1.06 Birthday and Gift

“So! Enough with the artifacts….. I came here to check up on you and have you treat me to some delicious food.”

Sura had a dumb expression on his face, after a while he asked. “Why do I treat you to delicious food?” As his question suggested, he didn’t know why was Brohimir asking for treat, if somebody needed to be treated was him, as he just get out of hospital and also had been suspended from academy, he needed something to brighten his mood.

“Why that look, don’t forget that today is your birthday…” Brohimir had a mocking smile on his face, he loved to see the disgruntled face of his friend.

Hearing the sentence that today was his birthday, he checked at the notifications window on the side of his view, as previously the notification icon was blinking, he got so immersed in the artificing that he even forget about checking the notification.

Looking at his friend’s mocking smile, Sura got up. “Here! Hold this!” Handing Brohimir one of the objects Old Han asked to be fixed, Sura went back to the room and started to undress. Knowing what Sura was doing due to seeing his present state, Brohimir started to play with the thing Sura gave him, so nothing to do and seeing Sura enter bathroom, Brohimir activated the artifact and a holographic screen appeared and a music video started to play out.

“Oh!! A holographic projector!” While Sura got ready, Brohimir kept watching the video and his eyes shined whenever the singer turned around with her hair flowing in the wind and a dazzling smile on her face, she wore a red dress and flew in the air from one place of the stage to another, the crowd was going crazy every time her pitch got high.

Brohimir didn’t know how fast the time went by while he was busy seeing the young singer’s performance, Sura was already ready and waiting for Brohimir to finish up.

“Oye! I am ready… let’s go.” Brohimir looking up and finding Sura all ready , he closed the projector and placed it on the floor.

“Why is your expression so grave?” Brohimir asked.

“Because I befriended a dwarf…. A fat dwarf.” The only reason Sura was bumped out was because Brohimir ate a lot.

“And next time… you are treating!”

“Yeah! Yeah!... I will!”

Closing the door behind their back, Sura went on with his friend’s demand.

After their gay dinner, Sura came back home, and as Brohimir already went back to his apartment, Sura was free to continue with his newfound techniques, in just 1 night he had made 2 artifacts, upgraded 1 and fixed one too. His speed was unusually fast considering him to be only in Human realm. But the speed he has achieved was what he got due to his hard work and years of practice.

He was just going to continue with his research, but in the side of the door he saw a brown package, picking it up, he checked for the senders name and not finding any, he only noticed his name on the package.

Opening the door and entering his apartment, Sura removed his shoes and start ripping the safety paper of the box, only to find a small metal box in the end.

“This!!” He tried to open it, but whatever Sura did, he couldn’t even budge open the small box. Turning it around, he found a small finger print scanner, by instinct he placed his thumb on the scanner, only to have it immediately scan his retina before a small opening sound came from the box.

“It’s opened… but who would send me something like this?” Inside he found a piece of crumpled paper and a syringe.

Ignoring the paper, Sura picked up the syringe and seeing the mercury like substance moving about in it, he felt a chill down his spine.

Slowly placing the syringe back in the box, Sura opened the crumpled paper. Reading the first few sentence Sura closed his eyes.

Father?

“This is my last gift to you for your 17th birthday, inject the syringe in your body, it will help you a lot.” Was the only thing written on the paper, with his father’s signature at the end. Sura never knew his father completely, for all he knew his father worked at a pharmaceutical guild and seeing the syringe with no indication of its name on it Sura identified it as a drug.

Sura’s mother died during his birth and his father was the only one taking care of him from birth, he was not a man of words, and he never even involved himself with Sura at all.

“Father is going for a walk Helius!” Was the last thing his father said to him, before going out and never coming back.

Lifting the syringe and seeing the metallic liquid move in the tube like a silent dragon, Sura with still some questions in mind, and what his father had gifted him.

At least note what kind of drug is this father? And did the old man went senile before his death, he didn’t just provide his son with a poison… right?

Maybe this is somebody’s or that Tommy’s bad joke, he still seemed to mess with me.

And even if it’s a ploy of Tommy, how did he got my retinal scan information?

And I am already facing trouble with that ghost haunting me, if this thing does any harm, I will have one more thing to worry about.

Ah!! Fuck it.

Ignoring the fact that the drug may harm his body, putting some faith on his father, he stabbed the needle in his neck and automatically the material entered his body.

”Just hope this is not a bad choice.”

Removing the needle from his neck, for some time Sura didn’t feel anything.

“And I was worried tha…AAH”

Before he can complete his sentence, the muscles of his body jerked hard and the nerves endings of his body started to tense up. It hurts… shit….”FUCK!!” Biting his tongue down to deal with the pain, Sura’s body jerked up and down, he rolled all around the floor colliding with the artifacts on the floor. Opening his eyes and looking up at the ceiling, he cursed himself.

If I knew this would have happened… I would have thrown this thing in the dustbin already….. shit! The excruciating pain made his mind go numb, his body was getting hot with steam rising from his body, similar to the time he ate the pill given by old Han, but more intense.

He tried to lift his arm, but soon the pain he felt lifting his hand made him forget all about looking at it. From his 7 orifices, the nose, ears, eyes and mouth blood started to trickle down, Sura thought that he was better being dead. Even the pain he felt in the dream was much more appealing than the pain he felt now.

That asshole loves me so much that he poisoned his own son….Father I don’t want to meet you so soon. Even though he felt his body breaking through, with all the muscles wracking in pain, he still didn’t forget to curse his old man.

His heartbeat was already so loud that if a person was standing in 10m range of him, they would have heard it beating with booming sound.

Sura’s hair was falling on the floor one by one and his exposed scalp was purple and throbbing like a bear’s heart. The neural link was thrown out of his skull like a bullet, cutting his connection from the net and the world, even calling for help will require him some work. But of course Sura didn’t noticed it.

As a thought appeared in Sura’s mind that this may be his end, his tensed muscles loosened up with the reoccurring jerk that happened in different intervals coming to stop.

The pain has still not subsided, as body of Sura was still swollen up due to all the contracting and expanding of muscles it’s been through, the blood still flow from his orifices but seeing that he was still not dead and survived the ordeal, all he needed to do now was immediately call hospital. If he wastes anymore time he may not be able to wake.

He tried to open his mouth, but as his mouth was dried out due to the steam he released, he couldn’t even spoke.

That old man is definitely a sadist… making his own son go through all the pain.

Though his brain power has been all used up due to dealing with all the pain, and in normal case a person in his place would have lost consciousness already, but due to of dream of him cutting his face and the time he was raped had already made his will strong, he keep up with the pain.

All the muscles on his body was loosened up, soft like a baby’s skin, all of them were already broken and were all squishy, if anyone even poked a finger on his body, they will see their finger easily stabbing the insides of Sura.

I can’t even get up.. how am I gonna call the hospital? His jaw was completely useless now, even the watch on his wrist felt heavy as car. So even if he giving a command to Sora out loud, nothing could be done.

Yeah.. I got neural link.! Being acquired neural link just 3 days ago, Sura has not got used to it and forgot to use it due to all the pain he experienced.

But his calling to Sora was never answered, it was as if his connection was severed.

Can’t move his body.

Can’t use neural link.

Can’t use his watch to call hospital.

Don’t have any methoud to let people know of his condition.

I am tired…. Even keeping his eyes open was exhausting a lot of his remaining energy. And before he knew it, Sura got into deep slumber.

This time in the dream, he saw one more memory.

His logical part of brain being closed off due to all the fatigue, he became the man in his dream.

Through all the dream, he kept killing his way out of a huge building with other people, knives, guns, even stick were used in killing people in his dream.

And for some reason, Sura was feeling glad. He felt elated killing each person in front of him.

And unknown to him, his body was changing too. Due to him having been dreaming in his sleep. Sura didn’t notice the things happening to his body.

Sura’s body was reconstructing, his muscles were stretching and new muscles were being born, all the energy to reconstruct his body was taken by the energy stored in his body, making his body go thinner at a visible rate.

After 2 hours, his body got so thin that bones started to appear under his skin. Though all the injuries he received previously have all been healed up, but the current him can only be described with one word.

Stick.

A thin stick at that.

His face was pale as a dried leaf, if Brohimir sees him now, he will think some hobo has invaded Sura’s apartment and throw him out.

The next day.

Waking up and finding some strength come back in his body, Sura dragged his body to the fridge and opening it with a lot of effort Sura fell down.

“Water…..water…..!” taking support of the fridge, he lifted a bottle which felt to him like a 2 ton gorilla, and guzzled down the water non-stop.

Eyes dispirited eyes came back to life, and drinking down 3 more bottle of water, he jumped inside the fridge and ate all that he can find, but it was still not enough.

“Need more food!”

He ran into kitchen and opening the cabinet start eating all the canned food, all the canned meat went into his body and completely turned into supplement disappearing from his stomach before it even get the time to stay.

His stomach turned into black hole, though he was eating all the food, his body was slowly recovering at a visible rate, the previously thin muscles were now filled with vitality, and his sunken cheeks were now glowing with rosy tint.

After feeling some energy back in his body and seeing al the food in the pantry empty, Sura dropped on the floor before speaking.

“What the fuck just happened?”

Looking at the fallen metal box, Sura didn’t know what to say of his old man.

He punched in the air and felt the power of his punch increase by a huge margin. Moving his neck he can hear his bones making creaking sound. His stomach was not in the least swollen with food, he still felt it empty for some reason.

“Just what the hell does that drug do to my body?”

He can even feel the processing power of his mind to be multiplied by 3, though it was not equal to a person who has already achieved hunter realm and has his brain power multiplied by 10, but it was still a lot, and if he achieved the hunter realm his brain power will only be greater than other people.

Is this the gift that old man left me?

If it was a blessing or a curse, only time will tell.

Only time will tell.