《Whispers from the Abyss》 Chapter 1: A Kind Soul In A Dark World Luke had always been a kind soul. He would go out of his way to help anyone he came across. When he was going to school at his usual time of 8 in the morning, he saw that an old lady needed help to cross the street. He sprung into action and went to help. Luke asked Her, "Do you need any help, miss?" The old lady responded, "Why yes dear could you help me find the grocery store I seem to be lost?" Luke responded as he usually would, "Of course, I would love to help you!" Once Luke was done helping the lady to the store, he checked the time. He saw that it was now 8:20 and he only had 10 minutes to get to school when it was 15 away. Luke thought, '' I guess helping her to the store took longer than I thought.'' Luke rushed to school running between the alleyways that he usually doesn''t take because of how suspicious they are. As Luke was using the alley as a shortcut, he heard an eldritch voice call out his name "luke" " Luke" " LUKE" The voice seemed to have a hypnotic effect, pulling Luke closer every second till he reached the voice, and at the end, there was some sort of portal. Once Luke saw the portal, he reacted as if he had seen perfection, an almost ethereal existence. As Luke started to step into the portal, he started to regain control over himself, but it was too late. He fell into some sort of darkness, so he called out "Help" which no one responded to. Luke decided that he was going to try and escape. He walked north for what felt like an eternity until he saw a glimpse of light. He kept walking towards the light until it flashed in his face and blinded him temporarily. After Luke regained his vision, he saw that he was on a barren and dead piece of land which only had a set of ruins on it. Luke started to freak out not knowing what was going on, wondering if someone had kidnapped him or if he died and went to hell. His thoughts were a mess, and he couldn''t get a hold of himself and started to scream bloody murder. In the distance, he saw something coming toward him, attracted by the sounds of his screams. He couldn''t explain what it was. His mind was still too weak to understand the eldritch horrors from beyond. After Luke saw that being coming towards him, he ran towards the only cover he had, the ruins, which looked broken down. Luke felt some sort of attraction towards it. Luke took cover in the ruins and caught his breath after running for his life. After Luke caught his breath after a few minutes, he looked outside to see if that monstrosity was still outside. He saw that it was waiting outside for him. Luke started to get a headache and heard whispers in a different language "C?????????????????o??????????????m??????????????????????e????????????? ????????????????o????????????????u??????????????t?????????????????.?????????? ???????????????C??????????????o????????m?????????????????e????????????? ??????????????????o???u????????t?????????????????.??????????? ?????????????????????C????????o????????????m????????????????e?????????????????? ?????????????????o?????????????u?????????????t?????????????????? ???????????????l????????????????i???????????t?????????????t??????????????????l??????????????e????????? ?????????????????????????o??????????????????????n????????????????????e???????????" It was like he was hypnotized and couldn''t control his body. Luke started to walk toward the exit of the ruins. Right before he took a step outside, the ruins emitted a pulse of some energy, scaring away the being. Right before the being ran away, Luke heard the strange language in his head again "W????????????h?????????????????????????a???????t???????????? ???????????????????w???????????????????a??????????????????s?????????????????????? ?????????????t????????????h????????????????a????????t?????????? ????????????????????p?????????????????????r?????????????????e????????????????????????s?????????????s?????????????????u???????????????????????r?????????????????e???????? ????????I????????? ????????j???????????????u????????????????????s??????????????t?????????? ???????????????????f???????????????e???????????l??????????t????????????? ?????????????????????????I??????????????????''?????????????????????????v???????????????????????e??????? ?????????????????????n?????????????????????e?????????v?????????????????e?????????????r???????????? ?????????????????f????????????????????e?????????????l???????????t????????????????? ?????????????????t????????????????????????h????????????????a???????????????t???? ????????b??????????????e????????????f????????????????????o????????????r?????e?????????????????????????" If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. After Luke heard that, the being ran away from whatever it was talking about. Now that the being was gone, Luke could leave if he wanted to, but he didn''t know what was out there and he felt some sort of feeling pulling him deeper into the ruins. __________________________________ Deeper in the ruins *Core awakening* *Detected being in ruins* *Detected being isn''t a part of mother''s race "Zeshaphines"* *Scanning database for species name* *Error Error Database has been corrupted 99%. Only the most basic 1% of knowledge is left* *Mother race "Zeshapines* was wiped out transferring the Mother race to "Unknown"* *New Mother''s race must still pass trials* *Detected over time that trials 1 and 3 have broken, transferring energy to trial 2* __________________________________ Back to Luke As Luke was going deeper in, he saw skeletons lining the passage as he went down. Luke made it to a metal door that had a scanner on the door. As Luke was walking closer to the door, the scanner activated and scanned him. After that, he heard a voice in the strange language again "A??????c???c??????e?????s???s????i?????n?????g?????? ?????b??????e????i????n???????g??????s????? ??????m??????e??????m?????o?????r??????i?????e??????s????? ???????a????n????d???? ???a????s?????s?????i????m?????i??????l???a?????t?????i??????n???g?????? ?????t????h????e??? ?????l?????a?????n???????g?????u??????a?????g????e?????.??? ????" Luke had another headache from that strange language, but it wasn''t as bad as the one from that strange being he had seen earlier. Now Luke heard that sane voice, but instead, it was in English and he could understand it. The strange voice told Luke, "Sorry for giving you a headache but that was the quickest way for me to learn your strange language. This is the ruins of an ancient civilization that was able to break free from the mortal world and thrive in the abyss till the catastrophe. I''ll answer any questions you have if you pass trial 2. I won''t respond unless you do so on your own till you do. Just keep walking forward to find it" Luke''s thoughts were a mess and he couldn''t form a full thought due to the absolute shock and fear he felt right now. It took him a full hour to at least get enough composure to ask, "If I pass the trial am I able to go home."There was no reply. He was all alone till he passed whatever this trial was. Luke keeps walking forward trying to find the second trial, which was his only chance to escape, no matter how small that chance might be. It took Luke at least an hour to finally find himself at the second door, which he could only assume was the second trial. Outside the door, there was another one of those scanner things that activated and he heard the voice in his head again "I know I said I wouldn''t say anything else but I just remembered one thing. This second trial will be 2 times as hard as usual due to the fact you get to skip trials one and three because they broke. That''s all" Luke''s thoughts went even bleaker now that he knew that the fight he had a small chance of winning just went down as he was only a normal human. Luke took the next hour to calm himself down and get ready to take his only chance to get back home to his friends and family that he already misses even though it''s only bee- wait, how long have I been here I can''t tell. Not that it matters right now. Nothing will matter if I am unable to pass this nightmare difficultly trial. Now that Luke had calmed down and psyched himself up for the fight. He got up and started to walk toward the door and the scanner. Once he got closer, the scanner activated and asked in a cold robotic voice, " Are you ready?" Luke answers with a quiver in his voice, "As r-r-ready as I''ll ever b-b-be." The cold robotic voice answered, "Then walk towards the door and open it, and good luck you will need it." Luke swore during that last part of the sentence he heard some sort of pity from the voice. As Luke started to walk toward the door, he started to shake but didn''t stop and as he opened the door he saw¡­. Chapter 2: Trial 2: Clone As Luke opened the door, he saw nothing but instead heard a voice saying, "Come to the center of the room." Luke started to make his way to the center of the room, and after he did, a dark beam of light came down on him and scanned him. The beam disappeared, replaced by some sort of dark liquid coming from the floor. A cold, harsh-sounding robotic voice told Luke, " Scanning complete. Initiating copy of challenger. The trial difficulty was raised by two. Clone may now deviate and use faints. The trial starts in 3, 2, 1." An alarm went off, signaling the start of the trial. As soon as the alarm was rung, a weapon rack rose in front of each Luke. On the rack, there was a wide selection of weapons, including but not limited to spears, mace, swords, pole staffs, daggers, staff, and even gauntlets. Luke wasn''t expecting the racks to rise, and it shocked him, but he knew he needed to grab a weapon to stand a chance. Luke grabbed the dagger because they were the closest weapon. Luke had never felt anything with a texture like this. Its blade was as dark as the void, and the handle felt as freezing as the depths of the abyss. While Luke was distracted by his newfound daggers, his clone took the chance to attack him. Luke noticed it at the last second, and his already shaking legs gave out, making him stumble back. Even though he stumbled and fell back, he didn''t completely dodge the sword swing. So he got a cut on his arm, which sent him into the worst pain of his life. Luke screamed, "FUCK ME, THAT HURTS SO BAD!" Luke then saw another swing of the sword coming down on his neck, but at the last second, he rolled out of the way. Luke''s situation was so serious that the instincts of all humans came into play¡ªfight or flight. Luke hesitated for a second, which felt like an eternity, but eventually, he chose to fight. The adrenaline pumping throughout Luke''s body made him forget about the pain that he was experiencing from the cut. Now that Luke had regained his calm, he started to try and fight back. Luke tried to use his dagger to swing at his clone, but he realized that the clone using the sword could give it much more control over his space. The clone knocks out one of the daggers from Luke''s hands. Luke was taken by surprise, not expecting to lose one of his daggers. Luke''s already wavering mind finally gave in, and he was left stunned and open to an attack from the clone. The clone didn''t let this opportunity go to waste and closed in on Luke. The clone slashes down on Luke''s shoulder, leaving a deep wound. Luke lost all control over his left arm after that attack, but the pain snapped him back from his daze. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Luke, now back from his daze, backed up as much as he could, and put up his remaining dagger as a guard. Luke had no control over his left arm, leaving it in his way, dangling by his side. The clone, not giving Luke any time, rushed up and swung right across Luke''s chest, but Luke, now aware and ready, dodged left and tried to get an attack on the clone''s right leg. The clone noticed what Luke was trying to do, so it jumped back to try and avoid it. The clone''s attempt to dodge the attack wasn''t fully successful; he got a cut on the back of his right leg. The clone''s movement slowed down after it got cut. Luke saw this and started to move on the offensive, but the clone still had a longer reach with its sword. Luke tried to get as close as he could to the clone, but every time he tried, he was met with a swing by the sword. Every one of Luke''s attempts ends with a failure, leaving him confused about how he should win this. Luke''s thoughts at this moment were, "How the hell am I supposed to beat this thing." The clone stayed on the defensive, countering all of Luke''s attacks. Luke was starting to lose his breath, needing to catch his breath. The clone noticed Luke was starting to let up on his attacks, which led him to counter his last attack and go back on the offensive. Once the clone regained the attacking position, it didn''t stop attacking Luke, leaving no chance to try and counter-attack. Luke needed an opportunity to catch his breath, but he knew the clone wouldn''t let him. At this moment, Luke''s mind was thinking at light speed, trying to think of any way he could survive this. Thought after thought raced through Luke''s head; after what seemed like an eternity, Luke finally thought of a plan. It was super risky, but Luke was willing to take any risk at this point to escape this hellhole. Luke tried his best to counter the clone''s attack, but after he messed up, Luke got grazed but used his already disabled left side to take the attack. After the clone attacked, Luke went for a counterattack on the clone''s right leg. Luke successfully hit the clone''s leg; now the clone couldn''t put too much weight on his right side. The clone started to put more of his weight on his left leg, but he still didn''t let Luke off. Luke jumped back to make distance and regain his breath. Luke watched as the clone started to rush him. He started to rush the clone back to try and make up for his dagger''s short range. The clone swung on Luke, but he dodged to his side, rushed up on the clone, and got a swing off his back. The clone counterattacked but missed, and Luke took this chance to stab into the back of the clone''s neck but missed. The clone used this chance to knock Luke back. Luke rolled back, knocked out of breath again from the clone''s attack. Luke noticed that the dagger he lost was right next to him. Luke hid the one he didn''t drop behind his back and picked up the one he dropped earlier. The clone rushed to attack Luke while he was on the ground, out of breath, but before it managed to reach him, Luke got up. The clone still rushed in to try and stab Luke in the chest or stomach. Luke tried to counter the attack, but Luke, being inexperienced, missed the counter and got stabbed in the stomach, dropping his dagger. The clone''s pitch-black face held a hint of mockery for Luke after he missed his counter¡­ Chapter 3: What The Fuck Happened To Me The clone''s face held a hint of mockery for Luke, almost as if the clone was gloating about winning. Now that the clone was almost certain it would win the fight, it lowered its guard. Luke, expecting it to lower its guard, grabbed the dagger he hid behind his back and, at an almost superhuman speed, stabbed the clone''s throat, killing it. Luke pulled the dagger out, and a pitch-black, blood-like liquid sprayed on Luke''s face. The clone''s body dropped to the ground. Luke''s mind was racing; he didn''t want to believe what he had just done. It didn''t matter how Luke felt because he was still bleeding from the sword stab. Luke didn''t know what to do; his strength was leaving his body, and his vision was slowly fading black from blood loss. As Luke started to see only black, he heard the same cold, harsh, robotic voice he heard at the start of the trial say, "Challenger beat trial two. Challenger has proven capable of being the new Mother Race. The challenger life force has been detected as dropping. Emergency protocol: scanning Mother race.Detected no abyssal energy..." That was all Luke heard until he was unable to keep consciousness. After Luke passed out, the voice kept going, "Detected no abyssal energy in Mother race. processing solutions to life force depletion. Solution 102 was found to be effective, administrating solution to target. Deploying remaining abyssal energy under control into the target soul and body." Meanwhile, in Luke''s mindscape, he was experiencing the aftermath of his soul and body fusing with the abyssal energy, turning him into an unknown being. Luke was under the watch of an almighty being in the abyss. It started down at him. Luke was under a lot of pressure, not knowing how to counter this situation. The incomprehensible being spoke with an eerie, distorted voice, "???? ?? ?? ???? ????? ?''?? ????? ???? ??? ?? ??? ??????, ?????? ???. ? ???? ???? ???, ??? ??? ???; ??? ???????? ??? ??? ?????? ?????." Luke had a splitting headache, the worst one yet since he had been here. Luke couldn''t wait to get out of this place and never have to come back to this hell again. The being stared at Luke for a few seconds after it spoke and then disappeared, resulting in Luke waking up. Luke woke up to an unimaginable pain, coming from what felt like the very essence of his being. Luke felt like he was being ripped apart and reconstructed over and over. Luke lost all sense of time due to the pain; he couldn''t tell if only a minute had passed or if an hour had passed. After what Luke could only describe as the most gut-wrenching, jaw-grinding, agony-inducing pain, he started to gain consciousness slightly when he heard that robotic voice again say, "Mother race transformation was successful. Mother Race managed to become a new species, a mix of abyssal and Unknown Mother race, named "To Be Determined." Mother Race, are you okay? I am only able to sustain my existence for a few minutes, but there is much you must learn. I can only give you so much help, but I will give you the remaining 1% knowledge of the previous Mother race." Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. After the voice, Luke felt another headache, but with his experience with the other ones he had earlier, it didn''t hurt as much. After the headache, Luke felt the existence of new memories that weren''t his. Luke tried to think about them, and he got sucked back into his mindscape, but instead, this time he was in front of what looked like a sphere. The sphere was swirling with colors, almost as if there was a galaxy inside it. Luke was enthralled by the sphere, moving closer every second, until he reached it and touched it. After Luke touched it, he could search through the seas of knowledge. Luke was amazed by just how much knowledge there was, but he couldn''t help but imagine how advanced the previous Mother race was if this was only 1% of their knowledge. As Luke was searching for the sphere, he came across the entry for abyssal energy, and it read, "Abyssal energy is created in the depths of the abyss, but no one knows the exact process by which it is created, but what is known is that it is one of the strongest energies available for use, only outranked by one that no one can use."Abyssal energy can be used to do almost anything, from creating a new being out of nothing to being able to curse your enemy, and anything in between." Luke was fascinated by this and started to look around for more things to read. Luke found another section, but this one is on the abyss itself. Luke read the following passage, " The abyss came into existence when the primordial energy exploded, leaving behind abyssal energy and origin energy, both creating realms. The abyss is where unimaginable horrors live, and not even we were able to explore the very depths of the abyss, but we were able to discover that the abyss went through some sort of civil war. The leading factors for the war that we found were the seven deadly sins, leading experts from the previous era, who tried to dethrone the abyss will and take over the abyss for themselves. They were able to interfere with the very laws of the abyss and add their specialty to them, Pride, Sloth, Wraith, Envy, Greed, Gluttony, and Lust, which angered the abyss will, and to retaliate, the abyss will put out a bounty on them, transmitting a message and rewards to every abyss inhabitant. The civil war ended in their defeat, but their laws still influence the abyss to this day." After Luke read this, he felt like the sphere was pushing him out. Once Luke was fully out and woke up from his mindscape, he felt a message sent from the sphere saying, "Two-hour daily limit reached, become stronger to access for longer; or wait for the daily limit to reset tomorrow." Luke, now bummed out he couldn''t keep reading more of the knowledge, realized that he was giving off some type of blue glow, looking like he was an abyssal creature now. Luke started to freak out, not knowing what was going on. Luke thought about his old human form and how much he wanted to be a human again until he realized that he had switched back to a human with no blue glow. Luke was confused about what was going on, but he just wanted to get out of here. Luke looked around to try and find an escape, but instead, he saw what looked like the portal that took him here, only a few feet away from him. Luke didn''t know if he should take the portal or not. While Luke was debating whether to take the portal or not, Luke heard a boom, looked back, and saw that the ruins were starting to fall apart and collapse without the support of the core. Luke ran toward the portal, not knowing whether it would take him home or somewhere far worse¡­ Chapter 4: Return Luke was blinded by a bright light as soon as he entered the portal. When Luke''s vision cleared up, he saw that he had reappeared in the same place where he had disappeared. Luke looked around to make sure that this wasn''t a lie. He was back, finally out of that hellhole. Luke saw that a glowing moon had replaced the sun that was starting to rise when he disappeared. Luke didn''t know whether it had been only a few hours because it was night or if days had passed and it was another night. Luke walked out of the alley and started to make his way back home. On Luke''s way home, one of his eyes had turned pitch black, almost as if taunting Luke, letting him know he couldn''t escape. As Luke was coping with his newly found pitch-black eye, he saw that behind humans'' everyday normal lives, there was a secret hidden from them all. Among humans lived unworldly beings. Luke only saw one on his walk home, but it scared him to know that humans weren''t at the top of the food chain. Luke rushed home, not letting whatever was known know that he saw it. Once Luke made it home and walked in the front door, his mother greeted him, hugging him as tight as possible. Right behind her was Luke''s dad, who looked ready to kill someone. Luke''s mother asked franticly and concernedly, "Where have you been?What have you been up to, mister, for you to be gone 3 days straight with no contact?" I have no words for you¡­" Before Luke''s mother could keep going, Luke''s dad cut her off with a firm voice: "Honey, before you keep going on, let''s have Luke here explain where he was." Luke had no idea what he could tell his parents; they wouldn''t believe that he fell into that hell. Luke wished he could have just gone to school on time back then and not have helped that old lady. Luke was trying to think of something fast. Luke couldn''t think of anything; his mind went totally blank; Luke ended up saying, "I have no reasoning behind what I did. I am sorry for it, though." Luke''s dad''s face changed up; he looked really mad now. Luke''s dad practically threatened him, saying, "Luke, get your ass up in your room right this second. If you do anything else similar to this, it will be more than just your stuff that I am going to take!" Luke rushed upstairs; he had never seen his dad this mad before. After Luke rushed upstairs, his parents started to discuss what had just happened. Luke''s mom, named Gwen, said softly, "What''s going on with him? He''s never done this sort of thing before, he was always a good kid with good grades." Luke''s dad, Clyde, responded, "I don''t know, honey; I''m just as surprised as you are. I''m sorry for yelling; he just really made me mad." Gwen slightly laughed, and said, "It''s alright, honey. I understand what happened. Maybe you should go check on him soon, but give him some time to cool off." ____________________________________________________________________________ Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Up in Luke''s room, Luke was lying down on his bed, sorting through his thoughts of the events that he was just a part of. Luke couldn''t believe what he saw, and he wanted to forget all about whatever he had seen. Luke tried his best to forget about his experiences; Luke tried to get some rest. He was so tired after he had to fight his clone. "Wait," Luke thought, remembering the text he read in the sphere that said that the beings made with the energy were real. If that''s the case, Luke didn''t want to think about it. Luke knew that what he did was necessary, but he didn''t think it was a living being as well. Luke felt sick to his stomach like he had just eaten rotten food and couldn''t keep it down. Luke rushed to the bathroom as fast as he could. Throw-up was sprayed all over the toilet bowl by Luke. His thoughts raced: "I killed a living being. What have I done? I can''t believe this!" Luke emptied his stomach into the toilet, after which he walked back to his room, shaking. After Luke made it back to his room, he decided that he would do his best to stay away from this crazy shit. Luke laid down in his bed, trying his best to go to sleep and forget all about this nightmare. During Luke''s slumber, he dreamt that he was in this pitch-black room. In the center of the room lay what looked to be a statue, but Luke couldn''t tell as the thing looked distorted. The statue moved, inching towards Luke. Luke wanted to run, but he felt some sort of force holding him in place. As the stature moved ever closer, fear of the unknown sprung up deep in Luke''s heart; he was starting to freak out. The stature made it right in front of Luke; he was having a panic attack from it being right in front, but what was he supposed to do when he couldn''t move? The stature reached out and touched the back of Luke''s left hand, a mark appearing on the back of Luke''s left hand. The mark was an all-black sphere, dark enough to drain the area of light. Luke woke up in a cold sweat, launching up and out of bed. Luke remembered what happened in his dream and looked at the back of his left hand. Once Luke saw it, he was terrified and asked, "How d¨Cdid t-this thing e-end up on my actual b-body?" Luke inspected the mark and saw that it seemed like the mark drew in the light around it. Luke looked around his room to try and find something that he could use to cover this up. Now that Luke was up, he checked the time and saw that it was 5 in the morning. Luke, remembering that he missed 3 days of school, checked on the work online and saw that he missed 3 assignments, so he used this time before school to his advantage. Luke had been doing his missing assignments when,n in the corner of his eye,e he caught an eyeball-like creature watching him from outside his window. Luke freaked out; He shot up towards the window. This somehow scared whatever that being was away; Luke closed the curtains now that he knew something was watching him. After Luke had gotten ready for school and was about to set out, he heard his dad call him from behind, saying, "I''ll give you a ride to school today sport." Luke found this weird as his dad never offered to take me to school, plus he never calls me sport. Luke suspected that his dad was going to try and talk his ear off, but he still got in the car. Luke got in the car, and just as Luke expected, as soon as they pulled out, his dad, Clyde, started to lecture him¡­ Chapter 5: Getting Chewed Out, Twice As soon as Luke took the first step into the car, his dad, none stopped yelling at him for a good 5 minutes, "I DON''T KNOW, WHAT YOU WERE THINKING, DISAPPEARING OUT OF NOWHERE LIKE THAT! YOUR MOTHER WAS WORRIED SICK, SHE HAS GOTTEN ALMOST NO SLEEP SINCE YOU DISAPPEARED¡­" Clyde just went on and on¡ªnone, stop yelling. The whole car ride was just yelling, after yelling. At one point, Luke started to tune his dad out. Clyde, still yelling at Luke, yells, "Luke, are you even listening to me?" You better be, or I swear to God, when you get home from school, you''re going to be in so much trouble!" After Luke heard his dad, he finally gave a response to him: "Yes, Clyde, I''ve been listening." Clyde annoyed that Luke called him by his first name and that he obviously hadn''t been listening to what he had been saying, decided to ignore him for the rest of the ride and punish him when he got home. The rest of the car ride was silent. As soon as they got to school, Luke got out of the car and didn''t say anything to his dad. Luke started to walk to his normal classes, just like before the accident happened, but Luke noticed that as he was in the halls, he was getting a lot of stares from everyone. Luke made it to his first period, but as soon as Luke stepped into the door, non-stop questions were asked one after another, "Where were you?" "Did you run away?" "What happened? Why were you gone for three days?" Luke was starting to get annoyed with all the questions. The bell rang, and the teacher started class, quieting down all the students, but the whispers were still there. A few minutes into class, Luke''s teacher, Ms. Green, got a call asking for Luke in student services. Luke left his math class, heading for student services. In the hall, even though the class had started, there were still the students who were late, asking Luke the same questions from earlier, "Where were you?" "Did you run away?" "What happened? Why were you gone for three days?" The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Luke couldn''t be bothered to answer any of them, so he kept on his way to student services. Once Luke stepped into student services, the lady at the desk, Miss Allen, asked, "Are you Luke, sweetie?" Luke responded, "Yes, I am." Miss Allen then told Luke, "Go back to Mr. Shaw''s room. He has some stuff he wants to talk to you about." Luke walked back to Mr. Shaw''s office. Luke had only been here a few times before, but never once for being in trouble. Luke walked into the office without a care in the world. Mr Shaw was sitting at his desk, doing some paperwork. Once he saw Luke walk in her gave Luke a smile and said, "Ah, Hello Luke, how are you doing? As you might know, we take attendance very seriously, but if you have missed 3 days in a row without giving us any notice, you Should be gone. What do you have to say, mister?" Luke coldly responded in a mocking tone, "So what if I did not do any of your business, Mr. ShAw?" This pissed off Mr. Shaw even more. Mr. Shaw told Luke, practically foaming at the mouth, "You better be on time for the remainder of the year with zero more absences." Luke got up and walked out afterward. Luke went through the day as he normally would expect, only acting more cold towards everyone who asked the same questions over and over each class. No one else was home when Luke got home; his parents did not get off work until 5. Luke decided he was going to go to his room and relax in his bed, after all, Luke hadn''t had any time to rest in 3 days. Luke laid down on the bed and tried his best to rest and forget all about the abyss. Luke shortly after drifted off into a deep sleep. Luke awakens to blackness all around him. The same statue is still in front of Luke, but this time the statue speaks in a distorted language that he still somehow understands: "We have been watching you since last night, and we have to say your progress has been unsatisfactory. We suggest you change how you spend your days if you want to survive the days to come." Luke wanted to ask the statue what it meant, but the words wouldn''t leave his mouth. Luke woke up the next minute, all freaked out by what that statue meant. Frantically racking his brain for an idea of what the statue meant by the situation to come and who the we, it was talking about is. Luke couldn''t think of anything until he remembered the sphere he had in his mindscape. Luke focused on the sphere for a moment and was taken into the mindscape, right in front of the sphere. Once Luke touched it, he was sucked back into the sea of knowledge. This time Luke had a specific area of knowledge, He was looking for disasters and/or what beings live in the abyss¡­ Chapter 6: Knowledge Of The Abyss Luke was in awe of the sea of knowledge, still not having any words he thought were excellent enough to describe this otherworldly sea of knowledge. Luke never noticed the first time he came here, that he couldn''t see the end of the sea. Luke took a few more minutes standing still, admiring the sea of knowledge, and then he started to get to work looking for the limited amounts of knowledge he needed. Luke looked for what felt like ages. He didn''t think that there would have been this many bubbles with 1% of their knowledge left. After looking for another 30 minutes, Luke found the knowledge of what beings lived in the abyss. Luke put out his hand to grab the bubble floating out of the sea. Once Luke''s hand grasped the bubble, he was dragged into the space with the information. The text went on and on with more information after information, but Luke knew he must learn what that being was talking about to survive. Luke started to read the information but got sidetracked with his thoughts: "Wait a minute, wasn''t I trying to do my best to get away from all this nonsense?" Luke thought back on his day and realized that he seemed to be acting a whole bunch more cold and distant. Luke remembered how he just ignored what Mr. Shaw had been saying and mocked him. This wasn''t like him at all, Luke thought. This freaked Luke out, not knowing what was causing this change in him, and he knew that this change must be why he believed what that being was saying. Luke decided to put this thought to the back of his head and think about it later, as right now Luke desperately needed to get as much information as possible in the limited time he had left to heighten his chance of survival. Luke started to? read the knowledge of the beings living in the abyss, "Throughout the abyss''s existence, there have been many different species of abyssal creatures. There is no set name for the uncountable number of species in the abyss. There are no set names for the evolved creatures in the abyss; instead, each civilization has to decide on their own names for the species. (Click to expand the list of species names.)" Luke clicked the expand button, and a list dropped down that went on forever. Luke decided to read a few of the creature listings, Ugrudek: This species is defined by its large stature and its three large horns on its head. Their skin is a dark purple, littered with cracks all over. The signature power of this creature is using the curse aspect of abyss energy to weaken its enemy''s physical strength, then using its large stature to beat down the weakened opponent. -|-|-;|} /-\-|-|-;}|-; |o|/=-|-o}|o? ()/-\|\|? }o}o|-/?-//-\/'' o}/-\}-/o||_]|? |_;/-\}o||-;/''?|_]||o/-\}/''|