Chapter 2: Dream or Reality?

“Where am I…? Did I… Die?”

Kai’s view gradually changed from pitch black to blurry. Then from blurry to almost good. Where was he?

The place seemed nothing like the school. The tiles were large and made of unbreakable glass. They were one black and one white, like a huge infinite chessboard. The tiles extended to all he could see. Who had the time to build such a thing? And why would someone build a place like that? A vast. Empty glass room with chessboard tiles. Nothing inside. Not a single person. Not another room. No walls. It was like a desert.

Kai realized he was lying down. What he thought was the floor was actually the ceiling.

Suddenly he felt the presence of something else in the room. A breath. A snarling sound. Something was there with him, and it didn’t seem that friendly.

Kai noticed he could move his body. He was normal. He hadn’t died… Yet. It would be good to ensure things stood like that.

He quickly jumped his body straight and as he did it, the monster charged with all its speed to him. He didn’t know exactly how he did it, but Kai managed to dodge the charge in the last moment, with a very accurate body spin.

“What the hell…?”

Kai felt his body was far lighter. Unlike usual, it responded exactly to his brain commands. Like the body followed his reflex. The other day he couldn’t grab the strange object under Aimee’s desk falling off his hands even though he anticipated the fall. If it was today, he’d have caught it in the air.

Kai stopped to look at the monster closely. It was nothing like the spiky dog form earlier. Some traits were similar. The color of the fur was the same but they didn’t seem that pointy. The size also had changed greatly. Now it was more like a bear standing on both legs rather than a dog thing. A bear so tall it wouldn’t fit Goldenville’s corridor of the second floor without having to lean the neck.

“This guy grew a lot heh? Maybe it’s not the same…?”

The face wasn’t also nothing like the one he saw. The eyes were smaller, pushed inside, almost covered by the fur. It kept the mouth shut under the snout. To be fair even if it was bigger it didn’t look as menacing as the one before. It seemed far more contained.

Kai for some reason knew he had the energy with him. Just like it was natural for a human to think of punching and kicking to defend himself against a threat, the first thing that occurred to his mind was ‘simply using the energy wave’ against it.

‘Yeah, when it charges in, I just extend my arm and… Wait, why do I have an energy wave?’ The thoughts went by his head.

Doubting himself a little, he extended the hand forward and shot. He felt some sort of very strong wind coming out with pressure.

But since he was just testing it got not nearly close to the bear-like thing. In fact, it caused it to become wary, as it hadn’t even tried attacking yet.

The thing was trying to charge in at first, but as it saw Kai’s attack it stopped mid-way, standing with the same expression about 40 yards away.

“Are you just going to keep standing there, ugly fellow? I can keep shooting, you know?”

The animal let out a groan. It was standing with both arms partially covering the chest. Then it opened the arms. And the chest opened together with it, like a man opening a coat and revealing multiple guns. The creature increased in width about twice when it did it.

Under the sides of the chest which were being covered by the arms. There were some holes and parts coming off that Kai didn’t understand well. It was definitely nothing bear-like, though. Kai could tell that body wasn’t of an animal but more likely of a machine. The holes and pointy parts were similar to the ones one could find in a robot under construction. It resembled an unfinished industrial robot with a fur casket protecting the view of the wires and metal pieces.

Kai took an instant to appreciate the scene: a vast unending dimension covered in black and white tiles, contrasting with the bear-shaped creature revealing its true power hidden in the chest, like a badass protagonist lifting the coat, revealing a secret weapon within his body.

“Ok. I understood everything now. I am dreaming.”

Kai smiled confidently.

He just charged toward the huge thing at his full speed. And the body once again responded just like he wanted to. It was like he wasn’t bound to his physique limitation.

“If I’m dreaming, I can just do whatever I want, right?”

As soon as he got near the monster, it used one of the arms which it had just moved away the chest to flicker at his face. The movement was fast and exact. Not even with his enhanced body, Kai could dodge the hit.

A single hit and he fell to the floor at full force, with an opaque sound.

Kai felt everything tremble as the pain infested his body.

‘Pain…? It hit me but I didn’t wake up? This isn’t a dream…? What is going on? Did I die at the school and go to hell and now I need to face the thing?’ Kai thought while his body was thrown at the floor. The bear thing opened the mouth and let out a screeching sound. The jaw when opened seemed to reach all the way to the neck, revealing a huge mouth with dark yellow pointy fingers. The mouth gap was twice the size of the closed muzzle.

“Ok, now that’s creepier than the dog at school. No time to think about any of this. I need to beat this thing.”

Kai quickly rolled to the side before he was stomped by the thing and then got up right after. He didn’t know how but the pain went away and he knew in his head that he was the one who made it go away.

‘What’s going on? It’s like I have been using these powers for a long time yet I have no idea how I got them.’ Kai thought.

This time he aimed right at the core of the ‘bear’ chest and shoot. His body could feel the recoil with the strength. He could recall scenes of himself destroying rocks with it, like had an intense training somewhere alone in a rocky beach.

Unfortunately, the damage didn’t seem to be as effective on the monster. It could stand the pain just fine.

“Uh oh…”

Kai started running away. But his mind accused him of uselessness. How would he outrun an enemy in the middle of such a vast and uniform environment? He pondered in his head:

‘Wait a second… The bear was afraid of my attack earlier but got all confident after he showed off those parts on the side of his chest. If an animal is so greatly enhanced using a certain position shouldn’t it always carry that when he hunts? Why didn’t he use that stance from the beginning?’ Kai thought as he was using every ounce of his speed to run away from the thing chasing him.

‘Either it has a limitation usage of that stance… or the things he showed when he uncovered the chest not only enhance them but are also the weak point… I should aim for them instead of for the middle of the chest…’

Oscillating in looking back and looking at his front, Kai tried aligning the monster right behind him.

‘I turned around, extend the arm then shoot. One single move.’ Kai kept repeating in his head.

Thankfully that version of the body responded exactly as he wanted. He executed the plan exactly. The aim was perfect.

The monster fell to the floor, groaning a deep sound which became almost robotic to the end.

“What is this thing?” Kai stopped and went to its direction as it seemingly had faint.

Approaching the body of the monster Kai could see that the parts where he shot were made of metal. The same shiny metal he saw on that object under Aimee’s desk the other day. He got so curious that he wanted to retrieve the thing out of the monster’s fallen body.

“What is this…? I don’t feel well…”

As Kai leaned his body to try and retrieve the thing from the monster, he felt all numb and everything began turning black.

“Is this… Exhaustion? Did I use too much power?”

Kai fell on the top of the monster, anticipating he’d pass out as well.

Then he woke up. He was back at reality.