At that, Mat began to have memories of someone he already seemed to know. But... These memories were fuzzy, and they were only fragments of these. Mostly they were fuzzy images of strange places he had never been, faces of people he had never seen, and thoughts he had never had.
"Oh, boy. This turned out to be harder than I expected." After slitting the throat of a four-legged, beast-like creature with a sword.
"This is... An orb...?" After reaching a pedestal on which a purple orb stood.
"You're welcome, see ya!" smiling, after a little girl thanked him for helping her find her lost kitten.
"Wow, but what is that thing?" After seeing that, behind a white orb was, in the void, a face, which was not human, very horrible. There were also some hands floating in the nothingness.
"Look, that's enough. There, there, there. See? It doesn't hurt anymore." After pricking his finger and putting his blood on the wound of a child. It regenerated.
"This is the hammer... But... It's of no use to me!" After finding a strange hammer, one of the sacred artifacts.
"This... And what is this? It has an edge." After finding some kind of ceremonial knife made of gold in a dungeon with earthen walls. There were roots all around and, also, walls of an unknown material... They appeared to be gold bricks, though.
"Phew... It's ready!" After finishing building a small hut by himself, for an elderly gentleman who lived alone in a forest. It took a day.
Suddenly, Mat had a more vivid memory. He was in a village (whose structures seemed to have old designs), in a forest that appeared to be a Mediterranean one. It had just dawned and the village was... Empty. Everything was completely silent.
- But... what happened here? - said the black-haired, spiky young man. The voice was no longer audible inside Mathias' head. - This...
"This is wrong, what if something happened here? No... I'm overthinking things, I think." Thought the young man. He continued to investigate the place.
- It can't be...
The young man found the body of a man lying in the middle of the street. He had no wounds.
- What the hell happened here?
He went back to investigate the town, but this time he also checked the houses, through their windows. Everyone was... Well, at first glance, most of them seemed to be still asleep, but... In reality everyone, from children to adults, was dead.
- They're all dead... What am I supposed to do in a situation like this? - he said to himself, he was scared and worried. After thinking a bit about it, he said. - No, there's no way I could have done anything, I don't even know what happened. Anyway, I have to warn the surrounding area about this.
He left the village quickly, to look for some other nearby village to warn about the situation.
While walking through the forest, after about half an hour, he came across a small hut, which was in very bad shape. There was a tombstone nearby. The young man heard a child crying inside, so he went to see.
"What is a child doing in a place like this?" he thought as he went to that shack.
He entered the house and...
Mat's memories became a blur again. But... He could recognize voices that weren't his though... They sounded like they were a great distance away.
"T-they’re all... dead... But... I... I'm fine..." It was the child's voice. He seemed to be inside the house, but... Everything was too blurry to recognize the place. Only the boy was somewhat visible. He was dressed in rags. His hair was light brown.
...
"So they poisoned the village? But how?" That was the young man's voice. At that moment he noticed something: the boy had some kind of dark aura.
"I-it was... It was my fault..." The boy's voice echoed in the void.
...
After hearing the boy's statements, the young man, along with the boy, went to give notice to a nearby town about what had happened... Although taking out the part about the little boy's part.
...
"I will do everything I can to help him." These were the young man's thoughts. He wanted to help that child.
...
...
...
"You... You're not going to leave me, are you?" - The boy's voice.
"I won't."- The young man's voice. "Leaving a child alone in a place like this doesn't seem right to me. Besides, I liked you, so come with me."
...
...
...
"Don't worry about me, I promise I'll be back." - Voice of the young man, in an unfamiliar place. One could only observe the ground, which was grass, and it was daytime.
"We'll be waiting for you, Mathias." - Voice of a woman.
"Yes." - Voice of the boy.
"Well then, see ya."
...
...
...
"This is... Wow..." The young man, who was in front of a huge tree that reached up to the sky. He advanced towards it, through the forest at its base, until he...
...
...
...
Mathias was in the void. Everything was dark and... Well, he felt he was in the void, but he couldn't even see himself. He was conscious, but he couldn't see or feel anything.
- The tree of life is spectacular, don't you think? - Mat heard this voice, it sounded familiar.
In the middle of nowhere an image formed. It was the young man Mat saw in his dreams. That was all he could see.
- But well... You couldn't see much, could you? - said the young man to Mat. - And it's the first time you've used the power of the mark... I guess that's why.
- ...What? - Mat replied. - What are you talking about?
- Mmm... You're a Hero too. My replacement, actually, right? This is very disappointing...
He said this talking about himself.
- I don't know what you're talking about.
- You don't know about it yet? Then I can't say much. - the young man replied, surprised. - But... Well, then. Those were part of my memories.
What he said was true, but... It was also a lie.
- You inherited the mark of the Hero knows who for what, but... As you did, you are a Hero.
- ...I already knew I was different. - Mat replied to the young man.
- Yes, very much so. - replied the young man. - You are even different from me.
- ?
- I had no base powers other than the mark, but you do. These were boosted after touching the creature you were fighting and... Your body could not withstand such power.
- And why did that happen? - Mathias asked. - My mark glowed sometimes, and it only made me not get tired when using my power, but now... This is different.
- ...I don't know why that happened either, even though that happened to me too sometimes. - he replied.
- I understand.
- So...
- Yes?
- ...You'd better go back now. - said the young man. - Something's about to happen. Well, so that what happened before doesn't happen, I think... I'm going to reduce the flow of the energy of the mark to a minimum so that you can bear it.
"And so that you won't have problems later on... You... Are still really weak..."
- And how are you going to do that? - Mat asked him.
- That... That's something you're going to learn, but there's no time now. - replied the young man. - Oh, and because... Well, rather, you're going to forget almost everything we talked about when you get back. Well, see you!
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
- ...H-hey!
...
...
...
- Agh! - Mathias screamed after coming to.
Mat began to feel guilt for no apparent reason.
He was still floating holding the creature, but... It began to deform. Only a minute had passed since he lost consciousness. When he saw a white thing come out of the creature, Mat wanted to let it go... And at first he couldn't. He struggled to make its attacks... Of light? To release it. After a few moments he could. It shot out towards the wall to the left, from the perspective of the rest. The creature stood there and its mark still glowed, but Mat didn't think anything of it then.
- Mat! - Sam shouted when he saw that.
The three of them went to him. The wall he had hit was concrete, and Mat had debris on him.
- Hey, Mat. Are you okay? - Erin asked.
- Of course I am! - he replied,
- You don't seem to be. - replied Andrew. - W-what?
[https://i.imgur.com/DhcRIu5.png]
Mat, who had injuries from the collision, began to regenerate quickly, to everyone's surprise.
- H-hey, Mat... What are you...? - Sam wanted to ask, but...
- Hey! This thing here seems to be getting stronger! - said the shadow, who was still hovering idly around the creature, which was no longer spherical and was starting to look humanoid.
- Oh, damn!!! - Mathias shouted, and headed back to the creature. He propelled himself with his PSI constructs.
The creature had just transformed. It had become a humanoid with several limbs (arms, legs and something that looked like a tail) and several heads... Although it had one that seemed to be the main one, and it had a leaf-like shape to it. It had eyes around its body. Mathias used his PSI Creations, to form several spikes and slam into the creature.
The spikes pierced the creature, but the creature didn't seem to have anything on it.
- What? - Mat wondered in surprise.
The creature, with its arms, grabbed Mat by his feet, to slam him to the floor, but Mat put more purple PSI spikes on that part, to make it let go, but it didn't work. He slammed it against the floor several times, but Mat kept regenerating.
Mat tried to hurt it only with his PSI Creations, but they did nothing. The creature threw him against the wall again. This caused more damage to the place.
- H-hey, I think we should go. - Andrew said.
- Yeah, it's getting pretty dangerous. - said Erin.
- So, we're going to leave Mat alone fighting with that thing?! - said Sam. - Well, I'm not going to do it!
- Do it, go away! - shouted Mat.
- B-but...! - Sam.
- Hey, young lady, do as he says if you want to live one more day! - said the shadow. - He's going to be fine, I know it!
- Yes, let's go! - said Erin.
- All right.
They all left the place. Already outside, about 20 meters away.
- I hope he's going to be okay...
Mat, inside, was standing next to the debris from his collision, again.
"What am I supposed to do?" thought Mat. He noticed that his mark was still glowing. "Oh, I know!"
He approached the creature again, this time intending to touch it with his left hand, the one with the mark. He thrust with his PSI Creations, but the creature dodged them, and sometimes attacked him with attacks he couldn't dodge.
- Agh!
Mat still couldn't hit it. At that, he decided to create PSI whips like the ones before, from his left hand. He did so, and the creature dodged the luminous PSI whips, which damaged the place more and more.
- Damn! - Mat said, when the creature was already lunging towards him, after attacking. "Wait, I must take advantage of this!"
Mat undid the luminous PSI whips and made luminous PSI spears almost instantly, which pierced the creature.
- Gruaaaaaaaaaaaargh!!!!
The creature let out a piercing scream. Apparently, the PSI Creations in Mat's left hand, when their mark glowed, could damage that kind of creature.
The creature began to disappear.
At the same time, in another place.
- !
In a room, a bedroom to be more specific, with a large window from which a city could be seen from a great height, a man, sitting at his desk, with a small red book, had sensed something.
- Oh! - exclaimed the man. - So at last... It was time for him to disappear.
He was quiet for a moment and went to the window.
- It took a long time to disappear, and that was weak because I created it many years ago... Never mind, it's time to make it work for the last time.
He snapped his fingers.
Back to where Mat was, the creature, which was still disappearing, exploded, like a bomb. But... Before he said it, he said a few words... Mat felt as if his voice from beyond the grave came from inside him. The words were:
- My job is done.
Those words were unintelligible, and they were like three syllables, if we want to compare them to a human language, but Mat understood them that way. Those same words, but in human language, that is to say... In this case, English, were pronounced by the subject already mentioned above.
The house collapsed due to that explosion.
Outside, everyone looked stunned at what had happened.
- M-MAT! - Sam shouted and went desperately to try to find him under the rubble.
The other two, seeing that, went too. They were like that for a few seconds, until...
- Agh!
Mat had just emerged from the rubble of the house without a scratch, only his clothes were somewhat torn. The three of them went to where he was.
- Mat! - Sam exclaimed, and went over to him. She hugged him. - You're all right... What about that thing?
"Thank God..." Samantha thought.
- I defeated it, I don't know how, but...
- M-Mat... - Erin said, it sounded like something... Her question felt a little grim. - What are you?
Everyone was stunned by that question.
- What kind of question is that? Well, we have to go to town, fast! - Mat replied and broke away from Sam.
- But answer me!
- It doesn't matter! I think... I think something happened to those affected! - shouted Mat - Come on!
- Oh, let's go then. - said Andrew.
- Yes! - said Sam.
- O-okay - replied Erin.
They all ran into town. Erin stood there, thinking. Then she turned to look at the destroyed house.
"This... This is a dream, isn't it? Mat, he... Yes, he always had powers, but... This?"
He remembered the way Mat used his powers, the spears and stuff. It scared the hell out of her remembering it, as she realized that those powers... Those powers were very dangerous and scary.
"But Mat is Mat, I don't think he would do... Something with them..."
Erin also went.
.
..
...
- So... So here you were.
It was evening, about half past ten. Sam had just arrived at the place Mat had shown her some time ago. Yes, the place that was on the mountain and from which the town could be seen. Mat was alone, looking up at the starry sky, sitting down. He said nothing when he heard the words of Sam, who was worried.
- H-hey, why are you so quiet? A-at least say something...
- I... I'm the Hero, but... I couldn't save anyone... And I don't even know what the "Hero" is... - after saying that, Mat turned to see Samantha, he was crying. - S-Sam... What am I supposed to do?