Chapter 17

All of a sudden, Conor woke up from the darkness. He couldn't recognise where he was. After a moment of confusion, it dawned on him where he really was; Conor was back inside the Unknown Realm.

Everything looked the same. Nothing was missing from its place. The large building was still there, the restaurant was still there, the rows of cars parked were also still there. Not knowing what to do, Conor just stared on towards the horizon.

There he saw it. The mountains were literally flying upwards again. It looked stunning, how those heavy mountains were simply lifted like feathers and vaporized against the red sky by an unknown force.

Conor didn't know what gave him the inspiration or the idea but he felt like there were answers there- right at the place where the mountains were destroyed. There was a strong urge inside him to go towards the horizon and find out what he needed to know to satisfy his curiosity.

Without hesitating, Conor started walking towards the flying mountains. He didn't want to run so as to save energy for escaping later. He crossed the road carefully and no lorry or truck or any vehicle had hit him this time.

Out of the blue, there was a huge force from his left side and he was flung to the right a couple of meters. Conor stood up slowly and winced in pain. His head had hit the bumper of a car and he was feeling a little dizzy.

Not waiting to wonder what caused him to fly like that, he continued walking towards the mountains. But he hadn't even paced for ten seconds when another thing happened. There was a weird sensation that someone was making a weird rubbing noise. He also felt moisture on his face.

That also made him realize another thing, Conor wasn't wearing a suit. He was just wearing his everyday clothes; t-shirt and track trousers. This kind of baffled him as he never knew that he could survive in the reality without a legitimate suit.

Not giving much of a thought, he kept walking again until he got smacked hard yet another time and flew back several meters.

'What the hell is going on-' Conor told himself. He got up, rubbed the dirt off his body, and started running at a moderate pace. After a while, he reached a small village type of place.

Conor stopped and looked around to see what he can do. But alas, nothing came to his mind except to go towards the flying mountains even though he knew something would happen if he goes there.

Ignoring his intuition, Conor kept running towards the mountains. Suddenly, the ground shook. Conor ignored it. High winds came gushing from his opposite direction, and yet he still ignored it. Then without notice, the ground beneath literally cracked apart. Conor fell into the ditch.

He fell and fell. He kept on falling. He could feel himself slowing down. At one point, Conor hit the ground. He was back where he was before he fell into the ditch. He looked forward and saw the land being folded in half. Conor just stood there, knowing that he can never outrun it.

He accepted his fate and stood there silently, without moving even a finger. Slowly, the ground came crashing upon him, making loud noises but Conor felt nothing.

And now Conor was awake, laying on the bed of Mr. Atlas's guestroom.