I Tried to Feel (3)

[Recommended Song for Chapter: 'Derek's Theme' "Pain" - Lucas King]

POV: ???

I tried to see.

But, the void surrounding me wouldn't let my eyes peer into their secrets. The darkness gripped me and chained me tightly to an invisible force. An indescribable pressure wrapped around my non-corporeal throat, seemingly warning me not to move.

I tried to hear.

But, the atmosphere around me choked out the sound waves, annihilating them before their formation. I tried to make a sound, but even the thought of altering the environment caused me to feel an inescapable loneliness deep inside my core.

I tried to feel.

But, the essence of life itself had been ripped from me. The sensations that would never come to be placed an unbearable pressure on my soul. If I had a brain, I was sure that I would go insane. Electrical pulses would fire at random to make me hallucinate and my skin would crawl with apprehension.

Purgatory was a bitter resolution for my world. Everything that I had ever experienced or perceived was locked in here with me. At least, it seemed like it was.

I was very patient. Though I couldn't tell if millennia or milliseconds had passed, I was calmly waiting for my reason. I felt like I would likely wait an eternity for nothing, but, if that was the case, then so be it.

I tried to remember.

But, it was hard. Without a brain, I could only feel inside the depths of my soul to seek answers. There were so few answers hidden inside that it almost seemed worthless to do so. However, the more I sensed around, the more I realized that these little secrets opened massive containers.

For some reason, the chains that held me in place began to loosen their grip.

I concentrated deeper on my soul and wriggled my way around the nebula-like void. Small channels of energy appeared, and, as I followed them, they gave me little truths. I didn't seem to exist in any meaningful way, but that wasn't the case for these joyous streams of life.

The energy in front of me waved forward ceaselessly and revealed to me the meaning of calm. As I searched to my right, I found a group of streams that ignited repeatedly. I couldn't understand it fully, but it appeared to be telling me about heat. I continued following the streams and they each told me their little secrets.

As I weaved around the streams, I came in contact with a little sphere. It felt unusually energetic compared to the other streams.

The little sphere seemed to reach out to me.

My soul felt happy at its innocence.

There's nothing there, silly.

I couldn't help but feel tickled by the sphere's actions. As the little sphere reached out to me, I weaved towards its outreached energy.

See, there's nothing th-

In an instant, the sphere erupted into a supernova. My eyes that were previously non-corporeal were now being incinerated by the immense light.

I could see.

The sound wave crashed into me and sent an unbelievably painful explosion through my core. It was so loud that I thought I may have phased out of existence in its wake.

I could hear.

The noise and light only intensified as a burning sensation ripped apart the surface of my soul. I could feel the scar tissue quickly rebuilding around it as a method of instinctual defense. However, the damage was accumulating far too quickly. The pain eviscerated the interior of my soul and left me flickering in the presence of an awe-inducing behemoth.

I watched helplessly as the sphere consumed the innocent streams of energy around it. It damaged me, but made sure not to erase my existence. It seemed to be holding back. Its previously white aura slowly changed to a true, defined black.

As it changed, a silhouette began to form. I watched curiously with my forming eyes as a man appeared.

I stared blankly into the lifeless black eyes of my brother.

I wanted to scream in happiness but my vocal cords hadn't developed yet. I helplessly weaved towards him, hobbling on my still-manifesting legs. Every action I took, he mirrored. As we came closer to each other, it became incredibly difficult to tell which being I was. I looked behind me and saw the event horizon of a black hole.

I blinked and returned my gaze to my brother. Behind him was the same supernova that I had experienced earlier. As I matched his confused gaze, I realized that I may have also been that same tiny sphere unaware of my form.

As our bodies began to firmly materialize, I took one last look at my brother before running up and hugging him. The embrace seemed to cause the void around us to tremble.

"It's good to have you back." we spoke in synchrony.

We shook as tangible memories penetrated our minds.

The difference in our voices began to become more defined as we took control of our own souls, "How are you here?"

Our souls became defined enough to where we could communicate individually.

I shook, "We have to go!"

He hesitated and bit his lip, "Why?"

I frowned, "I-I don't know."

My brother looked at me with compassion, "Is it our friends?"

I gripped my chest tightly, "Yes."

He smiled, "Well, you better go then."

An awkward few seconds of silence passed as energy began to surround both of us once more.

I stopped and began to grit my teeth, "Will you come with me?"

He nodded and softly smiled, "I'm already there. I'm just waiting on you, brother."

I took a step back and the space around me began to warp. Everything except my brother fell through the cracks of existence.

As reality collapsed around him, my brother narrowed his eyes, "This is going to hurt, brother."

-

My eyes burst open as a searing pain from my abdomen made me keel over.

"Gah!" I spat out a mouthful of blood and darted my eyes upward.

My vision shook as I watched a tentacled creature slowly edge his way towards me. My eyes shook as I begged for understanding. The creature's face broke a part of my soul simply by looking at it. It was remarkably human, but, upon peering at its eyes, my brain couldn't register what I was witnessing.

It moved forward against logic. Every 'step' it took wasn't the same. It was traveling towards me at a 45 degree angle as if it was straight. It took my rattled brain a moment to realize that this creature wasn't even near me.

It was miles away.

I clenched my hand tightly around the black dagger that was in my hand. I felt my brother's energy embrace me as I gripped the hilt.

"Brother, I need you to be able to use your full power here."

Our souls shook at the ridiculous request. The worst part was that neither of us could tell who had thought of it. The feeling of individuality began to crack and dissipate as we simply thought of the merge.

Cold violet particles dripped from the unidentified vessel's right eye.

The twin words on the tip of the vessel's tongue had a complex mix of rage and fear.

"Derek, Awaken."

Painful black tentacles crawled indiscriminately through our flesh and blood. it tore apart tendons and razed bones to dust as it creeped its way toward my eye. My eye dripped with black energy as I shot a glare towards the incoming entity. My sibling eye ignited a purple volley of particles that seemed to scatter almost immediately.

The black dagger began to slowly elongate its blade and collapse in on itself. Its weight became unnervingly light. The thinness of the newly formed midnight black blade was incomprehensible. It appeared to only exist on a two dimensional plane. When turned perfectly on its side, it would cease to exist. The blade began whispering something in another language incoherently while the bladed tip appeared to create a small vortex of violet particles. The amethyst motes trickled up to the hilt of the blade and permanently carved a violet insignia into the hilt itself.

"You fucking idiot! This is going to end up killing us if you don't stop!"

I was mortified by the two voices that came out of our mouth and my eyes began to shake again. I could differentiate our voices, but it had become twisted and almost demonic. In addition, one of us was falling unconscious, but I couldn't tell who it was.

Our souls were attacking each other.

The side of my face that my brother controlled smiled. "We're not supposed to be alive anyway."

I felt his consciousness fully dissipate, leaving me completely alone.

I grunted audibly, but soon realized that I couldn't hear it. All five of my senses were being blocked, but a strange sixth sense allowed me to perceive my surroundings to an even higher degree.

A terrible feeling came over me as I looked at the hand that didn't belong to me.

Fuck. I'm a parasite.

Our souls were so out of sync that it had become toxic to the vessel that we shared. I couldn't even tell which one us had even activated this union.

I turned my attention to the uncanny monster. It was even further away than before but, somehow, the time until conflict occurred kept decreasing. As my sixth sense activated strongly, I realized that he wasn't going through space-time. My eye flickered and I glanced at the rocky floor.

________________________

Proficiency +1

Activating Realm Break

Proficiency: 1/100

________________________

The floor in front of me was swallowed by a deep black liquid. I peered forward into the endless black lake and my emotions all momentarily ceased to exist.

"Rune."

The air around my mouth vibrated lightly as the words escaped my lips.

As I closed my useless eyes, I felt a being far, far below me.

I sensed the approaching threat. He was only about 4 seconds away from me. I returned my focus to the overbearing monster in the black lake. The difference between these two monsters was massive. However, to me, it didn't matter. Either one could most definitely kill me. My eyes flicked black as I jumped into the water and began to sink.

I glanced up with my soul to see the surface of the lake.

4 seconds had passed.

A violent explosion from the surface thrust me deeper into the lake. I sunk rapidly as pressure began to increase drastically.

My lips curved upward as I saw the being explode into a gut-wrenching crimson sphere.

A being softly grabbed me and pulled me close.

I looked over to see Rune staring at me with a smile.

"You came quicker than expected."

Her seductive voice felt even more intense this time. It reverberated strongly in my body as my newfound sixth sense radiated strongly.

I wanted to talk to her, but my strength was gradually fading as we sunk deeper into the black liquid that I somehow created.

She pulled my lips to hers, positioned her razor-like teeth on the inside of my mouth, and bit down lightly.

It didn't hurt like the first time.

It felt therapeutic, almost like it was some kind of medieval bloodletting.

Her presence began to flicker as my soul began to crack.

Confusion gripped me hard. My physical mind had just returned and began to work quickly on solving the disastrous position that my body was in. Everything around me began to whir as my sixth sense broke apart.

The sword in my hand disappeared and I hurriedly began trying to figure out who I was.

My surroundings were already near invisible but the sounds and feelings of pressure were still very present.

Where's my brother!?

I felt Rune lift me up in the water, "Don't worry you'll be alright now."

Despair began to rapidly set in. Her words didn't calm me at all as the sides of my vision turned red in the presence of absolute darkness.

Rune put her hand on my cheek as my consciousness finally ceased, "For now, go to sleep."

Rune brought the unconscious man out of the black liquid and laid him on a soft patch of Residum. With a snap of her fingers, the liquid disappeared instantaneously.

"Don't worry. You'll be awake soon."

"My precious Arlo."