I felt nauseous. My head was spinning. This feeling couldn’t be described with words. Existential dread, anticipation, disbelief, regret. Is this what death felt like?

  “You complete and utter fool.” A deep voice said to my right.

  “....”

  “You threw your life away for what? You won’t even get to witness her escaping. She could fail.”

  “I gave her a chance.” I said, curling up into a ball in this endless void.

  “I did all I could in the end to save us, but the flames already touched your skin before I could transport it away. Minimizing the damage wasn’t enough. If I had known you were going to push the girl out of the way, I would have used my spatial magic to set up a portal beforehand.” The deep voice said with annoyance.

  “You….did all you could?” I said, my eyes slowly opening. “Are you kidding me?”

  “…”

  “I don’t even know what you are. I don’t even know where you came from. You just suddenly appeared in MY body! Apparently sealing MY powers! If I had those abilities, I could have broken out of here far sooner! I could have leveraged my situation far better! I wouldn’t have NEARLY DIED at every turn!” I screamed, turning around to face this voice.

  It had no face or form. The only sign that something was there was a small wisp of purple and red energy.

  “I didn’t want to seal your powers, you immature brat! I was assisting both of us!”

  “Well, look at what your help amounted to! Now I’m dead!”

  “As I said, you’re missing the point—!”

  “THEN WHAT IS THE DAMN POINT?! EXPLAIN IT TO ME!” I screamed, my voice echoing throughout this place. “All I wanted….was freedom. Is that truly too much to ask?” I cried, tears flowing down my face. “I can’t even be free in my own body! Shackled by Mr. Magic Alien Thing, who appeared out of nowhere! And you can create portals, apparently?! DOESN’T THAT MEAN YOU COULD HAVE GOTTEN THE FOUR OF US OUT OF THERE BEFORE ANY OF THIS HAD TO HAPPEN?!I—argh!” I screamed, pacing back and forth before sitting down, burying my head in my hands.

  “There’s no point in even getting mad now. I can’t do anything to change what happened.” I said, wiping my tears off my face. Curling my body into a ball I rolled over, staring at the endless abyss. “I don’t even care anymore. Can my conscience just dissipate already?”

  “…I’ll explain it to you. Why I did the things I did. From the day it all began. The day I entered your body.”

  “.....Pointless.”

  Trapped in this dead space, I was curled up in a ball at the center of an endless void. I didn’t want to think anymore, I just wanted to be alone and drift until I die.

  “Nihilism will get you nowhere.” The voice said sternly.

  “Shut the hell up, and stop reading my mind.” I snarled, not even bothering to look.

  “Your parents would be disappointed to see you give up like this.” The voice said in a soft tone.

  “They both died of Rust poisoning. The dead have no feelings.” I responded, curling up even further.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Am I sure about what? That my parents are dead? Yeah. I watched it happen and tried to care for them. I searched for herbs day and night and hunted food for the three of us to try and make them feel better.”

  “No, no, no. Are you sure they died of illness?”

  “As I said, I watched it happen. You’re not making any sense. Stop incessantly blabbering in my ear and remain silent as you’ve always been. If I have to suffer an eternity here, then let it be in silence.”

  “ If you can answer me this one question, I’ll remain silent. What were their expressions when they died?”

  “....”

  “Can’t think of anything?”

  “I’m not trying to. Their deaths were due to their insistence on staying on that damn continent. I hated them for being so stubborn.”

  “That’s not what I remember. Use your small brain and indulge me.”

  My mind slowly drifted to that day. From my memories, I could recall myself waking up and noticing my parents not moving. Without any goodbyes or warning, death had taken them in their sleep.

  However, as I tried to recall my exact reaction or their faces, I couldn’t. As a matter of fact, even the scenery around me was hazy. It felt like static was overtaking my brain, and when I tried to remember more clearly, my head began to ache with pain.

  “What….did you do to me?” I said as I finally turned toward the voice.

  The wisp of energy seemed to glow brighter when I finally looked back at it again.

  “Shall I show you?”

  The void changed and showed the place I lived in before I was taken to that facility. A barren wasteland with dead trees everywhere. The corrupted red soil that couldn’t sustain any plant life, and the blighted waters on the coast from which only monsters emerged. A thick red mist seeped across the land, and even when the sun shone down on this place, no light could be felt due to its overwhelming atmosphere.

  A bleak place that I despised yet was forced to grow accustomed to. From my viewpoint in the sky, I looked down on two tents made with spare fabric and makeshift towels. One was for my parents, and one was for me. I was forced to make the tent on my own, so mine looked significantly worse than theirs.

  I saw my tent’s curtains move as a younger me ran out of the tent. At the time, I believe that day was my 9th birthday. Younger me was wearing a dirt-stained beige shirt and pants, with his black and purple hair matted and unkempt. Similar to how I looked before Dawn started taking care of my hair.

  My younger self ran off into the distance, with a knife at his side.

  “What were you doing up so early?”

  “My parents wanted to stress the importance of how limited our food was, and how important it was to get prey before other predators did. I could only eat what I caught, so I would try and leave earlier than them so I could clear out the regular spots.”

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  “Survival of the fittest? A lifestyle fitting for one such as yourself.”

  “Don't talk so casually to me, scum.”

  “You lowly human. Your kind holds the same arrogance here as they do in my homeland. I will talk to you however I wish.”

  My younger self ran and ran until he got to the usual spot we would find deer. However, when he got there, both of my parents were already there, eating the spoils of their hunt.

  The man who was my father had short spiky gray hair and a scar over his left eye. He was a dark-skinned black manand had dull black eyes. His and Lazarus’s clothes were the same, except his were bigger.

  My mother was a white woman with long flowing purple hair. Her eyes and hair were far more vibrant than my father’s, but it didn’t hide the fact that she had scars of her own. Her arms and legs had countless scars, so many that it was hard to find a clean spot on them. Cuts, indents, burns, they were all there.

  “Lazarus, you sleep too soundly. You should have woken up upon hearing the noise we were making and followed us.” My father said with a stern expression.

  “Sweetie, he must have been spent from trying to understand the arithmetic I was teaching him last night. We don’t have any notebooks to write on, so we had to write the equations on an actual book. It takes longer to read.” My mother said softly, caressing my father’s shoulder.

  “Regardless of the reason, we already cleared this spot, so you’ll have to go elsewhere.”

  “Can’t you be nice to your son?” Lazarus finally spoke, looking annoyed.

  “If we coddled you, you wouldn’t survive here. When we’re gone, you need to be able to fend for yourself.” My father said, holding a piece of the deer above the fire they made.

  “Darling, let’s at least share some of our food. It’s his birthday after all.”

  “Do what you want then.” My father said as he turned away and continued to pick apart the deer he caught.

  “How does one even consume such filth? It looks poisonous.” The voice said. Even without a mouth, I could hear it wretching.

  “People born in this place have a natural immunity. That’s how we were able to breathe in the toxic air as well. Our people have long lived here and developed both countermeasures and antibodies that can make them safe for consumption. More importantly, this is odd. It was only after I came back from my hunt that I noticed my parents were nowhere to be found. That’s when I checked their tent. Yet in this memory, they had already arrived at my hunting spot.”

  “Pray, maybe my words do hold some value after all. Hm?.”

  “….”

  Lazarus sat down and ate a piece of deer alongside my mother, while my father was turned the other direction.

  “How is it, sweetie?”

  “It’s good. Thank you mom!” Lazarus exclaimed happily, making a face I never could have imagined myself making.

  She chuckled as she rubbed Lazarus’s head with a smile. Lazarus also had a warm smile on his face as he happily munched on his food.

  He quickly finished and reached for another piece before my mother fiercely grabbed his hand with a hardened expression.

  “If you want anymore, you’ll have to earn it.” She said sternly

  He pouted for a moment before staring at my mother with determined eyes.

  “Such emotion struck across your face! Yet, look how you’ve aged.” It said in a mocking tone.

  “That’s another thing I don’t get. I don’t remember feeling remotely happy about anything during my time here.” I mused, ignoring the voice’s taunts.

  It didn’t respond; its flame flickered left and right, almost like it was enjoying my confusion.

  “What do I have to do to earn it, mother?” Lazarus said, bouncing up and down.

  “You know the rules. I’ll ask you a question. Prove your knowledge, and you can get food.”

  “I’m ready.”

  She nodded her head and put her hands together.

  “The affliction that curses this land. The Rust. Tell me the origins of this affliction.”

  “This is something I’m curious about as well. From where I’m from there was nothing of the sort there.”

  “The Rust is a byproduct of our planet mutating after the Great Cataclysm. When the meteor broke apart 1000 years ago above our atmosphere, a strange dust fell across all sides of the Earth, with it affecting each region differently. Rust is a byproduct of that dust merging with this land. It is a toxic gas and affliction that mutates animals and significantly lowers humans' lifespan.”

  “Very good.” She said as she handed him a deer leg.

  “I am not sure that is the case after what I saw in the facility,” I said, remembering the eldritch feeling and red mist that rift exuded.

  “Ah, yes, that crack in space? It was most curious. Why, I’ve never seen anything of the sort. Maybe if I had found one of those, getting here would have been simpler.” It said, its flame flickering violently like it was angry.

  We turned our attention back to the scene playing when Lazarus began to speak again.

  “But mother, that begs the question that I continue to ask. Why do we have to stay here in these terrible conditions? Why hasn’t any of the natives left yet?” He asked, his hand raised.

  “It’s tradition, and for safety.” My father said after sitting in silence.

  “Are you saying the other continents are less safe than this place?” Lazarus asked with his arms crossed, doubt plastered all over his face.

  “In terms of survivability, they are far safer. However, if you had paid attention when your mother and I were talking, you would understand why it’s safer here.”

  He then stood up and grabbed the large ax next to him.

  “Allow me to show you what I mean, prepare to spar.”

  Lazarus quickly unsheathed his knife and jumped backward, donning a dull expression with no emotion on his face.

  “There’s your usual disposition. Even back then, you could make such a frightful expression. Remind me, were you ever able to beat your father? ”

  “.....No. Not once. I was never even able to land a hit.”

  As I said, I heard the clang of cold steel and the clattering of a small weapon on the ground. In less than 10 seconds, I was disarmed and was laid flat on the ground.

  “Our bodies have adapted over the years to survive in this terrible place. If a normal person tried to live here, they would be able to last 6 months without being permanently debilitated, and if they are strong, they would survive for up to 2 years. As we have been living here since birth, our lifespans are indeed reduced due to continuous exposure, but we can live up to 40. If we were to leave this place, our lifespan would most likely greatly increase due to the non-toxicity of the air. Assuming we could get de-toiled fast enough. My father said as he helped Lazarus up.

  “What’s your point?” Lazarus said, glaring at the ground as he struggled to get up.

  “If we leave, we’ll be hunted by many people whowant our organs for longevity reasons. There are many animals and advanced technologies that can detect the differences in our bodies, so we would be on the run from unsavory people at all times.”

  “I feel like they wouldn’t be too difficult to dispatch.”

  “Hold your tongue, boy. Outside of these lands, many people have received the meteor’s blessing and have attained mystical gifts. You would be a fool to underestimate such opponents. It seems I need to be more strict with your training.” He said, grabbing Lazarus by his shoulder firmly.

  “This is dragging on a bit long, so how about we fast forward?”

  The clouds began moving faster and faster as the sun shot across the sky, until it was completely hidden with the moon taking its place. The area was dark, so dark that if this wasn’t a memory, I wouldn’t be able to see anything. It was completely silent, with only the sound of curtains flapping in the wind filling the air. However, after a couple seconds, the silence was broken with the emergence of countless lights and thundering footsteps.

  My parents immediately sprang out from the tent to figure out what the sound was, and Lazarus soon followed suit. In no time at all, men with advanced gear and weaponry had surrounded the two tents, with the light from their guns shining on all three of them.

  “Who are you people?! Where did you come from?!” My father yelled while brandishing his axe.

  The men parted, and a familiar figure showed itself in front of my family and younger self. My eyes widened and my teeth clenched when I saw his face again.

  “We are a sub-section of World Gear. I’m sure you’ve heard of our agency’s great accomplishments.” Dr. Verrat said, wearing a heavy-duty gas mask.

  Dr.Verrat....I've met him before?!