Chapter 14~The Genius~

The man was too stunned to speak Ben had really beat him, no one had ever done that before. The man asked himself how that was possible, he had counted 20 moves ahead, so it should be impossible to guess what he had planned and find out the weakness, for a newbie that is. But Ben was no newbie.

"Hey, Kid how did you do that?"

"Do you want to know?"

"Yes, of course, you are the tenth player to ever beat me in chess, so I would like to know how"

"Ok, first of all, I played a lot of chess when I was still living on earth and I was pretty good, I was ranked second on the global leaderboard. But as you probably guessed, that alone wouldn't be enough to beat you, so I used a skill"

Luca was surprised he knew that Ben was world-class in chess, but he didn't know that he was that good. The man looked at Ben and wanted to ask him something but closed his mouth, then thought about something else and opened his mouth again.

"Perhaps, the skill you used, was a skill of your sponsor?"

"Yes it was, do you the skill? I didn't even tell you the name"

"Ohhh yes, I know the skill after all I lose against your sponsor every time we play chess"

They talked for a bit longer before the man admitted defeat and left, but before he spoke out a warning that they shouldn't interfere with the plans of the big groups as long as they do that, there will be no problems for them. After the man and all the other players left, they received a system message and their status window was updated.

"Oh guys I can't believe we won"

Luca smiled happily as he said that and the others were happy too, they finally had a place where they could rest, and they could go to the next level if they wanted. But sleep was more important for them. The four of them walked to the door of the small family house, it was an old house with lots of ornaments on the stone walls and there was a terrace made of wood, on which they were standing now.

Eddie walked to the door and reached out to the doorknob, turned it around and the door opened and a big room with nothing in it could be seen by the four players. Ben rushed past Eddie into the house while screaming.

"I will get to choose the first room"

"Oh no you will not, I will"

"Hah, who do you think you are, ladies first"

Luca and Lena followed Ben quickly and only Eddie was standing at the door now, tears were flowing down his cheeks and he slowly murmured.

"A house together with other people, how nice"

After saying that he wiped away his tears and went inside too. The group finally got a rest after two hard weeks of surviving in a completely new world.

Anton was sitting on the top of a mountain in the middle of nowhere, he slowly looked around before he could see it, there was an entrance to a hidden cave about a hundred meters below him. Anton wanted to go to that place because it was the last thing his sponsor had told him to do before he died, but to Anton's luck, his sponsor somehow managed to leave a few of his powers in Anton's body.

Anton was jumping down the mountain like his body was perfectly fine but when he was standing before the cave entrance he had to cough up blood. His organs and body were recovering too slow and Anton had to find something to heal it, he first went to the forest in which the Goblin King lives, but the Goblin King and all the goblins weren't there anymore, and if Anton took a closer look at his left hand the mark from the Goblin King had also disappeared.

"It just doesn't make sense, neither I nor Anna won the Tournament so how could the contract be fulfilled?"

Anton thought that out loud, but it didn't matter because nobody was there and Anton again was standing before a door, the door was a lot smaller than the one from the Goblin King and there was another difference, the door was made out of wood not iron.

So all Anton had to do was to push the door a little bit and he went inside. Inside was a long tunnel, where the end could not be seen, Anton picked up a stick lying on the floor and made a torch out of it. While walking through the tunnel Anton thought about a few things like, if his friends are doing well, if everything is ok with Anna, and what he had to do here. He couldn't find an answer to the last question, but he would find it soon.

Anton suddenly came to a stop he felt a presence at the end of the tunnel, a presence just like a sponsor. He wanted to turn around and run away but a voice was heard and his feet moved on their own.

"You come here"

When Anton went around the last corner he could see a graveyard and at the end, there was a throne, and a being was sitting on this throne. The being was completely engulfed in shadow and a body could not be seen, only a vague silhouette could be seen and exactly that was what was talking to him now.

"What is your name young one"

"Ugh, my name is Anton"

Anton could hardly speak the pressure of the being in front of him was so strong, that his mouth wouldn't want to open.

"You are weak, why did you come here?"

"I came here because my sponsor asked me that before he died"

The silhouette was now standing and looking at Anton, before speaking up again.

"There is only one sponsor who knows that I am here, and he hasn't chosen an apostle in the last ten thousand years, what is the name of your sponsor?"

Anton felt a little awkward telling his sponsor's name.

"It is 'I roll down the hill' you know him?"

Anton couldn't see the silhouette's face but he could feel a little bit of shock coming out from the silhouette.

"So he has chosen an apostle and has given me the duties of a parent. Ugh?"

Anton couldn't believe what he had just heard, the duties of a parent. What does that mean?

"Ugh excuse me what do you mean by that?"

The silhouette now looked directly at him and Anton could see his eyes, they were pure white and Anton passed out the moment he saw them. The silhouette shook his head in frustration and whined while picking Anton up and going to a different room.

"Why does he always do that? Pretending that he died, only to make his students stronger"

When Anton woke up again he was lying on a comfortable bed, in a room that looked just like his room back in his house. No, if he looked closer it was exactly his room and the sun was just starting to shine outside. When he saw that a thought came to his mind, was that all just a bad dream? And if it was that his parents must still be alive.

He jumped out of his bed, opened the door of his room and started running down the stairs, but stopped halfway, what if his parents aren't there, what if it wasn't a dream? These thoughts came back into his mind and so he stood on the stairs for a long time before a female voice could be heard.

"Don't you want to come down Anton?"

It was the voice of his mother, tears started falling on Anton's cheeks and he jumped into his mother's arms, he was happy that it was all just a dream, a very, very bad dream. A dream no one wants to dream ever in his or her life.

Anton was sitting at the breakfast table with his mother and father, tears were falling onto the bread and his parents were looking at him, with a confused look but Anton didn't care. He had just got his parents back and was about to go to school again. Anton never thought that he would feel this happy about going to school, but today he was as happy as when he first got into elementary school.

After breakfast, Anton went outside to get his bike, and he started cycling to the train station. Ben was already standing there and was yelling at him.

"Why were you so late?"

Anton didn't answer and just hugged Ben, Ben's face became red and he pushed Anton away.

"Hey what is wrong with you"

"I was just happy to see you again"

"I know that we haven't seen each other much in the holidays, but please do that never again in public"

"Yes, yes"

Anton and Ben started talking about what they did during the holidays and Anton felt weird, hadn't he heard that somewhere before? But as hard as he thought about it he couldn't remember. So he just forgot about it.

They went on the train and Ben took out his phone and started watching a football game, it was Dortmund vs Bayern. Anton hadn't watched the game so he leaned over and looked at Ben's phone. For the rest of the ride, the two of them watched the game in silence. Their stop came and Ben had to stop the game on his phone as they were walking out of the train.

They walked down the stairs and Anton felt a slight fear for some reason, but nothing happened. They walked outside the train station and saw Luca waving to them, they went over and greeted each other.

"Hey, Luca how is it going, how is it with a girlfriend?"

"Huh? Anton, what are you talking about? I don't have a girlfriend"

Anton was confused, he definitely heard Luca saying that but the question was, when and where he heard it. But he couldn't remember that, it was frustrating, it was the same with Ben before, he was talking about things he already knew.

But Anton pushed that away and focused on school first, it was the first day of their last school year and he didn't want to make a bad impression.

While Anton was sleeping on a stone bed, the silhouette was standing beside him and gave off a troubled vibe. The silhouette thought that he could get Anton out of there easily since it was him who brought Anton there, but it was the first time that someone out of his own will wanted to travel dimensions and live in a different world.

"But I can't just leave him there, he would die inevitably, his souls would bond together and the memories of this world would start to fade away."

It was a problem for the silhouette he had never seen something like this, but he could also understand Anton. In this world, Anton lost his parents and now even his friends and he was about to die. He probably saw a world where that didn't was the case. And went there out of his own will, if the silhouette would now pull him out, he was sure that fragments of the soul would be lost, and Anton would die slowly after returning.

So the silhouette had to hope that Anton would wake up in the other world and that he would travel back here out of his own will again, just like he did before.

Anton was now lying on his bed staring at the top of his room and tears were flowing down his cheeks, he had remembered everything. He thought to himself, that he had to go and let the other Anton here live a peaceful and happy life, but he just couldn't get himself to admit it.