"Kendra, listen to us."
Near the strange luminance, all watched Kendra cross the swirling belts of vapor encircling a climbing spire of stone desperately.
A foggy look consumed her eyes. Her skin was blemished from the taint of the luminance.
Upon her approach, she heard voices. Familiar ones that can only be heard from her.
(Come closer.) They sounded gruff and strident, just enough for the voice to sound familiar to her. Beset by agreeable hallucinations, Kendra increased her pace toward the sparkles.
Asahi, however, was clueless. He sprinted across the mist-veiled meadows with his thousands of followers, chasing after Kendra without knowing what lured her.
As they approached the cliff-side leading near the cyan light, the followers stopped dead in their tracks. Shields and blades dropped onto the floor as all reeled back from the warmth of the glow. Frightened looks formed on their faces as their heads perked upward.
Asahi felt an absence of company surrounding him after he took a step upward on the cliff.
Motivated by intense curiosity, Asahi assumed his followers would mirror his every move. However, when the howling wind of the underground expanse whipped across his face, Asahi looked back and realized his followers had clustered several meters behind, not following his lead up the cliff.
"Huh? Followers, what are you doing over there?" He hollered to them sharply as he stood atop the natural staircase.
Conjuring up a scene of mystery and unease, most of the followers kept their mouths shut. They thought that the action of speaking itself might harm them because of the presence of the cyan glow. But as time moved onward, Flavia gulped down a breath of unease, stepped forward, and answered with an unusually trembling voice.
"Lord Asahi, that luminance is dangerous."
For a moment, Asahi found himself at a loss for words in response to her. The hopeful glow in Asahi's eyes flickered and faded. He fastened his arms in a stagnant position and ensured himself that he wasn't hallucinating. Once, after he had blinked, the sight of the still followers remained. Drawn with confusion, he shrugged his shoulders and sighed.
"Fine," He said as he slowly tilted away from the group. "If all of you can't advance to the luminance, then I will do it myself. There is a person in danger. I refuse to sit here and watch."
After his voice echoed across the cavern, Flavia bowed down to the white-haired boy standing confidently atop the stone staircase and replied, an unsure smile forming on her face.
"Do what you must, my lord."
From then on, Asahi moved forward until he was just a centimeter or two from Kendra. The light around him grew stronger, almost pulling him in. But Asahi resisted. He knew the luminance was dangerous.
When he tried to grow closer to Kendra, he was stopped by an invisible barrier. He raised an eyebrow in confusion and tried to pass it. But to no avail, he was halted by the transparent wall. A burning glare of frustration glowed within the center of his pupils. He forced all of his body to pass and enter within the proximity of the dangerous luminance, and for a second, he almost passed it.
A shockwave pushed him back, knocking him into a nearby stone wall. Cold filled his surroundings. Goosebumps rose on his skin. Each step made his throat tighter. Frost appeared on him, but Kendra seemed unaffected.
Finally, with just a few meters away from Kendra, Asahi felt the coldness that had been attached to him start to slip away. He could hear himself think once more, feeling his mouth unstiffen from the approaching warmth of the luminance. He hurriedly tapped Kendra's shoulder, but to his dismay, it seemed that she was unfazed by the impact. Asahi muttered with a tone of confusion.
"Huh? Kendra, hello? It's me, Asahi. Behind you."
Not a response was uttered from her stiff lips. In this moment of uncertainty, Asahi chose to investigate whatever it was that had entranced her by that luminance. His gray pupils slowly steered over to his left. The swirling streams of debris came to a brief halt, standing still as statues. His heart slowed down as a cold realization vexed him.
"That's not a luminance," Asahi said as he saw letters appear from the peculiar glow. "It's…"
When he saw the oddly written words floating in the light, Asahi's eyes widened. He read words deep within the glowing patterns that unsettled him and changed all he had known.
://: What is destroyed in this reality can not be erased, but replaced."://
Nothing of the sort made any sense to Asahi. Reality was a common word, indeed. However, the way it was written here made it seem as if it were part of a bigger whole.
Yet even so, his mind stitched that inscription deep into his consciousness.
(Could this inscription be why Kendra doesn't respond?) Asahi mumbled to himself, still standing beside the luminance. He turned toward Kendra and saw the blank haze continue swallowing the blue in her eyes, deepening to a dark gray.
Almost immediately, Asahi tossed that thought aside and contradicted it with another.
(No. Kendra wouldn't have sprinted from the city all the way here just for this.) He thought. (It has to be something else.)
Before Asahi could drown himself in his thoughts any longer, the spectacle of the floating inscription flashed suddenly. His eyes shrank in shock. He stepped back and tried to pull Kendra along with him. And to his momentary surprise, Kendra began to move.
He felt Kendra grasp his hands—a tingling, comforting warmth. Her eyes flashed, regaining their bright blue. She gasped for breath, shivered, and her awareness returned.
In the same token, all belts of vapor and debris encircling the inscription collapsed harmoniously. All levitating stones, trees, and debris rained down toward the cliff below, endangering Asahi's followers. And what followed was the sound of a piercing, irritating screech that had extended across the dark horizons, echoing for minutes until it finally had ceased.
As the luminance vanished into darkness, Asahi sprinted back down the stone staircase, gripping Kendra's hand. Her legs gave way beneath her, wobbly as a drenched twig. Seeing this, Asahi scooped her up in both arms and hurried down the cliff. He spotted his followers climbing up, blocking his descent. Forced to retreat, he turned back toward where the luminance had been, knowing the path below was now impassable.
Forced back among his regrouped followers, Asahi found comfort in their support. Shields and swords in hand once more, even Flavia smiled as she approached him. As the clatter of blades echoed through the air, she spoke.
"Is there something wrong, my lord?"
"Yes," Asahi said as he cradled Kendra gently on his broad arms. "I need you to escort this girl to safety. I don't want her to get hurt."
"Understood, Lord Asahi," Flavia replied.
Just before Kendra could be taken away by the followers, a shockwave burst out from the dying cyan luminance. All eyes reeled back toward the light and saw the inscription fading out into tiny particles. Immediately, the followers shivered in fear as they saw a glowing, teal-green circle expand from the center. Flavia shuddered, and Kendra quickly jolted upward from Asahi's arms, breathing and panting heavily.
"Huh? Asahi? What's going on? Where am I?" Kendra asked, confused.
"Nothing. Just. Stay put." Asahi replied with an unsure tone.
As they planted their feet onto the dry and brittle ground, the round object grew even more. Glowing cyan cracks slowly opened up at the recess of the anomaly. Strands of that same color emerged from the fissures and moved around like wild animals. Kendra and Asahi stepped back and watched as several followers cowered behind the stone, afraid of the luminance. Speechless, they turned away and fled across a bridge of stone, leading over to an opening leading upward into the cavern.
Although scared, Asahi encouraged his followers, and they headed up the bridge, dashing away from the peculiar portal.
"Lord Asahi, do you have any idea what that thing is?" A blonde-haired, gray-eyed man asked as they sprinted up from the trembling bridge.
"No. I don't have a clue at all." Asahi replied to him as he felt the winds of his speed whip across his face.
With little to no time at all, they continued scrambling across the bridge like frightened ants. The darkness strengthened as all of them departed from the circular luminance. Asahi lost sight of Kendra as he took a second to breathe.
Once they had reached halfway, Asahi finally found Kendra in the immense sprinting crowd. Quickly, he jolted over to her and tapped her shoulder. She hurriedly tilted back and gave him a relieved smile, keeping up pace as the sounds of their pitter-patters echoed across the underground expanse.
"Oh, there you are, Asahi!" She said with a smile, her eyes welling up with tears. "I have been looking all over for you."
"Me too." Replied Asahi, smiling in return. "I'm glad you're safe."
As nothing but silence and the sound of footsteps entered between them, Kendra scratched her head and asked with rampant, queasy breaths.
"Where are we going?"
Keeping up with her pace, Asahi looked back and then forward, scratching his head. He was clueless about where he was going. All he saw to his left and right was an expanse of stone pillars, the view of hills, villages, and entombed ancient structures, all buried deep beneath the rock ceiling.
"I don't know, exactly," Asahi replied with a shrug of his shoulders. "I'm just going anywhere that is safe."
Even with this current situation, Kendra decided to lighten it up with soft laughter, drawing up droplets of sweat on her face in the process.
"Ha ha, you sound silly!" She said as she covered her mouth, coughing up a breath of exhaustion as she kept running. "I guess you're right. Anything is better than getting caught by that… strange thing."
Seeing all the followers sprint away, Kendra decided to turn around and see if the anomaly was still there. Unfortunately, it seemed as if the cyan luminance had grown stronger, expanding and stretching to nearly every corner of the underground expanse like the sun. A chilling prang of fear grasped her heart as she turned forward, gulping down a breath of unease.
"What the…"
Yet, before she could even warn Asahi or even the followers of what transpired behind them, a gruff-sounding, deep masculine voice shouted out from affront.
"Light!" He exclaimed. "I see light ahead!"
And just like that, the man gathered everyone's attention, including that of Asahi and Kendra. Approaching the ends of the bridge, Asahi and Kendra watched as many followers stopped dead in their tracks, gazing heavenward at a golden light protruding from the ceiling.
It was a dazzling beacon of light, one that had shone on everything underneath like a spotlight. The followers watched in awe as the ribbon of light shone brightly down the expanse of stone. Many jumped up and screamed with wonder.
"It's a miracle!" One cried out.
"Sunlight. Finally, after years of being trapped in eternal darkness, we can see the true light!" Screamed another.
As they gazed at the glow with wide-open eyes, a strange emotion rose deep within them. A hopeful feeling. One that eclipsed the presence of the dragon. This, and many more reactions from this phenomenon, reminded Asahi of something.
(Oh, that's right. These people… haven't seen true sunlight in over… five thousand years.) He mumbled as he slowly walked over behind the followers with Kendra. "This is the first time… in millenia, the people from my old world can see… true sunlight."