Solar Ascension-Chapter 134: A Vision?

"My head’s killing me," Nox let out as he slowly opened his eyes, placing a palm on his head.

For some reason, whatever he was laying on was extremely hard.

The first thing that came to sight was a cracked night sky....wait, cracked sky?

He slowly sat up and realized that he was back in that world with the being of light. Nox stood up, looked towards the Eclipsed pile and sure enough the being was sitting there.

The glow on the seal surrounding it seemed a bit brighter now, and Nox could see a dark substance crawling towards the being of light, trying to detach itself from the seal.

"I guess I lost?" He muttered, referring to his last clash with Calewin.

All he could remember was a wave of SE crashing into him just before everything went dark and he was now here.

Letting out another sigh, he started walking up the pile of dead Eclipsed, towards the being of light.

"That doesn’t look good," Nox muttered as stopped climbing up the pile of Eclipsed corpse and bones, "you wouldn’t happen to know if a way to remove this seal would you?"

The being looked directly at him, silent for a short while, before it lifted a hand and pointed behind him.

"Hmm?" Nox let out, a bit confused as he turned around, only for his eyes to widen in horror.

Approaching him was a wave, a massive one at that. The worse part was the fact that he could move or do anything as it crashed into him, causing him to tumble and fight to reorient himself.

But his limbs refused to listen.

Nox’s body spun uncontrollably as the wave dragged him downward, darkness swallowing what little light there was.

Water flooded his ears next and all sound seem to disappear.

His mouth opened instinctively—and pain exploded in his chest as liquid rushed in.

Breathe. You idiot, breathe and you die.

He knew that if he tried breathing, his lungs would only be filled with water, but his brain was panicking, begging for oxygen.

With the last bit of proper thoughts he could form, his instincts guided him to coat his entire being in SE, which he immediately did, causing his form to glow.

Nox immediately drew in a deep breath as oxygen finally filled his lungs, so much so that he felt a bit light headed.

He also gained control of his limbs again, allowing to realize that he was floating, in what seemed like underwater.

It was a place no light reached, with the only source of light being he himself.

Before Nox had the chance to understand what was going on, a single, massive, glowing red eye lit up behind him causing him to slowly turn, coming face to...whole body (?) with the creature.

It was massive.

That was the only word Nox’s mind could form as his eyes traced the creature’s silhouette.

Its body seemed to stretch endlessly across the darkness, and it seemed to have some type of tentacles above its head, one that seemed to distort the waters.

Nox went completely still, as if trying to avoid its gaze, but it was too late. The creature had already spotted him, and he was made aware of this when one of its massive tentacles suddenly wrapped around him. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Nox remained still, even forgetting to breathe as the creature pulled him close and before he realized, the creature had opened a wide maw, tossing Nox inside.

But just before he could disappear into the void of the creature’s maw,

****

Nox’s eyes snapped open as he realized that he was now looking at the white ceiling of the medbay.

"...Hah—!"

The suffocating pressure, the water, the red eye, all of it had vanished in an instant, leaving behind only a cold sweat on his body.

Oxygen returned to his lungs as he placed a hand on his forehead as reality slowly set it.

"Guess I shouldn’t have asked how to release it," he muttered to himself as he thought about what he just saw.

Was that another vision?

He had no idea, but he wasn’t about to make the same mistake he did in that rift. If that thing was something he needed to face soon, then he needed to be ready.

But how? And what the hell was that?

How would you even start preparing for something you couldn’t comprehend?

"You aight man?" A voice snapped him out of his thoughts, causing him to look to the side, only to spot Devon, Cass and Linda standing there.

"Yeah," Nox muttered, "how long was I out?"

"A hours," Cassian was the one who replied, since Devon seemed to have a different answer prepared.

"C’mon man," Devon seemed a bit disappointed, "thought we agreed to tell him he was out for a week."

Nox looked at him with a dead pan expression before sitting up.

"I feel like I’m here every spar," he commented with a chuckle as he looked around.

"Yeah," Cass nodded in agreement, "fortunately, the academy covers every injuries gotten during a spar."

"Yeah," Nox nodded and they went silent for a short while.

"But damn," Devon muttered, breaking the silence, "you really got bodied didn’t you?"

"Hey," Nox shot back, "I didn’t get bodied."

Linda rolled her eyes. "You were unconscious."

Well, he couldn’t argue with that after all, he was the only one who ended up passing out, his opponent had seemed pretty fine before Nox blacked out.

Nox then proceeded to stand up before muttering, "alright then, I should probably get back to the dorms... I need a shower."

"Oh, before that," Cass muttered, "could you show me your watch?"

A bit confused, Nox extended his arm with the watch and Cass just tapped on it a few times before it let out a ding.

Nox looked at it, before he asked in confusion, "what’s this for?"

"I bet on you two qualifying," Cass explained, "and that’s your share of the winnings."

"I see," Nox muttered, looking at the fifty credits added to his account before saying, "thanks."