Chapter 114: Apocalypse (Part 1)
Rahz woke up from a very strange dream, in the dream he had being Level 19 and was taking a test in a temple in a far away land. The whole thing was surreal, the air, the temperature, everything felt like he was there, it was the kind of dream that blur reality. Rahz felt like he had slept comfortably all night, he looked around and went near some bushes to take a piss. Out of the corner of his eyes, Rahz spotted some bushes moving and the whole thing seem like he had seen it before. The feeling was ratified as an 8 ft Artic Bear stood on his back legs.
ROAR!!!
The bear started running towards Rahz, it was similar to an stampede that made the earth shake. The momentum generated by the bear was suffocating but somehow he was not worry, he activated strengthen defense and held to his axe in front of him for dear life. The Arctic Bear rammed into Rahz and send him flying about 10 feet. It was a completely different result of what he was expecting due to all the experience he had acquired through the years of constant struggled in the dream where he had seen this exact scene before but which life was the real one and which one was the dream. Rahz was confused by the whole situation, was he a Level 19 reverting back to when he was 5 years old or was he a 5 year old that had dreamt a whole different live. The thought stop as he was knock back by the bear and realize that the first thing he had to do was to survive.
The bear quickly close the distance giving Rahz no time to react, He breathed in a horrible stench as he saw the giant jaws of the bear coming towards his face. Rahz reacted quickly and strengthen his right arm and lodged it between the bear jaws. Rahz felt a crushing pain and remembered that it was almost exactly as it had been in his dream which was extremely weird.
Rahz desperately looked around hoping to see something that could help him. A few feet away a shiny object called his attention. He couldn't tell what it was at first glance but after a couple of seconds he realized that it was his Axe. Through great effort, Rahz rolled his body and try to grab it while the bear continued to bite his leg and clawed his back.
Rahz extended his fingers to his utmost and finally got a hold of Mr. Choppy. He was covered in his own blood but the endorphins had kicked in and he was starting to feel no pain.
Using all the strength he could mustard, Rahz turn his body and activated devastating blow, he swung Mr Choppy and hit the bear on the neck with all his might.
Rawr!!!
The bear howl due to the pain. Reflexibly, it activated his ability swipe and hit Rahz across the stomach. The impact sent Rahz flying 15 ft back and he landed on the ground with 3 big wounds across his abdomen.
Rahz saw it in his dream, this was the part when he awoke the amazing power that allowed him to go toe to toe with the bear.
"Hmmm. Come on!! where is it?"
The Bear filled himself with confidence once more and attacked Rahz using Rush followed by a double swipe using his front paws in a crisscross fashion. Rahz saw the claws coming his way but was powerless to do anything about it. One of the claws ripped a piece of his neck and as blood started spurting out and Rahz was on his last breath ….
Gasp!!
He woke up once more but this time he was in the body of his 10 year old self and had finished unleashing his Bloodlust after his father had detonated himself to take down the rest of the Level 20's invading his village. Rahz looked around and everything was like he lived it before except this time his dad fail to kill all the second evolutions that now where attacking his mother.
In his bloodlust state Rahz attacked to help his mother but the difference in levels was too vast and he was cut down like he was just an ant, in his last breath he screamed MOTHER NOOO!!!
Rahz woke up yet again and he was in the third floor of the Fifth Gate and the fight against Lord Darick was reaching his climax. Rahz activated all his buffs and he remembered it was his last clash against Darick where he was defeated but he had been able to give Elune and the others enough time to complete the cube.
This time the fight was different, Darick use his polearm to impale Rahz in all the vital areas and even crush his Axe before using the polearm as a Javelin and tossing it towards Elune that didn't manage to dodge in time before it went through her heart. The little that he could see before he faded away was a complete slaughter.
Rahz consciousness faded from the fifth gate and when he reopened his eyes, he was in the Abyss and he knew exactly what event he was experiencing for the second time. It was their confrontation with Xyra. Rahz tried his best to buy as much time for their savior to appear and save them but this time it never came. Rahz saw his best friend converted into a river of blood and store like a thing in a crystal base he knew all too well. It was similar to the one that he had drank from when he had a taste of the Dragonkin blood. It was the first time in all the scenes that he felt weak and powerless and it was clear to him that he shouldn't be alive if what he was experiencing was a dream and he in fact was taking the test in the hidden room of the temple.
Rahz consciousness was fading away once more but this time he was materializing in the hidden test room as the magic rune was fading away.
"I can't believe I was so weak all along, I remembered asking Fadall for the strength to be the strongest in the world but when did I started to settle, if I had a chance I would try even harder to be the strongest" Rahz felt this from the bottom of his heart.
Rahz consciousness was returning back into reality but a phenomenon happened in the Hidden Test Room as the magic circle lit up in response to Rahz sentiment and he disappeared from reality and reappeared in his 5 year old body again.
It was the same event against the bear but this time Rahz was ready, instead of taking the first hit he did a side rolled to avoid the charged of the Bear but every time he swung his axe it was stop by a claw attack or the tough hide of the Bear that was 2 levels higher than him. The fight lasted longer than before but he was still defeated.
He woke up in the next memory and finally had a taste of progress and lasted 7 hits instead of the one hit K.O of before. The drive to be the strongest that had been shelf at some point when he started surviving things by luck started resurfacing, it was the dream he had when he was a child and prayed to the Gods to give him some help to achieve it.
Rahz remembered that his desired to be powerful got renewed when the village lost people to the adventurer group and the desire to be their protector pushed him to train like a maniac. All his training paid off and he was able to beat evolved fighters as a Level 9.
Rahz went through all the events of the test once more and the frustrations of being weak in a world where strength was king came back to him like a tide in the sea and he realize there and then how feeble he was.
He finished his second loop and instead of lying quietly into that good night, he thought 'lets go again'. The loop started again and Rahz felt the answer to his question get closer and closer. When was it? When did he lose the Drive for strength? He said that was what he wanted but did he really strive for it? The answer was no, he had stopped after his First Evolution when by magic the God of War had made him a powerful first evolution warrior on a whim.
The feeling of power he felt just by standing there and receiving it from Fadall planted a demon that grew with every success and not even his dad's beating the same day, took the seed away. The success in the underground arena beating a level 12 made it grow, the war against the Orcs fed it more when he was the star of the show as his manic state send many enemies to their graves.
The Illusion of power continued to grow during the war when he caused a second evolution chief to apologize and beg for forgiveness.
In the third event against Lord Darick he had fought more or less toe to toe and it was his effort that help them achieve victory and against Xyra he had held his own to stop her from taking his best friend, and now that he was in the temple and everything had gone his way, he was on cloud nine thinking he was strong.
The test was different, all the events that happened in the test had a little twist that altered the complete outcome and showed him how lucky and weak he really was. All the events in the test had a minor change to them except for the first one, that one was exactly the same so the question was what made it different from the others?
Rahz was beaten down time and time again in every iteration of the test but what was getting grind into non existence was his Ego, the one that had rooted deeply in his heart and told him that he was strong when he wasn't.
On the hundreth iteration he wanted power so bad and he felt so weak that the emotions he felt that day resurface and he finally triggered it, his first Blood for Blood but this time he finally understood why he had done it and most of all he did it without the help of no Chaos Runes, of no Amorphous Titan, no Iron Axe, the first blood for blood was the Unlocking of the Elysian Potential.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
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