He was crushed between the wall and the serpent's head. He died. Or… he should have, but he opened his eye again, startled to still be alive.
Sweat ran down his forehead as the wind from the Aberration's sudden movements buffeted him from all sides as they crashed into the walls.
Nova clung to the hilt of his sword with every ounce of strength he had.. Even he knew he would not survive the fall, so his body forced itself to endure.
'Damn it! What the hell is happening to me?!'
He had no way of knowing. The premonitory visions kept coming uncontrollably. This caused more and more pain in his only healthy eye, which cried blood with each new vision that arrived.
'No! Crap!'
His eye widened in desperation. The moment he noticed that the Aberration was about to drag its head against the side of the wall, he saw his previous death superimposed on reality.
Pure instinct took over. by what he had seen before. The muscles in his right arm tensed. His eye aimed at the ground, and before hitting the wall, he swung to the side and climbed onto the snake's head, above its jaw.
A second later, the Aberration dragged the tip of its head along the stone, breaking it and staining it black.
'That was close…'
The boy felt his face close to the stone, but he managed to save himself from being crushed. However, the beast shook its head quickly to get the human off, but Nova was clinging to it like a damn tick stuck to skin.
Being shaken around, after a few seconds, he felt his body begin to give way. It was already a great feat to have stayed alive until now, but trying to push past that limit had become impossible. The human body isn't a machine—it breaks down with constant use and needs to rest every so often to regain its strength.
"When are you going to get tired, you bastard?!"
The fight was just beginning.
Seeing that this was getting him nowhere, he had no choice but to think of the most logical thing to do.
'Crap! I need to use the seeds!'
If there was anything to be done, it was to use his last weapon. Six seeds for a giant bastard, much larger than the Sand Octopi. Of course, he wasn't sure if this would work, but at least he had to try.
His hand was already loosening its grip on the sword hilt, so it would soon fall into the abyss.
At the same time, the serpent resisted and continued to thrash and crawl around the area. Its hissing and heart-wrenching roars scraped against the walls. The gas seeped from its scales, drifting through the air like a deadly cloud. The smell of charcoal only grew stronger, as did the intense emotions in Nova's mind. In addition, each time the Aberration slammed into the walls, it weakened the boy's grip even more.
Without thinking twice, Nova grabbed his boot with his free hand and took it off, dropping it into the pit. Then he took off his sock, which had the seeds inside, and concentrated on putting it in the serpent's mouth.
Bracing himself on the Aberration's jaw, he waved his hand in front of the monster's mouth, trying to find an opportunity to attack. The serpent, on the other hand, refused to give in. Its eye bled profusely with the sword deeply embedded inside it. The stone was stained with the golden liquid that splattered from the Aberration's wound, and its moans of pain grew progressively louder.
Overhead, the portal flickered, its light humming faintly. Waiting silently; watching the battle despite not being a living or conscious entity.
In pain, Nova screamed. With blood spilling down his face, he finally found his opportunity. But it was only when he tried to throw the sock into the serpent's mouth that a new vision appeared before his eye.
An orange aura wrapped around him. Its bright eye, the same color as its aura, watched.
When he threw the seeds into the mouth of the Aberration, they germinated and exploded. A life-giving tree was generated, just as with the other monsters, but in the process, Nova was impaled by one of the branches.
The vision ended when blood splattered in front of his eye, enveloping his being with premature death.
That brought him back to reality. Although he did not see for sure if the serpent died, he could see that what he was about to do would cause its death. In that case, he had to act differently. Also, with this, he could finally understand what was happening.
'This... I've seen this before. It's the same thing that happened to Miyu in elementary school!'
[Future Vision—The ability to see the near future within three seconds. Overuse causes blindness.]
However, the consequences for Nova were worse than those Miyu experienced when using her Spectrum skill, so it did not appear to be the same skill.
His eye was bleeding and causing him terrible pain. His vision was too blurry to see clearly, and the confusion caused by the beast's gas wasn't helping at all.
Well, the gas actually helped too much, because now Nova, since Serenity wasn't protecting him from his other unknown emotions, gained a new Spectrum. The emotion that dominated his heart in recent days was:
[Anticipation—Specter whose abilities lie in prediction, future visions, and heightened senses.]
An emotion he had never felt before. In fact, in his entire life, the only thing he had ever felt was the lonely and mysterious Serenity. That distanced him from everyone around him and made him feel different from others.
Right now, locked in a maze of poison-stained tunnels, walking alone in the darkness and silence, a monster constantly stalked him. All his mind and heart could do was try to foresee what was to come. That single emotion, intense to say the least, awakened the Spectrum of Anticipation in Nova.
"I have a new Spectrum!"
There was no time to celebrate. He clicked his tongue in annoyance, thinking before the serpent slammed into the wall again. As he slowed down, Nova almost dropped the sword, but he held on with his fingertips.
"Ahhhhh! It's now or never!"
With a quick movement of his hand, he threw the sock into the confused Aberration. A second later, he used his feet to push himself off the wall.
In the next split second, falling toward the rocks on the wall, Nova pointed his hands toward the Aberration's mouth. He formed a square with his fingers and, in his weak, broken voice, said:
"Fuck you, stupid worm!"
The seeds in the sock fell into the beast's jaws; they absorbed the moisture inside the Aberration like a sponge. A moment later, they exploded into branches and leaves.
The serpent groaned in agony. Its jaw opened grotesquely, stretching like rubber. Its single fang fought desperately against the branches, but in the end, the plant defeated the beast.
The crunch of bones could be heard as the snake's jaw could no longer withstand the pressure of the branches growing inside its jaws. It thrashed against the walls and dragged its elongated body across the floor in a futile attempt to pull the branches from its mouth. As the crunching grew louder, the monster stopped. It looked up at the small sphere embedded in the ceiling, and in the next moment, its head exploded into bones and golden blood.
The branches spread out as the beast fell. The roots dug into the bones and the ground. The blue leaves glowed, creating a strange and welcoming cold atmosphere.
And Nova? By pushing himself against the wall, he was able to save himself from falling. Now he was hanging by his fingers from one of the protrusions on the wall. He breathed heavily, small drops of blood and sweat caressing his chin and falling into the abyss of bones and roots.
In the following seconds, there was a deathly silence. Nova looked at the snake's corpse lying at the bottom. He felt a great weight lift off his shoulders when he saw the corpse.
'Great... I can't take it anymore...'
The exhaustion was too much. His muscles gave way, releasing their grip on the rocks. His body plummeted to the bottom and crashed loudly against the bones. As he hit the ground, his body broke, and his consciousness was lost in nothingness.
Warm blood spilled from his body, a sensation that had become all too familiar in recent days. The dark light of the portal accompanied the moment, where a corpse and a possibly fallen man lay in silence.
Nova was once again torn between life and death. His memories flashed through his mind, where he lay in the company of the serpent's corpse...
In the next moment, darkness swallowed him. The whispers from the first time he arrived here told him something, but he didn't understand what. Soon, those dark whispers fell silent. The darkness became deep and dark purple. Then, he found himself standing on top of mysterious blue flowers scattered across an endless field.
"Again... Where am I? Is this going to happen to me every time I'm about to die?"
No one answered. Nova hoped someone would, but this time he was alone.
"Hello?"
Silence.
"No one? Damn..."
Confused, he thought for a few minutes. Looking around and finding nothing nearby, he walked through the field of flowers for the next five minutes. Realizing there was nothing interesting nearby, he got tired and sat down on the ground.
"What am I supposed to do now? Could it be that this time I really am dead?"
The idea was quite depressing.
"Man... I did everything I could, and I still failed."
At least he tried and didn't give the world the pleasure of victory. He fought tooth and nail—with nothing but a sword and seeds stuffed in a sock. He killed three Category 6 Aberrations alone and traveled the lands of an unknown world. If anyone in his world knew about this, he would immediately be considered a legendary hero.
It was extremely rare for someone to fall into a portal and get trapped. Portals usually took a long time to close on their own. Unless an external force interfered, it was theoretically impossible for a person to get trapped.
Exhausted, Nova lay down… and looked up at the dark purple sky. After a few seconds, he said:
"This place... is too quiet. I think..."
His golden aura of Serenity covered him.
"There it is."
His eyes became dull, and all signs of emotion were completely erased.
"It has returned... but there is no point in my Specter working if I am dead. Oh... Wait," he frowned, remembering something. When the aura faded and the sparkle in his eye returned, the memory of visions of the future filled his mind. 'I remember hearing that when an Empath obtained a new Spectrum, on a few occasions, they used to have visions related to its power.'
Nova never had those kinds of visions since he was practically born a bearer of the Spectrum of Serenity. Instead, his childhood friend, Miyu, once talked about what she saw when she obtained her Spectrum.
'When Miyu obtained her Spectrum of Anticipation, she said she had a strange dream where she was floating in outer space.'
In that case...
Nova looked at his hand. Surprisingly, he could see out of both eyes.
'So, I'm not dead. This is just the vision of the power I've obtained.'
But a field of blue flowers? What do flowers have to do with the Spectrum of Anticipation? Flowers are pretty, they smell good, and the Needles of Light create nectar from them. They have Calem energy pollen that is spread across the field by the wind, and a few other minor functions, but that's about it.
There is nothing that connects flowers to something as complex as Anticipation.
'A field of flowers with a dark sky. This place smells sweet, but also...'
The place has a strange, disturbing, lonely, and sad atmosphere.
'It feels heavy every time I breathe.'
He stretched his arms out among the flowers. He caressed the blue petals with his fingertips, thinking more deeply.
'Besides, both my eyes are healthy. That only confirms one thing for me.'
Nova turned his gaze back to the dark sky.
'Out there, far from my mind, I am unconscious. When I wake up, I will still be as hurt as before.'
It was all a little ridiculous. Nova exhaled wearily.
'After everything I've been through in the last few days, I don't understand how I'm still alive.'
Although he is alive, he is not whole. He will likely continue to lose parts of his body as he progresses further on this journey. But, a journey... Crossing the portal does not guarantee his return home, and that is the biggest problem of all.
'If only I knew what happened and who threw me into the portal, I wouldn't have this thorn of uncertainty stuck in my brain.'
There had been many reports of Empaths falling into portals and getting trapped on the other side in the last three years. Unfortunately, Nova turned out to be one of those Empaths.
'Besides, the voice I heard when I fell... was it a child?'
With every answer, two more questions popped up. This time, the questions were too many, and the answers as scarce as water in the desert.
As the questions flew through his mind, his eyelids felt heavy, and a mysterious tiredness invaded his system. He began to close his eyes and open them slowly, trying to resist.
'Whoever owns that voice, I need to go back to find out the truth.'
Yielding to exhaustion, he fell into a deep sleep. The flowers resting around him seemed to embrace the boy after he fell asleep.
A mysterious wind caressed the field with a soft whistle.
Then, blood spilled onto the petals near Nova. The wind stopped, as did everything else in the field of flowers. However, this time there was something else with Nova.
Four corpses lay beside him.
***
He slowly opened his eye, adjusting to the dim light from the sphere on the stone ceiling, and groaned at the pain in his body.
Around him, cold snow covered the ground, which had already covered the bones and sharp stones. The monster's corpse lay coiled around the beautiful blue tree in the center of the large stone dome.
Such an image was too strange in such a dark and gloomy area.
'I'm alive... It doesn't seem real.'
Moving his hands slowly over his chest, he examined every part of his own body. He felt broken ribs and red-hot wounds, but other than that, he was fine.
'I have to thank my own luck. I would be dead a thousand times over without it.'