章節 4: Chapter 4: Going Deeper!
I was getting bored. I didn't even need to conquer cities myself anymore. I also noticed that my scouter had a handy mapping function. This thing was better than a smartphone. Having discovered the mapping feature, I went with my entourage to go spelunking. Tunnels were mapped and more cities were found and subsequently conquered.
During my downtime I taught them the finer points of art, in the form of self-portraits of yours truly and statues. Then assisted their attempts at starting large scale hydroponic farms and even helping them process minerals and goods. Other than that, I was training or dealing with the occasional show in the form of court.
I swear they caught on that I didn't know what they were saying, which made court even funnier. Like the current squidizen at my court. I think he was saying the other squidizen slept with his wife? So, I listened and somehow got his wife in, and she admitted to it. Then, then she went a step farther by bringing in a fourth squidizen to the shock of the other two… Then the accuser squidizen moshed into the accused… I think I was missing something. My scouter didn't help at all…
Regardless, it was just the normal stuff. More like watching the daily soap opera… ugh. Not a pleasant thought. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the entrance. Even with the whole squidizen kind assisting me. It just wasn't showing up. I was beginning to suspect there wasn't any deeper when a familiar face… lets go with that, showed up. They seemed familiar for some reason.
I couldn't recognize it by face, rather it was its ki. Almost instinctively I knew it was the chief from the village I had massacred. My anointed gave him wary glances as he walked to my one of many thrones erected for me in every conquered city. I checked.
He got past them with a few short burbles. He looked older, somehow. His limbs were almost too thin to hold his frame and his voice less chipper. I could sense his ki like a blazing fire. Almost as if it was burning him alive.
When he spoke, it already knew what he was going to say. His whole being here screamed that he was here for me to continue my path onward and deeper, DEEPER! I followed him, and as I went more and more anointed fell in behind me. We trudged through familiar tunnels, then at some point the tunnels changed. My scouter beeped in confusion and due to their unfortunate issue with exploding I shut it off, even handing it to one of the anointed as we kept going deeper and deeper.
The rough-cut walls swiftly gave way to purposefully carved stone. The downward path sharply cut up, and the second the chief left my sight, he disappeared. On the plateau I saw a massive gate and an equally large statue blocking it. I walked slowly, my senses tingling.
The area was massive, A giant pair of cathedra doors. No. The more I saw, the more it looked like an entrance to a massive cathedral. It was abnormally quiet. As if the sound of my own footsteps dared not echo out. When I reached the center of the football arena sized room I stopped.
The statue looked like an absurdly large squidizen. Its form bent into a kneel as it rested upon a stone sword. This was giving me boss vibes…
"You dead!?"
I yelled out over the room to break the tension. I heard a crackle, like stone breaking as the giant squidizen stood. They towered over me. It wore a simple wrap around its waste. Its beady eyes looked milky white, were they blind? They stepped, I blinked… The world froze, my heart hammered As I slammed Kaio-ken on, in the months since having hit mastery of the first level. A massive stone sword was right in front of me. The giant squidizen was already up in my grill! I burst my ki out in a burst as I forced myself back. I fired out my ki like thrusters to an engine for extra torque, launching me back into the wall of the clearing with a thunderous quake.
I tensed, waiting for it to attack again as its sword slammed into the stone below. I heard something like flowing water, but before I could find the source he moved and this time I barely caught it. I moved and narrowly dodged his blade again. It began to speed up as the sound of water in my ears slowly grew louder.
I ignored it as I got used to its rhythm and began to return attacks. I dodged swings with the barest of margins and slammed my fist into its squid face! It waved its blade with such force that the air around us formed into a small tornado. I felt like I was dancing in a tornado of blades as I dodged and continued to beat into the thing as we continued to fight.
I couldn't spare the attention to even consider using a ki blast. Luckily, I trained Kaio-ken enough to be able to use it almost regularly now. I could double up on it, but I couldn't afford the loss in precision as I adjusted to the new speed and power. Our battle scarred the ground around us as the thing swung its blade around like it was trying to swat a fly, except with the edge.
I felt like there was something missing as it continued to swing. And as I thought that I finally noticed the noise again. it had gotten almost painfully loud before it quieted down. Except, it didn't sound like rushing water anymore, instead if it weren't so damn empty in this room, I'd swear I was in a packed airport.
It was a low dull roar like the sound of people chattering all mashed together. It grew louder and louder and like a tuned radio specific syllables and words seemed to gain precedence. It was mostly just noise, which made it easy enough to block out.
"Three dollars and fifty-six cents."
Echoes, it was something so simple. So mundane. It distracted me enough that I nearly found myself bisected. I managed to recover and find myself on the backfoot as my rhythm was lost. I managed to recover it as strange words and numbers rang out.
"Hello…"
A voice spoke. A familiar voice. It echoed and froze me. The sword slammed into me, right in my armor nearly carving through it as I flew back into the wall. I felt my ribs crack. My whole body shook in pain as I swallowed blood. I didn't even focus on the creature as my body shook.
No.
I said in my mind. Trying to bury it as I went back into the fight. I fought with less margin for error, nicks and shallow cuts covering my frame as the sound of laughter and songs echoed. I ignored it pushing myself harder and harder as I forced myself to focus on anything but the voice.
Then it came, clear as day. Her voice was as if speaking into my ear. Her breath warm and tickling it.
"My dear child."
An image flashed. A pale hand. A sad smile.
"NO! NO!! NO!!!"
I screamed over and over as I redoubled my attacks. As my mother's voice echoed my mind repeatedly. I could almost feel fingers digging into my mind as I fought back with every ounce of my being. I had to kill this thing! I HAD TO!!!
I didn't care about my well-being anymore. Blasting into the thing with all I had. I hit better in every way, my body going so far as to struggle under the force of every hit. My eyes were hot. My whole body burned as I felt my ki destabilizing. The once tame ki within me beginning to revolt as I was forced to hear my mother's voice over and over again.
In the corner of my eye, I saw a group of squidizens enter thinking I was in trouble, it wasn't even conscious thought as I lashed out at them. Directly vaporizing a couple with an over strength blast that left my body aching. The creature took the chance to get another good hit onto me and nearly destroying all my armor and breaking even more ribs as I felt it grow harder to breathe.
Everything went dark.
I jerked awake panting. I called my ki and… nothing? I froze, too terrified to even allow myself to process that I had lost my power. Except I heard a familiar jingle over a familiar shit speaker. I took in my surroundings a familiar convenience store. I saw my own reflection looking back of a normal woman a decade older than I had been just moments ago.
Had I fallen asleep? I found myself thinking involuntarily. I felt odd. Almost listless. Everything was so foggy, yet so oddly clear. The jangle of the bells over the convenience store door rang as an office worker walked in. He had a suitcase and square glasses. He took his time looking through the aisles before coming to me to checkout.
He placed three soy bars down.
"Just this today."
He said with a smile and instincts kicked in as I rang him up.
"Three dollars and fifty-six cents including tax."
Those words? The man smiled as he pulled out the money.
"Say…"
He trails off as he hands it over, exact change included.
"What would you say to playing a game?"
He asked me. I looked at him and ignored his question as I barreled forward with my trained lines.
"Would you like a bag, sir?"
He chuckles.
"Sure, why not."
I got him one.
"So? How about that game?"
I sigh as I hand it over.
"What kind of game?"
"A game where you play a part, of course."
"And who decides my part?"
"You, mostly, but I get to make some rulings."
"And what would I get out of playing this game?"
He gave me a knowing look as he leaned over the counter.
"Power."
I stayed silent, looking at him like he was crazy.
"SO, what do you say- "
I felt my heart pounding. His mouth preparing to say something that I instinctively knew I couldn't let him finish. My arm moved faster than I could even process. Slamming into him and instantly waking me up as My hand slaps into the squid thing that had been just before me.
I stared in shock. The world slowed as the noise went quiet for the briefest of instants. White hot raged seared through my veins as the sound came crashing back trying to bury me under it all. I felt like a bottle cap about to explode. I felt a desire to unleash it all. All the emotion, all the fear, and all the stress.
And the answer came to me in a random word spoken as the thing redoubled its effort to dig into my mind. I wanted to scream. So, I screamed. I screamed as I screamed over and over in my head for the thing to get the FUCK OUT OF MY HEAD! Then my ki seemed to flow and before I knew it my qi grew a pitch higher. The silence held over us shattered as my voice carried and bounced along the walls seeming to amplify and strengthen as the scream extended longer and longer.
The voices spiked more like a radio rapidly switching stations as it tried to stop me from expressing every ounce of frustration and hate I had. Eventually they cut off like a radio that gave out, a small pop followed by silence. I fell to my knees as I coughed up blood and heard my own scream still echoing in my ears. I looked up and saw the dead thing lying, bleeding from the orifices in its head.
Blood dripped from my nose onto the ground. I coughed and hacked up blood as I focused on breathing. I felt something hot and sticky flowing down my neck. Blood. I could almost hear whispers in my surroundings. It became apparent as the anointed steadily flowed into the room that I had blown my ear drums, yet why was I still hearing things?
I didn't have the luxury to focus on the sensation as I felt myself nearly fall into unconsciousness. I couldn't fall unconscious. Not now. I forced myself up, powering through the pain. I ate the food they put in front of me as we slowly made it back to the nearest city. I didn't even notice when they gave me back my scouter, but before I knew it, I was on my throne and asleep.
I found myself back in the convenience store. The office worker's glasses knocked to the ground and shattered as I held my hand up. I blinked in confusion as he laughed. I was too confused to say anything as he slowly came to a stop.
"I must admit I was not expecting that response."
"I felt like you were about to say something that would piss me off."
I blurted out after he says that. He gives me a long look.
"A fair response then. I'll see you again."
He says as he begins to walk away without picking up his glasses. No… he didn't even care that I broke them.
"WAIT!"
I exclaim as I rush out from my bar. He turned to look at me, bag in hand.
"What should I call you?"
He smiled. His teeth almost gleaming in the black backdrop of the city at night.
"It's a tad cliché but call me Director."
I woke shortly after, my head pounding, my whole-body aching. I felt listless, my mother's voice echoing endlessly and yet, it lacked the sharp clarity it had before. She had died when I was young. I couldn't even remember her face, even her voice had been lost to me due to time. I only remember the warmth of her presence, and it was odd that those feelings came back with such a vengeance. Only to be violated by that squid, but still…
I could feel her presence, warming my body and soul. It was odd and it was in a way humanizing, reorienting me. I stared out at the countless squidizens and I reconsidered, or rather wondered if there had been a better way. Even now I can see the beginnings of ambition burning in those beady eyes. The moment I left what blood baths would follow?
Could I have done better for them? Could I be better? I thought that as I instinctively trained my ki control. Finding it far more fluid, even if the action of circulating it brought a pain like razors through my body. My channels were cut up, but I wasn't crippled. Even if I had been, I wanted to believe my monkey form would fix the damage to my body and I was tempted to go topside just to fix these persistent wounds.
I wouldn't though. Channeling my ki, using it to help accelerate my healing within reason. Eating food between. I could feel my body adapting better to work around my injuries and better adapting to fixing the wounds on its own. If I always took the easy way, then how could I ever be the best?
I suppose, getting into it, Rettas never had a mother figure, or even a parental unit to follow. All my memories of them were distant, no, try non-existent. A childhood being taught in a pod and then being sent to fend for myself. On return I was immediately sent on another mission with hardly any break. I expect they believed I would die, a sort of doomed agenda with no clearcut end as an excuse to ditch those lesser. She had never even seen them as she was immediately shunted through the program.
Perhaps I had been a failure, a sixteen-year-old female Saiyan with chump stats. Perhaps… Or perhaps that's just what happens when a child has no real clearcut goals. The idea of growing stronger was always in her mind, but for whom and why? No, she had a goal, but… nobody ever taught her how to achieve them. Just thrown to the wolves.
She had likely never considered those questions and instead focused on the survival aspect. Likely never considering that with enough power came freedom and the right to decide their own future. In a way, had my wish been to be stronger than anything, not for the sake of power exactly, but for the sake of not having to do things I never wanted to? To be free to pursue whatever I wished?
Had power been my wish, truly?
There was also the Director. I had slapped him back then and now that I was reminded of him due to that creature blatantly digging into my mind it became clear. He had done what he had said. Recreated me, rebuilt me, and even given me a new purpose from the bottom up. It hadn't been a deal I had taken on the spur of the moment. Instead, it was what came from months of careful meeting and deliberations as we talked over the details. Or, so I think. I couldn't be sure memories of him were… iffy at best. Had I even made a deal with him? I wasn't sure, but a part of me thinks I shouldn't have even remembered that little factoid. Disturbing, really.
Which beggared a far more important question. Did I really exist? Had Rettas ever truly existed? Was I a Saiyan, or perhaps I just assumed I was? Or was I just an entirely new entity in the form of a Saiyan? They say if it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck can I claim as such for myself. That I had enough traits inherent to a Saiyan that I may as well call myself one?
Deeper still, would this whole life be but a dream? Am I nothing more than a piece on the board to entertain the director as he works behind the scenes to constantly push me ever onward. To what end? He had claimed he was bored, that my new existence was nothing more than a means to alleviate his boredom. Or so I remember.
Was I even real? Or am I just a figment of his imagination? My history, my life, and even my dreams, are they all just convenient excuses conjured up to give me a semblance of humanity? A tool used for an express purpose of relieving an entity's boredom.
I could go in circles all my life and never truly know. The only possible answer I had was to keep climbing, to keep stepping forward and keeping an eye out for evidence. In the meantime, it was all bullshit, and I would focus on the only thing I could. Growing stronger. There was no need to reconsider my existence so early in my new life. This was a question for when I stood high above all things and came face to face with the inevitable fate of hitting the top. Or die trying and be spared the existential nightmare that is existence.
Refocusing, I do what I can. I heal, I eat, I train… Until I can go past those doors and go even deeper. Until I finally clear this so-called stage and head to the next. Such was life. A constant march forward, to the eventual end.
每周推薦票狀態
-- 推薦票
榜單 
-- 推薦票