14/16

Chapter 13: Clash that shatters reality

The alleyway was dark with small streetlights dimly lighting up the streets. It was dark and extremely quiet. A large shadow portal appears on the large brick fence with Tiana’s hand sticking out, signaling me to get into the portal; with one enormous step into the portal, I entered the portal. As usual, the portal leads to nothing but a black void.

「Have you ever consider decorating this place? 」

「Well no, there isn’t much point of it since this is just another dimension that anyone can travel with shadow magic.」

「It must be lonely here just floating in this void. I feel like if I stay here by myself long enough, I’ll go crazy.」

「You get used to it once you enter this dimension multiple times.」

We zipped through the shadow’s bypassing the fence traveling to a nearby tree in the forest creating a shadow portal.

「WELP, there’s no time to waste; let’s go.」

「Wait- 」

With no warning, Tiana shoved me out of the shadow portal, landing face first to the ground.

「Can you at least give me a warning next time?」

Tiana grabbed both ends of the shadow portal, pulling herself out of it.

「mmmm, yeah, next time.」

「That doesn’t sound reassuring.」

「Leo, nothing sounds reassuring.」

「What’s that supposed to mean? Woah- wait for me.」

She hums while walking straight towards the mountain, completely ignoring my question. What did I get myself into? The deeper we got towards the forest, the darker the area got; there are a lot of different wildlife sleeping on the trees with bugs crawl across the trees, rocks and even the ground. I can feel a sense of unease in this forest, but then again, going into the forest at night. Isn’t really a good idea. Somehow, this doesn’t faze Tiana; she is very calm and carefree about how she stroll. She is completely unguarded, unlike me, who is grabbing onto my knife, ready to sheave it at any moment. Maybe I should ease up a bit; she has some sort of future sight with her time powers. If anything goes wrong, she would warn me as soon as possible.

The closer we get into the mountain, the quieter the forest gets; Tiana’s eyes slightly glowed purple. An uneasy feeling creeps up towards our spine. Without hesitation, she summons her shotgun, readying up to fight.

「Are we sure this is a good idea?」

「I’m not too sure myself but something is dragging me towards it.」

I really don’t know if that is a good thing or a bad thing, but we are getting close to the end of the forest. I can see parts of the base of the mountains. The close we got, the more of the mountain we see?

「What the?」

My eyes widened, and my jaw dropped. There was a giant hole in the mountain! Black scorch marks ringed the edge, with a few flames still flickering. But that wasn't the weird part. There was an entire hidden facility tucked inside the mountain. I guess now I know why we couldn't mine here anymore.

Tiana got closer towards the hole to inspect it. With no hesitation, she tries to touch the flames.

「Wait, you shouldn’t touch -」

「Don’t worry, it should be fine. See?」

She slowly wave over her hands in the fire before dispersing the flames.

「Yep, that’s magic. An eternal flame as well.」

「Wh-WHAT. why did you touch it t?」

「Hey, it's not that bad; I've stuck my hand in worse.」

I felt a giant whiplash hit my brain, scattering all of my thoughts. I tried to scramble them back, but I still cannot process how someone would conclude to just do something dangerous like that.

「Don’t worry about it, Leo. I can get away with something small like this.」

「It doesn’t make it better.」

「I know, I know. I will be careful next time.」

Tiana’s carefree demeanor instantly vanished with her eyes glowing purple, replaced with a concern but ready expression. Her eyes weren’t the only part that changed; her left arm was radiating a purple light, pulsing with an unseen energy. An uncomfortable aura began to emanate from a distance, a chilling presence that intensified with alarming speed, creeping along my skin and sending shivers of dread spiraling down my spine.

The gale struck without warning, a physical blow that stole my breath. I was instantly airborne, slammed against the sturdy trunk of a tree, its rough embrace my only anchor against being swept into the void. The wind howled, a banshee's scream that clawed at my face and made opening my eyes an impossible task.

A vicious, tearing, crackling noise started to form in front of me. I forced my eyes open a slit to try to see what happened. Although blurry, I could barely see Tiana, resolute, her fist a blur clashing her fist against a large humanoid figure. Where their blows connected, the very fabric of the air began to crystallize and fracture, fissures spreading like spiderwebs across an invisible pane until the fractures shatters, flinging them both backward, and just like that, the tyrannical wind vanished. I fell towards the ground, barely catching myself on my feet. I ran towards Tiana, trying to pick her up.

「Tiana, are you alr-」

Her eyes snapped open; before I realised, I was instantly shoved into the void, forced to watch from a large floating screen displaying the outside world.