Hidden Lineages

Today was a really hectic day; a lot had happened, and Vaelen wasn't going to forget this day for his entire life, maybe.

He got out of the pod and jumped onto his bed. He was excited for tomorrow; getting an access card to visit outside the city was his dream for a very long time.

He fell asleep while thinking about it...

...

"Is it already morning?"

Vaelen looked around, confused, but he knew it wasn't morning as he would have woken up on his bed rather than on a circular platform.

He knew it was a dream, but that was even more disturbing as he was conscious in his own dream right now.

Thinking about it was a little disturbing, to say the least. He looked around and saw that there was nothing; even the sky looked totally black, like it wanted to swallow him right now.

After hesitating a little, he moved to the edge of the platform, which seemed to be a pillar.

When he came to the edge, he looked down and felt trepidation, staring at what could only be described as an abyss. He didn't know how far the ground was from this pillar, but he was sure it was extremely far below.

Only darkness could be seen, and it felt like he could actually see the darkness itself. The most intimidating part was that he felt like the darkness was seeing him too.

His back was covered in sweat, even in the dream. Inwardly, he knew it wasn't just a dream.

Just as he thought nothing could get worse, he saw something that made him almost move away from the edge.

Tendrils—tendrils made up of darkness. The reason he could even see them in this absolute darkness was because of the color of the pillar, which wasn't pure black, and those tendrils were attached to it.

The reason he felt fear was because he could definitely see them moving, and right now, they were moving up slowly.

He gulped a mouthful of saliva and thought to wake up, but what could he do to wake up? Hit himself? Why not.

He pinched himself and really felt pain, but nothing happened. It was like he was present in reality instead of on a pillar.

Fuck, what the hell is this? He couldn't help but curse at this shitty dream, if it was one at all.

He looked back at the tendrils, but just as he did, it gave him another shock of his life.

They were far below and moving quite slowly before, but right now, their speed had increased tremendously, like they sensed something and were trying to reach up as quickly as possible.

They looked like slithering black snakes. He instinctively moved back but suddenly forced himself to stop.

No matter where he went, he couldn't leave this pillar, and since those tendrils were climbing on this pillar—would it even matter if he stood on the edge?

This whole situation was more or less hypothetical. If it was a dream, then how could he be conscious? And if it was real, then who the fuck kidnapped him from the Tenebran house? Was that even possible?

Vaelen gritted his teeth, but inwardly he knew he hadn't been kidnapped. It was definitely a type of dream where his consciousness was totally awake. The reason was the darkness present around him; he didn't know why he felt a little familiarity here.

Vaelen was afraid, no doubt, but only because everything looked and felt intensely creepy.

Just as he was thinking about it, he saw that the tendrils had arrived at the edge of the pillar. Even though he was adamant about not being afraid, he still moved to the middle of the pillar.

The tendrils of darkness climbed the pillar and started coming toward him. They were dark, exceptionally dark in fact, but there was a little shine in them, the shine of darkness maybe, although it sounded a little absurd.

They came almost close to Vaelen's feet, but since he couldn't go anywhere, he just stood there and watched.

To his surprise, the tendrils started revolving around him but didn't touch him. As time passed, the circle formed by the tendrils grew even bigger than him.

Vaelen was now trapped inside a pillar formed by tendrils—what an irony. He was standing on the pillar, and now he was also trapped in a pillar.

He just sighed. What was going to happen, he didn't know. He just hoped that this realistic dream would end quickly. He felt it had something to do with his element.

Maybe this was what it meant that he was darkness himself. When his element was agitated, he felt it too, like his own agitation, like it was totally his other self.

Suddenly, he saw that the pillar he was trapped in was closing in. Now he really didn't feel afraid much, since it was his other part. What harm could it do?

Well, that's what he thought before the pillar closed in, covering him fully. The tendrils entered his mouth, nose, ears, and even eyes.

He couldn't even scream from the intense pain he was feeling right now. It was too much; he felt that his whole body was being torn internally. He couldn't even breathe right now. The tendrils lifted him up while entering his body.

It was too much. Feeling your body being torn from the inside out wasn't something anyone would want to feel. Just as Vaelen thought he would pass out, his eyes opened.

This time in his bedroom. Since his mouth wasn't filled with tendrils and he was still feeling the pain from earlier, he opened his mouth and was about to scream when he stopped himself with sheer will, realizing he was out of that dreadful dream.

He took a deep breath, and just as he was about to stand up, his eyes went to his hands. Vaelen's eyes widened looking at them; they were covered in the black tendrils he had seen in his realistic dream just now.

They weren't in the form of tendrils, though. It was more like a thin armor that had covered his hands.

Vaelen didn't even feel if something was covering his hands; it was like this armor was his own skin.

Vaelen immediately stood up and went in front of the mirror to look at himself.

And when he saw himself, he couldn't help but think that it was quite an interesting look.

His clothes were still there, but his skin was covered in dark obsidian armor. It was covering him from his neck to his legs, and his head had a slim floating crown with small spikes on it.

His pupils were totally dark with a similar shine he had seen on the dark tendrils.

The armor looked quite enigmatic. There were some tendrils that came out occasionally, making it seem like it was alive.

It was, in fact. There was no doubt about it.

But in the end, what the hell was this? This was something he really didn't know anything about. There was no information about it.

Vaelen could only think of one thing that made him different from others: 100% affinity.

Come to think of it, weren't people with 100% affinity called Sovereigns? So it wasn't just some kind of title but an ability?

Because it definitely looked like an ability. He could definitely feel his essence draining right now. It wasn't much, but it might be because he wasn't doing anything.

He could also feel that his strength was definitely quite higher than his previous strength when he used essence to fortify himself.

Right now, he was feeling too much strength inside himself, but how should he stop it? Because he didn't have much essence since he had just awakened recently, and it was already reaching zero.

There was a reason why newly awakened individuals weren't able to use any abilities: their essence was too low to use them.

Abilities were nothing but the manipulation of your element in an efficient way. So this was where affinity mattered the most; the higher it was, the easier it was for you to manipulate your element.

And every Hidden Lineage had developed a set of abilities that were perfect for their element. The knowledge of it came from the meteor too; it was like that meteor was a legacy stone or something.

Well, nowadays there were a lot more abilities in the market. Most people created them in a parallel world after experimenting and sold them if they wanted to.

There were basically two types of abilities in the market. The first were those that were restrained and could only manifest if executed perfectly, like using the exact amount of essence and manipulating it the way it was described in the skill. The second were unrestrained; these skills could get as strong as they could as long as you could provide the essence required for them.

So unrestrained skills were the most sought after, and all the main skills of Hidden Lineages were unrestrained, with only a few restrained ones they had developed by themselves for some specific purposes.

Just as he was thinking, he felt his head hurt as his essence was fully drained, and when that happened, his armor went away.

He wasn't able remove by himself but it only went away when his essence become zero, which was also expected, though, as he hadn't even started his elemental manipulation training.