Chapter 7: Aura's & Curses
I was still in astonishment as I looked up at what was apparently my soul, a bloody spike ball that looked like it would perfectly fit as the head of a mace. This confused me, as I thought the soul was supposed to be a representation of the person, so how does this oversized bloody weapon represent me?
"Fucking- so, my mind shows me that I'm a lonely bitch, while my soul shows me that I'm violent at heart." I said as I looked up at my soul, while getting the bizarre feeling that it was somehow sizing me up.
"Anyways, how do I get up there? I can't really do much to it from down here, so 'tempering' it is out of the question until I fix this." While trying to figure out what to do to close the distance between me and my soul, I started to find the surrounding environment to be pretty damn boring.
"Why does my mind even need to look like this? Can't it be more pretty, like Forever Fall and the trees in it that I saw earlier?" As I uttered those words the calm ocean around me turned into a sea of blood, and trees began to rise from the waters, each one standing far taller than me.
The red skies, the dark blood ocean that surrounded me entirely, and the beautiful red leaf trees that spread as far as the eye could see. It was a perfect sea of red that only I was so blessed to see in my lifetime.
"Damn... did I do this? I mean, I know it's my mind, so I should be free to do what I want with it, but still..." This sight was something that I could never really imagine I would ever see. So, of course it would be hard for me to fully believe that just me wanting a change in scenery caused this.
"Maybe if I..." Looking back up towards my soul I envisioned a staircase leading up towards it.
After a moment, some of the trees in front of me grew and morphed into a grand staircase, the leaves decorating the railing, and the trees under my soul turning into what could only be described as an altar with my soul in the middle of it. It looked like something you would see in a fantasy novel in the middle of an elf village, or something, which made it feel sort of weird that it came from my mind.
"I... Do I actually have a decent imagination, or is this just my mind filling in the gaps from my idea?..." It was pretty hard for me to grasp why my mind seemed to be creating these things when all I did was suggest a small change, and think of a simple staircase. Was I blessed by a god of craftsmanship to have this sort of mind?
"No... I was already lucky enough to get a system, anything more than that is just wishful thinking... Maybe I just had a talent for this stuff that I never knew about..." I squashed the thought before it got out of hand, as I saw no reason for a god to show me any favor, and started to walk up the staircase that now lead up to my soul.
With each step I took up that staircase it felt like I was walking towards a door that lead to something wrong, like a memory that was meant to be forgotten, or a secret that was never meant to be revealed. Maybe it's because humans were never meant to interact with their own souls, and me doing this is like I'm spitting on every rule in the book of what should and shouldn't be possible. Though, I literally have a system that makes me stronger by causing chaos, so I guess I was going to spit on those rules sooner or later.
Halfway up the staircase the red sky above me started to shift to the starless night sky that I often found myself looking up at when the sun set. Although some would prefer the sight of all those stars up above that you could find in places with fewer lights, that black expanse in contrast with the lights of the city just felt so alluring to me. And, no matter the city, or world, I find myself in, as long as there was a lively city, that sky would always be waiting for me.
Please... someone...
But, as I was gazing up at that night sky and climbing those stairs, I froze in place when I heard those two words. Those words, although not that important, came from a voice that was all too familiar. Because it was the voice that I had when I was still in my body.
Why... won't anyone help... me?...
"How the hell?..." I didn't know why I was hearing this now, but I needed to keep going, so I started to move up the flight of stairs again, my legs now feeling ten times heavier.
With each step closer to the top of the staircase that I took, I could hear my old voice more frequently. From the cries of mine that wished for my pain to end and for someone to save me, to my screams of rage after I managed to get away from that place of pain, I heard it all. All of it, although they were all my own words, pissed me off.
I despised that version of me, that little girl was someone who was too weak to do anything, and she paid for it by being taken advantage of for years. So many years of screaming my heart out as I was cut into, so many years of being forced to stomach those disgusting medicines, so many years of being told that all my suffering was for the 'public good'! It makes me sick to my stomach!!
"Shut up..." I was five steps away from the top now.
"Shut up."
Three steps away from the top.
"Shut up!"
Two steps away.
"Shut up!!"
One step.
Why...
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!" Zero.
I screamed out as I looked at my soul, the blood that stained it seemed to have started dripping down to the 'altar' below it, pooling into a small pond of blood.
"STOP YOUR BITCHING!! WE AREN'T THAT WEAK LITTLE CUNT ANYMORE!!" I stepped onto the blood soaked platform and walked towards my soul, the crimson liquid going up to my ankles.
"WE KILLED ALL OF THOSE BASTARDS AND MADE THEM FEEL THE SAME PAIN THEY GAVE US!! WE ARE BETTER THAN THIS!! I AM BETTER THAN THIS!!" Now standing directly in front of my soul, I just wanted to get this over with so I could stop getting reminded about these pointless things.
Is that really the lie you kept telling yourself?...
"What?" I took a step at its words, as I wasn't expecting my soul to actually respond to me.
Do you really think we are any better than we were back then?... If so... you are only lying to yourself... again...
"Bullshit! We broke out of that damned lab! We're at least better than that weak little-" I was cut off by my own soul before I could continue.
And there you go again... Cursing and acting angry to hide the fact that you're scared... Scared that this will all turn out to be a dream... scared that even with that system, you'll still end up being just as pathetic as we've always been...
"I-I'm not- I'm not..." I wanted to rebuke the words of my soul, to say that 'I'm not scared of anything anymore!' But, I couldn't, I couldn't because deep down I knew that what it was saying was true. Even if I try to act relaxed and carefree, I've still been waiting for the 'punchline' to this shitty joke to come at me and tell me that all of this was some sort of fantasy. That all of this is just something that I dreamed up after years of being drugged so much finally caught up to me.
The truth is... you know that nothing has changed, even after we got our revenge... We still hear their screams at night... We still desperately want someone to love us, yet we kept holding back our emotions... We are the same little girl that we were all those years ago...
"T-then what do you suggest, huh?!... If you know everything that's fucked with me, then what do you suggest I do!...." I could feel my eyes start to sting from the tears that I refused to let fall. The words of my soul cutting deeper than I thought it would.
Stop hesitating... Who cares if this is all a dream... If it is, then make this the best dream you've ever had... and if it's not, then make the world your bitch!... It doesn't matter if it's a person, a hero, a villain, a demon, an angel, or a god... slaughter everyone that gets in your way, so we can finally live without fear of anything!...
"Fine then... if that's your answer... I'll start by..." I swallowed the lump in my throat and walked closer to my soul, looking up at it.
"Turning your ass into something actually useful..." With a simple thought I made the trees below us grow so tall that they overshadowed the 'sun' that gave off no heat. With another thought I made them merge and turn into two large hands, which quickly took hold of my soul and started to squeeze it.
W-wait!... What are you doing?!...
"Oh? I'm just following your advice..." I made the trees twist and press down my soul, although it screamed in fear and pain at the action, I felt nothing as I did this. Which surprised me, as I thought that doing this might be painful, but I felt no such thing.
You don't know what you're doing!... If you go through with this, there'll be no going back!... You'll face Divine Punishment!!...
"Blah blah blah... I don't give a damn... Like you said... I should slaughter everyone that gets in my way... and right now, you're keeping me from my quest, so you are in my way!..." I could practically feel my soul quiver under my gaze, it doesn't matter what this divine punishment thing is, what matters is getting what I want more than anything.
W-wait!... The soul remembers what the mind forgets!!... I can give you information that the system won't!... I know the truth-
Before my soul could utter another word I made the trees flatten it and then squash it down until my soul was small enough to fit in my small hands.
"The truth is useless if it won't benefit me, just like how you're useless as you are now... So, I'll turn you into something to help me rewrite reality into something that will benefit me..." I said before I made the trees place my soul into my hands, where I saw that it was no bigger than a pen now.
My soul, although completely quiet now, started to shake in my hand while it's shape became more refined and sharp. But, before I could see what my soul was slowly becoming, I heard that same voice that I had been waiting to hear since I entered my subconscious.
[NOTICE: The Host has broken through the chains of one of the Divine Laws of reality]
[NOTICE: The Host has been given the Curse of Gluttony by the Old One's]
[NOTICE: The Host will now be awakened]
Before I could even read the first notification everything began to go fade, and my vision went completely dark.
After what felt like hours I awoke laying against the wall in that RWBY training room that the system made for me, though, something felt different now. Actually, multiple things felt different now.
For one, that strange feeling that I felt before was gone now, like it had all been gobbled up by something, or whatever. The second thing was that it the entire room now had a darker tint to it, like someone had put a piece of black film over everything I saw. And, the final thing that felt different, was that it felt like some chain or limiter placed on me had suddenly disappeared altogether.
[NOTICE: Congratulations, the Host has successfully unlocked their Aura]
"Hm? So this is what it feels like to have aura? Weird." I said before looking down at my lap and seeing the open book that I was reading prior. I was about to grab it, to continue reading where I left off, but I suddenly felt an extreme gnawing feeling inside my stomach, like my insides had been set ablaze with hellfire.
I screamed out in pain as I held my stomach and slumped over, desperately trying to ease the internal suffering that I had suddenly been plagued by. The pain was too much for this small body that barely knew the meaning of true suffering.
'S-system... what the hell is happening?!' I mentally asked the system while I tried my best to grit my teeth through the pain, and get out of the training room.
[Answer: The Host is feeling the negative effect of the Curse of Gluttony. To reduce the effects the Host must consume any type of meat, or edible substance]
With that question answered I began to make my way to the kitchen that I had seen prior before. Each passing second only made the pain feel like it was growing more intense, and it didn't help that my vision was starting to get fuzzy. At one point in the past I did feel like I would die of hunger at some point, but that was nothing in comparison to this shit.
Before I knew it had reached the fridge, so I swung it open with reckless abandon, I heard the sound of something breaking, but I couldn't care less. I began to consume everything I saw in that fridge, it didn't matter if it was raw, frozen, or a sauce, I didn't care, I just wanted to fill that incredibly empty feeling in my stomach.
But it wasn't enough.
Even after devouring everything in that fridge I still felt so damn hungry. I tried searching that kitchen for anything else that could be edible, but I found nothing. So, the only option I saw was to head outside, back to the Forever Fall replica that the system made, at that point I was willing to eat the bark off the trees, or any bug that I would be lucky enough to find.
[NOTICE: Due to the Host requiring more sustenance, the System will modify the Grimm to appease the Host hunger]
I didn't hear the system as I stepped outside the door of my living quarters, all I could think about was filling my stomach. However, I did notice something black with four red eyes charging towards me.
"Meat?..." Was all that I managed to say as I sniffed the air while looking in the general direction of the black blur.
After that, everything went completely blank. It wouldn't be until the next day, when I woke up covered in black blood and holding the skeleton of a strange creature, that I would come to understand what had happened after I 'tempered' my soul.