Eternal_Winter
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Chapter 45: Demons of the past
🕑 Added 2025-05-02 13:50:42 +0000 UTCThe darkness, the utter lack of any form of light, so all encompassing that you doubt your own existence.
The cold, there was no warmth, like the concept of heat didn’t exist in this world.
The Fear, it was depressing, cruel and paralyzing and had the ability to break every feeling creature in existence, something no weapon or magic could achieve.
He could only perceive those three things right now, the moment the wight king managed to conquer his mind he was lost, time stretching out until it felt like he spent an eternity here already. The only thing in his mind was the memory of a memory, a spell the king cast was like a golden thread connecting him back to the world outside of this void.
With careful steps he started to walk, there was no up and down or left and right. There was…nothing. No, he was wrong, there was something. A tiny speck of light got closer at an incredible speed but the vast distance it had to traverse would take a lot of time. He watched it as it grew in size, getting closer but his mind was empty, he couldn’t form thoughts that would explain what he even saw, until something hit him in the chest, his mind wandering for such a long time he was surprised the light already reached him. He felt his stomach but in this world he felt no pain, just the constant fear that was unguided by thoughts and memories.
Looking down he saw a snake, white scales covered its body and those piercing blue eyes looked right into his soul. It wrapped itself around his arm like it was a lifeline, he couldn’t feel the pressure on his arm as the snake held on to him.
What is a snake doing here? He thought and rubbed his chin, his mind wandering again, trying to flee from the fear that pressed down on him. Something different from that feeling of dread started to poke his thoughts but he just continued walking. While he walked he was surprised, there was no urgency in his steps, no will to defend himself. Like the fight of flight response didn’t exist here.
He twitched slightly when a mental nail slammed into his skull and he heard the voice of a woman in his head, it was the first feeling of pain in this abyss of fear. The woman sounded very pissed off, but why? He couldn’t know, he was just a wanderer going down his path. Still her voice was persistent.
…and I will bring you back, you stupid wizard! Wake up Ethan! I will bite you again if you don’t snap out of it! Believe me if I tell you there are worse things than undead!
Who is Ethan? Was he Ethan? He didn’t know, he was just a wanderer going down his path. That was the identity he picked to stay sane, he was the wanderer, right? His steps continued his walk never stopping, a stray thought managed to get stuck in his mind…somewhere must be an exit…and maybe this was all just a dream he was supposed to wake up from a long time ago. Right that must be it, just after he was about to…what was he about to do again?
His thoughts felt fuzzy for a moment but then he continued to walk. The fear dictating his path, but somewhere…must be…an…exit-
He screamed, an unknown pain threatening to split his skull open. Color exploded in front of him, the darkness was swept away by a literal rainbow of colors that swirled around him before slowly transforming into a vivid world full of life. He stood there in the middle of it but something was wrong, the scene was set, but slowly the color slowly drained away from the world and left it as a gray husk of its former self. Just like me…he thought.
****
Standing on the front porch he looked around and spotted a child sitting in the grass. The young boy that was playing in the dirt, his clothes stained with browns and greens, his eyes bright and his smile happy. He laughed and waved a small feather in front of the young cat, her fur snow white, the eyes a piercing blue.
The wanderer smiled, his fingers touching his face, following the wrinkles in his cheeks, something he never did before, but the boy was adorable and he looked so happy playing with his cat. He watched the boy play for a while, he must be around eight years old, he looked healthy and you could imagine how much his family loved him.
His smile cracked, the wanderer shivered and tried to save it, but it was forced and ugly, the corner of his mouth twitched and he slowly stopped smiling, memories came back to him and with it returned some color, the brown of the mud, the green of the grass. The blue eyes of the boy.
“That’s me….” With shaking legs he approached the boy and tried to grab his shoulder, trying to hug his former self, the fear he felt turned numb and hope retired to him. He needed to find out what’s going on here, the moment he touched the boy he fell through him, landing in the dirt while tears formed in his eyes. His past self was just smoke and old experiences. He cried, on hands and knees he cried his pain out, the pain that was taken from him by this abyss of fear.
Ethan! Snap out of it! We need to go! The battle is already under way!
“LEAVE ME ALONE!”
Ethan! This isn’t the real world! Please stop!
“I’m not- …No, wait…this isn’t right. Where am I, I’m…who?” He looked at the snake. “Wait, you’re…Nora…that can’t be…Nora is my-”
He looked down at himself, the tears still running down his cheeks. “I’m…Ethan…Ethan Delaney, but that’ can’t be I’m right ther-”
Tires squeaking and horns blaring, a driver slamming his hand on the horn again and again. The scream of a child and the loud crying that followed a few seconds later.
A death bringing cold seeped into his body as he slowly turned his head to the street.
There he was, his eight year old self, crying while holding his dead kitten, she ran away, the neighbor started his lawnmower and she got scared something normal, something you would expect on such a nice day out. The driver wasn’t speeding or distracted, there was no one at fault, it was just an accident.
He saw his parents running out of the house towards him, young Ethan turned around his dead friend cradled in his arms while he screamed for help, the colors muted again to make room for a different one, in this scene there was the blood of his pet covering its white fur and the boy’s arms and chest. The cat he rescued, found in some alleyway only a few months before, the kitten he fed with his mother to make her big and strong again. That slept next to him each night and waited for him when he returned from school.
Ethan wanted to hug his younger self but this was just a memory, his legs wouldn’t even work properly as he sat there in the dirt. New tears streamed down his face and he broke down again. He wanted to cry, his mind was spinning. Why could he forget something like this? Nora was his kitten, the same name he gave his new companion that was wrapped around his arm.
****
While he sat there crying the scene around him changed. He tried to stop the tears from coming but to no avail. Still crying and sniffing he managed to at least sit somewhat properly, the scene was familiar, he remembered it slowly at first but then it came like a waterfall, pictures and feeling settling into his mind again.
He was still sitting on the ground, his eyes wandering over the house. It looked older now, the tree had been cut down and the paint looked a bit worse for wear, flaking off in some spots. The whole house was not only lacking care but also happiness. Financial troubles and the loss of his fathers job made life that much harder for them. He wanted to go, warn them about what was to come but he was glued to the ground, his eyes fixed on the house. The pleading look in them sadly wouldn’t help.
Then it began, smoke drifted from an open window, soft white and harmless. But it quickly turned black, thick plumes of smoke escaping from each window, the life robbing orange and reds of fire cracking glass and setting the house alight.
Ethan remembered it, a fire in the middle of the night. How his mother woke him up and pushed the small bundle of blankets into his hand, his sister Amelia. Like he remembered it. There he was, running out of the house, his pyjamas on, the cold he felt in the middle of the night and the fear that his parents still weren’t out of the house, the worried glance he threw at the bundle in his hands.
He closed his eyes, tried to block out all sound with his hands pressed firmly over his ears, Ethan still heard the crash and the screams, he remembered how his parents were found, a picture he would gladly forget. His mother clutched a burned photo album and a molten folder with all their information in her arms, something she always had ready in case of emergency. She laid under a heavy beam that trapped her in the corridor.
His father behind her, his hands still touching the beam, he heard the firemen talking with each other. They guessed his father must have tried to lift it up but the rubble he was buried underneath suggested that he was knocked down when it collapsed due to the missing beam. Back then he didn’t understand it but he knew it all this time.
That was the day he lost both his parents in a house fire. The reason why it burned was never found. Ethan sat next to his younger self and watched his own young face, the look of disbelief, the fear, the shock, everything formed into a face of pure sadness and despair . He tried to touch his arm again but he just waved through the fog.
****
The scene switched again. While he finally knew who he was again it didn’t make it better. He saw himself, almost looking like now. He was twenty-one years old at the time, he sat in a doctor’s office, his head held between his hands as he nodded without really listening. For him now it sounded like the doctor was talking underwater, the gray color dominating this scene once again. But even if he couldn’t understand him he still knew by heart what the doctor said.
“I’m sorry Mr. Delaney, I know this must be hard for you but we need to talk about treatments for your sister. She is still young and with leukemia there is a chance she will survive. As her legal guardian you need to decide in the end.”
He saw himself nod, he wanted the treatment for Amelia. She was after all his only real family. Getting put from one foster family into the next wasn’t the best childhood but he somehow managed to always stay with her, no matter what they tried to separate them he always protected her.
Ethan didn’t mind the thrashings he received, the creepy dads he encountered, the hateful mothers, the incompetent adults that just wanted the money for taking care of children. To him it never mattered, only Amelia’s happiness and that she had a childhood, she was too young to remember their parents anyway.
When he was finally old enough he took Amelia and managed to become her guardian, it was a mess but in the end he won and was finally free of foster families. But even when he managed that, back then he already worked two jobs and suddenly he had to pay for her cancer treatments as well, the confident, protective boy that was a shield for his sister started to crumble from back breaking jobs and corporate greed.
****
The scene vanished, Ethan no longer had any tears left in this replay of his worst memories, they stopped coming after sharing a seat with his young self in front of the house fire. He saw the black and white mess of colors form into a new scene. This one was only a few months old.
Here he was, sitting next to a hospital bed, bags under his eyes, his shaking hand holding his sister’s small fragile fingers. Her breathing was shallow and the doctor had told him she was gone, the machines the only thing keeping her alive. He missed everything about her, the little dance she did when she was happy, the warm laughter, the hugs she gave him before stepping into the bus. She was his world, the center of his life and she was gone.
But Ethan didn’t want to let her go, he couldn’t she was the only thing keeping him sane, keeping him going all those years but now she was gone. A child that should have spent time with a loving family instead of her brother in a run down apartment, but Amelia always said she was the happiest girl, glad to have him.
****
He turned away from Ethan and waited for the scene to end, he couldn’t watch her again, how she laid there, more machine than human at this point. To his relief the scene changed and he stood behind the couch, past Ethan sitting on it holding a large bottle of his sleeping pills in his hand, beside him was a bottle of Jack Daniels.
Then he started chugging them down. Pills dropping into his mouth followed by the alcohol. Back and forth until he couldn’t stomach anymore. Past Ethan walked out of the living room and Ethan felt a nudge in his mind.
Why don’t you follow him? Nora asked and looked concerned at her soul mate, she stayed silent through it all, not wanting to disturb him but she felt the urge to speak up.
Because I already know what will happen to him. Ethan waited, standing there for a few minutes before he walked through the apartment. The paint on the walls was cracked and chipped off in a few places, a bucket stood right in the middle of the corridor, water dropped rhythmically from a leak in the ceiling. He stepped into the bedroom and there he was.
Past Ethan already laid on his bed, his smartphone in hand, the sleeping pills still clutched in the other. Then he closed his eyes and both slipped from his finger, he dropped his phone on his chest and the bottle rolled away over the floor. His mind drifted away.
That was the moment the system arrived, it saved me but until now…I couldn’t remember any of this. The system did something with me…that feeling I have, this fear it's the system I think. The system is feeling fear because something unexpected happened. He sends it to Nora and it seems the system finally found the little loophole.
****
Because, without anything he could do the system actually responded.
Error Emotional locks circumvented, trying to reestablish…failed!
Error Emotional locks circumvented, trying to reestablish…failed!
Error Emotional locks circumvented, trying to reestablish…failed!
Error Emotional locks circumvented, trying to reestablish…failed!
Error Emotional locks circumvented, trying to reestablish…failed!
Error Emotional dampener released, tutorial attendee performance dropped to…93%!
Error Emotional dampener released, tutorial attendee performance dropped to…85%!
Error Emotional dampener released, tutorial attendee performance dropped to…66%!
Error Emotional dampener released, tutorial attendee performance dropped to…46%!
Update Brute Force method…acceptable, commencing forced restart…
Update Patch getting deployed, mind magic on level ? not allowed in tutorial.
Update The offending god has been sanctioned.
Sharp pain flooded his mind and the scene vanished, he was back in the darkness of the void and slowly the world seemed to return, the scenes of his past finally gone from his mind. Instead he heard the cries of soldiers, the explosion of spells and the breaking of bones. Swords cutting into flesh and sharp blades sliding down bones.
Slowly his vision returned to normal, formless shapes becoming broad shouldered soldiers, muffled sounds piercing his ears again, the smell of blood and foul magic invading his nose. Then he was back.
The colors gave this cruel, unforgiving world back its life.
Update Emotional lock reengaged and reinforced.
Update Emotional dampener working at normal parameters. Tutorial attendee performance back to…100%!
Update We wish you a happy tutorial!
Ethan snapped back to reality, his aura expanding outwards like a blizzard in all directions. While the effect of his skill was absolutely pathetic every little bit helped in this war. While he wanted to strangle the system and leave the tutorial he couldn't now, even if this world was fake he cared about these people. But there was a certain god that had to answer some questions once he was back on earth.
Then it returned, the cold determination that sharpened his thoughts and gave him the clear mind he needed, he knew this wasn’t the system so Ethan embraced it. He cracked his neck and took a deep breath, when it streamed from his lips the air turned white from all the ice crystals he exhaled.
Frost started to creep up his arms and legs as he used most of his mana for a single spell. His nose started to bleed but he didn’t care, mana and health could be regenerated
His voice was barely more than a whisper as he said...
“[Icy Plague]”
