8 The Limbo Gate

Mack turned his head, but to his surprise, when he turned his head, he didn't see another room or anything like that.

What Mack saw was nothing, but was not a 'nothing' like the dark days from before.

It was a complete emptiness.

Mack turned his head back to look at the door again and lost the sense of touch and more nothingness.

Now he could not see the door anymore, too.

He looked at his foot, and there was no floor.

It was not darkness like the days before, Mack could see himself, but apart from him, he could see nothing else.

No sense of touch, no sense of wind, nothing.

Complete emptiness. Even his mind felt like that, like nothing mattered anymore, like there was nothing that could make him move a finger.

Mack stood there gazing at the nothingness, his eyes faded the color and he found himself thinking of why he was there. He didn't care. He could not care less, but just as he was waving between the reasons he was there, the memory of his father came, the scene of how they killed his father, the despair, the rage he felt at that day, and he snapped out of the trance.

"I am alone in this world, but I will never stop moving forward." Mack said, while regaining the colors in his eyes and taking a step forward in the complete emptiness.

The moment his foot moved and touched the ground, like a bubble of soap snapping, Mack could see around him again.

This time, what he saw was a room, not too big but big enough to accommodate a few dozens of people, and in the middle of the room he saw an altar, like the ones in churches, and past the altar he saw another door.

Mack took a few more steps, like someone wanting to confirm his beliefs, and stopped to look at the altar.

[Congratulations again, you passed the first test of the Tower of Chaos. The limbo gate.]

[I never saw someone do it this fast. It only took you four days on Earth time.]

"What? Four days? I was in that state for days? It looked like seconds to me."

[In the Limbo state, there is nothing, not even time. So of course you lost the sense of time there. It may look like seconds but was actually four days.]

"I see.... At least this one was an easy test."

[Easy for you, but only a few passed this test, and is only the first one.]

"Whats this altar for? Am I supposed to do something? I'm not a man of faith." Mack said while looking at the altar that seemed like it came out of one of those terror movies where people did sacrifices to some god.

[This is your reward for passing the test. Just follow the procedures in the tablet that is on the altar]

"Is that another trick of yours?"

[I'm not some circus clown. I only follow my creator's instructions!]

"Ok, Ok, no need to be angry." Mack said, raising his hands like someone admitting his faults. Alas, better not make this girl angry.

[...]

Seeing no response from the Arcane, Mack walked in the altar's direction.

"Let's see what kinds of gifts Santa is bringing me today."

After walking a few steps, Mack came atop of the small altar and saw a small Cube like the one from the previous room, but this one had a different design and was the size of a man's head.

Mack was about to touch the cube but he noticed a metal sign carved with runes by the side of the cube. Seeing the familiar runic language, he spent a few seconds to read it and as if to confirm he was not wrong, asked aloud.

"Am I supposed to drip blood on top of this cube?"

[Yes.]

"Ok..."

Mack shook his shoulders and took a small knife from his backpack and made a slight cut on his finger and dripped blood over the cube.

~drip~

The same moment a drop of blood touched it, the cube hummed and turned from blue to bright red, and a few moments later, a small cubic hole appeared in it.

Mack was familiar with these machines already and put his hand inside to retrieve the gift.

To his surprise, it was a syringe, with some metallic grey liquid inside.

"Let me guess...."

[Don't tell me you have a fear of needles?]

"I just prefer not to take suspicious injections with unknown contents inside."

[Up to you, but there is only one way for you to know what it is.]

~sigh~

Mack looked at the syringe, and after a few seconds, he closed his eyes and lunged the syringe in his left arm. Feeling the cold liquid run in his veins, Mack got a stifling pain in the arm, but was not that strong to make him panic.

After a few seconds and seeing he was not dead, he opened his eyes and felt nothing different.

"Is this thing working? I don't see any difference. Only a bit of pain in my arm."

[It needs a few seconds to start working]

"Ok..."

Just as Mack finished talking, his eyes started to burn in pain.

"Arghhhh what is happening? My eyes!!!!" shouted Mack, not seeing anything anymore, he suddenly had became blind.

A few seconds later an acute pain came to his eyes, and like a fog dispersing, his vision started to recover, and not a second later, he could see again.

All that happened so fast that Mack barely could react.

"What was that? I went blind for a few seconds" but just as he asked, a string of runic symbols showed in his vision.

(Installing System)

(Starting System)

Mack looked right and left with his head, but his eyes continued to show these runic symbols overlapping with his normal vision.

(System diagnosis complete. All functions available to use.)

"What system? What's happening?"

[Think of this as nanorobots from Earth but much more advanced]

"Nanobots? That thing is not even fully developed on Earth. What this one does?"

[Try looking at your gun and try using your will to know what is this]

"I know it's a gun."

[Just try. Focus your mind on wanting to know what is. This is a basic low-level use of will]

"Ok."

Mack took his rifle out and looked at it while focusing his mind on 'what is this?'

A few seconds later, a string of runic letters appeared in the right corner of his eyes.

(Generic gun, common grade, unknown manufacturer)

"That's freaking cool! Now I can know obvious things that I already knew. Great!" Mack said sarcastically, but he knew this thing would be extremely useful in some situations.

[This will be of use when you encounter things from other worlds that you are not familiar with.]

"Yeap I guessed. This thing has some kind of database in it?"

[Yes. It contains most of the commonly know information in several dimensions. Mages use a spell for this. But, as one that treads the path of Magick, you can't use spells. My creator devised this method in his earlier days, combining technology and Will. The effects are almost the same as a mage spell]

Mack then grabbed a banana like fruit from his backpack and looked at it.

(Scurata, common grade , Made by Cube Inc)

Mack shook his head, no new information, only the weird 'made by Cube Inc' at the end, he already knew it was a scurata, he took out from the metallic box himself.

"Ok. Thanks for the boring explanation. Should I proceed to the next door? I don't feel tired and there is nothing else here."

[...]

"Ok, Ok, Sorry I was rude."

[...]

~sigh~

"All right, I guess next door it is, then." Mack said already walking toward the next door.