Man With Golden Eyes

A cave crawling with spiders with dangers teeming at every corner and darkness that slowly drove one insane.

Dark silence echoing at random intervals outlining a picture of the unknown, the mysterious unknown.

That was a description I saw of some cave in a scary story in my life.

Well, that has nothing to do with my situation currently.

I'm stuck in a cave with a clear exit that I can't hope to open, but am literally given a space I can chill in for the rest of my life. I could really just vibe in here for eternity.

Eh, I might go insane without human interaction in a week or so. Especially in this eerie silence.

I'm not sure how much time passed, but the only thing on my mind right now was how to train.

As for developing schizophrenia of some sort, I don't care. The only thing that could quite possibly drive me insane is:

How do I train?!

I don't know why, but because of these magical elements my muscles recover way too quickly and grow at the same speed, giving me muscles nearing 8 months of progress from my past life.

I literally can't feel anything no matter how advanced I make my workout. To be fair, I don't know much about bodyweight training, but I could easily do thousands to tens of thousands of the most grueling bodyweight workouts that I knew of…

Ah, when can I get out and start training with mountains? Curling them, like they're a toy bear. And let out an all-out blow, tearing the wind, separating the clouds.

I wasn't too into fiction or literature in my past life, but I'm guessing this is the main attraction of them. I want to try it so bad, but…

It's been over a yeeaaarrrr, what do I do??

I feel so lost. I'm sure it's only been a day, but aaaah.

Also, now that I think about it I haven't eaten in a long time. Yet despite the harsh training, my muscle recovery required almost no energy. Or rather hasn't diminished any of my energy. I feel as packed to the brim with energy as when I first came here.

Calories, found in food, are a unit of energy my body uses to perform my daily actions by sending that energy to my muscles to exert the relative force… ENERGY

I see, so this supernatural Mana, I mean, Qi allows me to replace that required energy without eating.

That's pretty reassuring, besides the fact that I don't know how much this can last me.

Seeing some sort of problem has arisen. With nothing else to do, let's focus on that I guess.

Ok, now it's settled: practice meditation since that's the biggest problem I have.

I'M SO FRUSTRATED. LET ME OOOUTT.

…

I slumped back down on a chair-like rock I found during the exploration and flipped open the top of some canned beans I found in the hole of food.

I had no talent for this sort of thing. Sigh.

Sitting down, focused on my breathing in complete silence, and trying to focus on the energy running around rampant in my body.

I thought.

Impossible for a person with muscles for brains like me.

Probably one of the few times I envy a person like Matteo who in my past life had both brains and brawn.

One of my favorite guys to be hones. He used to correct me on my form for every workout. Used to somehow always have the money to bless me with Chipotle food post-workout. The person who essentially introduced me to the gym and the awe-inspiring world of bodybuilding.

I recalled that first day where Matteo suddenly called me when I was just about to call him while sitting on a bench.

I chuckled in the surprisingly clean cave, echoing a dry voice around the stalictites.

I remember shouting into the phone microphone, "Where are you? It's been 40 minutes since our scheduled gym time! You're late!"

He replied with a wry laugh. "Sorry, I should've called earlier. Something came up. You work on ahead without me."

That was the first of many days, weeks, months, and years. This is the beginning of the time our schedules never lined up.

With my eyes closed and legs crossed, the energy that was so rampant was, unknown to me, following a strangely melancholic path. A rhythm, synchronizing with my feelings as if it understood.

My eyes grew watery in the cave where I was once again alone. My seemingly boundless strength was still unable to break through the entrance and my seemingly boundless loneliness welling up in the cave.

'I wonder what Matt is doing right now… How is he?'

…

In the same world of Eteria, Xi Jin was looking around.

Around him was a village with straw-made huts and dug-out routes leading to different farms. Many people were setting up shop selling their harvests or some variety of useful commodities.

His eyes darted around as if searching for something specific. He was in his short sleeves that were tighter than most people were used to as he wore a separate piece of pants that were similarly tight fit to accentuate the large muscles the size of tree trunks.

Yet he looked around scratching his head in confusion.

An old man in a dirtied brown robe noticed this and walked to the sturdily built man's side. "Sir, do you need any help?"

Xi Jin ignored him like he was thin air and suddenly walked away looking elsewhere.

He came to a stop and abruptly looked at the air to his right when nobody was around.

His voice sounded hoarse like he barely ever spoke. "I thought you said you'd help?"

Suddenly with a poof, a cloud hovered by Xi Jin's side. On it, lay comfortably a man with golden eyes that looked like they could peek through the deepest recesses of impurities in anything. On his back were folded fluffy-white wings.

He smiled, causing a bright flash of holy light.

His voice was ethereal as he spoke in a way that was no different than a whisper.

"I am helping more than you might think."

Immediately after, he weakly pointed upwards where a transparent square appeared. In it was a view of a world that couldn't be described, engulfed in a mysterious hint of purple. Tentacle-like strings were lashing about uncontrollably in this world.

Xi Jin narrowed his eyes and furrowed his brows. He croaked with a snicker. "What type of bullshit are you spouting?"

The man with pure golden eyes simply kept a smile and shrugged, making the square disappear. He quietly rolled over on the cloud and lied on it with his hands folded behind his head.

Xi Jin clicked his tongue at the lazy man.

Ever since he started existing in this world, this infuriating man was always by his side, either giving advice in the form of some abstract string of words or becoming invisible to his eyes with the excuse that he was 'busy'.

Xi Jin paused for a moment and then walked back, passing by more people, not afraid they'd notice the golden-eyed man or interrupt him.

With his domineering physique and movements that indicated he was busy, nobody else walked up to him. They even stayed away from him, afraid he was one of the rumored arrogant cultivators.

They were simply trying to earn their living. They didn't want to infuriate any important figures to result in getting squashed like a bug.

As he looked around, he reached the edge of the not so large village, looking at a large forest in the distance.

With his powerful eyesight, he could see a cloud of smoke past the forest.

Xi Jin glanced over to the man on the cloud to realize one of the golden eyes glancing at him as well.

When the golden eye met his gaze, he immediately shut both of his eyes lightly pretending he was never looking in the first place.

Xi Jin sighed at the child-like act. "What is it? Does that have anything to do with you?"

The man didn't respond and hummed an ancient tune.

Xi Jin looked at the gray smoke in the distance. 'Then it's confirmed. That's my next location.'

Rage moment only after he realizes something and gets tight, getting stronger and stronger feeling.

Goes past tense "At that moment, a red aura started to escape from my skin, tightenting around my muscles, feeling like they were almost strengthening them."