Part 008

Byklokinator

Something is bothering me. That might sound asinine, given the literal river of souls under my feet, but the river isn’t what I’m referring to. I’m being watched. Somewhere, in this hell, another presence gazes at me, evaluates me, and registers me as a threat. I can’t pinpoint where this feeling of mine comes from, but it permeates every cell of my body. My stomach tightens as I flick my gaze around, trying to find the source of my anxiety.

Turning back to the Shadow, I narrow my eyes. Instinctively, I raise my palm up and spread my fingers out in a ‘stop’ gesture. The Shadow, unable to halt its snail-worthy momentum, continues to leap at me, but a single words escapes my lips. " Light. "

A ray of energy shoots out of my hand, enveloping the Shadow’s entire side of the room in a luminous warmth, almost as bright as gazing at the sun during the heat of the midday. The shadow opens its mouth, but no sound comes out, as it melts away, devoured by the power of a single word.

Odd. Why did I do that? How and why did I know that I could shoot magical light rays out of my hand? Am I in some form of virtual reality? Of course not, that would be ludicrous! Besides, the floor beneath me still feels quite warm, and my sensation of touch can’t be as easily fooled as my eyes and ears can.

But then, if I were in the future, especially a hundred thousand years or so, perhaps virtual reality has evolved? Who knows what a futuristic humanity could come up with. This might be well beyond anything a primitive like myself could even imagine.

Time returns to normal, and the orb dulls somewhat, no longer acting like a miniature sun in the palm of my hands. While it doesn’t illuminate as much of the room, my eyes hurt much less, so it’s an improvement compared to before.

In any case, I’m not going to figure out where I am or understand my predicament by randomly guessing. This orb has given me the ability to shoot holy rays of light, so it’s a suitable weapon. I’m useless with a sword, and the armor laying around is way too big for me, so I doubt I’ll need anything else. I’d better just get out of here.

Sloshing my way through the piles of gold, I almost trip a few times, but manage to keep myself together. I consider taking some of the gold with me, but I doubt it’ll be any use. Hell, it’ll probably just slow me down. I can probably come back later if I find a use for it.

After wading through the gold, I evaluate the three statues. To the right of each one, on all three walls opposite the door I entered from, there are passages leading to various other hallways. Unlike every other instance up to this point, the moonspeak that lead me here isn’t anywhere to be seen. I can go right, left, or forward, and there are no indicators which way is the correct path to take. Hell, with my luck, they’re all the wrong path.

I don’t know where the passages lead, but one thing is for certain: I do not want to head down. It may be miles and miles below, but that river of souls is the last place I want to be.

When I was fleeing the statue monster, I used the left door, and it paid off for me. Since the left passage seems to head back up, in the opposite direction as the river of souls, I trudge past the piles of coin and step inside the hallway, and am pleasantly surprised to see rocks embedded in the walls, every ten feet or so, that glow. While they don’t illuminate much, they don’t need to, either. That’s what my new orb is for, after all!

With a pep in my step, I force the thoughts of the statue monster to the back of my mind and head down the passage, praying to whatever gods may still exist to watch over me.

…………………………………………………..

As the puny human leaves the room, the Three Great Kings turn their heads to look at one another.

The Knowledge-Seeker: Is that boy a candidate?

The One Who Weeps: Difficult to say. I saw no rejection. Anything is possible.

The Greatest Sinner: He is part of the great cycle. In the direst times of need, a champion will rise. The time is right.

The One Who Weeps: It doesn’t matter. The boy cannot redeem our failures. All hope is lost.

The Greatest Sinner: As long as one draws breath, there is always hope. You have forgotten the ancient struggles.

The Knowledge Seeker: You speak the truth, Arthur. As long as the boy has the Power of the Kings, he can right the wrongs we’ve wrought.

The One Who Weeps: He will break, just as we did, just as all heroes do. Man cannot overcome his weakness.

The Knowledge Seeker: Ye of little faith. That is why you fail.

151 Comments

      2. Google translates it to “you can have died” so it’s probably something along the lines of “you have died”. I’m getting a very Dark Souls-y feeling from this story.

          1. The problem seems to arise from the way google translates it. I used the romaji, or “shin ga kimasu”, when I put it into the translation tool and got “you can have died”. Entering “死が来ます” into google translates differently; the result is “death is coming”. Unfortunately I can’t read kanji yet so I’m going off of the assumption that “死が来ます” actually is “shin ga kimasu”, though it seems right since が is ga and ます is masu.

  10. This was great. I was half expecting it to be a prank for a Japanese game show, but this was much better. Are you thinking of finishing the story, or leaving it open?

    2. I was actually thinking of this as the story for a “choose your own adventure” video game, or at least writing it like those. I used to love reading books like that.

  20. That took my breath away in the literal sense. I felt like I was the one going through all that. I’m currently having to breath heavy to calm myself.

    Wonderful writing.

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              1. Haha, it’s your story, so do it however you want.

                I didn’t mean bad as in too short or anything though. I meant that they don’t really make sense. Some of the words aren’t even real.

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