SL: Chapter 726 – Day 5,915 Part 2 – Hell Cometh

There were swirling balls of energy coming out of the black portal that was ringed with golden energy. The exact shape and color of the balls were hard to make out and remember. My danger sense was still going crazy. My eyes began to hurt quite a bit. I looked at Young Michael and his eyes were bleeding. That wasn’t good.

“Your eyes?” I said.

“What, my eyes?” he asked.

“Don’t look at the portal, angle the airship more away so we have to look back. Clarissa, don’t look at the portal. How is Michelle?” I asked as Young Michael rotated the airship and put more distance between us and the portal.

“Heavily injured and unconscious. As long as she gets a restoration in the next few days, she should recover physically. As for whatever did this to her,” I can’t say and I don’t dare check,” Clarissa said as I looked back at the portal.

The swirling balls of energy numbered around 10 at the moment. My eyes hurt quite a bit looking at them. Like staring at something that shouldn’t exist. I felt the energy in my eyes trying to move and rip them apart. “Memetic hazards of some kind. That is an exit portal. But into hell.”

The airship lurched violently. “Something is fighting my control!” Young Michael shouted out. I looked over at the black portal and something much larger was coming through. The black portal was being pushed upwards.

“Michael, we need to get out of here,” Clarissa said. I didn’t know which one of us she was talking to while she was leaning over Michelle and making sure she didn’t go over the railing of the airship.

“Get us out of here,” I said. I had seen enough. Staying to fight was just madness. It was difficult to look away. “AH!” I shouted and jerked my head to the side. I felt blood pouring down from my eyes as the energy behind them kept shifting around.

“Michael?” Clarissa asked me.

“Don’t look. We aren’t fighting that nonsense. Set course for the nearest city. Michelle needs a regeneration,” I ordered.

“Got it,” Young Michael replied. Glancing off the edge, we were speeding away from the hell portal. Having an escape plan was a good idea. Hopefully the Almighty System would close that portal as soon as possible.

“That was bad,” Clarissa muttered. I was about to agree with her, but I noticed we were turning.

“Michael! Stop turning,” I shouted at him. He didn’t say anything. I rushed over and grabbed his hair. I yanked his head to look at me. His eyes were pouring blood and his body had gone completely limp. I noted that the energy swirling in his eyes matched that of the energy of the monsters that had come through the portal.

“Sorry about this,” I said and my other hand reached out and my fingers pushed into the bone around his eye socket. I then ripped out the eye and the bone around it. He didn’t scream or say anything. Tossing the chunk of flesh and weird energy off the side of the airship, I did the same for his other eye. Young Michael then went completely limp. I moved him out of the pilot’s chair and tossed his body over next to Michelle’s.

“Watch him,” I told Clarissa as I took over the controls with my bloody hands. I reoriented the airship to move us away from the portal. The headache wasn’t going away and the pain behind my eyes wasn’t going away either.

“Are you going to be okay?” Clarissa asked me as I let out a groan.

“My head feels like it wants to split apart. But I am myself. Those two?” I asked.

“Still passed out. Young Michael is in really rough shape, there might be some brain damage. If they can’t wake up, they won’t be able to get a regeneration,” Clarissa said.

“That is a risk, but whatever those monsters are they are memetic. Just looking at them or interacting with them is dangerous. We need to-“ There was a large wave of energy that came from behind us. The airship began to spin about.

For a single brief moment, I got to see what was behind us. There was something large. Large enough only part of it had fit through the black hell portal. It was probably what had been deforming the portal before. The swirling balls of energy were far enough way they were hard to make out. It wasn’t a claw, limb, tentacle, but there was something.

My brain just wouldn’t process it. As the airship spun back around from the turbulence, I barely managed to orient us away properly as I felt my stomach twist. Something was wrong. That thing…that thing was always there. I couldn’t stop my gut from twisting and I puked. Blood poured out of my mouth. The energy in my body felt completely off.

“Michael!” Clarissa shouted and rushed over to my side.

“You didn’t look?” I gasped out.

“No, what was it?” she asked. I felt a sense of relief as my gut twisted again. My entire body, and especially my head felt like they were going to rip apart. I puked out more blood all over the airship controls. “Can you fly?” she asked.

“Don’t….don’t ask. I can fly. I haven’t lost my head yet. Look after the other two,” I said. That was when there was a large burst of golden light from behind us. I hesitantly spun the airship to check behind us again as the pain receded. There was nothing behind. No swirling balls of energy. Nothing coming through the portal. We were too far away to see the portal at this angle.

My headache started to fade and my entire body didn’t feel like it would be ripped apart. I breathed more easily. I wiped some blood away from my eyes which were itching. “How are they?” I asked.

“Bleeding, but stablish. They need a regeneration as quickly as possible,” Clarissa said. I adjusted our course due North to New Jaipur, or at least that was the name before the calamity wiped out everything. I felt exhausted despite having done nothing. Clarissa came over to me and looked me over. “You look terrible.”

“I need a regeneration as well. I resisted the effects of whatever those hell monsters were, but they were very bad news. Far worse than a level 7 or level 8 monster. It was memetic, at least I think it was. If you saw the last thing that came through, you would have instantly died, or something terrible would have happened,” I said. I felt her hand tighten on my shoulder.

“That is bad. Very bad. The rainbow dimension is far better than whatever all those things were,” Clarissa said.

“I am having a hard time remembering them, my memory feels fuzzy, like I had a lot to drink. At least they were all cut off by the Almighty System,” I said.

“We aren’t going to check?” Clarissa asked me.

“No. We all need healing. Ripping out Michelle’s tongue and the front of Michael’s face is not pleasant. I am afraid if they wake up before we get to a city,” I replied. “We aren’t leaving any time soon, or ever.” I muttered the last part.

“So, hell, huh. I know you named our city Purgatory as a joke, but hell? Really?” Clarissa asked me.

“I can’t think of a better name. Why would there be an exit into hell? With the way my energy was attacked through Michelle, it would seem that even the Almighty System would be at risk. Like how the sphere messed with the System’s energy,” I replied.

“Maybe it needed a thinking being? The landscape wasn’t impacted,” Clarissa said.

“Through energy. But the energy in the surroundings did get lower when the portal vote occurred. It wasn’t that noticeable compared to the portal itself, but it did get lower. Perhaps too low for whatever those monsters were,” I replied.

“Possibly. And the Almighty System was read, since it was maintaining the portal. Unlike the sphere which just showed up. Still, that was a bad outcome,” Clarissa said.

“Could it have been anything else?” I muttered. “Like some starting area where we could get information.”

“The starting or welcome area could be through the portal. Nothing says that this place has to be working properly,” Clarissa replied.

“Some sort of broken alien training facility?” I asked.

“It could be. There is nothing saying otherwise.”

“Seems a bit of a stretch, but it is as good as a guess as all the others. But there is no way I am opening up another hell portal or going through one,” I replied.

“Ever?” Clarissa asked me.

“Ever. I feel better now, after the System got rid of all those monsters and the portal, but facing them at close range and directly, no way. I would call them level 10 or perhaps level 13, since they are truly strong,” I replied.

“With whatever they were doing,” Clarissa said.

“Attacking directly through a person’s energy. Like the Astrologer, only a hundreds time better and stronger. I can only hope those two can regenerate and won’t be blocked from the store,” I said.

“If they are, they have no chance,” Clarissa replied.

“I know. You sense anything?” I asked.

“Nothing, but I didn’t sense anything in Michelle to begin with,” Clarissa said heavily. I let out a sigh as well. What a complete an utter disaster. One step forward, three votes backwards.

“I am guessing that is a no on the other votes?” I asked.

“We might consider end arrivals a couple thousand days from now, but even that seems risky. It could easily trigger other effects and everything got worse the higher up the voting list we went,” she replied.

“Three monsters. One super large, that was dangerous for me to look at which disturbed my energy. Balls of swirling energy that targeted eyes. And something else that got Michelle,” I said.

“Three types. Hell appears to operate on different rules from the zones,” Clarissa said.

“Would the Almighty System even control things like that?” I asked.

“That would have to be a meta-point question. And I would rather ask about Earth if I had to ask a question or the safe way to leave this place,” Clarissa said.

“Level 13. Just looking at them is insanely dangerous,” I muttered.

“The points would be quite high for killing things like that,” Clarissa replied.

“How would it even be calculated? You are forgetting that points are based on the level and multiplying the previous level. After level 10, they shouldn’t change which is why we had assumed that level to be the maximum,” I replied.

“Maybe. Or maybe the System would use another counting method. Or it would award meta-points for winning,” Clarissa said.

“Hell has no silver linings and I don’t believe the Almighty System would ever be that generous. Handing out meta-points like that? As for your broken idea, the System was too prepared to close the hell portal. It was basically telling us, there is no exit. A shame we didn’t have the Avatar to chuck her towards or into the hell portal,” I said.

“Really?” Clarissa asked me.

“That is her best use, chucking her at dangerous things and until I see her dead with my own eyes, I won’t believe it. Some enemies you need to be sure they are dead,” I replied.

“A shame Doctor Katz isn’t here,” Clarissa said.

“Maybe he will show up one day,” I replied. Having a dedicated healer was useful in situations like this. He would have been better able to tell what was happening and take a look at my mother.