NOVEL WEB Chapter 0
The moment the lightning struck me, it felt like a thousand needles piercing every inch of my skin. My body convulsed with an intense pain that was reminiscent of the soul-crushing beatings my father used to give me. As the energy coursed through my veins, I could almost feel myself being grilled alive from within.
But the feeling scratched that itch of feeling something whilst my emotions slowly but surely blurred like a landscape painting being thrown into a river. Once virgorous colours of trees were washed away by the passage of time only to leave behind the dimming sun on the otherwise blank slate.
This time, the green lightning struck me on the very top of my elbow, but it merely tickled my senses when it passed through me towards the ground. Like a spider web, the mysterious energy sprawled all around me for several seconds, touching my toes a little until the energy dove deep into the earth. Completely unfazed, I held down the straw hat on my head and leaned against the strong, dangerous wind, struggling to keep on going forwards. The dust whipped against my scarf and goggles, making a scratching sound as it hit the fabric. The wind howled in my ears, drowning out any other noises.
“By mother nature’s tits, why the fuck did I make this storm unending?” Cursing quietly about the weather, I leaned against the inhospitable wind once more and continued to stomp back towards my home, probably the only place where a human could survive. The next red lightning was like a fiery serpent, its flickering form winding around me with deadly precision before disappearing into the earth, leaving only a lingering sense of danger in its wake. Lightning behaved weirdly on the face of this planet like all the other forces of nature.
The pitch black clouds loomed menacingly above, constantly covering the continent in a thick, dark blanket. Against this backdrop, vibrant arcs of energy in various hues danced and leapt from one cloud to another, creating a dazzling display of destruction.
This planet was inhospitable. As apocalyptic as it can get. There were only two seasons left of the yearly cycle. The stormy season was my favourite by far. The other one was quite rainy, which would be alright if not for my irrational fear of water and the undrinkable fluid being highly toxic even to my skin.
The landscape didn’t do too well under these conditions either. It was a desolate and barren wasteland, with cracked, dry earth and jagged rocks scattered about. The few exceptions were the towering volcanoes, constantly spewing toxic fumes into the air, and the dark openings of underground caves. So far, I wasn’t able to find any plant on this destroyed planet and I highly doubted there were some left.
There weren´t many organisms left either. With the exception of two intelligent beings, there were parasitic worms, cannibalistic monsters and of course goblins. Not even the end of the world could rat them out. Not even the god of death could and certainly not me.
But hey, none of these races were responsible for the harsh weather which destroyed every hope of a holiday at a beach. And not even the humans with their undying thirst for progress had anything to do with the molten mountains.
No, no, that achievement is mine. I was not too proud of that one to be honest. I would rank it right in the middle of making love with my subordinate and that beaver genocide … they deserved it though. Maybe I would even put it on my CV some day … even though I doubted any sane person would want to hire someone with my criminal record.
With a puzzled frown, I quickly dropped to my knees as a massive boulder, three times the size of my head, hurtled towards me with terrifying speed. The wind and chaotic gravitational field propelled it forward, threatening to crush me beneath its weight. As I braced myself, the ground trembled and pulled me backwards, nearly causing me to lose my footing in this frenzied world. It was pure chaos and destruction here - the rules of nature were constantly shifting, creating an unstable and apocalyptic landscape that only a goddess could pacify. The boulder suddenly stopped in mid air, spun around itself slowly and then flung itself a few meters to the side.
“How much I hate this…” I mumbled through the scarf, rubbed my bleeding nose and watched how the stone crashed down into the sand. Glaring at it angrily as the boulder rose into the air again, I walked backwards until it flew into the distance, hopefully going on the nerves of a few goblins.
A few minutes later the next obstacle presented itself to me, just when I was about to enter my home. It was green and surprisingly not a goblin. Standing at a towering height of three meters, the creature resembled a t-rex with razor-sharp teeth and muscular legs. Its tiny arms waved in excitement as it stomped towards me, saliva dripping from its open mouth. My emotions had been numbed after my long journey, so I felt nothing as the monster greeted me with deafening roars of joy.
I knew that my appearance could be considered beautiful, but the idea of being hugged by a beast with sharp claws made me shudder. I leaned against the entrance to my cozy cave and watched as the monster charged towards me, its steps sending tremors through the ground. As it got closer, I noticed how its eyes seemed to glint with a hint intelligence, despite its terrifying appearance. Suddenly, just a few millimeters from me, it pounced onto the sand beneath its feet like a child jumping into a pile of leaves. With an open drooling mouth, it eagerly scooped up handfuls of dirt with its violet tongue and laid there unmoving. The creature had died in a split second, leaving nothing but a disgusting corpse behind.
“How am I supposed to clean that up now?” I mumbled as I nudged the unmoving creature with my toes. “… she won´t like that.” I concluded and hoped the corpse would be eaten by other hungry creatures. Undoing my scarf around my head, I turned around and strolled into the cave while coughing up a little bit of blood.
I let out a sigh of relief as I entered through the clean, untouched entrance. Despite the chaos that had just occurred, the pristine condition of the stone stairs brought a small smile to my face. As I descended further into the depths, the walls were bare and bleak for at least fifty meters. But as I neared the central room where I lived, vibrant glowing plants began to sprout along the walls, adding a sense of warmth and life to the otherwise dull surroundings. Besides the multitude of plants I grew in my free time, the cat that didn’t like me at all and the bit of clean water in a small pond, there was only one valuable inside. My sun.
“Mum!” She said happily and waved in my direction. No matter how often I saw my darling, it would always warm my heart. She was my everything, the fulfilment to the wish I had since I was born. And surprisingly, I didn’t even have to sacrifice that much for her.
Just my best friend … two times. The world itself. And all the other beautiful elements of the landscape in the river. But as long as the other side of the painting remained intact, loosing myself was well worth it. This side depicted an apocalyptic world with small pockets of life far above the clouds. It showed the universe with every being, every speck of dust being represented by a touch of color. It was the place I needed to protect at all costs because without, all life would end.
But enough about that. This story begins long before the middle, in a time when this planet was just a distant dream. It starts with me, a blank slate drenched in darkness, created by my father's twisted hand and dipped into a bucket of bleach, ready to be written on with his cruel intentions.