Chaos I

The metallic smell of blood filled the air. A sweet, warm breeze caressed Iwao’s face and carried the scent straight into his nostrils, making him cough and wrinkle them.

He opened his eyes with difficulty. The place around him was pure white, as bright as it could be. Pools of blood and stains spread here and there. Confusion clouded Iwao’s face as he glanced around, unable to tell what was up or down.

“Where am I? Just seconds ago I was… attached to that cross…” He thought as he walked – or floated – through this strange place.

There was nothing in this void. He passed the pools of blood, tried to look into the distance, but there was only emptiness.

“Am I doomed to wander here forever? This can't be... I must save them.” He clutched the pendant around his neck tightly and brushed his fingers against the stones between his horns.

He turned round and round. Each time, some bloodstains vanished while new ones appeared – larger or smaller, fouler or fainter – pushing him closer to vomiting.

“If I’m trapped here, maybe immense power could break it… but Lo isn’t here, and I don’t know how to activate these artifacts myself…”

He tried casting as many spells as he could – fireballs, thunder bursts, and even more – but nothing worked. None of his spells touched anything solid. They just flew off into the void.

“Well… I can’t do anything else… Think, Iwao. You’re clever. Analyze the situation and find a good idea.”

As Iwao struggled to think, he didn’t notice the voices beginning to echo around him.

“Iwao!”

“Come here!”

“Iwao! Iwao!”

“Come see it while you can!”

These different voices repeated endlessly until his ears tickled every time his name was spoken. He regained consciousness of his surroundings. Panic set in. He looked everywhere, trying to find the source, but the voices came from all directions.

When he looked at one of the pools of blood, he saw it bubbling like boiling water, the stench growing unbearable. Yet Iwao walked toward it, drawn by the sound of his name, unable to control his movements – as if possessed.

He leaned over the pool, unable to touch it, staring into its opaque surface.

“Dive in!” A voice shouted from the blood.

Iwao obeyed without hesitation. He stepped onto the pool and sank into it, though he hadn’t been able to touch anything earlier.

He neither spoke nor thought. He simply obeyed, doing as the voice commanded. His eyes were vacant – the eyes of someone no longer in control of his body.

Within the blood, a voice struck him. A familiar voice. His own.

“Don’t look too long, or he will come. Seize this opportunity to tip the scales.”

A tornado rose within the blood pool – a whirlwind that spun Iwao. Then, total blackout.

When he woke up and regained his senses, he remembered what just happened.

He was now near a small village at night. People walked everywhere, some passing right by him.

But none of them saw him.

He hadn’t activated his invisibility.

And yet, he was invisible to their eyes.

******************************

The village bustled despite the late hour. Shops glowed, their products lit along the main avenue. The noise made all voices indistinguishable.

People passed by, carrying children or bags overflowing with goods. They all seemed happy.

Iwao walked through this lively street, quietly enjoying the sight of a world he could watch unseen.

“I don’t know why I’m here but… the atmosphere is pleasant. Maybe it would be – No! Don’t lose your mind, Iwao! Think! Think harder! How do I get back to Saya and Celi?”

He stopped at each shop and house along his way, straining his ears for conversations.

“I need to gather more information about where I am, and how I can get out of here…”

As he approached another house where two men were talking outside, children’s screams suddenly rang out from every direction. Panic spread. Everyone rushed into their homes and locked the doors.

Iwao stood alone in the deserted street, the cries echoing. A woman’s voice called out.

“How many children disappeared tonight?” She shouted.

Three people answered from their houses: four children were gone.

“Disappeared? I can find them!” Iwao thought, starting down the main street.

The ground shook. Claws scraped closer. The children’s cries fell silent.

Iwao was the only one to saw what was approaching.

Himself.

Or rather, the creature he had always feared, walking toward him, carrying bones of all sizes in its hands.

“The children…”

He stared at it intently.

“Even without the artifacts, it still looks exactly like me…” He thought, terrified.

He waited, rooted to the spot, unable to move. The creature walked slowly, chuckling, and passed him without looking.

“Wait! Stop here! You have things to tell me! And more importantly… why did you kill these children? Answer me!” He shouted, determination pushing past his fear.

But the creature continued on, ignoring him. Rage replaced Iwao’s fear at being dismissed by what he dreaded most.

“This isn’t normal… Where am I really…?”

He stopped, staring at the ground. Light flickered in his eyes.

“If it can’t see or hear me… If no one can see me… then all of this must be… memories. Its memories. It would make sense after what happened... I should follow it while I can, until I find a way out.”

For two days, Iwao followed the creature, but nothing of interest happened. It walked at night and slept by day in trees or caves. Animals and monsters fled at the sight of it, terrified by its aura and dreadful smile.

Nothing else happened. Iwao just stayed awake, night and day, near this creature that was only a memory, keeping a constant watch on where it might go.

“I’m completely independent in these memories. Normally, I’d just be tied to its body, since these are its memories. But it’s not like that. I must keep following. I feel strange and scared near it – less than before but… seeing it, and what I look like… it terrifies me…” He thought, leaning against a tree and staring at the creature sleeping above as the suns sank in the sky.

As night crept in, the creature woke instantly and dropped from the tree, landing on its feet. It laughed with a chilling smile, sending a shiver down Iwao’s spine.

The creature whistled as it walked into a forest. The tune was not joyful – just four notes that sent terror through Iwao.

At the edge of the forest, they reached a silent village – no one was outside. The atmosphere was nothing like the previous one.

“Will it do this again tonight? Is this how it fed every time? If only this weren’t a memory… I could have stopped it…”

As soon as they entered the village, the creature disappeared. Iwao searched, but found nothing.

A few seconds later, it reappeared in front of a house. Cries erupted, lights flicked on, parents shouted.

“It...it just slipped into a nightmare in the blink of an eye?” Iwao thought, horrified.

He ran toward it, but the creature vanished again. Seconds later, it appeared again in front of another house. More cries. More panic. Again and again, until most of the village was lit, filled with screams.

Iwao stood in the center of the village, spinning, searching everywhere.

“It’s too fast! I can’t keep up. Where is it? Where will it go? Where? Where? I must see! What is it doing in those nightmares to make the children suffer?” He thought, frantic, stumbling in circles.

Chaos reigned. Iwao clutched his ears as the screams rang so loud that blood spilled from them.

“Please, stop these screams! Please! I must escape these memories! I must fight those brown-robed people who trapped us! And Urui – if he touched Celi and Saya – he’ll pay! I will… I will…”

His thoughts were cut short when he saw the creature right in front of him, standing still, laughing with the terrible smile he once wore.

Iwao examined it carefully.

“No bones, no bodies… so… no children to eat tonight?”

The creature cleared its throat and rose into the air, floating a few meters above the ground. It raised its head and spat a huge blue fireball. Purple energy swirled within it.

Iwao braced himself reflexively, covering his head. The creature hurled the fireball down. But it didn’t explode.

Iwao peeked up. The fireball rested there, unmoving.

Nothing moved. Screams ceased. Wind halted. Clouds stopped their race in the sky. There was nothing.

“What is thi-”

The world rewound, rolling back slightly before despairing forward again.

When time resumed, flames engulfed everything. Houses burned. Bodies charred. Survivors wept.

“What happened? Did the memories glitch before resuming after the attack?” Iwao thought, fear and sadness twisting his face.

The few survivors glared at the sky, rage in their eyes.

“You killer! You’ll die one day! The Nightmare Eater will die!”

“You’ll pay for this, Nightmare Eater.”

“What you did will never be forgotten!”

Their shouts of vengeance rained down on the creature, who laughed in reply. It pointed at them one by one, firing lasers from its fingers to kill them.

It laughed once more before descending to the ground and walking away.

Iwao remained, untouched by the flames, surrounded by the last survivors screaming as they burned alive, the stench of charred bodies filling his nose.

“I know this smell… it’s not new. It’s... familiar…” He thought, wide-eyed, lost, as the village burned around him.

Suddenly, as chaos reigned all around him, everything stopped, just like before.

Then, still in shock, a total blackout.

******************************

As soon as Iwao opened his eyes again, he found himself in the middle of a battlefield – an immense battlefield. Screams, roars, blood, flames, corpses, swords, armor, horses, strange creatures, spells cast everywhere. Everything was chaos. To his right, chaos. To his left, chaos.

Soldiers kept dying, yet it was as if their number never diminished. More and more continued to join the battle.

“War… This is war! What’s that supposed to mean?!” Iwao thought, as swords passed through his body as though he didn’t exist as a physical entity.

War raged.

Despair.

Death.

Chaos.

Chaos everywhere.

Chaos filled Iwao’s head as he turned in every direction, noting all that was happening before him.

He staggered, clutching his head that ached as he stumbled in circles. When everything suddenly calmed, he glanced over his shoulder, startled by a scream from behind.

“I don’t recognize this blazon... nor any of the others on these soldiers’ armors. What is this war? Which armies are fighting each other?”

A soldier stood before him, atop a pile of corpses. He raised his arms high, sword dripping in blood, striking a victory pose while roaring loudly for all to hear.

He laughed. Nobody attacked him, since everyone else was occupied with enemies trying to take their lives.

A sudden gust of wind struck the ground, powerful enough to force the soldiers back.

Then came an explosion. A destructive blast of fire erupted in every direction, flinging the nearby soldiers away. None of them were fatally harmed, but none were left in one piece either.

When the flames died down and the dirt settled, Iwao looked back at where the soldier had stood only seconds before.

Nothing was left – only a wisp of smoke rising in the air. He had been at the center of the explosion.

“It was… as if the explosion had been aimed at him, to eliminate the strong ones…” Iwao thought, edging uncertainly toward the spot.

A laugh echoed above the battlefield, tickling Iwao’s ears.

“This laugh… I know it…” He thought, raising his head quickly toward the sound.

The creature was hovering above, smoke rising from its hands. Everyone could see it, yet no one seemed to care. They all kept fighting as if nothing had happened.

“It cast that explosion… but why? Why does it take part in this war, and why is nobody reacting?!” Iwao thought, screaming inside his mind.

The creature began preparing another spell – the same blue fireball it had unleashed on the village – laughing endlessly with wicked glee.

Iwao opened his mouth, ready to shout in a desperate attempt. But at that exact moment, the ground shook violently. Soldiers froze mid-fight, all turning toward the same direction.

A man approached – heavily muscled, with a thick beard, short dark hair, and clad in massive armor without a helmet. Iwao’s eyes locked onto him.

“This blazon… It belongs to the Polmo Kingdom. And those little stars on it… It’s… the king of the Polmo Kingdom!” Iwao thought, shocked by the realization.

“Nightmare Eater! You’ve finally come! This battlefield will be your last! I know how to kill you!” The king shouted, enraged.

The creature didn’t reply. It only charged its spell further, preparing to hurl it at the king.

“You will pay for everything you’ve done on Aruniol! For those you’ve slaughtered, for the wars you’ve unleashed. A monster like you should not exist! I’ll send you back into nothingness!” The king roared, his voice heavy with fury.

Iwao stood there, staring like the others. All eyes were on the immense man approaching the creature, as the fireball swelled ever larger.

A flicker of realization lit Iwao’s eyes.

“Wait...I forgot something… He said Aruniol! And he’s the king of the Polmo Kingdom... the previous king maybe… wait… wait… The creature came from Aruniol? Urui’s words and how he seemed to know things I didn’t… A war this massive… it must be an Annihilation War… I was so shocked, so overwhelmed by everything that I saw, that I didn’t realize. I’m inside its memories of Aruniol. I’m witnessing its past!”

He clutched his chest in agony.

“So it wasn’t a product of my imagination… this creature… it really existed… But how? How did it end up in my nightmares, in another world?” Iwao thought quickly, his eyes wide.

He raised his head as the creature hurled the massive blue fireball downward. The king leapt with all his might to meet it midair, fists clenched, magma-like energy radiating from them.

But just as the clash was about to occur, the memories glitched again.

When time resumed, soldiers lay scattered across the ground – some dead, some still alive. At the center, before Iwao’s eyes, stood the creature and the king.

Both were covered in blood. The king was laughing, while the creature coughed blood.

The king’s fist had pierced through the creature’s chest, shattering its heart.

“I WON! YOU WILL NO LONGER TERRIFY OUR PEOPLE! YOUR TERRIBLE DAYS END HERE!” The king roared with triumph.

The creature gritted its teeth at those words.

“It’s not over… I will come back one day… you’ll see… You don’t know me… I underestimated you, and I paid the price… But I’ll be back... to avenge my own death!” It rasped, panting in agony.

With its final breath, the king pulled his fist free and raised it high in victory. The few survivors applauded.

“An enemy is down! But the war isn’t over! I know I’m the only man of Polmo who came to help – but see! We will win this war!”

All the soldiers roared, cheering for the king, even though they came from other kingdoms.

“How could this be… This king was a monster too… I didn’t even get to glimpse the fight… Something must be stopping me from seeing the rest...” Iwao thought, lost in his mind.

Then he noticed a strange white aura rising from the creature’s corpse. All eyes turned toward it in shock. Iwao too stared, wide-eyes, mouth agape. The aura engulfed the body, and moments later, the corpse vanished.

The world glitched once again.

Then, another blackout.

“You had no right!” A voice shouted in the black of his mind.

“Since it died in its memories… I was thrown out…”

“These were my memories! You should never have seen them, not even a fragment!” The voice thundered again.

“This voice… it’s the creature… but this time, it’s real…”

A sudden evil laugh made Iwao’s eyes snap open.

He found himself back in his bedroom.

He was on Earth.