-Nightmare(3)-
“Kenshin, wake up!! It's already 8 Am, you have to go to school in two hours…” hearing the same line for what would be 100th or maybe 1000th time, Kenshin’s conscious, which was just a third party spectator twitched once again. He had long since passed the ‘freaking out’ and ‘going mad’ phase, if he remembered correctly, it was around 9th time watching or close to that.
Every time, the scene would start with Kenshin's mom’s loud voice calling him to wake up. Then his morning quarrel with his parents, then his school day and then the call from DCB and then finally the suffering he had to go through until he gets the system, everything would play again and again like a damn recorder going back and forth infinitely.
Contrary to the kid from Sylph race’s thoughts, Kenshin was nowhere close to losing his mind or going insane. The main thing was, Kenshin’s high amount of WIL, as well as INT and WIS, was the main reason behind this. During his fifth time watching the same scene, he was indeed losing his sanity, turmoiled with guilt and overwhelming shame. But, he quickly regained his bearing after the 14th time of seeing the same thing. After that, he gradually overcame his guilt, as there was no way he could right his past wrongs, not now at least when both his parents were dead.
But things got scary when he, instead of seeing it as a traumatic past, saw it as a simple recorded cinema. He began discovering things that were, and still now didn’t add up no matter how much he thought about it. And that came in the form of his father’s call while he was in school…a memory that he had forgotten until he saw the whole ordeal of that day. It made him remember that day suddenly.
The memory went like this~
He, Kenshin, was sitting on the roof-top of his school, enjoying a rare moment of calmness while regretting his behavior that morning. He also regretted whatever he told to his father and mother, but it's just that whenever he hears them denying him or giving him an ambiguous answer, he just couldn’t control his temper. He even considered consulting a psychiatrist to have a better understanding of his condition, but for some reason, he couldn’t go with the idea. Something in his heart, a kind of fear always held him back from doing so, which in turn, made him even more irritated.
Ting! Ting!
A melodious sound came from his pant pocket, breaking his melancholic thoughts. The default tone of his phone’s brand rung, alerting the teen that someone is calling him. Pulling it out of his pocket, he saw the caller was his dad. For some reason, a frown marred his face.
“Hello! What do you want?” despite all the regret he had earlier, he still spoke rudely. Its as if he couldn’t control himself at all.
“Kenshin, did you remember the promise we made that day, the day Akari was born?” his dad didn’t ask anything else, just that one sentence.
“What are you talking about? What promise?” Kenshin wasn’t in the mood, so he rudely answered back. Despite that, he still tried to remember that day 9 years ago.
“Try to remember that promise you made me, no matter what you have to keep that promise. Me and your mom, we are going to a higher level dungeon next town, so we might not be back for a few days. The bank card and everything essential is above the fridge. Take care of Akari until we are back, okay!” with that, the call was hung up, confusing Kenshin, who couldn’t understand the meaning of the call at all.
Memory end~
The call about the death of his parents came exactly 3 hours later. This made Kenshin extremely suspicious. His father’s call might look like some random call, but considering the content of it, it was indeed quite odd. Why would his father ask about this promise made all those years ago when just in the morning they had a huge quarrel?
Kenshin started to suspect that there might be something more to his parent's death than what meets the eye. With his now increased INT, he started to notice signs, that he had missed before. He started to remember his dad’s cautious behavior that he developed a few days before their untimely demise, his mother’s permanent creased brows… at first, Kenshin thought it was all because of his attitude back then, but after seeing his own memory so many times, he discovered that it wasn’t actually because of his attitude, or else they would have been like that for a few years already.
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Their change in behavior only occurred a few days before their death, which was too much of a coincidence.
“Now, how the hell should I get out of this place, I wonder…” now that he was calm and collected, he decided to first break free of this place where that kid had tied him to. He knew that all this was an application of WIL, an application so advance that humans couldn’t even fathom. Despite trying to understand, he wasn’t able to do anything.
Currently, he was trapped in such a place, where he couldn’t feel his body parts, he couldn’t feel his skills and his magic. Although he can see, he couldn’t blink or close his eyes, all in all, he was in quite a predicament.
“WIL is it…I wonder,” after thinking of an idea, Kenshin began to concentrate. According to his knowledge, WIL is the manifestation of his innermost desires. The stronger his desire, the more powerful the WIL would be. To make one’s WIL powerful, they have to have a strong drive, a desire so strong, it would rouse the fundamental energy of the body or more like, the energy that generated from their mind and heart.
Very less is known about this obscure force hides in the body of all living beings. Even after all these years, humans were unable to find a suitable way to use the force or the origin for that matter. They only know how to increase their power and defense with this force, which was nothing but a crude use of such a valuable force; at least this Kenshin had conformed after dabbling with the kid this long. Although he couldn’t do anything about obscure usage of the force called WIL, he could very well try to use it and break this illusion he was trapped in.
At this time, Unknown to Kenshin, a certain someone came to his rescue after the kid pulled him into the illusion.
And that someone happens to be the very old man he saw who also had a system like him.
Boom!!!
“Impossible!! How can a mere human like you have such control of Spirit energy around your surroundings?” the one who shouted this was the kid from sylph race who looked to be a little worse for wear. His hair was already unkempt, with half of it burned to crisp. His old-style powerful-looking armored clothes were in tatters; what left of it was barely holding on to preserve his modesty. His pale skin was half charred to black, giving him the appearance of a coal mine worker. The kid was kneeling while panting heavily. At the same time, he was in denial of something that he never expected to happen.
Standing a few meters away from him was a familiar old man, holding a huge hammer shining with a golden glow. In fact, the hammer looked transparent, as if it was carved out of a huge jewel. The old man scratched his head after hearing the kid’s rant, before lifting his hammer once again and slamming it down full force.
As he did so, a huge shock wave generated from the ground, before fissures spreading everywhere with the old man as the epicenter. After that, golden light emerged from the cracked ground as they traveled light speed towards the kneeling kid. The kneeling kid could do nothing but brace himself to brave the golden storm.
Boom!!
With a resounding explosion, he was sent flying across the ground, coughing blood on the process. After this explosion, he had no energy left to do anything and simply lay on the ground motionlessly. His WIL or Spiritual force, as he called it, was already drained to an all-time low. Any further usage and it would affect him psychologically, which was an ill-advised situation for him right now. No matter what happens from now on, he mustn’t lose his cool.
While lying down, he tried to call back Bleake, but for some reason, the tiger wasn’t responding to his call. The situation made him even more anxious, his last line of defense was on the verge of crumbling. Seeing his change of expression, the old man laughed, “If you are thinking about calling that cat, you better stop. I have already made everything around me, a place closed-off space. You cant transfer any kind of signal or energy without my consent. Besides, even if you can, chances that the cat will come to your aid are quite low, you know!?”
“Who the hell are you? How can you easily counter my attacks and defenses?” although the kid was curious about the old man’s origin, he was even more concerned about how he can counter everything known to him. He still couldn’t figure out what that golden shock wave was, the thing which could damage his physical body, which was protected by a thick layer of the Spiritual Energy barrier.
“Do you think just because you asked, I will tell everything? Fuck off, idiot!!” with a snort, the old man showed him the middle finger before throwing a glance at Kenshin and Joy, with both having lost their consciousness. Looking at them, he sighed, “I am pretty impressed. Although you are weakened to this degree, they still held their own against you long enough… after all, your physical body wasn’t something that could be harmed that easily.”
The kid who was within the hearing distance twitched involuntarily. He desperately wanted to shout, ‘Didn’t you smash my physical body pretty easily?’ But he held back in favor of not infuriating this wicked old man any longer. Although the old man told him that signals won't work, he still tried to call out for his pet desperately.
Suddenly he observed something that made him widen his eyes in fright. The space in front of the old man rippled like it was a water surface and a stone tossed into it, then the old man inserted his hand into it, pulling out a huge jet black rope from within. The kid trembled in fear, though, it wasn’t because of the rope, rather the ripple itself.
“you old man, don’t tell me you are one of them?” when he muttered ‘them,’ his voice cracked a little as if he remembered something frightening.
“Correctamundo, but you aren’t getting a prize. I hope you like shibari!” the old man smirked with a dirty grin that sent shudder throughout the few-millennium-old kid’s body.