Welcome to Impending Hell

The moment Axel stepped through the portal, his enhanced senses were assaulted by an overwhelming wave of decay. The stench was so thick he could almost taste it - a miasma of rot, mold, and something else. Something older. Like the smell of a grave that had been sealed for centuries, suddenly cracked open.

"Jesus..." He gagged, covering his nose despite knowing his new biology made such gestures pointless. "Couldn't smell any of this from the other side..."

It made sense, he supposed. The portals were like windows - you could see through them, but they didn't let scents or sounds pass. A small mercy, given what this place smelled like. His superhuman olfactory system was picking up layers of decay he couldn't even name, each more nauseating than the last.

The mall itself looked like it had been abandoned for decades, though that was impossible given how new some of the store signs were. Nature had begun reclaiming the space - moss grew between cracked tiles, vines crept up walls, and patches of mysterious fungi sprouted in the darkest corners. But it wasn't natural decay. Everything looked... wrong. The moss was too dark, almost black. The vines pulsed with an inner light. And the fungi... he didn't want to look too closely at those.

"Focus." He told himself, forcing his attention away from the alien ecology. "Check the surroundings. Plan an escape route. Don't think about how everything here looks like it came from some cosmic horror's garden party."

His enhanced hearing picked up sounds from outside - lots of them. Shuffling footsteps, ragged breathing, occasional growls and screams that were almost but not quite human. The monsters were out there, surrounding the building like wolves circling prey. But strangely, none of them seemed interested in coming inside.

"Why aren't they...?" He trailed off, catching his reflection in a cracked window. He was still covered in gore from his earlier fight - dried blood and... other substances... coating his clothes and skin. "Oh. OH. They can't smell me over this mess."

It was like camouflage, he realized. The monsters' blood and viscera masked his human scent, making him effectively invisible to whatever passed for their senses. A gruesome advantage, but an advantage nonetheless. 

"Note to self: monster gore makes excellent monster repellent." He grimaced at his reflection. He wasn't going to start a fight with unending horde of monsters. "Though it's probably not going to win me any fashion awards."

He created a small portal, checking the real world. The security guards or whoever they were had moved on to a different section of the mall. Good. He could wait them out here, then...

An idea struck him. "Wait a minute. If this place is just the same as the real world, just... different... then maybe..."

He knew the layout of the mall by heart - had walked these corridors countless times before everything went sideways. If this twisted version matched the original closely enough...

"I could just walk home from here." He muttered, creating another surveillance portal to confirm his theory. "The streets and buildings might be different, but the basic geography has to be the same. And with these things thinking I'm one of them..."

It was risky. Very risky. But less risky than trying to portal-hop his way across town while dodging both monsters and humans. Plus, he needed to know more about this place. Understanding the enemy's territory was basic strategy, right?

"Right. Because I'm suddenly Sun Tzu: Art of War-ing this situation." He shook his head at his own attempts at rationalization. "Just admit it, Axel. You're curious. And scared. But mostly curious."

He began moving through the twisted mall, keeping to shadows more out of habit than necessity. His enhanced vision meant darkness wasn't really an obstacle anymore, and the monster-blood camouflage seemed to be working. He could hear the creatures outside, but they paid him no attention when he passed by windows or gaps in the walls. Some did look, but he was too fast for them to notice.

Moving through the twisted reflection of his hometown was like navigating a nightmare. Axel kept to the shadows between buildings, his enhanced vision picking out safe paths through the corrupted landscape. The sky above was a sickly greenish-black, like a bruise that refused to heal, and it cast everything in an otherworldly pallor.

Despite his monster-gore camouflage, he quickly learned that visual stealth was still crucial. A group of what might have once been people turned their malformed heads toward him as he crossed an intersection, their movements jerky and unnatural. They didn't immediately attack, but their attention was unsettling enough. Their eyes - too many eyes, in some cases - tracked his movement with an almost childlike curiosity.

"Don't run," he whispered to himself, forcing his pace to remain steady. Adrenaline raced through his heart, and it wasn't due to him being afraid. It wasn't fear. It was violent anticipation. "Running attracts predators. Just keep walking. You're just another monster, doing monster things..."

The creatures tilted their heads in perfect unison, reminding him of birds watching a novel stimulus. He ducked into the shadow of an abandoned convenience store, heart pounding despite his enhanced physiology, wishing that it would find him for a good confrontation. His mind told him otherwise. More reasonable to listen to his brain. 

After a few tense moments, the monsters lost interest and shambled away, their footsteps echoing on the cracked pavement.

"Note to self: they may not smell me, but they definitely notice anything that moves differently." He waited until the sound of their movement faded before continuing his journey. "Got to match their behavior patterns or something. Think like a monster, move like a monster, eat like a... stop it, Axel."

The thought of becoming a monster made him uncomfortable, but it was better than fighting them right now. Each encounter he'd had with these things had been brutal, messy, and loud - exactly what he needed to avoid if he wanted to make it home in one piece. Plus, he wasn't sure how many he could take on. One - half of one - was easy. Two got him bitten. Three... well maybe that was the limit.

The hunger was getting worse.

It had started as a nagging sensation in his gut, like missing lunch and dinner despite having already eaten just an hour before. But now it was a constant, gnawing presence that demanded attention. His enhanced body burned energy at an incredible rate, and without fuel, it was starting to consume itself.

He caught his reflection in a shattered storefront window and still didn't recognize himself. The massive, superhuman physique he'd gained was still there, but it was beginning to fade. His muscles, while still impressive, were noticeably smaller. His face looked gaunt, the skin pulling tight across his cheekbones.

"Well, that's... concerning." He pressed a hand against his stomach as another wave of hunger hit him. It felt like his insides were trying to digest themselves, which, he realized, was probably exactly what was happening. "Really concerning, actually."

The hunger was different from anything he'd experienced before. It wasn't just his stomach that felt empty - every cell in his body seemed to scream for sustenance. His enhanced senses made it worse, picking up phantom smells of food that triggered almost painful salivation. Even the rotting vegetation and fungal growths were starting to look appetizing, which was definitely a bad sign. 

And it wasn't because he instinctively knew they would taste like garbage.

"Focus on the silver lining," he muttered, ducking behind a dumpster as another group of monsters passed by. "If this keeps up, I'll eventually go back to normal. No more explaining to Mom why her scrawny teenager suddenly looks like he's been mainlining steroids..."

The thought of returning to his normal 15-year-old self was appealing, in theory. But the reality of the transformation was agonizing. Each step felt like walking through molasses as his body desperately tried to maintain its enhanced state. His vision would occasionally blur, his super-senses flickering like a failing light bulb. Even his healing factor seemed to be slowing down - a small cut he'd gotten from broken glass wasn't closing as quickly as it should.

"Just got to make it home," he told himself, but even his voice sounded weaker. "Get home, find food, figure this out..."

Another wave of hunger hit him, this one so intense it made him stagger. It felt like someone had replaced his blood with acid, like his own body was trying to eat itself from the inside out. His enhanced nervous system meant he felt every moment of it with perfect clarity - every cell crying out for sustenance, every muscle fiber being broken down for energy.

He slumped against a wall, breathing heavily. The hunger was becoming more than just physical - it was affecting his mind. Dark thoughts crept in at the edges of his consciousness. The monsters didn't look quite so monstrous anymore. They looked... meaty. Substantial. His enhanced sense of smell picked up the thick, coppery scent of whatever passed for their blood, and his mouth watered involuntarily.

"No," he growled, forcing the thoughts away. "That's not happening. I'm not that desperate. Not yet."

But his body disagreed. Every passing second felt like an eternity of starvation. His enhanced metabolism was consuming itself at an alarming rate - he could practically feel himself shrinking, growing weaker. The massive arms that had torn through monsters like paper were now trembling with fatigue.

A sound made him look up - more creatures, moving through the twisted streets. But these ones were different. They moved with purpose, hunting something. Their heads swiveled back and forth, searching. Had they somehow sensed his weakness?

Axel pressed himself deeper into the shadows, trying to control his ragged breathing. The hunger pangs were making it hard to focus, hard to maintain the careful stalking movement that had kept him safe so far. His legs shook with each step as he tried to move away from the hunting party.

"Just a little further," he whispered, though he wasn't sure how much further he could actually go. The familiar landmarks of his neighborhood were visible in the distance, but they seemed to waver and shift in his hunger-addled vision. "Just need to make it home..."

He caught another glimpse of himself in a car window and almost laughed - a dangerous sound he quickly suppressed. The massive, monster-killing machine he'd become was rapidly disappearing. His clothes, torn and bloody from previous fights, now hung loose on his shrinking frame. The muscles that had made him feel invincible were melting away like ice in summer.

"Mom's going to be happy," he muttered deliriously. "No awkward questions about sudden muscle growth. Just got to explain the blood stains... and the portals... and the monsters..."

The hunger struck again, doubling him over. This time it felt like his stomach was trying to collapse in on itself, like his body was desperately trying to find anything it could use for energy. His enhanced senses, already flickering, began to fade in and out like a bad radio signal. The world alternated between sharp, painful clarity and normal human perception.

He stumbled into an alley, needing to rest. The hunting party was still nearby - he could hear them, even with his failing senses. They were methodical, thorough. Searching. But searching for what?

"Not me," he tried to convince himself. "Can't be me. They can't smell me. Just got to stay still. Stay quiet..."

But the hunger had other ideas. His stomach cramped violently, producing an audible growl that seemed deafening in the quiet alley. Axel froze, horror mounting as he heard the hunting party pause in their movement.

They'd heard him.

"No, no, no..." He forced himself to his feet, fighting against the weakness in his limbs. He could create a portal, escape back to the real world... but in his current state, would he have the strength to fight off whatever was waiting on the other side? 

What? Why did he think that...?

Axel shook his head violently, then slapped himself hard across the face. The sharp sting helped clear his mind, if only momentarily.

"What the hell am I thinking?" he muttered, steadying himself against the alley wall. "Safer in this nightmare? The hunger must be affecting my brain worse than I thought."

He was right - the very idea that this twisted reflection of reality could be safer than the real world was absurd. Yes, the security guards or whoever they were might be looking for him back there, but they were just humans. Normal, non-monstrous humans who probably couldn't tear him apart with mutated appendages or infect him with whatever cosmic horror virus was running through this place.

"Okay, okay, think." He forced himself to focus through the hunger pangs. "Check the real world first. Make sure it's clear. Then get the hell out of here before these things figure out I'm not one of them."

Creating a portal was harder than before - his weakened state made maintaining the connection difficult. It was like trying to hold up a heavy weight with trembling arms. The circular window to reality flickered and wavered before stabilizing, giving him a view of the real-world alley.

It was empty. No security guards, no police, no concerned citizens wondering why a blood-covered teenager had been running through their mall. Just a normal, slightly dirty urban alley. The sun was setting in the real world, casting long shadows that would provide decent cover if he needed to move quickly.

"Perfect timing," he whispered, listening to the hunting party drawing closer. Their movements were more purposeful now, their inhuman sounds taking on an eager quality that made his skin crawl. "Time to-"

Another wave of hunger hit him, this one so intense it nearly brought him to his knees. His vision blurred, the portal wavering dangerously as his concentration slipped. For a terrifying moment, he thought it would collapse entirely, trapping him in this nightmare realm.

"No!" He gritted his teeth, forcing himself to maintain the connection through sheer willpower. "Not dying here. Not becoming one of these things. Going home, finding food, figuring this out."

The portal stabilized, though maintaining it was like holding his breath underwater - he could do it, but not indefinitely. He could hear the hunting party at the entrance to the alley now, their twisted forms casting bizarre shadows in the sickly light. They moved with an almost military precision, checking corners and doorways as they advanced.

"Now or never," he told himself, gathering what remained of his strength. "On three. One..."

The creatures were halfway down the alley, their malformed heads swiveling as they searched.

"Two..."

One of them paused, its too-many eyes fixing on his location. A sound emerged from what might have been its throat - not quite a growl, not quite a word.

"Three!"

Axel lunged through the portal, his enhanced muscles providing one last burst of desperate strength. He hit the real-world pavement hard, rolling to absorb the impact as the portal snapped shut behind him. The sudden silence was almost deafening after the constant background noise of the nightmare realm.

"Made it," he gasped, pulling himself to his feet. His legs shook with the effort, and his stomach felt like it was trying to digest his spine, but he was alive. 

Back in the real world. Safe.