Chapter 15.
The Welcomes Of Destiny and The Trial Of Light.
Another blinding white light later and Blaze was standing in the last trial – the Trial Of Light. Before opening his newly acquired eyes he felt intense heat wrap tightly around his body, washing out all the moisture around Blaze. He took a deep breath into his lungs and wished he had not done so in the next second. The air was completely dry and without any moisture at all, scratching Blaze’s throat, like the claws of a vicious tiger and setting his lungs on fire. Blaze opened his eyes and started blinking quickly as the unmerciful wind combined with the scorching heat of the midday sun to dry his eyes. Of course, the only place where it could be this hot was a desert.
Blaze looked around and saw nothing but gray sand and gray sky without any clouds. The heat was immense, making Blaze start to drip sweat all over his body just by standing still. The wind did not help to cool his body at all. On the contrary, the wind was strong and combined with the heat it sent waves that cut into Blaze’s skin, almost making it melt. In less than a minute, Blaze’s throat was completely dry, just like the sand under his feet. Blaze let his chains drag behind him, like unneeded weight, making deep trails inside desert sand. The sun was not sending warm rays; it was fiercely launching blazingly hot rays of fire. The temperature of the place was over two hundred degrees and Blaze was not expecting to see anything that was alive inside the overheated desert.
Blaze was pouring more sweat than he thought he had inside his highly fit body. The shoes that were around his feet had been like a roasting oven. Blaze was afraid of taking them off only because he didn’t want his feet to cook on the hot sun like chicken legs in a frying pan. The chains just added more weight and heat onto him, and acted as unnecessary weight in this Trial of extreme endurance. “So, this is what it must feel like to be a turkey in an oven…” – Blaze remarked while continuing to walk straight. All of a sudden, Blaze heard a loud smirk come from up above him that seemed to rocket through the whole sky. Blaze stopped and looked around and up but saw no one at all. “That was a very stupid remark on your part,” – a voice that seemingly came from all directions answered. “Uhh… Who is this? Am I hallucinating or something? Is this a part of the challenge?” – Blaze continued to look around and could not see a single soul. “I can’t believe such a punk can pass through all the Trials, I still do not think you are worthy to be the savior of Order…” – it was definitely a voice of a young woman close to Blaze’s age. The voice was icy cold and seemed to be always upset and unfulfilled by something. From the first remark Blaze could tell he was talking to an ice queen. “Before making such a sudden judgment, maybe you should get to know a person better. Don’t judge a book by its cover…” – Blaze answered back with a gruff and very hostile tone. “You insolent fool! You don’t even know to whom you are talking to!” – the voice was suddenly angered and Blaze felt the volume increase dramatically. “Let me guess, some stuck up girl who gets what she wants and is now angered because something is not going her way! Am I correct or am I right?!” – Blaze answered back with the same amount of sudden anger that he was answered too, matching the intonation pound for pound. “Your wrong! And you need to learn your place, mortal! Because you are talking to Destiny herself!”
Blaze was staggered and his mind was completely blank from the verbal blow he had just received. “You… are Destiny? Wait, I never thought there is a person who controls the faith of trillions of races and billions of planets inside the universe… Never thought there was anyone with such power…” – Blaze answered with a slow whisper, accompanied by the gruffness. “Well, I am not a person, although I am a female. I am not just a person, I am a higher being. I shape up the lives and the faiths of every soul, I am the one who creates heroes and villains, war and peace. I am the architect behind every planet and behind every life. I am the one who makes them and breaks them,” – While the voice was not as mad anymore, it still remained very cold and belligerent towards Blaze. “Wow! So you are the reason behind the heartless, nobodies and my planet being destroyed?” – Blaze decided to keep the same uncongenial tone towards Destiny. “Apparently, no.” “But… I thought you said you shape everything…” – Blaze was again amazed. “You are so nearsighted! Seriously, I have no idea how you had gotten all the way through here! These things are none of your mortal concern! At least, not until you pass, which I think you won’t manage, not in this heat anyways. There is an oasis, the final door, in the middle of this desert. Prove to me that you worthy of getting to that door and you will be granted the power of Chaos among the ones you already have,” – Blaze felt the responsibility tighten up his shoulders, along with the flaming heat. He felt Destiny’s presence completely vanish away. Blaze was left with no choice but to continue to move his sweat pouring body straight, towards where he hoped was the middle.
Thirty minutes had gone by and the heat was melting Blaze’s skin, making him sweat and cook under the heat. His eyes were becoming very heavy and a giant wish of just lying down on the sand and not moving forever was trying to tame his soul. Everything was so gray and tediously tiresome, Blaze felt like he could not make another step before he pushed himself to walk forward. Every breath made his insides burn in hellish flames, slowly giving away their life to the cruel desert. Every movement seemed to take enormous strength to produce, and Blaze’s will was slowly dying, melting off like a church candle in the altar. Blaze stopped, and looked forward in hopes of seeing a glimpse of the door that symbolized a finish line in his mind, but could only see the gray sand. Blaze did not even want to make a sarcastic remark in fear of using up too much energy to unnecessarily speak out loud. His eyes were half closed and his mouth was half open, taking deep breaths as he stood there, all motivation completely gone from his mind. His fire was dying down inside the scorching flames of the brutal desert. His mind was completely absent from his body, as if trying to find a place to rest away from the heat. With his mind completely absent, Blaze’s hand flew up and pointed at the sand. Inside his almost closed eyes the eyeballs lit up dark red, and on the sand formed the seven letters that symbolized fortune and desperation in his own world. All Blaze had to do is take one look at the letters, and it seemed to call his mind back to him in an instant. All of the motivation got back to him, and maybe Blaze even felt a small refreshing breeze that cooled him off for two seconds, all because of the seven simple letters formed in the sand that together read a name that Blaze held the closest to his heart, “Roxanne.”
He decided that he could not quit now, and Blaze started walking forward again. The ground shook around Blaze, as he halted his movement. “No please… not this…” – Blaze thought to himself while only imagining what could be making the ground shake so badly. He did not have to imagine for long, as the sand behind him opened and a forty-foot tall worm rose up high above Blaze and roared a truly monstrous roar that spread all across the desert, breaking away the sleeping silence. The worm was huge, ten feet wide and forty feet high, with two feet tentacles coming out from the sides that seemingly never stopped squiggling around. Seemingly he could see living creatures in color, because Blaze could perfectly see the worm. It was completely dark brown, and the hair-covered skin looked like thick armor with many folds. The face of the creature is what was truly terrifying, as its mouth was open, Blaze could see huge, sharp, white teeth, each being half the size of Blaze. The worm had many eyes placed above its revolting mouth, stacked in two rows all being colored red, as if filled with blood. Blaze could not see a nose, but the mouth had many strange, nasty and disgusting tentacles coming out on the side of it’s lips that were always moving, twisting and whipping around, while making the saliva of the worm fly in all directions. “Ahh great, I see the little Fido came to play with me…” – Blaze said to the worm while looking up into its mouth. Blaze was sure that he did not want to end up in there. He felt another movement, and as if one of these worms weren’t enough, three more showed up from below, closing in on Blaze from all sides.
Blaze felt like he was in a major pile of crap, and, with the ravenous worms surrounding him, he indeed was very close to being digested into one. The way those worms stared at him with their bloodthirsty eyes and flesh hungry teeth was not comfortable in the least. Blaze was very sure that they haven’t had much to eat in the lifeless desert, and he looked like a delicious meal full of tasty meat. Blaze did not move at all, and was just praying that the worms may pass him off. Of course, that didn’t happen. The worm that Blaze had his back to charged in on him with it’s gaping mouth open, and in short two seconds Blaze was gone from the view. The worm rose back up and was chomping its jaws with loud and wet smacks. The seemingly enjoyable chewing was stopped and the worm seemed to be struggling to connect its jaws. The worm froze, and then the jaws slowly started to open against worm’s wishes. It struggled to get them closed, but it couldn’t, and out of the deadly and disgusting mouth of the creature emerged Blaze, pushing up on the upper jaw of the beast and trying to straighten his legs out on the lower part. Blaze’s teeth were clenched just as tight as the worms were, as he was stretching his body for his life. The worm’s slimy and revolting saliva was pouring all over Blaze, making him feel like he was about to puke. The worm was struggling hard, but Blaze’s strength was prevailing over the creature, and he almost had the jaws open, as the tentacles on the sides of the worm’s mouth came alive and started whipping Blaze’s body. Blaze let up only slightly from the harsh whippings and it was enough for him to become worm food. The jaws closed with a loud thud, and the creature seemingly forgetting to chew its food swallowed Blaze whole.
The worm had a satisfied look on its face, while the other three looked very pissed off. The now full worm slumped slightly; enjoying what he thought was going to be a pleasant digestion. For half a minute the creature was slumping back onto its tail and taking deep and satisfied breaths, then the chest of the worm shook. It worriedly looked down onto its own chest area, and then started to strangely and loudly cough. First there was only saliva, but as the beastly coughs got stronger and the monster started spitting out blood with every cough. Other worms looked onto their sibling with slight worry in their many red eyes. The strong coughs tuned into even more powerful surges that went through the body of the beast. The worm rose up in its towering full height, and started twisting left and right, making sorrowful cries of agony between the bloody coughs. The intonation and the volume of the cries rose higher, and the worm’s agonizing motions were accompanied with even more agonizing pulses in its chest area. The worm was practically turned into a crazed tornado, with the yelps being its whirling sounds. Then it froze and stuck its chest out upwards, groaning and shrieking in purely agonizing horror as its chest exploded, sending out a curtain of green gooey mess and thick red blood, behind which Blaze emerged, all covered in crimson color, while holding in his hands the seemingly still beating and humongous heart of the vile creature, “Who else wants some?!”
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