71 Sundering Seals: Illusions

To be honest, Jason's Dad, or in essence my father from my old life is the only father I had an impression of.From what I heard, I lost my father at a young age, forcing me to take control of the Cor family when I was still a little more than just a child. But all that pales in comparison to the fact that the only memories of a father that I have, are his, Jason's.

He looked really pale, and his blond hair was ragged, and plastered to his forehead with sweat and his breathing was labored, as if he had struggled to get here. But his eyes, were empty, literally, all that there was to it, was blackness, pure endless holes of black nothingness. And that's when the whispers started, they were soft at first, but they increasingly vivid and somewhat irritating.

"you're a failure. Why weren't you strong enough, I am so ashamed of you."

[Seriously, do you think wearing my father's face and telling me I'm a failure would make me whine and clutch my head like a baby while I go through a veritable mental torture. Dude come on, that's the most generic and overused trope in action movies. Facing inner demons my ass.]

Funny thing about Jason's angry tirade, was that he had said everything I wanted too, word for word, every syllable down to every crossed T and every dotted I. It was as if I was the one talking instead, and I was weirded out by the fact that I actually didn't find it strange. Truly Jason was more than just a simple part of me, he was me.

The soul beast in front of me disappeared, fading into black smoke like it was never there in the first place, leaving me surprised by the sudden turn of events.

[Seriously? Is that all you got?]

"maybe you shouldn't jinx our...…. ARGHHHH!"

I fell down to my knees clutching my calf as a giant earth worm tried to bore a hole through it. This was the single most terrifying thing I've ever experienced.

The feeling of something trying to get into your body, was not pleasant. I grabbed the earth worm, and started puling it out of my leg as it wiggled it's fleshy body in my hand. But there was no end to it, I kept pulling and pulling, screaming in pain with each pull, but the worm had no end.

I created a sword, and sliced the earthworm in half, but that was a mistake, as the remaining half slid into my leg and began to crawl all over the inside of my body. I could feel it beneath my skin, crawling, nibbling, searching. I had to get it out, I needed to get rid of it!.

I took my sword and stabbed my thigh, hoping to kill the worm, but it had rapidly shifted position and moved to the back of my thigh then proceeded to crawl up my back before shifting position to my chest. I could see the bulge of its figure underneath my skin, it was like having and extra large vein that was moving around. And then it bit me.

"GARRRGHHHHHHHH HAAASRRRRGGGGGG"

It was going deeper, trying to bore a hole towards my heart. It was going to kill me. I pulled my sword out of my thigh, and faced it towards my chest. I was going to stop it before it got to me, I'm going to kill this infernal creature. I pulled the blade towards my chest, but before it could pierce my body, I felt my hand stop, refusing to go any further, as if I no longer had any control over my body.

[Kael stop!, it's all an illusion. It's in your head!]

"What?"

[Snap out of it, or you're going to kill yourself. Think of Asha and your baby. What you're seeing now is all a LIE!]

I looked down at my chest, and saw the image of the worm underneath my skin fade in and out of focus. It was as if my perception of reality was flawed and I was seeing things. An illusion, there was no pain, no worm, it was just me about to shove a sword through my own heart. I took a deep breath, and closed my eye,and when I opened them, I was still surrounded by golden spikes. But the soul beast I thought had disappeared was still in front of me, only this time it was no longer wearing my father's face.

It had pitch black eyes that were much too big for it's human head, with those eyes of his taking half of his face. He had no nose, but his mouth...….well I wouldn't call it a mouth in a normal sense. The worm that I had just seen crawl into my body was hanging out of it's mouth, like it was planted there.

Only difference is that the worm was there with it's two hundred and fifty brothers and sisters, give or take a few dozen worms. I shuddered and took a step back, what the hell was this thing?

It's very look alone was so eerie that every second I spent looking at it, my blood grew colder, but boiled harder at the same time. I took a step backward.

[Go forward! You have to get closer to kill it or it will keep throwing illusions at you until you tear yourself apart!]

I heard Jason shout in my head. But seriously, I was trying to get away from this monster, and he was telling me to go towards it. I was really reluctant, but if this was the only way, then I guess I had no choice. I took three steps forward, and all of a sudden everything became cold. There was a chill so deep I could see my breath fog In front of my face and my skin had a layer frost over it.

Then I felt my leg get stuck, I looked down to see a sort of wavy and syrup like liquid clinging to my feet, and slowly creeping upwards. It was a struggle to keep moving forward with the liquid hindering me, but what was worse is the fact that the liquid was the source of the cold. My teeth began to chatter and clack together as I held my hands to my body and took another two steps forward.

I stumbled, and. Realized that the liquid was no longer climbing up my body, instead it could be said that I was the one sinking. It was as if I was in quick sand, and I could see solid ground just a few feet away from me. I began to struggle, trying to take more steps forward, but my footing couldn't find a stable ground to find traction on. With every step I struggled to make, I sunk deeper and faster, and the other end of this pond of thick honey like liquid seemed to be getting farther and farther away from me.

In seconds I was submerged and drowning, I couldn't breathe, and it was hard to move in a liquid this thick, my hands ached, and my lungs burned for air, as my heart began to pound intensely. Fear, terror, horror, they all came at me at once, taking on a physical form as they tried to drag me deeper. They had no faces, but they were all wearing suits and had a sort of bony figure as their skins seemed stretched tight over their bones.

They were practically skeletons, with a blank white space for a face,they each grabbed a hold of my two legs and my waist, trying to drag me down into the thick liquid, pulling with all of their strength, and taking me deeper into the depths of despair as freedom and light was taken away from me.

[Kael Fight Harder!,you have to think of Asha!, I have to think of what I'm fighting for.]

At some point, it was no longer Jason talking to me, but it was me giving myself advice. I couldn't hear him anymore, all I could hear was myself. My voice, just me. Not Jason, Just Kael. Kael who was Jason, but was now Kael. Something had happened, but I had no idea what, but I was filled with a determination to fight harder, to do the right thing, and to do it not just for myself, but for the people who were depending on me. I had to fight.

I reached out for the light that was gradually becoming nothing but a speck in the distance, then I pulled myself up, away from the grasps of faceless terrors, and out of the pond. The moment I was on solid ground, I started coughing as if I was trying to expunge the liquid I had inadvertently swallowed as I was drowning, but nothing was coming out, only problem was that the cough was getting harder and more intense.

I looked up to see the soul beast standing almost five meters away from me, a whole lot closer than before. I felt the cough wrack and shake my entire body as I took my eyes away from the soul beast. I coughed harder, putting my hands to my mouth until they came away covered in a black substance that was filled with maggots.

My eye widened In shock as another cough came flying out of me, carrying along more of the black colored substance with maggots in it. I felt as if someone was pulling at my insides, and that thousands of those maggots were moving within me, causing all sort of damage to my body.

I leaned to the left, and my shoulder brushed one of the golden crystal spikes, sending white hot pain through me as I felt as if someone had shoved a thousand red hot needles into my body.

I pulled back and stumbled to the ground, only to discover that I was no longer standing on the ground, but right in the middle of a nest of snakes, the very worst of their kind, all clustered together and hissing and writhing. I hate snakes, even when I was still alive on earth, it was the one thing I couldn't conquer.

However that's the mistake the soul beast made. There was nothing I was more scared of than snakes, but my fear did not make me feel the need to take to my heels and run like the entire legions of hell were after me.

On the contrary, it instilled a very human response in me. Attack what you're afraid off, even if you don't understand it. As long as your afraid, just fight it. I got angry, really angry as I felt my rage suffuse and ignite within my body. Then I began to take sure steps forward, completely ignoring the snakes that struck at my body from below.

I could feel them crawl over me, all the way to my face, and even bite my neck, but I was not stopping, even with how weak I was beginning to feel. Thirty seconds later I was two feet away from the soul beast, sword in hand, and a snake trying to drill into my ear.The beast looked at me and shrieked.

"SHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

"SHING!"

And off went it's head. Almost immediately, everything else dispersed. There was no snakes, no worms, and I could see the soul beast burst into a fog of bright golden soul energy that flowed into my body. It was a wonder how a regal and bright looking soul energy like this, would spawn a soul beast of such a caliber, it was completely polarizing.

I took a deep breath, and tried to reorient my self, I was still feeling rather shaken by my previous ordeal. Just like Earth had said, I have experienced quite a lot of surprises.

I heard scratching and shuffling of feet just in time for me to look up and see a sight that left a pit in my stomach.

"Are you freaking kidding me! What the hell!"

The soul beast that I had just struggled to get rid of was back, well not it exactly but another one just like it. And there was about a thousand, ha! Hehehe this day really was full of surprises.

"I'm going to die aren't I."