Amid that seemingly endless horizon, under a sky as black as tar, Laura and Emily knelt before me, as still as statues. It was as if their bodies were on the verge of falling apart, ready to melt and spill across the ground at any moment.
Neither of them dared to speak a word—or maybe they weren’t even capable of speaking anymore. Their faces, caked with dried mud, held a sickly pallor, and their breathing came in short, ragged intervals, as if each breath might be their last.
The decay consuming them seemed to grow stronger with every passing second, a slow, cruel process that dimmed the light in their eyes. For a brief moment, I had the disturbing impression that if I reached out to touch them, they would simply crumble to dust, like ashes swept away by the wind.
I stood there in silence, my eyes locked on every detail, while a single, nagging question hammered in my mind: why, exactly, were these strange visions being shown to me? The only thing I was certain of was that all of this was a direct consequence of the anomaly Laura had introduced to us.
And yet, curiosity gnawed at me—if these were the images meant for me, what was Eryanis being shown at that very moment? Despite the urge to find out, I decided it would be smarter to focus on my own problems before they grew into something even worse.
With that thought in mind, I took a few slow steps, circling Laura and Emily like an indecisive predator, letting my eyes trace every detail of them before stopping, finally, behind the two.
Should I help them? But... why would I, exactly? In the end, they’re not even really them, are they? Just projections conjured by the anomaly, empty representations of something that once existed.
In theory, that means I don’t have to save them. And honestly, even if I wanted to, I don’t know if I could. In the state I’m in, I can’t think of anything I could actually do to help them. Maybe—and just maybe—things would be different if Althea were here.
In the end, all I could do was stand there, watching them in silence, while an uncomfortable thought kept repeating in my mind. Even if I still had all the powers I’ve gained up to this point, I doubt I’d be able to truly save them. And considering most of those powers have been sealed away, my chances of interfering—of changing anything—had dropped to practically zero.
Honestly, even for someone like me—someone who usually keeps a cool head in situations like this—it was impossible not to feel the weight of what was happening. A strange feeling of powerlessness cut through me like a cold blade.
Laura and Emily weren’t just random people; they were two humans I know, that I respect... that, in a way, I’ve grown to care about. Maybe calling it affection would be an exaggeration, but there was warmth there.
That’s why seeing them like this—their bodies practically melting, their skin breaking apart in silent agony—and realizing that all they had left was to wait for the end, broke something inside me. It was as if the world was reminding me, in the cruelest way possible, that not all power is enough to save the ones who matter.
Save the ones who matter... that’s a strange definition too. Maybe it’s because Laura and Emily—the Laura and Emily I know—are alive and well. I’ve never really stopped to think about it before, to be honest.
Even in the most dangerous moments, I’ve always had this strange feeling that I knew exactly what to do to get them out of trouble. It was instinctive, almost automatic... Almost as if... as if I’ve been through all of this before, repeating the same steps without even realizing it.
(... Huh?) I thought, frowning slightly as I tilted my head, as if that gesture could somehow help me think: (Why does it feel like I just thought of something really strange? Something that felt important for a second, but is already slipping away from me...)
I cast one last glance at both of them before turning away. As soon as I took the next step, I expected to feel the wet, heavy touch of muddy water... but that’s not what happened. Instead, my feet sank into something soft, almost spongy, with a strangely pleasant texture.
It was cold—not enough to be uncomfortable, but cold enough to raise goosebumps on my skin and make me realize, with startling clarity, that I was stepping on something unusual.
In the next moment, I lifted my gaze and finally took a closer look at my surroundings. I was in some sort of partially frozen forest. The ground, where grass should have been visible, was completely covered by a thick layer of soft snow that crunched under my feet.
The trees, tall and twisted, were nearly bare, their naked branches heavy with snow, bending slightly under the weight of the cold. A chilly wind blew gently, making loose flakes dance in the air before joining the white carpet below.
When I looked further ahead, a lake of completely black water appeared before me, so still and silent it seemed to swallow the very light around it. My eyes locked onto the scene, unable to look away—but it wasn’t the lake that held me—it was what lay right at its edge.
The snow, which should have been white and pristine, was stained a disturbing shade of red, as if the ground itself had bled. And there, in the middle of that crimson stain, lay three bodies.
They were arranged in an unnervingly neat manner, almost as if someone had placed them there on purpose. At first glance, their bodies seemed untouched—no cuts, no visible blood—nothing that explained their deaths.
But a closer look made it disturbingly clear—their eyes, noses, and mouths were stained with dried blood, as if the cold had crystallized every drop.
And, of course, there was no need to explain who they were. Just like before, it was Laura, Emily, and Victor lying there, their motionless bodies partially buried in the snow, their pale faces stark against the dark red that tainted the surrounding white.
I glanced around, desperately searching for any sign of what—or who—had brought them to this state. But I found nothing. No movement, no sound, nothing to betray the presence of anything nearby. A heavy, suffocating silence seemed to press down on the place.
When I finally lifted my eyes, a deeply unsettling feeling rippled through my entire being—if I could even still call it a “being” If I’d had a stomach, it would have surely turned. The sky... wasn’t really a sky. There was something profoundly wrong with it, a dissonance too strange to put into words.
It was as if the world had been covered by a thin coat of paint, a poorly stitched veil meant to fool the unsuspecting. The color looked far too artificial, almost motionless, and the clouds—if they were even clouds—seemed like blurry smudges, frozen in place.
It felt as though the sky, once filled with ordinary clouds, had been replaced by a massive black liquid mass—dense and silent—so much like the water in the lake that it seemed ready to collapse over us at any second.
My eyes stayed locked on that dark ceiling, unable to look away, when suddenly, a flash tore through the darkness. It wasn’t the crack of thunder or the flash of lightning; it was something else, something strange—like the sky itself had decided to ignite for one brief instant, flooding everything around me with a cold, almost otherworldly light.
But the moment the sky lit up in that uncanny glow, something caught my attention. A figure. Not just any figure, but something colossal, shaped from a darkness so deep it seemed to swallow every bit of light around it. For a few seconds, I could barely make out its form—not because it was small or distant, but because it was far too big to take in all at once.
Even so, its silhouette was unmistakable: tentacles twisting slowly, as if searching for something in the void. There was no doubt—this was the same creature, the same massive squid that had risen from the lake before. The one I fought and defeated to earn the ability I now carry—the power to summon my own Alter Ego.
Thinking about it that way, it made sense. Considering everything I’ve witnessed since I began seeing these “Worlds” I could only reach one conclusion that explained the state of things: (Hmm... was it because I failed to stop that giant squid when it emerged from the lake?)
In my current state, I had far more questions than answers swirling in my head. For starters, were these situations—so unlike the ones I remember—really creations of the anomaly? Or were they fragments of memories it was tearing from the depths of my subconscious? The second option made more sense, but if that was true... then it meant all of this had really happened.
Yeah... if I really stop to think that all of this actually happened—and wasn’t just something made up by my mind—then what exactly are Laura, Emily, Victor, Rupert... and even the world I’ve been living in until now? I can’t see it as an illusion. In fact, I feel, with a nearly unsettling certainty, that the place where I spent all that time is absolutely real.
In the end, as these thoughts tangled in my mind, I cast one last look toward the horizon, toward the spot where I had last seen that shadow. So many ideas rushed to me at once that it felt impossible to put them into words. And once again, I found myself thinking of Eryanis.
Was she seeing something like what I was seeing now? Honestly, what were these visions even supposed to mean? What was I supposed to feel—or understand—when faced with these “Worlds?” Somewhere deep down, I felt like I already knew the answer—an ancient, almost familiar truth—but I chose to set it aside, at least for now.
(Anyway...) I thought, letting the silence of the frozen forest seep into my mind as my eyes wandered over the ice-covered trunks. The cold air seemed to bite at my skin, and every breath turned into a white cloud in front of me: (What exactly am I supposed to do now?) I asked myself: (Just... wander around?) The thought felt as hollow as the space between the trees, but still, it seemed like the only option.
The last few times I suddenly found myself in a different place, I hadn’t done anything significant—at most, I’d taken a few aimless steps. But this time was different: even when I had moved my feet a few moments ago, nothing happened. It was just as I was reflecting on this that I felt something strange, like the air around me had folded in on itself.
My eyes blinked involuntarily and, in the next instant, someone was there. They appeared beside me without warning, standing near the motionless bodies of Victor, Emily, Laura, and Rupert, as if they had always been there.
I couldn’t make out the face, so I wasn’t sure who it was. Still, the gestures, the posture, even the way they moved stirred something disturbingly familiar. Slowly, the realization clicked in my mind—that was me. Or at least, it looked like me. But there was something different about this figure, something subtle yet impossible to ignore.
Its outline resembled mine, but it wasn’t quite the same: the shoulders seemed broader, and the gaze—even without seeing it clearly—radiated a strange, almost hostile intensity. It was like staring at a distorted reflection, a version of me that had walked another path, that had become something beyond what I am now.
For a moment, I was caught in those thoughts, as though my mind were surrounded by a thick fog. Then, suddenly, a voice cut through the silence: “Another failure...”
The sound reverberated through the air, sending chills down my spine. It was my voice—or at least it sounded like mine—but I hadn’t moved my lips. And the most unsettling part: it wasn’t an inner whisper, a memory, or a thought I could hear in my head; it was a real voice, echoing all around me.
I was startled when I heard my own voice—not just an internal whisper, but clear and resonant. It was charged with emotion, something I rarely feel. Normally, even when I speak in my mind, my voice sounds flat, almost mechanical. My conversations are usually telepathic, and while I can convey some emotion that way, hearing my own voice dripping with such raw intensity was something entirely new.