Everyone must have something to worry about, but worry can also be mixed with anxiety.
All of that can happen because we are thinking about something, more precisely something valuable and some certain aspect.
But what does that have to do with all this!
In another dimension, there is a beautiful and magnificent floating island. On that island, there is a place in the middle, where there is a beautiful mirror with lovely wooden carvings, even the mirror emits a magical Aura that is very strong but also beautiful.
There was a woman standing in front of that mirror, her hands joined together at her chest, as if something was happening.
But, without warning!
"HEY, MISS GUARDIAN!" Shouted someone.
Instantly, that startled her.
The woman's name was [ Youdona Qulva ] A Goddess who guards and aids a prophecy.
Or called [ Goddess INWA (Information Warden) ], or more simply, just Yona.
Yona turned around with a sulking expression, "Can you please greet normally, I'm not deaf you know! I can still hear clearly,"
"And I almost fainted because of your shouting you know!" Turning around and crossing her arms.
"Yeah sorry sorry, besides I did it on purpose hehe," he said.
Yona, who heard that, could only pout.
The one who surprised Yona earlier was Noah or [God Noah], yes that's his name, nothing more.
"Yona, you've been restless all this time, do you still not believe?" Asked Noah, worried.
"I, I feel afraid if this fails, even though he's just an unfortunate ordinary young man, who must get lost in an unknown place," answered Yona, gloomy.
The two of them then looked toward the mirror, where the mirror was a medium used to observe Ace. But it seemed that at this moment he was sleeping on the cable car, in a place so silent and frightening, with only the light from the cable car illuminating his journey for now.
"I feel sorry to see him. He has to be in that dark place, for our belief. Even though his behavior was silly from the start, that won't guarantee his safety for now, I-I– ,"
Noah then cut off Yona's words, placing his hand on Yona's shoulder to wake her up again, with eye contact, "Yona, are you starting to doubt your duty, to guard and observe all information. Every information has its stages, you've read them, it's impossible that your prediction is wrong,"
"You Yona, you're the one who holds the prophecy, not the one who makes it, so what has been prophesied must only be believed, not doubted,"
"For the sake of the world, for saving it again, you must believe ok," said Noah firmly.
"I believe, but will all of this–"
Noah then cut off Yona's hesitation, "If you're still in doubt, then let's see the prophecy unfold together, so that the doubt within you will disappear forever,"
"But your eyes are closed, how will you see it!" said Yona.
"I don't know, maybe using inner sight. Let's just see." replied Noah.
They then looked into the mirror, observing Ace's movements closely. Yes, pray that he will be safe on his journey right now.
Ace, who was asleep from exhaustion, began to dream of something, like a memory!
A memory or just–
Where someone seemed to be calling him, like an invitation to eat soon.
Ace looked around, and found himself in a beautiful, vast, and green garden, so refreshing.
Ace then touched himself, and realized that he had become a child again. The ones calling were actually his parents. But why did their faces look blurry.
Ace didn't care about that, and decided to enjoy it. He walked toward them and said, "Father, Mother, is this really you!" he asked enthusiastically.
Those who resembled Ace's parents only gave him a warm smile.
Ace, feeling happy, didn't feel suspicious at all, with his current situation.
At Yona and Noah's place, Yona held her chin and looked carefully, feeling curious about Ace who was sleeping while smiling.
Noah responded to Yona's curiosity, and told her that Ace was having a pleasant dream.
"So, you mean Ace is having a pleasant dream right now, but what kind of dream could make him that happy!" asked Yona.
"Yeah, I also don't know what he's dreaming of, because I'm not a dream seer," answered Noah.
"Oohhh, okay nice info," said Yona.
"I wonder what he's dreaming about, I'm curious!" said Yona curiously.
They were curious about Ace's dream. But Ace instead was having fun in his dream, where he was eating a cake with white Cream. A happy expression.
In short, the eating event was over, now Ace had only one purpose, which was to talk casually to his parents.
Ace then approached them. Because Ace was trapped in his joy, he lowered his guard. As a result–
"Father, Mother, I want to tell you something, I–"
Before Ace could continue his words, his parents suddenly touched his cheeks gently.
"Uhh, is there something wrong?" asked Ace, confused by them.
But they only gave him a smile, yet Ace began to realize something. That smile was their last smile meeting him.
More precisely, his parents were already gone.
Because before they died, they smiled at him — a smile that didn't want to part, but that smile was the last gift from them.
A sincere smile, born from a parent's love for their child.
Now Ace shed tears, and an uncontrollable emotion overflowed.
"Father, mother." A tearful cry.
Without Ace realizing it, his parents transformed into something nightmarish, a black lumped being merged together, forming a terrifying and incomprehensible entity.
He could only stand still, unable to move even though it was only a dream.
What's happening to me, I can't move at all
The vast green field that was once lush, now sprouted { Wild Red Poppy Flowers }.
The weather changed drastically, silence became chaos.
Ace could only think, is this what the end of me looks like. The creature still held Ace, then lifted his body, then the creature opened its mouth wide. From that mouth, it could be seen that many terrifying creatures were ready to tear Ace apart.
Without warning, Ace was then thrown into that terrifying mouth.
Will I be able to fight!
Will I be able to keep struggling!
Or will I be able, to erase all these nightmares forever!
Before Ace approached the creature that wanted to tear him apart, unexpectedly he finally woke up from his nightmare.
Panting, "That, was that real!" he then touched his body, to check if it was real.
Fortunately, nothing happened to his body.
(Deep breath)
Ace then looked at the travel distance of the cable car, where the system showed that his destination was only 5 km away. Ace, seeing that, could only breathe in relief, then took a drink from the bag or loot he got earlier, where it was a clear bottle of water.
Because of dehydration, he now drank that water all at once, until the bottle was empty.
(Adjusting breath)
After that, Ace began to calm his mind, to ease his stress, "oh my, I feel kinda messed up. I need a towel to wipe this sweat–"
=What, your journey's safe, right?= A mysterious voice.
"What, who's that!" asked Ace, resting casually.
=Actually, I'm the system from your watch= answered that system.
Ace then looked at his watch.
"Oh, I thought it was something else," answered Ace, indifferently.
=Oh come on, am I that lowly in your eyes=
=No reaction like (wow you can talk / what kind of cool system is this / wow this thing's so advanced) or something!!=
"Actually, I'm already used to it, so sorry," he replied without guilt.
=Whatever you say=
=I was going to introduce myself, but you fell asleep, so I had to wait for you to wake up=
=But the longer I waited, you didn't wake up at all=
Because of that, the system told many stories about how it tried to wake Ace, from school bells, office alarms, to using the sound of beautiful older sisters.
"Oh my god, you're that low huh, your wake-up methods are like AI without artificial intelligence," said Ace, holding his head, hearing the system's absurd stories.
=Actually, besides introduction I also wanted to tell you something!=
"Hah, something, about what–"
While Ace was talking to the system, without realizing it, from behind the shadows something accidentally saw Ace inside the cable car and eventually.
"What did you say, another entity is here!" slightly shocked.
Before processing what was happening suddenly.
BOOMM
Ace then got shaken by an unknown object.
Then the emergency system blared, giving a warning [ to everyone, an internal attack detected, standby mode activating ]
[ I repeat, to everyone, an internal attack detected, standby mode activating ]
Because the emergency system was too noisy, the entity watching felt disturbed and let out a piercing, loud scream.
Ace then ordered the system to immediately turn on the lights in this empty tunnel.
=Order received, connecting=
While the system was trying to turn on the tunnel lights, Ace immediately prepared the rifle he had brought, checking its condition and all needed things were fine, even the bullets.
With that, Ace was ready to survive and fight the entity disturbing his journey.
=100% tunnel lights on!=
"Good, let's see what kind of weird creature that..." Ace froze instantly after looking out the window.
"Please tell me, this is just a nightmare."
Something that could not be comprehended by a sane mind.
A giant entity with six human arms, a body resembling a carnivorous insect, and—
Not only shrieks but also cries.
A face distorted, more like an evil being, even though its posture looked fragile.
The creature stared sharply at Ace, as if holding a long resentment.
Or maybe!
= Sir Ace you're almost at your destination, therefore please– =
"No, I won't back down," said Ace, flatly.
= But, that creature! =
"I know, but just so you know, I'm not a coward nor even a loser,"
=You mean, you'll fight it like that!=
Ace, hearing that, then smiled happily. He opened the cable car window, then aimed at one of the creature's hands.
=Sir, I know you're brave, but don't go crazy!=
=your safety is more important–=
While the system babbled about what Ace should do, Ace chose to ignore it and focus on aiming.
This creature isn't that big either, good, I just need to drop it down.
"Hey, system, what's below us right now,"
=A very large and fast-flowing water channel, why!=
"Good, that means we just need to disable it, then," Ace then targeted one of the creature's hands.
After the target was locked, Ace then fired toward the monster.
(Trigger pulled)
The bullet shot quickly toward the monster, and unexpectedly it managed to injure the monster's right hand.
The monster began to groan in pain, not accepting what Ace did to it, the creature began to attack back toward the cable car Ace was riding.
From its mouth, the creature began to shoot strange substances toward the cable car.
Seeing the creature wanting to attack back, Ace then took his stuff out of the car, fortunately there was a wide path below not too far down.
After taking out his belongings, now Ace followed to jump out!
Unexpectedly the monster's attack hit the car suddenly, forcing Ace to jump down.
Ace didn't land perfectly, almost making him fall.
Not yet catching his breath, suddenly.
=Sir, quickly dodge!=
Hearing the warning from the system, Ace saw the creature starting to attack again.
Without a pause, Ace immediately grabbed his things and dodged toward the front route.
The creature immediately attacked again, forcing Ace to leap far away.
"Thanks, you saved me,"
=No problem :D=
The monster's attack then broke the path with its substance, with a fairly large size. But luckily it didn't spread.
It seemed the creature wasn't happy either, and began to roar.
With no other choice, Ace pulled out an explosive launcher, aiming it at the monster and fired.
That triggered a collision explosion that hit the monster.
As a result, the monster immediately paralyzed and began to fall, because the attack hit straight to its head.
That made Ace finally breathe a sigh of relief. "That..was..almost.." panting.
"Hmm, I should check first. If the creature's still alive, that'd be troublesome."
Because of that, Ace then got curious and wanted to see how deep the abyss was.
After carefully looking down, now he got the answer to his curiosity.
He then continued his journey on foot, after walking about ½ km, he rested for a bit on the road.
Just as he wanted to rest a moment, unexpectedly the road suddenly shook!
=Something big is approaching, toward your location=
=Run immediately. Entity not detected as ally=
Right after the system said that, from the hole came a familiar shriek, the same sound Ace heard the first time.
Wait, is it still alive don't tell me! All his intuition was right, the creature was still alive with a half-destroyed face, standing on the path Ace was on right now.
Knowing this would happen, Ace then activated something from his watch system and then!
Dddyuuuuuuaaaarrrrrr
The bridge then exploded in a chain from the starting point Ace wanted to go.
Ace ran forward, but not the creature who couldn't save itself, and eventually fell again.
But without clear calculation, the explosion began to follow Ace, "what, you're kidding!"
Because of exhaustion from running, he began to lose consciousness, and finally, he was thrown by the explosion he triggered, flying forward.
Because he was flung too fast, he had to hit the iron door in front of him hard.
Ace did make it to his destination, but he had to postpone his journey because he lost consciousness, due to the strong impact.
Can Ace convince Yona with his current state, well maybe.
Even this place is still quite a secret, perhaps?
End of chapter (a coincidental meeting)