Chapter 25: Strange Reaction

He woke up the next morning tired, but didn’t seem to remember anything from the previous night, but something even stranger he suddenly had these random flashes of light strike his mind over and over again, for no reason, each time his mind hurt. He was having trouble thinking that day but he was glad that soon after seeing his friends again that they’d managed to rescue so many more people. He felt a sort of good inner feeling of accomplishment all he hoped was that they wouldn’t be as hard to control, he wasn’t going to act like a tyrant, this group didn’t seem to really have a leader yet most of the time they were all gathering ideas and going forward. He was also hoping that he and Taj would get along as great as they used to and possibly catch back up onto their old memories. Rayhan left his room and stepped outside, there he saw everyone in their little groups talking about stuff, and Steven, Pierre and Paul were in their rooms. There outside was a nice day he saw Sarah, Noa and Amna all hanging out in one huddle then he saw Rielle, Antoinette, Abbey, and Jasmine in another huddled group and then he saw in another group of people, Emma, Marsal, Jeylan and Jessica. Then he saw Taj sitting under a tree staring aimlessly into the sky. Rayhan decided the safest place to be now was next to him. He sat down next to him.
“Hey”
“Hey”
“You look like you’re missing someone” said Rayhan
“Well before I came by, I was in my own resistance team, but it didn’t have as many people as you do now” said Rayhan.
“Were they also captured?” Rayhan asked.
“No, well I don’t know, they might be, I was captured, I didn’t see them but they might’ve have gotten captured I didn’t get a chance to properly maintain contact with them in that cell” said Taj.
“Well that could be my fault, after I managed to escape, he must’ve gotten the chance to tighten up security, but like, he got the entire world captive, everyone, your friends, your family…everyone, if only I could manage to work out what he’s after, all I got so far is that he wants to bring back someone named Lucifer, but there must be a reason he captured all those people, it happened so fast I didn’t even get a chance to see it coming” said Rayhan.
“That’s true, I heard about Lucifer too but I don’t have any better information than you do now” said Taj.
“Great minds think alike” said Rayhan.
“Ha, yeah right” said Taj.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Rayhan laughed giving him a friendly punch to the shoulder.
“So you got your eye on someone back in your resistance?” Rayhan asked.
“Yeah” Taj said sounding a bit hesitant.
“Nice man nice” said Rayhan.
“Yeah well I bet you got your eye on some bitch” said Taj laughing.
“Ha yeah well I’ll tell you it’s Rielle” said Rayhan.
“Oh shit, never mind, she’s cool” said Taj.
“Damn man you gotta tell me this shit what else happened?” he asked.
“Ah man not much, not much” said Rayhan.
“Cool” said Taj. And continued staring into the sky.
“So how’ve you been? Where were you for this long?” Rayhan asked.
“After Hell capture me I was in a room for like ever, it wasn’t a cell though it was a white room, but then one day he, came in and I don’t really remember what happened after that man, I just remember a lot of flashes of blue light and suddenly every part of me burns like never before” he said.
“Do you remember anything at all after that?” Rayhan asked.
“No actually, a lot happened but when I try to remember all I see is blackness, like I remember the memory clearly, but after Hell opened the door it all goes black” said Taj.
“That sounds familiar it’s kinda like what happens when I try to remember anything from before I got adopted” Rayhan.
“I’m not sure, but maybe there’s a reason for that, maybe there’s something going on here” said Taj.
“Well we’ll figure that out later” said Rayhan.
“Yeah” Taj said. They just sat there, Rayhan on one side of the tree Taj on the other just staring at the empty sky. They sky hadn’t even a single cloud in it, it was clear blue now melting into a bright shade of orange, the sun was setting, against the castle’s window, the light shined so brightly against their faces they decided to leave.
Taj went into his room and sat down for a moment, it was like everyone else’s a window taking up the entire wall, an in-wall fridge over the bedside table. A closet full of HL clothing, a crest carved into the wall forming the letters “HL”. He sat on his bed as the sun set through the window. He looked around, this place was different, it was much less hard on him, and it was better he only wished his resistance was here. They’d like this place a lot. It’d been so long since he’d been here last so long since he’d seen Rayhan, so much had changed, and so much hadn’t about him. He seemed quieter since the last time they met. He felt freer here; he found it odd that that people were so much kinder but then again after six years of being a captive prisoner he had the right to assume so. He fell back onto the bed, it was so much softer compared to that he used to sleep on. This place was so much warmer and more of a home. He closed his eyes and took off his hat; he took his shirt off and wore an HL coat over his black undershirt. He lay back down onto his bed and closed his eyes it’d been a while since he’d earned a goodnight’s rest.
Rayhan was in his room sitting on his bed and playing around with his metal arm. He was unscrewing some screws trying to find his way around it, adding gadgets, removing useless parts. He managed to finish doing all of that after a while and just sat and pondered before falling back onto his bed and just thought about everything. They’d managed to get yet even more people into HL and would soon have yet even more once they’d tracked down Taj’s friends. He thought about Abbey, even though Taj was alright he can’t go assuming they’re all completely normal there’s no telling what Hell might or might not have done to them. He was quite worried about that, Abbey had always been the one person he could turn to about anything, he trusted her with his life, and if anything happened to her he’d really be unhappy. There was also Marsal, Jeylan, Emma, Jasmine, Amna and Noa. All of them he trusted, he really cared if anything would ever happen to any of them, he really hoped they were alright. He’d find out most information tomorrow, but getting the job done wouldn’t be a problem but getting through all of this right without messing everything up with that many people seemed a bit hard, but they were all trustworthy and would listen, but then if too many arguments and fighting went around in the group it would be hard to maintain balance and understanding, he might end up losing it and getting angry, his friends were important but this was a very hard time for him, there was only one time before he’d been considered a leader and that was ditching class that one time when it was only him and two other friends, he had done it the most and he was chosen to lead the group back without getting caught, he failed at that but he managed to come up with an excuse, it was sort of the same, except at a much higher magnitude. He was no longer fighting to stay out of trouble; he was fighting for his and his friends lives. He had others that could help him lead, he had Steven, Paul, and Pierre and most importantly he had Taj. He wasn’t going to blame catastrophe for all of this it was him who asked for it and he was glad he got it to be perfectly honest with himself, he wanted the adrenaline, the blood sweat and tears, one thing he hadn’t called for though was seeing his friends being tortured, and seeing his friends suffer and go through that much trouble, he felt almost guilty about it he felt like this was all initially his fault, but tried not to think about it, he’d try to protect them as much as he could, no one really relied on him, he was relying on himself, he was relying to try to keep everything in order, keeping them all as a group. He thought about Rielle, he hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to her in a while, he decided not to he didn’t want her to think he couldn’t survive without her even though he knew perfectly well that he couldn’t.
The sunlight shined through the windows and onto his face, his metal arm was almost burning with heat and he was sweating even though he was no longer wearing his shirt, he never did when he went to sleep. He got up tired and rubbed his eyes. His hair was messed up that morning after looking in the bathroom mirror. The marking on his forearm stopped burning unfortunately; he’d yet to ask Elnar about it, if he got the chance. He tried not to let his mind worry about small things like this but at the same time he hoped them not to escalate, things had a tendency to escalate in his life; from arguments, to schoolwork… but that was life, he never bothered to question that rule, probably because he was never offered the chance to. It’s not everyday you get a call from god asking what’s going on in life. He threw water onto his face and rubbed his face with soap before rinsing, shaving, brushing his teeth, fixing his hair, applying deodorant, applying cologne and whipping his face clean. He threw on the black shirt he’d been wearing the day he was captured. The cologne, toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant and comb were all created by Elnar. He lay on his bed without leaving his room. After a couple of hours, he got bored from lying down and sat back up, and then almost immediately lay back down. Suddenly a flash of light, and images flashing past his eyes like crazy, then he felt his amulet burn against his chest and he saw a white crest dangling off of a pole in a very red zone, it was dark and red, then he saw in space, right out of the reaches of the atmosphere, a black inverted version of the Hubble telescope, it was pointing a loft into the blackness of the starry emptiness of space. He was getting confused, over these thoughts getting headaches wondering to ask about this or not. He kept thinking that just because he was a major part of this didn’t mean every hunch he had was worth telling everyone and pointlessly worrying them, in case it was just an empty assumption. He went over to the balcony and felt the morning frozen air. It was so cold he couldn’t believe it. He could pretty much feel the sunlight’s warmth fading away. He looked into the sky there were clouds gathering covering the sunlight and the blue sky. He closed the door and went back in as the wind increased. He walked down the stairs slowly trying to take in the time and the weird thoughts that kept swarming his mind. He tried not to pay it too much mind but then again he didn’t want to risk them in keep coming so frequently he could barely see what’s in front of him. He tried to control it and luckily it didn’t seem to really bother him but it kept happening randomly as he was making his way down the stairs and through the kitchen. He looked around the bottom floor trying to see if anyone had made it down other than him, he checked his watch; it was 7:30 am. He sat down, and gazed around the room his eyes rolling from one end of the room to the other, trying to take in the entire room. He just sat there for a while. Soon more and more people started coming downstairs. Pierre sat in front of him.
“Morning” said Rayhan.
“Morning” said Rayhan.
“So see anyone you like yet? I mean we just managed to rescue so many people, anyone at all?” Rayhan asked.
“Well…” said Pierre.
“Haha I see” Rayhan said.
“I think I kind of like Sarah” said Pierre.
“Oh I see, well hmm I was thinking you were going to mention someone we worked so hard in breaking free” said Rayhan.
“Oh well no” said Pierre. He heard footsteps coming down the hall he quickly turned to Rayhan.
“I’ll talk to you more about it later” he said in a hushed voice. He left the room after that and Abbey arrived.
“Hey hanray” she said
“Hi Beyab” he replied. She walked up to the counter and pulled out a glass and poured water into it. She carried the glass and sat down onto a chair and placed the glass onto the table after taking a brief sip.
“Good morning” said Rayhan.
“Good morning” she replied.
“And in case I don’t seeya good afternoon good evening and goodnight” he smiled, taking that almost word for word but toppling over it by saying it too fast thus ruining the affect of the line from the movie he got it from Abbey wanted to see called The Truman Show. She laughed as a result.
“So, like do you still like Jessica?” she asked.
“Well actually no, see I got over her but now I like Rielle, it just happened a while ago” he said.
“Oh well does she know?” Abbey asked.
“Yeah I told her a while ago” said Rayhan.
“I see” she said turning her gaze to the glass of water and flicking her fingers around. Abbey was fairly tall, with long brown hair, brown eyes and light skin; she wore braces but was really pretty.
“So like are you gonna ask her out?” Abbey finally asked turning her eyes back at Rayhan while leaving her head slightly tilted towards the glass of water. Rayhan sat his legs open, wearing his jeans, leaving his hands resting on the table his back slouching against the back of the chair. He thought about that for a second. He wasn’t quite sure of how to answer it, he’d answered it many times before but for some reason it wasn’t as awkward right now, maybe because it was morning, and he had run over this so many times in his mind he had trouble speaking it. He quickly gathered the breath and the words.
“Well no not really” he said.
“Awh really why not?” she asked sounding curious.
“Well I thought about it, Rielle means more to me than the world itself, I’ve done stupid things for her, I’ve done things that could’ve gotten me killed for her, but like, I don’t want to end up going out with her and breaking up and ruining the great friendship we have, she means so much to me, I love her” Rayhan said stuttering a bit and rushing it too much. He had trouble believing that Abbey actually heard him.
“Awh, but yeah I get it” she said. The next few moments were filled with the silence of the clock ticking.
“So like tell me, what was it like being in Hell’s prison?” Rayhan asked gesturing his hands into his pockets before realizing how uncomfortable that would end up and taking them out and resting them down in his slouched position.
“Ahh it sucked, he’s such a taco I hated him, that vag, he friggen kept me locked up in this stupid cell for like ever” she said. Rayhan felt bad, he hated seeing Abbey go through trouble any at all she was one of his closest friends and one of the only friends he’d trust no matter what.
“But like, what’d he do, did he just leave you in there? Like what the Hell why would he do that? What the hell was going down with the other people who were there if you saw anything?” said Rayhan sounding a bit concerned.
“No actually he never showed us any of them, and I never got a chance finding out being too worried about myself” said Abbey.
“Oh I completely understand must’ve been horrible there, don’t worry though now you’re safe” said Rayhan.
“Thanks” she said sounding preoccupied
“Anytime” said Rayhan. The next few minutes was again filled with silence. Rayhan got up and left the room for his own room but was suddenly halted by Abbey’s voice that stopped him.
“Wait, there’s more, He…..he….kept us looked up, but he would occasionally…he’d grab someone who wasn’t cooperating or listening, he’d drag them away to a room, it was a room…..a dark room, that you could here screams of horror from, they were horrible, they would scream in the night, the voices would be….terrible…..no one came back….I would see them being dragged away by the arm, they would break their arm…so they couldn’t struggle as much and would drag them, and they’d…they’d fight but wouldn’t make it” she said about to continue but silenced by Rayhan who could clearly see she was having a lot of trouble telling him this, it must’ve been horrible.
“It’s alright, but just please, stay here, rest, eat, don’t strain yourself, you’re free here, relax, and don’t make it hard on yourself. Don’t go fighting for a while rest” said Rayhan.
“Thank you” she said sounding a bit more focused, Rayhan left upstairs, a bit more worried, he was especially worried about Abbey, he knew he would never be able to stand that kind of stuff, he’d suffer every night worse than ever just the thought of it, imagining it in his head was horrible but to see it happen in front of your own eyes would be even greater of a terror in itself, he tried to keep things under the weather, Abbey was a strong person, she needed a bit of support was all anyone would after dealing with this kind of torture, he would be crushed if anything should happen to her of all people, she was the closest and most trustworthy person he’d known he couldn’t stand it if anything should ever happen to her, he arrived to his room and closed the door, opened the window and threw himself onto his bed after throwing his sweater against a hook where he managed to get it to hang without getting up to place it back, he felt the softness of the bed beneath him, as he stared into the ceiling, thinking, pondering, wondering and worrying.

Chapter 24: Endurance

After climbing for what seemed like hours it looked like he hadn’t gotten any distance, Hell was smart he had thought this through entirely and therefore made it so he could not make it through, but he had to find a way of testing Hell’s intelligence, he started climbing downward after a few minutes the rain and wind had gone. He was right, Hell was making all this happen in advance but he had to have made one flaw just like Elnar had told him, Elnar had been right so far about everything that happened, it all followed one real rule, Hell would make it look impossible, there had to be one way to get through, one almost unreachable way to get through, and he had to figure this one out alone. It was going to be hard, but he’d have to one way or another. Let’s see, the rain only appears as I escalade, therefore hell must’ve made the dangers increase as I get higher, but as I get lower, it gets safer. Hell had spent so much time thinking this through in advance, so I should take care of the obstacles in advance, if I fly away from it, I could probably see what’s going on above me. He thought. He flew back using his black wings, but could not see anything due to the winds. Then he thought again, Hell made it so it would be very risky and probably almost impossible, he thought for a moment. Lightning was a threat, he grabbed onto the metal fence again and pulled out his sword and held it into the air, maybe if the lightning struck it he could electrocute the fence, it was risky because he’d have to be very quick to be able to get the lightning from off his sword onto the fence, and he only had one shot because lightning only struck in the same spot once. He held his sword high and tried not to get blown down by the wind. He gripped tightly around the fence and held his sword as far from the fence and into the air as possible. He closed his eyes the bitter wind and water striking against his face and scar was burning but he had to keep going. He held it high in the air hoping to attract the lightning which sure enough finally struck his sword, without as a much as a second to waste he threw the sword against the fence and watched as the lightning climbed its way up the metal and burnt down anything that was potentially hanging against it, they fell down and into oblivion. The effect of the lightning also lit his way through, he kept climbing unstopped, finally he arrived to the top and he looked up and saw the towers above and nothing more, he looked down and saw nothing more, He ran up to the tower, the winds increased and so did the rain. He ran towards the tower and went through the tower doors. He closed it behind him silently. He started climbing the stairs. He wouldn’t stop until he reached the top. He was tired and weary but needed to keep going his endurance had always been weak but he had to fight it.
He kept running and arrived to a door; he kicked it open and found a hallway lit buy lanterns. He walked across it and saw in the distance nothing but darkness; he pulled off a lantern and moved faster, trying to get through. He held out his sword ready to face anything that might come out and attack him knowing Hell, it was quite likely. He ran through the hallway for some reason it looked like the hallway was shrinking slowly and slowly, like the walls were slowly closing in. He could hardly breathe anymore, he ran back but it was the same, he realized the walls were closing in even more by the second. He was being crushed within the room itself he had to escape and as soon as possible, the obstacles were becoming more and more difficult. He couldn’t take a breath. Slowly he felt his lungs contract slowly and slowly he felt his body crush within him he had to make time to think somehow, he pulled out his blade. And held it onto the ground standing up avoiding being crushed, the heat increased in the room ad he tried to fight his way into oxygen. He got a hold onto it. He was breathing slowly and taking in even breaths. He thought for a moment, he blew out cold air and allowed the contraction to expand and him to move around, and the door to be large enough to get through, at this point he was feeling utterly claustrophobic, but his plan was working, slowly but it was working as he got more and more space to move around and the blade fell over having nothing to support he was free again in the room to breathe freely without being crushed by a room. He stretched out and picked up his sword. He tried to turn the knob but it wouldn’t twist, he pulled out his sword and tried picking the lock, and slowly it opened up with a clicking noise and he went through. The next room was a stair case, he climbed it higher and higher and higher and higher her escaladed up the tower, until he finally reached the top. It was blocked by a plank of wood; he broke the plank and opened the door. There he was on the roof. He got up. It was windy and the sun was setting. He pulled out his gun. Hell stood there facing the opposite direction.
“Where the fuck is it?” Rayhan asked.
“Where’s what?” Hell asked.
“The ice amulet!” said Rayhan.
“Put the gun down” Hell said.
“First tell me or I’ll shoot” said Rayhan.
“What will that do?” asked Hell.
“Well if you’re so eager to know maybe we should find out” said Rayhan.
“A little metal piece can’t kill me, and even if you did kill me what good would that do you? I’ll only be replaced by someone much stronger” said Hell. Rayhan was intrigued by that.
“Shut up!” Rayhan shouted shooting simultaneously.
“As you can see, they did me no harm” said Hell.
“He hasn’t told you yet, has he?” said Hell. Rayhan pulled his sword out and gripped it tightly as Hell shifted from one position to the next in almost a blink of an eye. Rayhan could only see a grey blur moving off the corner of his eye and into focus.
Then it disappeared. Rayhan gripped his sword tightly and had his eye open wide. He looked around, he was sweating, as the wind blew against his face, Hell was near he could feel it. Then out of thin air he appeared right in front of Rayhan as he had anticipated and both their swords smashed against one another sending sparks flying everywhere. Rayhan didn’t have a chance to think as he slashed angrily through the air, the cold steel of his sword crashing against that of Hells. He turned around as Hell flew over him and slashed, Hell tried to evade him and hit him while he wasn’t looking but it was no use they were both mentally matched. They kept trying to outsmart one another not even wondering how it would be if they were too alike to compete against one another. They slashed and were throwing weight against each other they were matching forces this is where Rayhan would lose his even hand. He was on his knees.
“You asked what good it would be if I killed you, well what better would it be if you killed me?” Rayhan asked. Hell dropped his sword.
“Nothing, I never intend to kill you” said Hell. He flung his hand around blasting a black orb of energy knocking Rayhan to the ground.
“Than what is it that you intend?” Rayhan asked.
“Nothing you should be concerned about, just play along” said Hell.
“I deserve to know; after all you put us through!” Rayhan shouted.
“All I want is power, to bring back someone important” said Hell.
“You’re not going to bring Lucifer, I won’t let you, and you’re unleashing so much onto us for no reason! You don’t deserve to live, and then why did you come here?” Rayhan asked angrily.
“For power, I must sacrifice the people to create the philosopher stone, one of the ingredients I need, and the red water is a remnant which runs within all your bodies, your minds, I need the red water, I have to destroy all of you and take your red water, with it will bring enough, to bring him back, I need your resources, your planet will be destroyed” said Hell.
“What the hell do you want this for? Why are you bringing back so much suffering? Why do you hate?” Rayhan asked angrily.
“I have my reasons, but right now I need something from you, which is why I won’t kill you just yet, give the crystal to me and maybe I won’t kill you” said Hell. Rayhan thought for a moment he didn’t want to give the crystal up, after the effects it had on him and his friends, he wasn’t going to wait and find out what Hell might have to do with it. He didn’t even have it with him luckily, so it wasn’t like Hell could forcefully take it from him.
Rayhan gripped the handle of his sword, he felt his throat pulsing out with fear but he couldn’t let that control him, he grasped it tightly not knowing what he could do, he got up pushing against the sword, until he was standing up. He pulled the sword away, and then slashed with his most of his strength; he slashed again and again always to be hit by Hell’s sword. He didn’t want to give up; even if his strength would give in he knew he couldn’t give up. He kept throwing empty worthless shots. He didn’t know what he could do now though, it wasn’t like slashing would get him anywhere. He threw his sword at hell without thinking and pulled his hands up and started swinging them around throwing, quite strong, gusts of intense air at them, over and over and over again, Hell was losing his sense of power and superiority, Hell was undoubtedly a lot like him unfortunately, they both never relied on strength to get them anywhere, but instead determination. Maybe if Rayhan could somehow manage to crush that sense of power or render it weaker and weaker he had a chance of beating him. He kept throwing gusts of air, Hell fell back further and further, He was sort of dancing in this case just throwing air, he threw a punch in the air and the force of his arm was sort of thrown forward and magnified by the looks of it, he liked what he was seeing, maybe this whole war against him and Hell wasn’t as impossible as he thought it might’ve been, it didn’t look like Hell had the same power as he did, maybe that’s why he was so desperate to get the crystal, that only made things harder for him and the rest of HL now, not only were they supposed to stay out of Hells way and try to take him down, but they had to keep the crystal away as well which wasn’t going to be easy, they were part of a manhunt now, the entire population of the world multiplied by about a hundred was after him, and who knows maybe Hell had more soldiers hidden, and they didn’t have as much as a single army to fight all those people, but what they did have was the energy of earth, fire water and air, he’d have to make sure that in case would Hell get the stone, if he got it if would pretty much be the end of everything. They only had that one stone, without its energy they would have nothing.
He continued to fight despite how much his physical being stopped him. He closed his eyes. Consciousness was running low he was being thrown around so frequently he was starting to get a bit of a headache and was slowly losing consciousness. He closed his eyes and tried to think of something Elnar may have taught him that might aide him in this situation. He was on the ground and Hell was closing in, He got up though bruised and bleeding and as Hell reached him he pulled his hands out and pushed Hell across the room to hit a wall. This was unreal, he looked at his hands. He was amazed by his sudden strength, he remembered his ability, he closed his eyes stepped forward and suddenly became a blur of energy to anyone who saw him he sped through the air until he came to Hell who seemed to have just gotten up off the ground, he threw a punch which Hell grabbed and tried to throw and uppercut which Rayhan grabbed, he threw a roundhouse kick and nailed Hell in the ribs, who let go Rayhan didn’t waste time and quickly grabbed Hell’s neck and threw him back towards a wall, this wall burst into flames and smoke surrounded it, apparently he must’ve hit a gas pipe which burst through the smoke Hell emerged and used the same technique but grabbed Rayhan by the neck threw him into the air flew up grabbed his collar and threw him so hard towards a mirror he broke through and landed onto the hard concrete of the ground. Rayhan was bleeding now. Hell flew back down and grabbed him once again by the neck and lifted him off the ground and threw him back in the air only this time he held out his hand and threw a blast of water looked like waves of energy and hit Rayhan. For about half a second he was airborne, next thing he felt was a blast of combustion and he was flying through the air. He felt every bit of him burning with agony. He could briefly see, Hell appeared in mid air and blasted him back down now he fell with almost twice the impact of how he’d normally fall. He felt his back aching and burning from high combustion levels, but he loved it for some reason. His shirt was practically torn and ripped up, and the wind blowing against his wounds was stinging him so much but he loved this feeling, possibly because he knew that he wouldn’t witness this level of pain or this level of adrenaline at home under any circumstances. He just lay back on the ground, he was in no position to really fight but as a flame was headed his way he realized he could not move, He squinted his eyes and let it hit him but then reopened them, his eyes were now grey and his pupils black, something went wrong, his wings sprouted and his shirt burnt off. He got up, and it looked like he was on steroids because he was practically twice his regular size. He extinguished the fire within the palm of his hand, no ash marks or anything stained it. Hell arrived back down. Rayhan’s face wore no expression. Hell threw a punch Rayhan grabbed it reverted it and threw a punch so fast Hell could not avoid it and took it face first. He was bleeding. Hell got up Rayhan kicked him back down and tried throwing another punch at him this time with some strange energy circling around it, Hell’s eyes turned white and the same thing occurred they both fought for about an hour and got nowhere being too evenly matched. Soon they were both nearly dead and left. Rayhan created a portal and collapsed on his bed when he got home. He put on a new shirt and fell asleep.

Chapter 23: Hide and Seek

Rayhan and Elnar left the room. They continued their way down the hallway, after rescuing more and more people; they now had Jeylan, Emma, Marsal, Noa, Amna, Jasmine and Antoinette. They continued their search after about an hour they came to the last room, room 103. They found that there were two guards guarding this one, and for good reason as well. Behind it was Taj, Rayhan’s long time best friend and one of the smartest strongest people were held in here. Elnar handed him the badge that would prove he’s a guard from behind. He approached them and held out the badge. They moved aside. They went through the door. The darkness nearly swallowed them whole. This wasn’t like the cells they’d already broken in and out of. It was larger and there were stairs going down. It looked unsafe. They took slow steps down and came into another room. It was exactly like the room in the forest temple, it had statues facing in all directions. They had to get through, they pushed the button and the door opened. Rayhan climbed onto one of the statues and tried jumping over each but that didn’t work, he used a gust of strong wind to redirect the direction the faces were facing. He then went through. They went through the door which closed. It looked like an arena Elnar was pushed back through a force field. Rayhan was on his own for this. A black figure in a cloak appeared. It was completely covered in the black cloak. Then it approached him, he or she held out a sword the size of Paul’s. He slashed Rayhan’s sword out of his hand which went flying off. Rayhan was left with his own two hands and of course the magic he had. They fought for a while all Rayhan did was avoid getting hit and block with his air and hands, but even so he was left cut, bruised and bleeding. He was now exhausted and the guy in the cloak was also weakened slightly breathing hard. Rayhan got up, his vision hazy and his cloak and shirt both ripped so deep that it was revealing his skin. He threw his air forward and the cloak blew off, to reveal a man with grew eyes and black pupils, his hair was black and shining, his skin was paler than most people, he had a scar across his face. He was larger than Rayhan and looked as though in his twenties. He had a blade broke off and fell onto the floor. Now they were both at the same stage. The man still seemed to have some energy in him though. He closed his eyes and two black, slightly ripped and broken wings grew out of his back. Rayhan now understood he was fighting his older self! The older Rayhan approached him and grabbed him by the neck and threw him against a wall. Rayhan managed to escape and rushed him. He threw a punch at him but hit his stomach nearly breaking his arm. Rayhan grabbed a metal bar and slashed it onto his shoulder which didn’t seem to really affect him at all.
He kept doing it and soon he managed to damage him a bit. Rayhan then was exhausted bleeding, cut, bruised and practically dead. He kept going though he knew he had to. He punched but missed, his vision was getting hazy. The older Rayhan held out his hand and a black orb seemed to form in from of his fist, he threw his hand forward and the orb hit him square in the chest throwing him back and making him feel like he was being electrocuted from the inside. He was dying, but even so he got up. He wasn’t going to give in. He kept fighting, He wasn’t planning on getting anywhere it was impossible, he used all his energy up already and he felt like his bones would soon give in and he’d collapse but until then he would keep fighting. He was on his knees but still got up the electrical feeling still stinging inside of him, his temples bleeding, and his left arm nearly broken but he kept going, slowly but was trying, it was like Hell said he could destroy his body but never his mind and heart, if his heart said fight he’d fight even if he were physically past the point of dying, his willpower was more enduring than the rest of his physical body, he believe that it didn’t matter how weak or pathetic ones body might look it was only the vessel he was put in to live. It meant nothing more. He kept fighting, until his spirit were fighting he would never give up, something was inhuman about him, he could fight forever until his mind would give up and that could go on forever no matter how many bullets went through his body it would never touch his spirit, his willpower was the strongest part of him, that’s why being strong didn’t matter to him, and if it ever did it would be for Rielle, but never for himself. He ran towards the second the older Rayhan and threw a punch which hit. He was head locked and punched in his stomach a few times and then thrown to the ground. He got up again. He held out his hand and took a deep breath, he was about to die even his air was failing him. Then the older him grabbed his neck and dropped the black liquid into his mouth and he suddenly had a flash back of memories and soon he collapsed onto the floor. He soon got up and pulled out his gun, he shot simultaneously. The other Rayhan fell back; since this was the other Rayhan had no soul and was another dummy or copy of the real original Rayhan he was easily taken down by the gun. Rayhan got up heavily breathing hardly able to see, the shield disappeared and right as he was about to collapse Elnar caught him on his back and disappeared behind a doorway. He made his way over a very thin and unstable bridge but it broke behind them. They came to the next room and sat down for a while, Elnar healed Rayhan and they took a break, after that they continued until they arrived to what looked like layers and layers and layers of tight security at the very bottom was Taj changed around so heavily it was impossible to see his face. Around every single floor there were guards heavily armed and at the very bottom floor there were about twice as many guards as there were in the entire cell.
“Only one way to get down” said Rayhan. He ripped his ripped up shirts remains off and spread his black wings and jumped into the air he flew down and landed to the bottom floor, all the guards swarmed around him, he fought them all off with gusts of air sending them flying from wall to wall. He kicked them punched them and knocked them out, he was also getting brutally injured but he disregarded that., once he’d taken care of all of all them. The gates around him flew open and about fifty more soldiers ran out of it. Rayhan thought quickly of what to do he hadn’t the energy to fight all of them so he broke open the chains, Taj came out and pulled out a machinegun he blasted every single soldier out of the way killing every single one simultaneously the bullets were barely seen as all was seen was the fall of billions of people, and the cries of billions of men in pain. He soon ran out of ammunition and they both pulled out their blades. About a thousand more people came running out with spears. They surrounded him and started slashing and thrusting, Rayhan and Taj started killing them, Grabbing them by the head and cut them open, Rayhan kneed one and kicked him across the face after thrusting through one like tissue. Taj had his silent pistol out and shot, cut and punched them. They started using magic and Rayhan and Taj started throwing gusts of air around. They both had touched the crystal once before, Taj had been Hell’s prisoner for three years, in that timeline Hell had gotten hold of the crystal and Taj managed to as well. They blasted shot of black energy, they didn’t know what it was so they redirected it and watched it take effect over another guard, the guy soon lost his skin, his muscles, his veins, and his bones, they all disintegrated. Rayhan shot blasts of air continuously, soldiers flying everywhere and blasts of air and black energy zoomed across the place. Rayhan and Taj pulled out their swords and started swinging it around creating stronger gusts of air, and cutting people in half, Rayhan and Taj were both skilled with the sword. They kept shooting around but as they killed more and more people more people came out.
“Shit” said Rayhan
“How the hell do we take them all there are just too many?” Taj asked.
“I think I got it” said Rayhan as he slashed a guy across the face.
“Really?” Taj asked kicking a guy in the stomach and head locking him.
“Yeah, grab the handle of my sword” said Rayhan, Taj did so and they both concentrated as a blast of air equivalent to both their strength shot out from the tip of the blade. It was so much concentrated air it turned into a white beam of energy destroying anything in its path, people all around screaming, gushes of blood flying everywhere. Soon they were all dead.
Both Taj and Rayhan were exhausted Elnar came by. They were lying on a ground of sand breathing deeply.
“Nice job you two” said Elnar.
“Thanks, who are you?” Taj asked, his voice deeper than Rayhan had assumed.
“I am Elnar the sage of freedom and Rayhan’s guardian angel” said Elnar.
“Do I have one?” Taj asked.
“I’ll explain later, right now we still need to find out the location of the amulets” said Elnar.
“We also need to free some more people, preferably people who have high power over others, that lead an army or something” said Rayhan.
“Really, why?” Taj asked.
“Because if we have that kind of power with us we can easily take hell down, you saw how exhausted we got fighting all those people, and imagine that wasn’t even a fraction of the amount of warriors Hell has, and all the warriors combined aren’t even a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of how powerful Hell is” said Rayhan.
“True, but how do we get this high authority without summoning someone older? Didn’t you not want someone older, with that many people it’ll be hard to control and keep track” said Elnar.
“Yeah you’re right, so what do we do?” Rayhan asked.
“We’ll talk about this later, I have an idea but it doesn’t have anything to do with anyone here” said Elnar. Suddenly they heard guards coming down the hallway.
“We have to hurry” Elnar whispered. They split up in all directions. Rayhan ran down one hallway, Elnar down the stairs and Taj down the other hallway. Rayhan concentrated on the necklace and tried to reach Elnar telepathically.
“We need to find everyone else” he said. He repeated the message to Taj and then he tried to reach the others. They were all reached and he told them to meet him back, he then stopped running suddenly. He couldn’t leave, this would be his last chance, he couldn’t just leave without finding information, and he called Elnar again.
“Take them home, there’s something I got to take care of before I leave and I have to do it alone” he said.
“But how will you get back?” Elnar asked.
“I’ll call and then you open a gateway” said Rayhan.
“If you insist” said Elnar. Rayhan tucked the amulet back into his shirt and he got up, he was on the bottom floor and needed to get to the top where Hell was. He needed to find a map. He was right now in a hallway with people in cells. He kept running despite the cries of pain and horror around him. He arrived to the stairs and climbed them. It spiralled its way up, he kept climbing it, the entire staircase soon changed, he was now walking on red glass stairs that fell into blackness after he stepped onto them, and he kept moving all the same. He was running, his pulse was beating like a metronome. He kept running, his endurance was weak so he quickly ran out of breath, and soon his lungs felt like they were on fire, he was sweating his head hurt and felt heavy, he was feeling horrible after fighting all those people it was only inevitable that he’d eventually run out of breath easily, he couldn’t stop though, the scene soon changed back to before, he was now climbing higher and higher, he soon arrived to a door as he slowed down and slowly opened the door without making a noise. He went through and arrived to what looked like a roof, he looked down the ledge, he could only see clouds, and he was getting close. He looked around and saw that there was nothing he could do, there was another door but it was separated by a long gap he could not jump.
He shot a gust of powerful air towards the ground allowing him to fly and flew over the gap. Once he was through he was greeted only by more guards, he pulled out his sword and sliced through them like butter. The sky was getting darker as clouds began to gather slowly across the empty see of stars. He put his sword back and pulled out his silent pistol, he made his way to the wall, he loaded it and looked beyond the wall trying to stay hidden, he saw a group of guards there and took a shot, and he nailed one in the back of the head. He saw that most of the guards noticed. They were rushing towards him; these guards looked quite larger than most of the ones he took care of back at the cells. He needed to be careful. Since he was already out of breath he had only one option, to hide and stay out of their site, it was already foolish of him to have distracted them. He could only see one alternative, the wall he was hiding behind was heavily fenced he’d have to climb it. He grabbed it and started to climb as fast as he could, suddenly he felt a drop of rain hit his face, and the winds had increased, his hands were too occupied for him to be able to do anything about the wind. He climbed it continuously. The metal was beginning to rust from the rain and it made it harder because it became slippery his hands were wet with the rainwater he couldn’t do anything, the metal was already bent in the wrong directions, ripped and edged, the metal was peeling off cutting against his skin as he tried to climb it. The rain and the winds against his face were making this harder for him. His he had to keep climbing as the rain started pouring down harder, he looked up and could see that there was still too much for him to climb, but he had to keep going there was no turning back, he looked down the distance he covered was really high, he would either have to climb all the way and decided from there or let go and risk dying of high impact against the ground. The metal from the fencing was ripped up and silver, he kept climbing as the winds shook the fence, it made a cut across his face. He could barely see the top. He didn’t stop climbing for anything.

Chapter 22: Search

Rayhan sat on his bed in the dark, looking through the window on his roof that led directly over the pillow into the night sky, he just gazed silently at the stars, his mind swirling into thoughts and fears, he was never more afraid than he was at this moment. He tried to take his mind off of this for while but that just seemed impossible, the thought kept creeping into his mind one way or another. He could hardly bear imagining the sights he’d seen running through his mind, but what really irked him was that Elnar didn’t know what it was that Hell had used and Rayhan was afraid that Hell might use it again, it was his strongest weapon. Rayhan slowly drifted to sleep and woke up well rested the next morning.
***
He sat up and stretched his arms out until he got the feeling back into him. He got off of his bed and went to the washroom to drench his face in cold water to wake himself up. He walked in and noticed something particularly strange, there was a marking on his arm, a pentagram marking like a tattoo on his left shoulder, he tried washing it off but it didn’t go away, he felt as if it were permanently there, but he decided to pay it no mind. He went through his daily hygienic morning routine and left the room. He was in his room with a couple of screwdrivers and nails; he began to tighten his right arm and the loosened nails at his wrists. He placed some in and added some more pieces to make his arm look like his other arm; he shined it and pulled a black undershirt over himself. He went downstairs and found that everyone was awake that morning. He spoke to some of them and went to Elnar to ask if they’d relocated the next amulet. Unfortunately there was no luck with that. He left and went back into his room and sat down on his bed. He tried to think where the next amulet might be. He sat there lying staring into the ceiling. Someone knocked on the door, it was Paul.
“Hey” said Paul.
“Hey” Rayhan replied.
“Hey, where do you think the next amulet might be?” Rayhan asked.
“Not sure, but we know so far that Hell could put it virtually anywhere on the earth and the universe” said Paul.
“That’s true but Elnar told me it’d be somewhere we can get it but it’ll be really hard” said Rayhan.
“Well yeah I guess we should trust Elnar’s judgement because it’s the best we have” Paul said.
“But where do you start looking for something we have no leads on?” Rayhan asked.
“Well I’d suggest we check earth first because we know Hell is there right now” said Rayhan.
“We can’t just let him hide it anywhere that would make it like fifty times harder to find it” said Rayhan.
“Dammit if only I’d gotten the little shit earlier we wouldn’t have to wonder” said Rayhan.
“Hey don’t blame yourself, it’s not your fault, it’s not anyone’s, I mean it’s not like any of us knew it would be there” said Paul. Pierre and Sarah walked in.
“Hey what’s up?” Pierre asked.
“Nothing just trying to find out where the other amulet is” said Rayhan they sat down; Pierre had a box of ice cream on his lap.
“Where do you think it might be?” asked Pierre.
“Not sure” said Rayhan and Paul almost exactly on the dot of unison.
“Okay then” said Sarah.
“So any ideas at all?” asked Sarah.
“Well we think it might be somewhere on earth” said Paul.
“I have a feeling it might be somewhere he’d think really mattered to me, Elnar said Hell was only doing this for his own amusement” said Rayhan.
“Did Elnar say anything else?” Paul asked.
“Not really” said Rayhan, he didn’t want them to know about the Trickmaster he didn’t want to worry them they already had enough to worry about.
“For some reason I keep feeling as though we’ll be at this for years” said Rayhan.
“Well there’s a good chance we will be I mean we’re only like thirteen” said Paul.
“I’m fourteen” said Rayhan.
“Oh big difference” said Pierre. Rielle walked in.
“Hey” she said.
“Hey” they all said except for Sarah. After that Steven walked in almost right after. They both sat down.
“What’s going on” Rielle asked.
“Trying to find the next amulet” said Rayhan.
“Well I don’t know” said Rielle.
“Hey guys” Steven said a bit late.
“Hi Sheven” they all said.
“Like when did we sign up for this?” asked Rayhan.
“We didn’t” said Paul.
“What we need are more people, I mean really like there’s us going against an army of people, none of us, except maybe Paul, can take this on with an even match” said Rielle.
“Yeah but how are we supposed to get more people?” asked Rayhan.
“We’ll have to break them free” said Paul.
“And how?” asked Pierre.
“Well we broke ourselves free didn’t we?” asked Rayhan.
“Yeah we can do this” said Pierre.
“I feel special” said Paul all smiley. They laughed.
“Hey if this world was real, do you guys think DL is real too?” asked Pierre.
“Don’t get excited Pierre” said Sarah. They continued to laugh.
“So when do you guys want to go?” asked Rayhan.
“I’m not sure I mean we’ll have to get ready and all so I’d say like tomorrow?” asked Paul.
“Okay” they agreed.
“But how do we get there?” asked Rielle.
“The fake Elnar showed me another gateway” said Rayhan.
“Oh god Rayhan is it far?” Sarah whined.
“No actually it’s the fountain” said Rayhan.
“Oh okay” she laughed” said Sarah, Rayhan felt them all release a relieving breath.
“So we better get our stuff ready, I mean we don’t know how much bigger Hell might’ve made his prison cell” said Paul.
“Yeah” said Rayhan. They all left the room one after the other. Soon the room was empty except for him. He lay there quietly. He gazed into the ceiling. He though for a moment tried to think of ways he could pull this off.
He felt strange he was never a leader for anything but if the world was depending on him he’d have to be there were too many people depending on him; if they died it would be his fault and his alone. He’d have to bear the consequence of grief and hate for the rest of his life which probably wouldn’t be long. He was more of a lone wolf than anything else, he was independent and worked alone, whenever they’d get an assignment for school that was done in groups he’d end up failing it, he didn’t work well with others probably because people rarely trusted him, and when they did he’d end up being the enemy for something that wasn’t in his control, he’d have to lead them himself because people were counting on him but the weight of all of this over his head felt heavy and as he got further it got heavier and heavier until he felt like his neck would break off, he was leaning in a direction he wasn’t supposed to and he was falling apart from the inside. This was his job and he couldn’t do it but he had to it was too late to turn back, he’d asked for this to begin with not thinking it would be this hard but to be perfectly honest with himself there was a part of him that was glad it happened because if it hadn’t he’d think life was boring, dull and pointless, where people never got what they wanted, where people were shunned for believing in their dreams, fuck the crap people go around saying thinking they were going to make a difference, they only say that, the horrible truth was that when you believed in your dreams you’d only get hit with a hard big dose of karma, bitter karma, it was just the corrupted way things in this world worked. He felt like he’d rather die then go on like this but he didn’t have practice, there was nothing that could have prepared him for this. He sat up on his bed and looked around, after gathering his stuff her walked outside, the weather was nice, it always was in Heaven’s Light, no matter how he’d felt, after he got ready he just sat on his bed quietly and tried to tighten his arm and ad weapons to it, it was his only real weapon that could compare to Hell’s, even his pistol wouldn’t work in this case, but there was his control over the wind but how would he beat Hell with a couple of gusts of air, he wanted to kill him not annoy him to death. He sat there quietly. Someone knocked on his door.
“Come in” he said. The door opened and Paul walked in.
“Hey” Rayhan said.
“Hey” he replied.
“Can I help you?” Rayhan asked.
“Well it’s just a friend of mine that I really care about is caught by Hell I really look forward to going to save her tomorrow but I want her to come back, because she means everything to me” said Paul.
“I get it alright” said Rayhan.
“Thanks man” Paul said.
“And Rayhan?” said Paul
“If you tell anyone about this I’ll beat the shit outta you” he said.
“Haha alright I know I won’t tell I swear” said Rayhan. Paul left, Rayhan was left alone and he just stayed there fixing his arm thinking about Rielle. He could only think about two things these days Rielle and the whole Hells controversy, nothing else could go through his mind, Rayhan understood people like Hell, they weren’t insane they were mislead and misinterpreted, but these kind of people would go beyond the boundary of even evil to reach their goal, if only Rayhan had known what Hell’s goal was, it would make everything much easier for him.
He went downstairs and left the castle to walk around, the world was vibrant here, the grass was green and amazing, it shined amazingly and the sky was blue without a single cloud visible. He sat onto a large boulder. He just sat and looked around; it was a nice day to be outside; the breeze blowing against his face, the trees around him grown, full of life and leaves. He was tired of all of this but he didn’t want to give up it was too but this timeline was so depressing lately. He rested his head on his hand. He looked into the ground. He moved away since the weather was getting a bit too hot, he sat under a tree; soon everyone came outside and started talking and stuff. He looked up into the leaves of the tree. He closed his eyes. He sat facing the tree and looked at the carvings on it, within a heart was written “Z + Z” in a heart. He felt over it. Under that was written “C + E” in hearts. Rayhan thought for a moment wondering who these initials might be of and in case they might belong to his parents. Then he picked up a sharp rock and started carving onto the tree HL in commemoration to someone who might read this and see that initial and remember what had happened if anything were to happen. After that he noticed something else that came a bit bizarre to him, another carving this time of something he could not make up it said something in another language again he decided to pay it no mind. He got up and walked back inside, it was a typical afternoon, he just ate and soon he went to bed knowing he’d have to wake up next morning, but despite that he had a lot of trouble sleeping but finally managed to. The next morning he woke up a bit tired having trouble falling asleep the previous night. He ignored that and continued his way downstairs and sat by the fountain waiting for his friends to join him, inevitably he had to wait a while. He sat there and waited, soon Paul, Pierre and Rielle joined him followed by Steven, Jessica and finally Sarah.
“You guys certainly took your time” said Rayhan.
“Shut up” Sarah laughed.
“Alright, what we do is sort of fall into the water face first, don’t’ worry you don’t get wet” Rayhan said.
“Haha that’s what she said” Pierre said.
“Shut up Pierre” Rayhan laughed.
“Alright let’s go” Rayhan said and they stood at edge. They seized each others wrists and closed their eyes.
“Ready? 1….2…..GO!” Paul shouted and they fell face first. They rose out into a white floor within a tornado of swirling colors some of which they’d never seen before. They were being lifted towards a light high above them that resembled the sun once they’d reached it they were standing beside a large rock and could see one of the largest monuments ever built. They stood at awe with no words left to say after standing in astonishment, last time they’d seen it, it was not even a fraction of this size, and it was so large it would probably be visible in space.
“How the hell are we supposed to find our way through there?” Pierre asked his mouth agape.
“We’ll have to though, it’s not like we can just make them appear like magic” said Rayhan.
“But still, It’s definitely going to be hard it could take ages to get through, we’ll like have to set up camp in it” said Rayhan.
“Okay and how are we supposed to survive that long without eating? You know not all of us are like you and just don’t have an appetite” said Paul.
“Shut up” Rayhan laughed.
“What we could do is steal from Hell but, it’ll be hard, where’ll we hide?” Paul said.
“We’ll have to find some place without getting caught” said Rielle.
“Well we’re going to have to start at some point, let’s go” said Rayhan.
“Alright” said Sarah. They left.
They walked from behind the castle and arrived at the large amethyst wall surrounding the entire place. There was no opening so they didn’t know how to get through.
“You guys still have those guns we stole earlier?” Rayhan asked.
“Yeah” they all agreed.
“Alright then let’s bust this wall down” said Rayhan. They pulled out their guns and shot with great dexterity at the seemingly impenetrable wall. They shot for a while until they were all out of bullets and gave up.
“I don’t get it what kind of wall is this it won’t break” said Rayhan.
“Remember we’re at Hell’s place he won’t let us in after we knock three times” said Sarah.
“Okay well then there’s only one thing to do” said Rayhan unsure if anyone had been listening to him at all at this point. He decided to just go for it then since no one was listening to him anyway. He decided to just go along with it anyway, and if they were alarmed that’d be their fault. H snatched all of their guns and detached and re attached them to create something very bizarre no one had ever seen.
“What the hell is that?” Paul asked.
“Well only one way to find out” Rayhan repeated He held it up with all his muscular strength making sure it would not fall, he pulled the trigger and a blast of who-knows-what shot out and created nothing more than a mere dent.
“Wow fail” Paul laughed. Rayhan grimaced.
“Okay well that didn’t work out quite as well as I thought it would” said Rayhan.
“Well now what?” Pierre asked.
“We have to find another way in” said Rayhan.
“Or we can try to penetrate this wall again” said Paul.
“I’d rather go find another way we could be wasting time with this” said Rayhan.
“Alright how do we get in?” Rielle asked.
“These walls are amethyst, I know from fighting Hell twice he’s no pushover he probably created like a force field around this thing, as much as it pisses me off I have to say that he did overlook one thing, these amethyst walls are only mere stone, and the shield can’t grow out of it, its probably taking a curved formation out of the centre of the entire thing. See that tower up there? That’s probably where Hell is and if I’m right about that then he’s probably keeping himself safe, or calling himself the defender but we can’t assume anything at this point because we don’t know what he’s after, but we can assume that he has the ice amulet so we need to get to that first and foremost so he’d be inclined to keep it in the safest place that being the centre, he’s probably hiding it there and to protect it he’s got this entire place under lockdown, I know Hell he wouldn’t be afraid to face us, that shows that the entire purpose of the shield was to defend something other than himself, so we know hw has the amulet or maybe he’s already hidden it and trying to distract us little does he know we’re stopping here for more than one reason, and we won’t leave empty handed” said Rayhan surprised he actually managed to get everyone’s attention, they’d usually break into conversation and ignore him.
“Well you managed to make your point, so what d’you do we do now?” Pierre asked.
“Oh yeah, well obviously what we have to do is get in through the most vulnerable part of this entire structure, which is the top centre, he made that part vulnerable not expecting us to make it, remember what Elnar said Hell won’t make the obstacles completely impossible, he’ll make it so we think it’s impossible and give up” said Rayhan.
“Okay, how do we get to the top?” asked Sarah.
“Well we have to try to get there by the cliff we started running off of when we had to sprint for shit that day we were getting out of his cells and one more thing, it’s obvious that Hell’s gotten a few renovations and probably improved his security around here, he wasn’t as developed when we escaped, it won’t be as easy anymore” said Rayhan.
They made their way around over to the hill and climbed it, it was very large, possibly bigger once Hell had tampered with this place. They made it to the top and saw over the wall, to their amazement there was a large castle coming out of the darkness beneath, the place was larger than they could have ever imagined. They threw a rock at it to assure there was a shield and they were right as the rock created a ripple after making it halfway through and the ripple illuminated its way around the shield making its shape which they were also right about.
“Sheven we need a bridge” said Pierre. Steven threw his hands forward and a long rock bridge made it’s was through the air and stopped halfway towards the shield. They walked over it and Steven created a stair case which they climbed and then descended at the vulnerable part of the shield.
They kept climbing downward until they found a rather strange device, it was very colourful and had billions of buttons but it was producing the shield. They crushed it with a rock and started to fall into the darkness. The pressure of the air was so strong it was becoming hard to catch a cool free grasp of air weak enough to actually breathe, and they could hear the pressure clogging their ears. They were falling through such an intensely deep pit that the air was clogged up around them and it became harder and harder to bear the powerful air pressure, it was like their lungs were imploding slowly and gradually to the point where they would crunch up and air could no longer cross, it was starting to occur as they noticed the hard pressure against their chest like as if their ribcages were being pushed back. They finally landed onto the ground with such forced it would be enough to kill them but they did not die because they landed into water. They came out, and were all drenched in water. They shake it off and swim up to a shore of dusty sand. Once they got there they came out of the water drenched and tried to dry off.
“Damn, FUCK, I fuckin’ think I pulled something!” said Pierre.
“Holy shit you alright?” Rayhan asked.
“I think so” said Pierre hanging onto his arm. People went around him.
“You didn’t pull something but like how’d you land?” asked Paul.
“I don’t know but I think I like landed on like a rock” said Pierre.
“Well how does it hurt, do you think you can make it through?” asked Paul.
“Yeah I think so” said Pierre.
“Looks to me like you broke a ligament in your arm” said Paul.
“Shit so I did break something” said Pierre.
“It’s nothing major I can probably fix it, but I’d need my stuff back home, for now just like wrap something around it tightly” said Paul.
“Well alright, but try to fix it as soon as you can” said Pierre.
“Alright, we need to get moving without stopping, the faster we move the faster we get out of this place” said Paul. Rayhan however had no intention of just freeing the people and leaving. He just nodded and followed Paul.
They made there way through the cavernous place they landed in now completely dry. They walked for a couple of hours as it became darker within the cave. They walked through tunnels and climbed walls. They arrived to what looked like a crystal fissure. It was bright in there. They walked around the place and found a crack in the wall. They looked through the crack and found the way out of the cavern was just beyond that wall, they also noticed it was getting dark and they had to pack up and sleep. They lay down around lit by the light magnified by the shining blue crystals; they were warm inside the cave because the cave had been underground. They sat around the place and unloaded their things; Pierre wrapped a cloth around his arm tightly like a tourniquet since it began to bleed. Most of them were hungry but had to hold it in since they were yet too far from Hell. Rayhan sat alone against a large crystal shard. He thought, he didn’t want to rescue too many people for several reasons, once there were too many people it would be hard to get order amongst them, people would constantly be fighting to lead and not know what to do when they got there, he didn’t want to endanger Rielle either, he could potentially end up doing that if he got too many people he didn’t know, plus they would all have to search for more food and more water, their shelters would have to be larger and it would be hard to tell where people went if they ended up disappearing, In cases where there are too many people they often have a tendency to split up into groups and that was in his opinion the worst thing to do. Not to mention if there were more people it would be harder to talk and give out points because people would constantly be fighting and breaking into large loud conversations in which no one could be heard. He wanted to only save some close friends. He fell asleep shortly after thinking about the drowned thoughts of what might happen the next day. He woke up and the crystals were shining so brightly onto his face it was hard to see. They got up. They grabbed their stuff and left. They tried to break down the wall but it didn’t work with gust of air and fire and it just so happened that the material was not earth at all so that didn’t work either.
“Screw this” said Rayhan pulling out his silent pistol. Loaded it and then shot it like there was no tomorrow, crystal pieces and titanium flew everywhere they had to close their eyes. The sound was so loud they could barely hear a single thing, after about a minute it ran out. It left a large hole which they went through. They looked around, there was crystal everywhere, and they were standing on crystal covered in about puddle level of water.
It looked like they were in some sort of cavern with water, there were stalagmite hanging from the ceiling and coming out of the ground almost everywhere, so much it became harder to get through.
“Where the hell are we?” Rielle asked as they all looked around.
“I’m not sure” said Rayhan.
“This place is in the castle?” Paul exclaimed.
“Sure looks like it” said Steven.
“But then why would he keep this place here?” Jessica asked.
“Well, he must have a good reason, maybe the cells are close bye” said Rayhan.
“Hey I got an idea” said Rielle.
“Really, what?” Rayhan asked.
“Well we know that hell probably has like soldiers and like people to fix this place up” said Rielle.
“Yeah” said Paul, everyone’s attention was now directed to Rielle.
“Well maybe we could like break something grab someone’s attention and the person who comes to repair it might have like a map or something of this place” said Rielle.
“And when they come to fix this place we knock them out and steal the map! Nice work Rielle” Rayhan said maybe sounding a bit too proud.
“Okay but we’d have to break something that important, like a gas tank” said Paul.
“Where do we find one?” said Pierre.
“I’m not sure, this place isn’t exactly you’re basement cellar, it could be anywhere” said Paul.
“True” said Sarah.
“Well, then looks like we’ll have to find out by looking” said Rayhan.
“Alright” they agreed. They looked around the cavern in hope of finding an escape or some opening but progress was taking a slow turn. This place was like a labyrinth, the turns would often lead to dead ends or forks. It was had for either of them to map it out in their heads. They often tripped over stalagmite. The cave became darker and darker. They decided to map out the place by leaving a crack in the rocks beneath them from behind them., but it was like their tracks were being filled in, and what was even more surprising to them was that several of the caves would often close when they tried to get through and neither Steven or Sarah could pull them apart. Fire seemed to have no affect since they were on water. It looked as though Pierre, Rielle and Paul were suddenly weaker here. Elnar appeared and decided to help but it wouldn’t make much of a difference even he could not bend reality. They pondered, conversed and walked around trying to map out the cave. They got to a fork and just before giving up Elnar insisted they try going through it, they tried one direction and came to what looked like a pit, they tried again another direction and came up with the same result, and they finally tried the last one and came to a dead end.
“FUCK!” Rayhan shouted. Most of them shook there heads in disapproval or disappointment.
“Why the hell can’t we find a simple enough route? How does Hell get through this labyrinth everyday?” he continued.
“He probably has an alternative route or a map” said Elnar.
“Even with that it’s still bleak” said Rielle.
“Well remember he can bend reality any way he wants, he’s got that much power and the more time we waste the stronger he gets” said Elnar.
“But what the fuck do we do, how the hell are we supposed to get through this damn place?” Rayhan shouted punching a wall. It echoed around the room, they broke into silence.
“It’s hollow” Paul noted. Rayhan knocked again and the same sound occurred.
“Well even if it is how do we get through?” said Rayhan.
“We have to blow it down” said Sarah.
“Haha that’s what she said” Steven laughed.
“Shut up” Sarah laughed.
“THAT’S IT I CAN’T TAKE THIS SHIT ANYMORE WE’VE BEEN AT THIS FOR HOURS AND HAVEN’T GOTTEN SHIT!” Paul shouted he went up to the wall in rage and threw both his hands at it and destroyed it revealing a stairway. Everyone just looked at him oddly.
“Ahem, alright then let’s go” said Rayhan finally after what seemed like ten minutes of awkward silence. They continued moving. They went up the stairs and arrived to what looked like a dungeon.
“Alright this is where we should split up” said Elnar.
“You think so?” asked Rayhan.
“Yeah, each sector here has a hallway we have to find people we know but we can’t look suspicious so here take these” said Elnar throwing seven black hooded cloaks onto the ground, they quickly wore them and pulled the hoods up.
“But how will we contact each other?” Rielle asked.
“You guys still have the chains I gave you that day?” asked Elnar. They all nodded and showed them.
“Okay so each of us is separate?” Rayhan asked.
“No, Rielle you go with Steven, Sarah go with Pierre, Paul you go with Jessica and Rayhan you come with me” said Elnar. They weren’t all okay with the groups but then again they hadn’t a choice so went ahead. They split up in all directions walking to avoid suspicions. The hallway looked like that of an insane asylum. Elnar disguised himself as a guard dog. They walked through the hallways, Rayhan had his sword out. The doors were numbered, with the name of the prisoner next to it in what looked like a tattered silver metal; under the name in golden lettering was the name of the guard of the prisoner who was either standing outside or inside torturing the prisoner. Rayhan took a glance at the corner of his eye, to see if he recognized any of them.
So far he didn’t see any name he could recognize, he just kept walking, the guards eyeing him cautiously. He found a room with a name he recognized. In the tattered dented metal was written; Savage, Abbey and underneath was written Larth in golden writing but without a last name. He heard cries of horror and insanity around him; he only hoped that he wasn’t too late. Abbey was one of Rayhan’s best friends who were on vacation somewhere far. He went up to the door and tried opening it but it was locked Elnar looked at it, without losing any eye contact and the door knob soon melted. Rayhan pushed it open and went through. The cell was large and dark with black chains hanging with skeletons. There was one window on the roof of the cell. There was what looked like a large moving eyeball looking at the prisoner chained against the wall. Rayhan approached her slowly, suddenly someone in the corner in the same black cloak jumped out and attacked him Rayhan pulled out his sword and blocked the other man’s blade; they slashed aimlessly hitting one another crazily. Rayhan pulled out a gun cocked it and pulled the trigger once releasing the bullet, then twice and a third time and then kept shooting with both hands. The guy kept falling back every time he got in contact with the bullet and came back to attack but it was no use the bullets had no affect on it. Elnar turned himself into something large and beast like, huge teeth hanging out of his mouth, with claws the size of cars, it was too dark to see what he was but Rayhan could see a horn and as he grabbed the guy from the neck and ripped his entire body off of his waist. It dropped the legs and returned to normal size. Rayhan went up to Abbey and ripped the chains open, Elnar transported her back to the castle after telling her everything that was going on, she was smart so she understood.

Chapter 21: Trick

Rayhan had made his way to the fountain and sat by it, the water glowed in the moonlight. It was shining brightly. He looked down into the reflection of the water and sat his back against the supports. He sat there and closed his eyes. He had his mind fixed on how he would get through this battle. He opened them and gazed back into the water and saw his own reflection, He thought for a few moments of where the next amulet could be it was the amulet of ice so he assumed so knowing that the first one was of earth. He was stuck waiting for something to happen over the next few hours but he knew nothing important was just randomly going to happen, he gazed into the fountain water which seemed to be shining so smoothly without as much as a ripple to uneven the flat almost ice like water. He gazed through into the reflection into his very own eyes; they were light brown but not hazel some other color. His black hair hung over his face. He had to wait for Elnar to re appear which could take weeks, months even depending on where he was and what he was doing, but perhaps it was something important. He gazed into the water and put his finger in it and created a ripple which grew wider and wider as it soon vanished within the small pool of water. He could see something strange in it, he noticed the water color had completely changed to the scenery of a starry night sky he looked around for something that may be reflecting the night sky into the water but there wasn’t anything that could reflect that into the water. He peered deeper into the water. He could see Elnar in his reflection.
“Wha- how’d you get in there?” Rayhan asked astonished
“I’ll explain later, you need to find the next amulet the amulet of ice which you will find up North back on earth” said Elnar.
“Alright I’ll notify my friends right away” said Rayhan.
“No you have to go alone” said Elnar.
“What, why?” asked Rayhan.
“Just do as I say, you’ll know soon enough” said Elnar.
“Alright” said Rayhan.
“Leave right away” said Elnar.
“Okay, but how do I get there?” asked Rayhan.
“Use the fountain it’s a gateway” said Elnar as he disappeared in a ripple of water and Rayhan’s reflection had returned. He grabbed his stuff and came right back to the fountain. He closed his eyes and thought of the North Pole, he took a deep breath and stepped into the water he fell into snow. He look around, the amulet shouldn’t have been far he thought. He didn’t feel cold having worn the HL uniform which apparently had a heating system. When faced with cold. He got up covered in snow which melted off.
He could see snow everywhere; he’d walked into the middle of a blizzard. Luckily he could change the path of where the wind was blowing; he pushed it to go in the same direction he was walking. He noticed a tall black figure standing on a black rocky cliff. It must’ve been Elnar, in his human form or someone who he had sent to help him. Rayhan walked up barely able to see through the thick snow blowing and the darkness, there seemed to be a source of light behind the man. Rayhan could just barely see a shadow of what might’ve been a man he was still unsure whether it were a tree or a person or something in between to be honest. He kept walking with the wind which blew him closer, his hair blowing in all direction. He finally arrived to the base of the cliff. He started to climb it he grabbed the black rocks and pulled himself up he tried climbing as fast as he could pulling himself higher and higher but the rocks were slippery and wet with snow and ice. He found himself slipping several times, he continued to climb. He was sweating and the wind pushing him towards the cliff was no help for him, he’d already been climbing it was too late to revert the air in another direction, he had to keep moving, he was determined to make it to the top. His coat flew off he felt the sting of the bitter cold bite his skin causing excruciating frosted pain. He kept going, he had only been wearing a black undershirt underneath the cloak which had flown off, plus he was carrying his heavy metal weapons thus increasing the wait onto his body which made it even harder to climb. He was sweating and tired, his knees were bruised and cut, he was bleeding and on the verge of catching frostbite, he felt such an unbearable amount of pain it was almost impossible to make it but he had to try, the world was depending on him. He kept going, He felt cold and bitter but kept climbing he was more than halfway through, he kept going despite his pain he kept climbing and finally made it to the top he gripped the snow for his life he pulled himself up.
He stood only metres away from the man who had turned around, he didn’t believe his eyes this wasn’t anyone who was here to help him, and it was Hell. Rayhan pulled out his sword and gripped it tightly which was hard because his fingers were numb and painful all the nerves felt like they’d been frozen off.
“Hah, you idiot” said Hell.
“Where’s Elnar?!” Rayhan shouted.
“Hah you dumb bastard you actually fell for it” he laughed.
“But now that I’ve got you right where you I might as well remove you from the face of the earth” said Hell.
He ran at him with his sword high in the air it swung and smashed against Hells. They slashed at each other. Rayhan kicked, punched, slashed and struck his way through; Hells blade turned into a scythe as he slashed Rayhan jumped and dodged it. He slashed again and Rayhan dodged it, once again and landed a cut over Rayhan’s forearm. He was bleeding. Rayhan threw his sword at him and missed. He shot another slash and cut him over the shoulder again. He did it again and again and slashed Rayhan to the point where he was so brutally injured and frozen it would hurt to even move. Somehow he’d managed to stay on his feet and raise a shaky hand to throw a blast of air which missed and wasn’t even a scarcely strong enough it was only strong enough to just barely knock over a pile of snow. Rayhan fell to his knees, the snow stung his wounds crazily causing more pain than ever and the breeze felt terribly cold, the cuts left by the cold metal of the blade were burning him so hard he just wished he could die already. He was on his knees. Hell walked over picked him up by the back of the collar and kneed him in the stomach he threw him towards a cave and walked over he punched him in the stomach until he was coughing up blood. He used the back of the blade to bash him in the head and knock him to the ground. He was bloody, broken and bruised. He still got back up after all that he couldn’t fail no matter what and he knew that. Hell grabbed him by the hair, and pulled his mouth open.
“Maybe destroying your body isn’t enough” said Hell pulling out a small glass bottle full of some mysterious dark liquid. He uncorked it and flooded his mouth with it. He let go. Rayhan felt the rush of the cold black liquid run down his throat.
He felt nothing. Then once it was all down his throat, it happened. He crippled up his mind was being stung a billion times pain running through ever bit of him, like his nerves were replaced by beams of lightning that ran through his body causing him to move crazily on the ground as if he’d been having a seizure. He moved crazily and shook very fast. Then images ran through his head memories, harmful memories he’d never seen of his friends suffering of Rielle in pain and him chained against a wall. There was a man in a mask, running a whip, whipping his friends who were chained up against a dungeon wall. They were being constantly tortured without stop tears running down her face. A woman’s voice screaming, then an instant momentary flash of a man’s face; he only noticed his black hair and pale white skin with red eyes and long black hair. Then again with the torturing, suddenly he saw himself become a dark thing, he was in the body of the torturer now he was wearing a mask and was looking through the small slits for eyes and he was out and he was watching unable to do anything suffering pain. He shouted at the top of his voice. “Not them….Take me instead…leave them alone….let them go take me…..not them..ME… NO!” Tears’ running down his face he shouted but it was no use his voice was silent, they couldn’t hear him. He was suddenly back in his own body he saw Hell over him a smile stretched across his face, he felt a pain like none other and then he saw Elnar, Pierre and Rielle appear. They ran up to him as Hell vanished, followed by darkness. Through that whole time he couldn’t hear anything.
Hours, days, weeks, perhaps months had gone by and he had just opened his eyes and showed a sign of life. It was morning; he was starting to get tired of always ending up in the same room over and over again, but this time it wasn’t his choice. He looked around, he felt the terrible aftermath feeling you’d get after surgery. He took a few harsh breaths. His head was tightly bandaged. His eyesight was a bight hazy and blurry. He also had heavy bandaging over his cuts, his metal arm was broken in half its wires ripped and torn, the other piece resting on a table. He could taste nothing in his mouth. He tried sitting up but felt pain in his back, like he’d been at school sitting at a long boring assembly and had finally got up and felt his dead legs stretch back into life. He managed to sit up after a couple of minutes. He thought for a moment, the last thing he’d remembered was pain beyond measure seeing his friends, his only known family suffering and the one he loved being tortured by him unwillingly who could not control his very own movements. He felt like he shouldn’t have woken up in the hospital, he had hoped for it to all just be a dream. A terrible dream, but what was that liquid? What was hat strange substance that had run down his throat and caused him to think like that? Questions like this zoomed through his mind. He felt lazy, unwilling to get up, to stay lying on this soft bed, he felt that his dreams had always required less energy and effort than reality did. Even in his nightmares which he could not tell reality from fantasy seemed to have had prevented him from using up energy. He looked around, that was definitely no dream, he felt pain, up to the point of his physical and mental limit, he could not bear even the thought of it, he tried his best to fill his mind with the thought that that had only been a false memory Hell had displaced in his mind and nothing more than a false memory and that it could never happen. He got up off the bed and walked across the room. He pushed the door open expecting to see everyone minding their own business having had probably totally forgotten, but he could not entirely tell whether he’d merely expected that or hoped it or both. Unfortunately if he had hoped that his hopes had been false, everyone sat around the room on a sofa in deep thought looking like someone had just passed away.
He didn’t want to get noticed so he tried to make no notions as to display that he had just walked in, no one had seemed to notice. It was only after a few seconds Rayhan had considered leaving the room, that someone had noticed him. They didn’t seem surprised which really got Rayhan to think. If they hadn’t been surprised to see Rayhan well then obviously there was something else that worried everyone else, something perhaps even worse than his death. Elnar had crawled up to him like an obedient dog that had just been called. He sat in front of him. Rayhan gazed deeply into his mystic bright blue shining wolf eyes. Rielle had as usual and as a friend would, embraced him. Pierre patted him on the back lightly.
“What’s wrong?” He finally took an initiative to ask.
“Rayhan I’m not sure if you’ve realized, but Hell’s gotten stronger, and chances have become slim” said Elnar.
“Well, that doesn’t mean its impossible though does it?” Rayhan asked.
“Well no but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t concern us at all either, especially you Rayhan” said Elnar.
“Well I guess so” said Rayhan.
“Don’t take this lightly, you should know of all people this is the kind of situation that worries all of us, do you realize how many times you’ve ended up in the hospital infirmary? It’s obvious you need to be more careful” said Elnar.
“But this time it wasn’t my fault Hell tricked me into thinking you told me to go up North to find the amulet of ice” said Rayhan.
“Take these” said Elnar holding out a paw with seven differently coloured chains.
“What are they?” asked Rayhan grabbing the blue one.
“As long as you are wearing them, you can communicate with me telepathically” Elnar soon explained once everyone had one dangling around their neck.
“Sick” Paul said. They then continued doing what they were, Rayhan grabbed a can of Coke and went into his room and stayed there for a few hours. After that he decided to pay Elnar a visit.
***
“Hey, Elnar?” Rayhan asked pushing the door open scarcely.’
“Come in” said Elnar. Rayhan stepped in.
“Can I ask you something?” Rayhan asked.
“Go ahead” said a curled up wolf in the corner of the bed recognized to be Elnar.
“I was wondering about something, when I fought Hell that day, he beat me senseless without killing me and then he did something worse than anything I can imagine, he pulled out this bottle with this liquid in it and made me drink it, it didn’t seem to have any affect until it started showing me these horrifying images, these things were downright scary, I couldn’t stop seeing them, and what really troubled me was because he found a way not only to defeat me physically, but now he’s found a way to take me down on the inside, Elnar, what I mean to say is, is there any way someone can show you the future through a liquid and if so, how do you think Hell would’ve gotten it?” Rayhan asked.
“I have never heard of anything like that” said Elnar. Rayhan’s hope was crushed.
“Then what was that thing he made me drink?” Rayhan asked.
“I’m not sure, but Rayhan, I hope you realize that now that Hell can access you mind, you are now in more danger than ever” said Elnar.
“Just one more thing, I was wondering how we were going to get the next amulet?” asked Rayhan.
“Well this is a tough situation because you went to the correct location but since Hell was there, there is a likely chance that Hell had probably taken it, that’s the majority of the probability, and Hell will stop at nothing to avoid you getting it, he will stop at nothing to prevent you from getting it so be prepared for anything” said Elnar.
“But like, couldn’t Hell just destroy it?” asked Rayhan.
“No, the amulets are not destroyable” said Elnar.
“But then Hell would like take it somewhere impossible to get so that I don’t get it, somewhere where I can’t physically get it” said Rayhan.
“That’s where you’re wrong, if I know one thing about Hell it’s that he likes twisting things to breaking point, he’ll place it somewhere where you can potentially get it but the chances are slim, almost impossible, but Hell is like an insane person, the only reason he kills is for either supporting something or just for an excuse to cause commotion. He’s a sick twisted person, this is all a game to him” said Elnar.
“That’s terrible, to torture someone just for amusement? That’s just insane, corrupt, and I can’t stand the though of it how could someone be so cruel and sane?” asked Rayhan.
“Rayhan this should be the least of your worries, Hell is less than a fraction of the kind of evil these people are, they go beyond the limit of evil, they have no reason and there is one you should look out for out of all of them next to Lucifer himself, his right hand man, the trickmaster, he’s not a normal villain you’d expect he has ways of killing that are virtually impossible to decipher, it takes years for us to solve his riddles, he’s vicious and inhumane, he’ll stop at nothing to kill for laughs, he drinks the blood of the victim, if you care about anyone you’d hold them closer than you hold your very own life, truly he is insane” said Elnar.
“Where is he?” asked Rayhan.
“I’m not sure us sages are still tracking him down, but be aware he carries a white mask over his face, that’s all you need to know, and he’s very edgy and downright insane” said Elnar.
“Alright” said Rayhan, he felt even more scared of everything going on now that he knew about this trickmaster; he didn’t initially like the sound of this guy at all. He left the room and went back into his own.

Chapter 20: The Amulet

They had already left when the roaring had reawakened. They assumed the bear had started to become hungry they ran back and arrived and not too soon either for the bear had just caught a glimpse of the amulet. Rayhan and Rielle both hurried and pulled out their weapons. They shot and slashed their way through fallen trees and dodged bolts of fire, but they needed to lure it somehow. Rielle then thought of an idea she grabbed the amulet (which surprisingly had not fallen apart yet) and wore it.
“What are you doing?” asked Rayhan.
“I’m going to make him chase me down to the roots, and make him trip, go compress them!” she shouted.
“NO WAY, I CAN’T LET YOU DO THAT IF ANYONE I SHOULD!” shouted Rayhan as the bear had begun to chase her he seized the amulet and wrapped it around his neck.
“GO!-BUT-GO WE HAVEN’T GOT THAT MUCH TIME!” said Rayhan. She understood and left. Rayhan was being chased and Rielle ran towards the rooted area and tried to compress it by dropping rocks onto them to block out the fluency, which was clever to Rayhan. He tried his best to hold it off but was failing due to the constant weariness. He fought his way through but it wasn’t making any progress, Rielle realized that as she was trying to hold it and compress it, it came to the point where the boulder was no longer enough of a hold she pushed it onto the compression in the roots but it kept pushing out she kept her arms there and tried to hold it in place but as it grew it became harder and harder of a task to fulfill. She kept pushing it. Holding something in place was harder and Rayhan was having trouble as well he was brought to the point where he could no longer move he felt every nerve in his body shatter as he fell over and collapsed he tried his best to hold the log in place over which stood the giant bear. He then decided that this was going no where he rolled it over his shoulder and the bear rolled over the log and fell back onto the compression and nearly crushed Rayhan. It fell onto the gasses and the gas exploded they suddenly felt extremely tired as the gasses filled their lungs and the bear too soon fell at rest. Suddenly the bears eyes sprang open and it woke up.
“You’ve got to be KIDDING ME!” Rayhan shouted. It got up, Rayhan and Rielle both pulled out their weapons Rayhan tried to work out what went wrong in his mind. Then he thought for a while and realized it was probably that they hadn’t gotten it into enough gas, he thought as they dodged the logs it threw. Rayhan threw his sword at it hoping it’d go through, it didn’t and he felt like a total failure.
He quickly fetched his sword; he realized they were both way too tired to do anything about it he picked up the amulet and suddenly everything went green, he felt a power run through his body a sort of electrical wave that ran through his veins and into his mind and he felt like he was part of the earth, he lost all control of his body, a green ball of light surrounded him and he felt pain in every muscle in his body, he felt lightening struck, it was like no pain he ever felt before. Suddenly he rose into the air, wanting nothing more than to get out of this green ball of pain. He shot bolts of green light everywhere and the beast was tormented, it was cut, and sliced as blood flew out of it. , everything went intensely green as streaks of white lightning struck the bear from all angles it roared, Rayhan could not control his body and the pain had increased tenfold, this was torture Rielle far below unable to act except by watching in horror. It was like he felt nothing could ever be felt with more intense pain than this, the green glowing ball around him shattered into a billion pieces that went into the bear as it broke into thousands of small molecular particles and disappeared. Rayhan could not see anything, his eyes were bright green. He fell to the ground as everything came back he, felt a surge of energy, he could not move, every breath became a struggle he closed his eyes falling through the night and landed onto the ground. Rielle couldn’t do anything but call for help, she ran to the gate called everyone who arrived moments later and carried Rayhan back to the castle. They threw him onto the bed and shocked him consistently to wake him but it was no use, Rayhan felt nothing but that pain that had scarred his mind, he was shocked a billion times but no affect or sign was made. Once they’d given up and left. Elnar walked in with what looked like a green crystal, he pointed it at Rayhan and suddenly Rayhan felt a sudden shock and woke up. He started breathing as though he had been holding his breath for so long, he opened his eyes wide and the bright green light had slowly faded back to his original eye colour. Elnar left. Rayhan looked around; he saw the amulet on the side table next to him. He realized why it had been so important, it held such power, just by touching it Rayhan had been brought to the brink of total infinite power, but the pain was beyond anything he’d felt before. He closed his eyes and fell asleep.
The next morning he opened his eyes to the sunlit morning. He sat up. His eyes had a lot of trouble focusing into sight, he felt dizzy as though on a very fast twirling rollercoaster at a spinning theme park, he got the feeling of suddenly being momentarily airborne and thrown back down by the force of gravity. It was starting to give him a headache; he lay back down onto the bed and closed his eyes trying to refocus. After about an hour he suddenly got his focus back, but his mind was still spinning wildly. He tried to disregard that and got up. He walked to the window and looked outside. It was a nice sunny day, not single cloud in the sky, a bit of wind but still a mild day even though the weather was leaning towards a bit of heat. He had been lying in the infirmary in the 8th tower, the 2nd highest. There’d been a glass of water on the side table which he drained. He put the glass back down and stared into the sky, he didn’t spend too much time thinking about the amulet’s affects because he had been foolish not to have expected anything to happen but he was under pressure and he was had to retrieve it, it’d been only natural for him to have forgotten especially him of all people because he never had a good memory. That caused him unbearable pain but he was just glad that it was over. He went back into bed, at this point he decided he needed a bit more rest and so he sat down trying not to make that much physical action. Suddenly there was a knock on the door. They walked in after Rayhan didn’t answer. It turned out to be Elnar.
“How are you doing?” he asked.
“Better and glad to be” said Rayhan.
“It’ll take time to repair the damage but you should be better sooner or later” he said.
“Yeah” Rayhan replied.
“What was it like?” he asked.
“What?” he asked.
“Holding the amulet and drawn into the air and to be suppressed with so much power unable to control?” asked Elnar.
“It was a strange feeling, but it was very painful, I don’t know exactly how to describe the feeling, I mean it felt like every nerve in my body was constantly being twisted, pulled or electrified” said Rayhan.
“I could imagine, so much power stuck in your hands, you realize any normal human would’ve become a god with so much light energy” said Elnar.
“But then why didn’t I? Why is it that I just became that empty cell? Why is it that I keep surviving or have different treatment?” asked Rayhan sounding a bit stressed out.
“Calm down, it’s alright, the thing is, you aren’t exactly what any of us expected” said Elnar taking a dramatic pause.
“What d’you mean, I mean like what were you expecting?” asked Rayhan.
“Well I’m not exactly sure how to explain this to you, but let’s take a look at the situations you’ve been faced with, when you touched the amulet you didn’t become a god, you became something more, for an instance, it wasn’t safe, it was unnatural, you see, there was a reason you became a god, the blood you have had a negative affect over your power thus increasing your ability, we still have to find out what that boost in your blood was, but for now Rayhan, I’d be concerned, when I saw you from the sage raelm you reminded me a lot of him” he said.
“Of who?” asked Rayhan.
“Lucifer” said Elnar.
“Who’s that?” asked Rayhan curiously.
“He was a devastating being; he was a sage, the greatest of all power, he was a prodigy when it came to being a sage, it seemed he was a lot more gifted than most of us, when we found him he seemed as though he’d already been a sage, but he was corrupted by power, and so we sealed him in an hourglass, the hourglass of time, he became more power hungry, and as he progressed in his attempts to which we still don’t know as of yet, he was caught trying to bind two worlds together for some reason, he was feared by all, he created an army a long time ago perhaps before you were born but, this army was of chosen people who he corrupted to think like he did, he crossed the boundaries of your classic evil villain and up to date almost every other sage we’ve met, no one sage was ever as close as you are to him” said Elnar.
“Are you implying that I may be a sage?” asked Rayhan.
“You seem to have a lot of characteristics of which Lucifer possessed but I don’t know about a sage” said Elnar.
“Oh” said Rayhan a bit disappointed, he had been very keen in figuring out that he’d been much more powerful and different form those around him than most people. The next few moments were silent, Elnar who had been perched at the window in his usual wolf for staring out the window at the rising sun, and Rayhan sitting on what looked like a hospital bed staring at his hands.
“Elnar?” asked Rayhan.
“Yes?” asked Elnar a bit curious.
“I know it may seem a bit strange of me to ask this, but something happened which I didn’t entirely understand and I was wondering whether you might be able to enlighten me” said Rayhan.
“I can try” said Elnar.
“While I was in the forest I think I was knocked out, and, while I was lying there I’m not sure but I woke up somewhere else, I met with Azraeth, he told me something but disappeared, and after he’d left, something happened I landed on the ground and met with this guy who I fought and who reduced me to the point of being killed, and my spirit left my body and I shot a golden light from my hand and something happened to him……something scary” said Rayhan.
“What was it?” asked Elnar.
“The golden light hit him in the chest and his eyes went black, he rose into the air and laughed in a strange way, he seemed inhuman, like possessed, he laughed louder and he said something even stranger, he said something very unclear and not in a full sentence, it was like he was having a seizure in mid air as he said like suffer, cower, die, risen, fear, kill, blood, hate, rise, fear and he said something like prepare to suffer eternal pain after and he trailed off and fell to the ground but in a strange position his facial expression in fear and his eyes were still pitch black, I needed to prove to myself if this was a dream or not and it wasn’t because I have his weapon” said Rayhan pulling out a rusted broken blood covered blade that had lost it’s shine.
He held it out, for a moment Elnar looked at the blade and then directly at Rayhan. Did this man say anything involving chains of any sort?” asked Elnar.
“I think so, like chains of light being broken” said Rayhan.
“I see” said Elnar.
“What do you think it means?” asked Rayhan.
“What I think it means is obvious, it means we are all in more danger than ever before, and I suggest I better prepare you for what lies ahead, even beyond Hell, this won’t all be over after Hell is dead, this is going to go on Rayhan, and when it does we’d best be prepared for it” said Rayhan.
“And one more thing” said Rayhan.
“Go” said Elnar.
“Before Azraeth had left he explained to me something, he said that I wasn’t a human he was about to tell me what I was but left” said Rayhan.
“I see, that’s what happens when we say more than we should, we fade into oblivion but I can promise you that when the time is right you will know, maybe I won’t be the one to tell you but you will know” said Elnar. He left the room leaving Rayhan to lie down and stare at the ceiling. Thought soon carried him to rest.
He woke up and went downstairs to see his friends and explained everything that had happened to him since he had fallen unconscious specifically leaving out the detail of what had happened to the man he’d fought. They all were sitting in Rayhan’s room all but Paul. Rayhan lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, Steven sat against the bed, Rielle sat by the window, Pierre sat on the table, Jessica sat her back against a wall and Sarah sat next to the drawers.
“Oh well I thought it would, by the way just thought you’d know Paul’s pretty pissed off at you for going after the amulet” said Steven.
“I don’t care, I had to and it’s because I did that we’re a step ahead and can move one” said Rayhan.
“Well where do we move onto?” asked Pierre.
“I don’t know yet but when it’s time to move on we’ll know right? I mean it’s not like we’re going to stay frozen forever right?” said Rayhan.
“I guess” said Sarah. Rayhan noticed some drama had been going on around his friends, Sarah and Rielle would never talk, Sarah and Steven would never talk and Pierre and Rielle would never talk. It was like Sarah and Steven broke up Rielle and Sarah got into an argument and Pierre was siding with Sarah. He had once again been faced with a problem and he just knew he’d be sucked into it one way or another.


***
A couple of months had gone by without a word from Elnar or anybody, things had gotten a lot quieter lately, Sarah and Pierre still refused to talk to Rielle. Steven and Rayhan had managed to declare themselves in the middle of the entire argument and refused to take sides but Rayhan felt as though he wanted to take Rielle’s side because she’d had no one to accompany her he was in the middle and he was afraid that whenever he’d try to defend one side or call the argument off one of the sides would be inclined to think that he was siding even though he wasn’t that’s all that he really was afraid about. He wouldn’t mind talking to Elnar though about this entire thing maybe he’d be able to sort it out but by the looks of this argument Sarah and Rielle would definitely not get along they were two polar ends of a magnet, the closer you bring them the more pressure would try to push them apart. It was impossible to join those two back he’d have to bear them disliking one another but that’s not what bugged him, what bugged him was the feelings he’d get if they wouldn’t leave each other alone, they’d hate each other but he just wished that they left each other alone. He didn’t want to take sides but it was like a side was grabbing hold of him and pulling him close. He tried his best to stand his ground in the middle but that became harder and harder if the ground shook him to one side. He tried not to think about it too much even though the thought of it still bugged him he decided to put it off. He woke up one morning a bit less tired than usual, but still not looking forward to the rest of the day. He sat up onto his bed. He looked around the room and rubbed his eyes, the sunlight was brightly illuminating the room, and it was a bit hard to see frankly. He got off of his bed and headed to the washroom. He turned on the cold water and filled his hands with it and then threw it towards his face he woke up suddenly cold, all his facial nerves felt like they weren’t working for an instant, just another typical morning. His friends were downstairs he soon found out after throwing his sweater over his shoulders and going downstairs. He wasn’t surprised; Sarah and Pierre had been at one side of the room Rielle was at another, Paul was making coffee at a table. Jessica wasn’t awake yet. Steven was in his room according to Pierre. Rayhan could notice clearly it was sort of a cold war between the two. He could sense the bitter silence was so unnerving. It was bitter and violent, unwelcome and painful. Just the air in the room was so deadly. He walked around and went to Rielle.
“Hey” he said.
“Hey” she said a bit bitterly. Already Sarah had been throwing him dirty looks. Rayhan found this very unpleasant.
“How’s it going?” he asked.
“Has Sarah said anything about me to you?” she asked.
“Not really” he replied.
“Alright” she said. Rayhan felt like he’d slowly become a weapon. He went back up stairs trying to stay away from them as much as possible. He went back into his room and closed the door. He went onto the balcony, He climbed onto the roof.
He sat down and just wished Elnar would show. He felt strange; he sat for several hours and didn’t move, the sun was beginning to set. He watched until it completely had sunken into the darkness and the stars illuminated the black inky darkness of the sky. He closed his eyes as it became colder and colder. He felt his heart beat faster and faster, as though he were right next to her even though he wasn’t. He stood up and looked around, no sign of Elnar, he’d begun to miss the white and black, light blue eyed wolf. He peered into the distance he could’ve sworn he’d seen the silhouette of the wolf walking in midair towards him about three times but each time it’d seemed to have been either a leaf floating in the distance or his imagination. He felt a bit cold but ignored it. He got the same waiting impatient feeling, he wanted to get a move on finding the amulets as soon as possible and he wanted to talk to him about the situation between Sarah and Rielle. He got down and leaned against the railing of the balcony, he gazed into space emptily and hopelessly without a single lead, without a single joy. He tried to make out constellations again but that didn’t take his mind off of her, he kept making out her face among the stars, he felt strange, he knew he was different but he thought that maybe certain characteristics were the same between him and everyone else, he felt sadness and love right now like anyone would, maybe he had the best judgement between right and wrong but he felt pointless and like a total loser, he had brought all his friends into this, it was his fault all of their lives were now in jeopardy. He had brought up danger and violence upon around everyone else around him he was a disease. He felt desperate. He threw his head over and closed his eyes in shame, why had he brought danger upon all of these people? He was afraid. If anything were to happen to anyone he’d hold himself responsible and would never be able to ever forgive himself, and he knew that they were so happy to have gotten away from home they wouldn’t want to go back no matter the danger, it would fill their lives with excitement. He thought, what if anything happened to Pierre, or Steven, or Jessica, Paul would probably be able to fend for himself fine knowing him he wasn’t as worried but what about Jessica? Sarah? What about Rielle?! He thought at the thought of Rielle in harm physical or anything made him slightly more than flinch, it was like a wave of electricity had ran through his nerves down his entire body.