Legend Reborn

Chapter 17: Oblivion

The first thing I notice is that the pain is gone. The second thing is the ground is really hard. I slowly open my eyes, expecting to be blinded by sunlight, but nothing of the sort happens. The ground is neither cool nor warm under my cheek, and it takes me a moment to realize I'm lying on my stomach instead of my side. My vision is slightly blurry, but I can definitely tell this is not the same place I was when I passed out.

"Gilbert? Kiku? Feli?" I call out in a rough voice. There's no response, and I push myself up to look around. "Ludwig? Lovino?"

I'm met with an ominous silence. I swivel my head around to try to get my bearings. This definitely doesn't look like Wolf Territory. To my left the land looks like a broken mess of stone and large masses of earth. It's like a mountain crumbled to pieces, and this is the left over debris. To my right there's a beach made of gray sand. It meets the largest body of water I've ever seen in my life. The word "ocean" comes to mind, but I've never seen one before since they're just a rumor in Elarium. I imagine this is what it would look like though.

I carefully stand up and brush the dust and off of my clothes. The broken land doesn't look promising, so I walk toward the shoreline. Everything is different shades of black and gray, including the water that noiselessly laps at the shore. There's no noticeable source of light in the dreary, gray sky, which makes the whole landscape seem like it's made of shadows, but not at the same time. Silent shadows that could be hiding anything.

My body involuntarily shivers, not from cold, but the eeriness of this place. How had I gotten here? The last thing I remember was Gilbert trying to talk to me and throbbing pain. Horrible, unbearable pain. At least nothing hurts here, but there's not a lot of other feeling happening here either. It's not hot or cold, bright or dark, happy or sad. This place just is.

Standing around isn't going to do me any good, so I start walking down the beach. I can feel the sand shifting beneath my feet, but it doesn't make a sound. The only thing I can hear is the sound of my own breathing, which is beginning to drive me a little crazy. I pause to look around again, but it's as if I haven't moved at all. The landscape looks exactly the same as before, and I wonder if I really have made any progress or not.

"What is this place?" I murmur to myself. Even though it was hardly more than a whisper, my voice rings out loudly.

"This is my home," a voice from behind me answers.

I whirl around to see a shadowy, cloaked figure sitting on some of the rubble that's behind the beach. He seems too far away to have sounded so close, but nothing seems to work here the way it should. I jog over to the figure, and my eyes widen when I realize it's Kirkland sitting on a broken rock with a large grin on his shadowy face.

"Welcome to Oblivion," he says in a mocking way. "Make yourself at home because you won't be leaving for quite some time, I assure you."

"How did I get here?" I ask him tersely. "What is this place, exactly?"

"You're here because I brought you here," he replies with a smirk. "At least your mind is here. I'm not strong enough to bring your body here.....yet." He practically spits the last word at me. "And here is where I've spent most of my existence. It's a kind of netherworld. A world that isn't."

Kirkland hops of his rock and begins to circle around me. His eyes stare into me as if he's trying to pick out every weakness and flaw in my soul. He reaches out a hand and trails his fingers along my face. I flinch at the coldness of his touch. His fingers are cool like a place that has always been in shadows, somewhere never touched by the warming rays of the sun.

"This is the awful place where people like me have been doomed to stay for the rest of eternity. People who have committed some horrible treason against the goddesses. There is nothing here. There is no warmth, but there is no cold. No happiness, but no sadness. No hunger, but no contentment."