie infection.”

Abby charged ahead next to Funk, “And he saved my mom.”

Funk smiled, “It is good to see Steve become a better man.”

Lory chuckled, “I am going to take the credit for that.”

We all looked at her and just agreed. I walked slower and ended up next to Lory. “You know that you mean a lot to me, right?”

“Yes, I know that.”

“Then, what is a special magical being?”

Lory shrugged, “I really don’t know. This whole thing with the void and that shadow man you told me about. If you ask me, the void sounds more like an element.”

“What do you mean? Like your moon element?”

“Yes, just like that, as if someone has massive power over this unique element and is using it to destroy this reality.”

“What? That is, bad. It would mean the void is not just a natural phenomenon, there would be a dangerous wizard or something behind this force.”

Lory and I were silent for a moment, thinking about who would want to cause this kind of mass destruction. We had just left the city and walked over a green plain with one road. It seemed as if not many people have travelled here for a long time. I heard some creatures in the distance, I even saw two animals, I had no clue what they were, but they looked like some kind of oversized Komodo dragon. For some reason, they were playing on the edge of this world, not afraid to fall off.

I heard some kind of rattling under the ground. “Did anyone else hear that?”

Abby looked at me, “No, I am just talking with Funk. Maybe those weird dragon things made a sound.”

Lory looked at the Komodo dragons, they suddenly ran away. Funk looked around, “They are scared, and not of us. Something is awry.”

All of a sudden, before I could even react, roots sprang from the ground, and they wrapped around me before I could spawn my weapon. I got dragged away through the air and a huge flower bud burst out of the ground. “Any help!?”

Lory started shooting energy beams at the roots wrapped around me, however the energy beams bounced off. The flower bud came closer, and I saw it was at least three times my size. It opened up, and it was not a pretty flower. Instead, I saw a horrifying mouth open up with sharp teeth and a large tongue. “Guys? Please?”

Funk started running my way while spawning two dark blades, and he chopped up roots. Abby helped him with killing some roots while making their way to me.

The roots launched me towards the huge open mouth of the open flower bud. As I got launched, I made a shield with my dark energy, and it tried to bite me and my shield cracked. I tried running over the tongue to freedom. However, a root rammed me and I got launched backwards, deeper into the flower and the bud closed. I could feel the flower disappear into the ground. Then I had this odd sensation of falling and I landed on something soft.

I slowly got up, that is when I noticed I landed on a bed of leafs. Out of them came small walking flowers, and they had very sharp teeth. In the distance I saw acid pits. I sighed as I spawned my silver energy sword, and my dark energy sword. As the first flower jumped at me, I slashed my sword at it and cut it in two.

More and more flowers appeared, as I started shooting energy beams at them, I noticed this place writhed up and down. This flower thing swallowed me whole, and these things want to drag me down into the acid pits. That is not going to happen. A flower jumped towards me and I rolled aside and slashed my sword down, cutting it in half. These flowers were not strong, but there is strength in numbers.

With a deep breath, I let energy infuse me and I fought back, slashing around while more of them spawned. One of them bit deep into my leg and blood squirted everywhere. Where my blood dropped to the ground, a small pit of acid spawned, I quickly jumped aside. However, I dropped one of my energy swords. Another flower jumped at me and I tried to block, but I fumbled my other energy sword due to panic. Quickly, I drew my normal sword. “Come out flowers and fight me!”

I infused my sword with silver energy and started slashing left and right. The flowers kept coming and as they bit me and blood sprayed everywhere, more acid pits appeared. As I threw one of the flowers into the acid pit, it suddenly drained, as if someone pulled out the stop. The flower and the acid got drained deeper into the flower. Alright, that is creepy, I don’t want that to happen to me.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

I kept fighting them off, but there was simply no stopping them. For every flower, I sliced in half, or threw in an acid pit, two more flowers came back. I only noticed when one of them jumped towards my face, it was some kind of red flower with a creepy smiley face and sharp teeth. As it jumped on my face, I fell backwards and more jumped on me as I landed on the ground. I started sending energy waves around, launching them to every corner of this flower's stomach.

As my blood splashed to the ground, an acid pit spawned below me, I kept rolling aside, until I rolled into an empty pit. Quickly I grabbed the edge with one hand while swinging my sword at the flower that tried to bite my hand which I needed to hold on. The flowers that were attached to me fell down into the hole. As I looked down, I saw nothing but a green abyss. I would rather not find out what is at the bottom of this pit. I am hanging on by a thread here. As another flower came back, I stabbed my sword in its creepy face.

It fell down into the hole. Maybe this hole is like its intestine, how should I know what the anatomy is of a magical carnivorous plant?

I panted and tried to catch my breath for a moment as I did not see a new flower trying to bite in my hand. Slowly, I tried climbing out of the hole, but the leaves were slippery with my blood. Slowly I managed to climb, I saw no flowers at all. When I looked around, a root came towards me. I stretched my hand and started firing energy beams. It just deflected them as if we were playing a game of baseball.

I used my energy to jump up and slash at the root, it did not expect that, and I cut it in half. More and more roots spawned. There seemed to be only one thing I could do right now. It did not seem like I had any other options. I need to let my rage out. But how? A root slapped me and I fell down. Of course, I just have to imagine, Lory getting slapped like that. “Thanks plant thing.”

As I tried to release my rage, my nose started to bleed. As if something is blocking me from using my full power. The voice in my head spoke up, “Are you sure this is a wise decision?”

“Yes, it is, either help or shut up.”

“Fine, I'll help since I have no intention of dying, going through this will be hard in your current state. Side effects may include but are not limited to, bodily horror, nausea, vomiting, feelings of your guts being smeared on the wall, your skin drooping off, a heart attack and perhaps, the worst case of identity shock ever.”

I grumbled, “Just help me!”

“Alright, don't say I didn't warn you.”

I screamed as the plant roots were still slapping me, “Nothing is going to stop me from breaking free.” My ears started to bleed as well, The plant started to shake as dark energy gathered around me and scattered over the floor. I have no clue what happened next, my mind blacked out, not being able to process what was going on, what I did know is what I felt, though. The flower and I are shooting up as my body got mutilated, not by the plant but by me.

Something horrible happened to me. It felt as if my body, changed, but I cannot remember into what. It sure as hell felt painful as I shot through the flower bud and swung something that did not feel like my arm at the giant flower and cut off its bud, killing it. Then I fell down on my hands and knees while vomiting, it felt as if I vomited out my guts. Slowly my body started feeling normal again, but something horrible had just happened to me.

I cannot even comprehend what exactly happened, did the voice in my head do this? I used so much energy and rage, I lost control and I changed, but something forced it back, something is holding my power in check. While still trying to process what the fuck happened or was going on, I looked at blood falling down from my nose, my eyes, and even my ears. It just dropped into the pile of vomit in front of me.

The voice in me sighed, “that is always nasty, energy emitted from me and suddenly the ground in front of me was clean.”

After a while, I heard voices behind me, everything sounded blurred, wait, can something sound blurred? What happened to me? What am I? Who am I? What is this terrible power that lurks within me? Did I just, do something, bad? Someone started shaking me, I could not hear the voices. Is this what my rage is? Does it have, an embodiment? Is that what lurks inside of me? Would I have lost control, if whatever thing is holding me back was not there? This must be what Jolene meant, a special magical being. The reason the zombie infection did not apply to me, the infection got scared of what was inside of me. What is even inside of me? I am scared of it, I am scared of me.

Suddenly, I looked at a face in front of me, Lory. She gave me a kiss. “Steve, come back to planet earth. Abby told me to say that.”

“Lory?”

“Yes, it's me, you are not dead?”

“Lory?”

“Yes, I am here.”

“I deflowered the flower.”

Lory hung her head, “That sounds terrible.”

“I mean, I cut off its head. Lory?”

“Yes? I’m scared of myself.”