The Ever-Changing Variable (1)

I left my old neighbour's house, my hands stained in blood. I pocketed the phone that I borrowed from them and unlocked the car that was also borrowed.

I drove Uncle Walter's car and started making up a plan on where I should be headed.

As I decided that, I felt no reasoning within me. I didn't feel any place I should head towards. I didn't feel any true motive I had to chase after.

Right as those thoughts stagnated my logic, the entire world around me started to shake violently as chunks of land all around me began to break free from the Earth and hover in the air. The road began to crumble, along with the houses surrounding it and the very land that the houses were built upon.

I began to laugh. The sight before me felt utterly hilarious to me. Everything was being destroyed and it was such a-

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The sound of hooves clopping through the rough ground could be heard as dust that was being kicked up fogged up my surroundings. For the sake of humanity and the honour of my kingd-

Wait.... the hell am I saying?

I scanned my surroundings to find myself riding a horse while wielding a longsword almost a metre long in a battlefield. Chariots and horses could be seen stretching out several hundred metres beside me.

Right in front of me, stood an army of..... giant creatures. I rubbed my eyes with my left hand and looked in front of me again. They towered over the entire army that was marching towards them and picked off smaller battalions that were already engaging in combat with them.

Blood splattered everywhere and a sense of grief took over me. My comrades were dying in front of me. The comrades I had known for many years, were now becoming fodder for giants.

But within my grief, I felt pleasure. The sight of many many humans dying gave me an inexplicable feeling of euphoria.

My mind began splitting apart. The happiness I was slowly getting drunk on clashed with the immense sense of grief that I felt at the sight of many soldiers dying before me.

Pain shot through my entire skull. I assumed that somebody had impaled my head with a spear and was ripping it open while I was still alive throughout the process.

A few agonising seconds later, the pain went away. My senses cleared up as I looked at my surroundings once again. Through which curse in hell did I ever find any of this pleasurable?

Gruesome bodies lay dead and unmoving, spilling forth blood with no end in sight. The giants picked up the corpses they had slain and began to eat them.

Anger welled up deep within me. And while I watched the giants marching forward and slaying hundreds of my soldiers without a second thought, a chant left my mouth.

"O' Angels of the World, Show me the way"

Bright light illuminated my surroundings. My blade screamed in my grasp as power began pulsating within it. The blade that looked completely ordinary just a moment ago now possessed the grace of the heavens. And with this blade in my grasp, I glared at the giants.

'How dare you kill my comrades as if they were mere ants.'

The thought enveloped my entire being as I jumped from my horse, right towards the giants. I howled out loud as swung my blade down on the giant before me, whose size was more than 30 times my own.

With a loud boom of electricity, the giant before me was split in two. And thus, I let my rage fuel me. I handed over my body, my freedom and my will, to the power of the heavens.

One by one, I cut down the giants as if I was an unstoppable streak of lightning and turned the tides of war in no time. I felt my flesh burning away with every move I made, but I fought through the pain and kept fighting.

Amidst all the chaos of the raging battle that was taking place, a very quiet whistle could be heard. I struck down another giant as the whistle shrieked behind me, followed by the sounds of something being pierced through.

Right in front of my eyes, an arrow could be seen, lodged into the ground. Black flames burned through the arrow while blood sprayed from my chest. A hole could be spotted in my armour from where blood gushed through.

Another whistle immediately blew past me as another arrow shattered my knee. I fell to the ground and stared at the sky. My blade was still tightly held in my grasp.

A figure walked toward me, bow in hand, with a quiver full of arrows burning in black flames that distorted the air around them. He stopped as he had reached right before me and spoke, "The heavens have blessed your soul. They have given you their powers and have let you protect all that you want to. But the flames of hell will never forget the lives of those whose sacrifices you may have long since forgotten."

With those words, the man cocked an arrow into his bow.

"I hope you are able to atone for your sins, Francis. I will be joining you soon enough."

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["Ahhhh! This idea's another dead end."]

The voice echoed through the entire world as my surroundings disintegrated within a matter of seconds.

What was happening?

I was adrift within space. At least it looked like space. There were no stars that sparkled throughout, or planets that could be spotted. All that existed was me. Within the pitch-black void, I stayed adrift.

I looked down at my hands, they looked broken. As if cracked fragments of my hands were barely joined together and were somehow maintaining their shape.

Each fragment looked different, the colour of my skin in each fragment, the length, how much hair there was, how bony or muscular the fragment was. Each fragment looked different from the other.

I kept looking at my hands before I felt my 'self' fading. My morals were crumbling, along with my memories. I was Francis Wright, the commander of the armed forces belonging to the kingdom of..... huh?

Which kingdom did I serve?

Uhh... its name was the bo- .... the bari-? My memories were fading. I was Francis W. The commander of something. I was Francis....

I was... nobody.

And so, a while passed as I floated in the void. I felt nothing, while also feeling everything. My emotions didn't take shape. I felt flustered, anxious, excited, worried, scared, curious, confused and lonely and many other emotions. But at the same time, I felt nothing at all.

Throughout everything I felt, none of the emotions quite felt like my own, while they were undoubtedly my emotions alone.

But alas, one feeling that stood out from the rest did exist. It was desire. The desire for me to know. Curiosity in a way. I wanted to know, however, just what exactly was I?

And thus, I kept searching. I kept trying to find out who I was. I lived another life, and another, and yet another. I kept living, life after life, experience after experience. Only for it all to end one day, and for me to return to the void.

And as if it was pitying me, the void seemed to speak.

"Your pursuit is a hopeless one. Your answer, does not exist. However, clarity can be given. And as such, I hope you realise the futility of your situation."

With those words, a small panel began to form in front of me. It was as if a digital screen hovered before me. What was the purpose of such a system? How did it work? I got giddy with the possibilities that could exist.

"Is this like a game system?", I asked. A vague memory of me going to war with such a system seemed to surface. My conscience blurred.

"Sort of.", the void answered. "Although you cannot interact with it."

I was puzzled at the void's words. 'Interact', it sounded like a big word that adults used. "What does 'interact' mean?", I asked the void.

The void sighed as it seemed to look at my confused expression and spoke, "Hopefully the next story arrives soon so you stop constantly shifting personalities. It's hard to talk to you when your intelligence suddenly drops to that of a 5-year-old without warning."

I steadied my thoughts once more. I looked at the screen in front of me. It was similar to the system I had a vague idea about. Its appearance caused my feelings to plunge into chaos.

My mind stayed unstable. My feelings didn't feel even one bit sensible. I tried comprehending the screen I saw before me even though nothing in my mind made sense. My memories were scattered like a fallen Jenga tower and so were my emotions.

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Role: 'Protagonist'

Character Name: ???

Age: ???

Height: ???

Weight: ???

[Appearance features have been omitted or do not exist]

<Main details>

Setting Information: ???

Core personality traits: ???

[Smaller details have been omitted or do not exist]

___

The screen's contents showed me a bizarre collection of information. I didn't understand most of it, but I tried to piece together whatever parts I could. However, after every few minutes, my memories would crumble and scatter away once again.

And thus, I continued to float within the void while ever so often having a small world built around me and gaining a small semblance of a personality for a few minutes before it disappeared once again.

I stayed afloat within the void.

It was odd. It was obvious. It was terrifying. It was calming.

I felt happy. I felt sad. I felt abandoned. I felt ecstatic.

My emotions kept switching. Again and again and again and again and again and again and again.

They seemed to infinitely change every passing second. My body remained cracked and broken, made of various different types of parts. I could only assume that even my face looked the same.

Each broken fragment of my body would also constantly morph into different and unique parts. Different skin tones, maybe fat parts, maybe skinny parts, sometimes even animal-like parts.

Nothing about me remained the same.

Within the void, that remained constant every passing second, I was the only entity that existed for as far as I could see.

I was the entity that always changed. The entity that was made only of variables from heads or horns to toes, or the end of a tail that appeared every once in a while.

Time continued to pass when suddenly, a flash enveloped the entire void.