Under The Sun

As that pressure set in on my chest, I found myself in some place peaceful... someplace with a ton of flowers, a place I think I could call home.

"Nono! Where are you?!" I heard a voice call out.

I looked at my hands as if I had woken up for the first time in my short life. I was close to the ground like I was little...

"There you are! Come on, Dad's making dinner for us, so let's go play some chess, yeah?" Mom asked me.

That's who you are... Mom... she's alive here?

No... I never had a Mom... I woke up on the Isle, I never had parents... but why did they look so familiar to me?

I walked over to a weird straw hut in the middle of a field littered with red, white, purple, and gold carnations.

"Where are we?" I asked my mom as she stood in the doorway to our home. She turned back to look at me and tilted her head.

"A much peaceful place under the sun. This is a place without Fico... where we can be a happy family forever, doesn't that sound so much better?" She asked me.

I was poisoned with the thought, wanting to step into that home... but as the wind swayed the flowers back and forth, I took one step back.

"What about Tavian? I want to be with him... is he here?" I asked Mom again. She crouched down to my level as I took another step back.

"Don't be silly Nono... it's just us here. Tavian isn't here, nobody else is here... this is a place without pain, where we can all be happy. Where I can be the mother you didn't have when you woke up on the Isle," She told me.

As nice as it sounded, it felt like this was a trap. No place could truly be that happy, could it?

The flowers started to turn from white, red, purple, and gold, to green, blue, and orange.

"Isn't this what you want, Noboki?" Mom asked me. I slowly started to grow in height, and my mom stood up as well, following my eye line the entire time.

"I want... to... be... happy..." I muttered. It was getting slower, my speech couldn't catch up to my thoughts.

"Here, there will be no pain. Doesn't that sound nice?" She held out her hand, and I couldn't help but raise mine in conjunction.

I slapped hers away and she looked hurt, holding it with a displeasure in her eyes.

"I... have to... live..." I told her. I felt my eye slowly slip out of my head, and my chest filled with pressure as I started to remember my situation.

Dad came to the door, holding it open lightly with something in his hand that was metallic. It looked like a belt... made of very flexible metal.

"Stop Fico, you got this Nono," He told me.

I woke back up with Fico pushing on my chest, feeling something wrap around my waist. I was able to remember my vision of Dad, and strands started to swirl around my arms. These weren't ordinary strands... they were Essence Strands, something that could apparently stop normal strands.

They grappled around Fico's ankles and lifted it all off of my chest. The pressure released, and it tripped Fico so she fell on her back. I felt that prowess she wanted me to awaken, and I ran at her with a burst of speed as my lungs had trouble expanding.

"You think that's all you need to beat me?!" Fico asked me.

The golden saber melted into my arm like a gauntlet, and as the Essence strands followed suit right behind them, I felt my eyes light up with passion.

The Essence Strands restricted Fico's movements on the ground, causing her to get stuck in the dirt and by the Essence Strands that held her in one place.

And using all of my strength, I whipped my entire arm back over her body and started to move toward her chest.

"THERE IT IS! GO AHEAD, JUST TRY TO PUNCTURE ME!" Fico screamed out. I followed suit, following right behind her, and screamed as well.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!" I screamed out. My memories were bottled up into my fist, and as all the pain and feelings came rushing to the forefront of my head, getting lost in my head injury, my entire hand planted itself in Fico's chest, moving straight to the metal.

It scraped for a moment, and I felt it slowly dent as I focused everything into the punch. The golden saber that morphed into my hand started to burn a symbol into my bicep, and as my entire arm lit up in golden flames, the Essence Strands burned straight through to her chest, and I planted my arm straight through, even going into a few inches of dirt.

"You... what...?!" Fico's face turned to one of alertness and started to rapidly shift out of my grasp.

In a mess of strands mixed in with her blood, something stood out to me as pure white strands started to grapple up my arm. I felt intense pressure as they climbed up to my elbow.

It felt like an insane amount of people were screaming right in my ear. It felt like my arm was heavier than my entire body.

"You want some of the burden?!" Fico asked. She smiled, with her teeth expanding and her jaw unhinging. She let out a scream so loud that my eardrums burst within my head, and my entire body rattled.

My arm was completely dead, as I couldn't move my fingers anymore, or feel anything past my elbow. I was worried about how things would turn out, but when Fico broke out of the Essence Strands from my decree, she didn't run toward Zealous... she left in the opposite direction as if she was retreating.

I panted heavily as most of my body was beyond repair, and fell into the dirt face first.