Chapter 13: Return
Isaac abruptly opened his eyes, a silent scream trapped in his throat.
He didn't move.
His whole body froze, his breath suspended, as if waiting for something to strike again. For the whip to crack again. For the pain to return. For the foreman's voice to ring out, ordering him to get up when he couldn't. But nothing.
But nothing.
Just silence.
His gaze was hazy, haunted, lost in the darkness of his room. The reddish light of the digital alarm clock pierced the blackness, the numbers trembling under his misty eyes. Only one minute had passed.
One minute.
It couldn't be.
His fingers tightened on the sheets, squeezing the fabric until his knuckles whitened. He expected to feel the roughness of the stone floor, the dust sticking to his skin, moist with sweat and blood. But no... they were his sheets. His worn, but clean sheets. Her bed. His shabby apartment.
He was home. He was here.
So why was his heart still beating as if he were going to die?
He wanted to sit up, but as soon as he moved, a sensation of agony exploded in his back. A memory. Just a memory. But so real... His breath hitched, and in uncontrollable panic, he ran a trembling hand down his back.
No wounds. No burns. His skin was intact.
And yet, his mind refused to believe it.
The blows. The screams of others. His own broken scream, his voice drowned out by too much shouting. The smell of blood. The sweat. The humiliation.
His stomach contracted violently.
He was suffocating.
An immense blanket of terror crushed down on him, crushing him under his own trauma. His breathing raced, his chest struggling to rise, a painful hiss emerging from his throat. His fingers clutched at his skull, as if he could keep his thoughts from exploding all over the place.
He was alive. He was home. He was... he was...
The sobs burst without warning.
An uncontrollable, bestial torrent. The sob of a lost child. Of pain. Of terror.
He wanted to forget. He wanted to erase that night, that nightmare, that horror that clung to him like a second skin. But he couldn't. Every image, every sensation was etched in his mind.
His chest heaved in fits and starts, as if his lungs refused to work properly. He trembled. An uncontrollable trembling, a spasm of cold and anguish that shook his limbs.
He couldn't breathe.
His fingers tightened against his chest, trying to calm the furious beating of his heart. But he felt like he was going to explode. That the earth would open up beneath him and swallow him up.
He wanted to forget.
But his body remembered.
Isaac remained curled in on himself, his body trembling under the invisible weight of his own mind. He wanted it to stop. For his heart to slow down. For the air to return.
But nothing came.
He clenched his jaws, trying to swallow his sobs, but the more he struggled, the more they seemed to want to suffocate him.
He forced himself to inhale deeply. Inhale once. Inhale twice. He had to calm down. It was just a nightmare... just a nightmare.
A lie.
His hand tightened on his sheets. He knew. This wasn't just a dream. It was too real. Too intense. Too... painful.
He could still smell the metallic scent of blood in his nostrils. He could still hear the whistle of the whip splitting the air before crashing against his flesh. He could still feel the shame, the humiliation... the fear.
A spasm shook his stomach, and he rolled onto his side, lips parted in a hiccup of distress. He was going to vomit.
His trembling legs barely supported him as he leapt to his feet and rushed into the tiny adjoining bathroom. He knelt before the bowl, fingers gripping the cold rim. His body convulsed, and a bitter flood rose in his throat. He spat out everything he had, his stomach twisting with the effort.
When he finally finished, he stood there panting, his forehead pressed against the icy porcelain.
He was hot. He was cold. His limbs were numb, but his mind was on fire.
Slowly, he straightened, his gaze vague, and met his reflection in the cracked mirror above the sink.
His eyes were bloodshot. His face was hollowed out, distorted by panic and suffering. Her hair stuck to her forehead in damp strands, and her torso was still heaving frantically with anguish.
It's you, Mordred.
His breath caught.
The voice echoed in his skull like a blade through the heart. He clutched at the sink, shaken by sudden nausea.
No. It wasn't him. It wasn't him! He was Isaac. He was here, in his apartment, in HIS world. He wasn't a slave. He wasn't this wreck chained to a post.
He closed his eyes, trying to crush that voice, that memory, that pain seeping into his skin.
He turned on the cold water, dipped his trembling hands in and splashed his face.
The water slid over his burning skin, a violent contrast that brought him back to reality.
He had to pull himself together.
Gently, he let himself slide against the wall, resting his forehead against his bent knees. His breathing was still erratic, but there were no more tears.
He felt as if he'd been drained from the inside out.
After a long moment, he forced himself to get up and go back to his room. He dropped onto his bed, staring at the ceiling with tired eyes.
But just then, a system notification sounded.
[Return to host's home world]
[4 moonstones have been absorbed]
[Transformation begins]
A new wave of pain hit him, pinning him against his mattress. Isaac didn't even have the strength to scream this time. He clenched his teeth, his muscles stiff with pain, his fingers clenched on the sheet as if he could hold on to it to keep from sinking.
His flesh was burning.
Not a superficial burn, but something much deeper, a fire devouring his body from within. He felt his blood boiling, his bones twisting under an invisible force, his muscles reshaping to accommodate this unnatural transformation.
His breathing quickened, erratic, disordered. He curled in on himself, wrapping his arm around his chest as if he could prevent what was happening.
Cracking.
The sound froze him.
It wasn't a simple muscle spasm, or a cramp from exhaustion. It was something more... visceral. As if his body was fracturing itself to be reborn.
He slowly lowered his eyes to his forearm.
His skin...
It was heaving.
Small blisters appeared under the epidermis, pulsing like parasites trying to extract themselves. Horror gripped him by the throat, an icy shiver crawling up his spine.
He wanted to scream, to strike, to tear away this thing growing inside him... but his body no longer obeyed him. It was as if he were trapped in pain.
Then the skin cracked.
An excruciating pain.
As if someone had just lacerated his arm with a white-hot blade. He saw a dark liquid dripping from the small open wounds, and then... something else.
Scales.
Deep blue, almost black in the flickering light of his room. They were smooth, with a dark sheen, and yet they seemed to absorb light more than they reflected it.
Isaac felt his heart pounding furiously in his chest. He shuddered as his fingertips grazed the cold, hard surface that now covered part of his forearm.
This was no mere change.
This wasn't a dream.
This was real.
The transformation had taken place.
But... it was so little.
He had expected a radical change, a power that would explode within him, strengthening him, giving him a new asset to face this unforgiving world. But no.
Just four miserable scales.
All this... for this?
He dropped back onto his bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. His breath was still ragged, his heart beating at a frantic pace.
How many stones would it take to absorb for real change to occur?
Ten?
Twenty?
A hundred?
[Ding increase in statistics]
[Status]
Name : Isaac
Race : Human
Hunter Rank: F
Statistics :
- Strength : 15 --> 19
- Agility : 16 --> 21
- Endurance : 11 -->19
- Sense : 5 -->16
- Dexterity : 4 -->15
- Intelligence : 6 -->19