New Power? (2)

2 days later, he awoke.

As he woke up, he looked around where he was, disoriented.

'Where am I?'

He couldn't seem to remember what happened before he woke up, but after a minute he seemed to regain his memories of what had happened the days before this.

As this happened, he also noticed the changes within his body and senses.

He felt several times stronger than he had before, and his body felt more sturdy and less fragile. He also noticed that he had much more control over his senses, and they improved overall.

Besides that, he noticed that he could switch between normal vision and seeing the particles, which eased his brain, which was overloaded from the constant sight of countless particles wherever he looked.

Whenever he would activate his new sense, the degree to which he could see everything was much more potent. The particles seemed to hold the tiniest bit more detail, and the huge aura radiating out of matter seemed to make just the littlest bit more sense than before.

After the amazing transformation his body had just went through, although he hadn't realized it yet, he was strong enough to fight the entity again without many major injuries.

Thinking back, he now partly understood why his body was like this now.

…

2 days before this, he could be seen sitting on the rocky ground, in a meditative-type state.

Inside of him, there was a rough and rocky battle going on.

Aiken was trying to assimilate another one of the particles. Although much less painful than the first one, it still felt like someone had just stabbed him. The particle struggled and thrashed inside his body, but he didn't give up.

He completely focused all his energy on subduing the particle, tiring him quickly. Although he was becoming tired, because of the immense amount of pressure and energy he used to subdue the particle it only took him a few minutes that time, much less time than the first time.

He was tired, but only laid back down on the ground for a few minutes. Even if it was just one more particle, his body still felt the tiniest bit more powerful, and he cherished that feeling. The more time he waited to continue, the more unbearable his greed for power got.

So, getting back up again, he once again entered his meditative state right after looking around to make sure no creatures would sneak up and kill him.

He once again focused on one particle, attempting to assimilate and fuse it with his body.

But this time, the pain he felt was a lot more bearable. It still felt like he had gotten badly hurt, but it wasn't nearly as painful as the time before. The particle also seemed to struggle less than the one before it, as if it was accepting his body more easily.

After only a couple minutes, it had already fused with his body, and didn't cause him nearly as much energy loss as before.

He then repeated the process of fusing the particles with his body over and over again, for several hours. He also started to fuse more than one particle at once, since he felt that it would take too long to only do one at a time.

After a few hours, he finally had gotten down to just 20 more particles. The particles seemed to easily fuse with his body at that point, only causing a slight pain. He took a minute to take a deep breath and got ready to assimilate the last particles.

Although he was only fusing 10 particles at a time before, he felt that he could now handle 20 particles with a bit of difficulty.

He entered his meditative state and focused on all the remaining particles. They slowly melted down and started to fuse with his body.

After a short struggle, he finally managed to take control of them and absorb them.

But once he absorbed the thousandth particle, an unfathomable pain washed over him.

It was such an immense pain, that his mind couldn't seem to handle it. His mind went blank, losing consciousness.

Immediately after this happened, his body seemed to go under a change. He seemed to lose some of his fat, replacing it with muscle. His skin cleared up, and his bones and muscles seemed to become a bit stronger. Even his organs had a tiny improvement, they seemed to work faster and became sturdier.

Back on earth, his new physique would be on the level of strength of a top-level fighter. His strength seemed to become inhumanly stronger than before, even though he hadn't gained any size.

Inside of him, where the core of his being lay, and internally throughout his entire body, even more miraculous changes began to happen.

...

(Changing from third person to first person)

Ah, thinking back just a few days in the past, everything used to be so much more simple and less complicated than it is now. After all, I've gotten closer to death many more times in the past few days than ever before.

I'm not too sure why, but I feel strangely accomplished and happy at my current situation. Even though I'm all alone in the middle of what seems to be an empty, silent island, on a planet that I anyone knew about before me, without a single drop of life, it's remarkably enjoyable to be all alone, to myself, for once in my life. I don't have any burdens here, no worries to think about, no people to annoy me, just myself.

What I want to do next is to enjoy my life to its fullest. I want to explore whatever this place is, experience new things, and free myself from any past burdens.

The first thing I need to do before exploring whatever and wherever this place is, is to find out the internal changes in my body. It feels like something has unlocked in my body, like a closed door that's never been opened before, was finally opened.

Sitting down, I go into a meditative state like before, trying to get a glimpse into the core of my being. But unlike before, I feel like I'm being restricted from entering it, like there is an invisible barrier blocking my consciousness from entering.

Although only a few minutes had passed, it felt like hours. I feel cold sweat running down my face and spine, and I'm starting to get tired.

Just break, goddamnit! why can't I all of the sudden not get into a meditative state like before! I can't even feel the energy inside of me anymore, it's almost like it dispersed across my body.

Wait, dispersed across my body? What if this entire time, I've been trying to do it wrong? What if I focus on my entire body, not just the core?

Switching my focus from just entering my core, I try to feel my entire body, not just the core. feeling throughout my entire body, I can feel all the muscles, bones, ligaments, joints, blood vessels, veins, and also... something else.

It seems like I have a second set of veins, but it doesn't seem to be carrying blood, it just seems like it's... empty?

Following the vein-like paths inside my body, eventually I reach the center of my being, where the hundreds of particles used to be before I integrated them into my body. But there, instead of emptiness, there was now a hollow sphere that had hundreds of small pathways, similar to veins, running out from the sphere, throughout my entire body. The only problem with them, is that they were all empty, even the sphere, which seemed to be an organ, comparable to the heart.

Suddenly, my view seemed to collapse, and I forcefully left the meditative state, just to open my eyes and see a terrifying view surrounding me.

In front of me, thousands, maybe even tens of thousands of dark particles rushed like madmen towards me. All of them entered my body almost instantly, forcing me once again to enter a meditative state.

Inside of me, I saw thousands of particles rushing into the spheric-shaped organ. I could feel it slowly fill up to the brim, until the point where it couldn't handle it anymore. Inside of the organ, which I'm calling a core from now on, small pathways slowly began to open, revealing hundreds of pathways that led all the way around my body, and eventually back to the core.

Instantaneously, the core seemed to come to life, and started pumping the darkness energy throughout the veins, filling them to the brim with energy. It felt invigorating and made me feel stronger than ever before.

Sadly, the amazing feeling didn't last long when even the veins slowly began to fill to the brim, and eventually they did. but when I saw a few thousand still rushing towards my core, my happiness faded away faster than ever before.

Why are they still coming? There isn't any room left for them inside my body, what is going to happen if they enter the core?

But soon, my questions were answered when they happily rushed into my core, which was already filled beyond belief. the darkness energy, which seemed to be massless before, couldn't handle so much of it compacted into such a small point, and it began pushing outwards!

With just the beginning waves of pain the energy was causing, my mind instantly went blank. As if it were running rampant inside my body, slashing every neuron, it felt as if it were destroying everything. A pain so unbearable that my eyes turned into the back of my head, and my brain felt as if it would melt.

Slowly but surely, the pain started to subside, due to the core forcefully being expanded by the energy. It continued to grow in size, until it was double its original size! It seemed that some of the overflowing energy, under the immense pressure began to merge and combine with the core, making it much sturdier and larger.

Finally, the core which seemed to be a pure black before, slowly changed color, and turned into a deep, dark, reddish color! At that point, the pain finally subsided.

Struck with relief, I felt my consciousness begin to slip away.