Chapter 25: A Fate Worse than Death

The bond that I shared with my mother was stronger than I thought. Her death right in front of my eyes caused me so much grief that I stopped all other things. After yelling at the people from the UKC for several hours I lost my voice so I could no longer retort to anything they said, but nor could I give them information as easily.

I was currently in a mock hospital room strapped securely to a bed. The only thing I could move, were my fingers and wrists. I was strapped in to the hospital bed in a sitting position. At least it was comfortable.

“So Ryu. How are you feeling?” A large man wearing a doctor’s uniform came in to check on me. This man I called a doctor was also in the seventh realm.

I give him the middle finger the best I possibly could with my hand restrained.

“I see. However, I have something important to tell you. Here in this branch of the UKC we have just developed a new drug. However, it needs a bit of testing. Since it probably won’t kill you, we here have decided to use you as our test subject. Just give me one second here to read the list of possible side effects.” The large man reaches into his shirt and pulls out a piece of paper.

“Side effects may include: Nausea, weight loss, dizziness, upset stomach, headaches, migraines, rashes, a slight tingly feeling, loss of consciousness, extreme hunger, extreme thirst, explosive diarrhea, cysts, coughing, and cancer.”

What an impressive list of side effects. Not like I can argue about it though.

The doctor pulls out a small pill bottle, “Such small pills. It says that you need to take five of them at the same time for immediate effect, but it will result in maximum chances of side effects.” He turns the pill bottle around in his hands.

I see the five pills inside the bottle tumble around. They were roughly the same size of a dime. I don’t really think those are small. I pray to whatever higher life form I can, hoping that they can be taken like a normal painkiller. I really hope so.

“These pills really are amazing you know. The name that the scientist gave it was way too long to even try and remember, but it was given a nickname. Want to know what that name is?” The doctor waves the pills in front of my face.

I shake my head with an annoyed expression.

The doctor presses the pill bottle to my forehead, “Well too bad, I’m telling you anyways. These pills were given the nickname, ‘Fate worse than death’. Want to know why? Wait, why am I even asking? Of course you want to know! These five nice pills were given that name because of the effect they have. You will no longer need to eat food or drink water. At all! Isn’t that wonderful? However. Two of the side effects are permanent. And others are just temporary, and some may not even appear! Such an amusing little drug!”

The doctor seems to start going into his own world as he starts to talk to himself about completely unrelated things.

I take a couple deep breaths. I wonder which of the two are going to be permanent.

The doctor suddenly coughs and comes back to his senses, “So Ryu. You have two choices for this pill. You can be good and take them with some water, or, we can go for the more, ‘scientific’ method.”

I make an ecstatic expression. That’s an option! Finally something is going the way I want!

The doctor brings over a glass, “I may be from the UKC, but I still feel you were treated wrongly. Most of the people here do. We have secrets that we are all hiding from the higher ups. Especially the one that wrongly treated you. However, in order to keep you the safest, we need your cooperation.”

I make a complicated expression and tilt my head as if asking, ‘What are you talking about?’

The doctor gives me a weak smile, “You’ll know soon. Just sit tight and enjoy the ride. This will hurt a lot at first, then for a bit after… but you will probably get used to it.”

What is with this personality change? I don’t trust any of these guys. They killed my mother!

The doctor checks a watch, “Looks like times up.” He looks to a corner of the room. “Nice to see that you chose to be good Ryu. Try not to choke!”

His personality changed again. Why?

The doctor opens the bottle of pills and places them into my mouth. He then puts the glass of water to my mouth and tipped the water into my mouth.

Despite the weirdness of the scene, I swallow the pills.

My mouth and throat instantly start to feel like they have caught fire. I try to move my arms to grab the glass of water to drink more.

The doctor sees this, “You want more water!? Are you a masochist or what? Water will make it worse, but if you want I’ll give you more!”

I shake my head quickly. If water will make this worse I’d rather die of dehydration! This pain is crazy!

I clench my teeth in order to not make weird noises as my vocal cords have definitely been strained. I definitely would not want them to be permanently damaged because of some pain.

The doctor smiles as he looks at his watch again.

I lose focus on the world around me as my conscience slowly slips away.

Right before I lose consciousness, the pain stops and I quickly breathe deep breaths in order to regain composure.

The doctor smiles at me gently, “We should have a small amount of time to talk, so I will make this as quick as possible. We here in the lab have decided to give you a small gift, but please do not tell anyone about this. The pills you took will make you extremely hungry and extremely thirsty all the time, however you will not need to eat anymore. I mean at all. These pills will form a small lump on the outside of your stomach and absorb minute amounts of the power of heaven and earth in order to create nutrients. Also, you played a lot of games right?”

I nod slowly.

“This should make it simple then. Say if you had a regen potion for your health bar, it would work for a couple seconds at least and then wear off. Well. As a gift. This will absorb another miniscule amount of the power of heaven and earth in order to give a small regeneration effect. You will have to supply it on your own using internal energy. But that really isn’t much of a drawback compared to the effect. That is the gift from us here at the lab. The burning pain you felt was your vocal cords probably repairing. It is a fast acting drug. However, it will not help your condition currently as it can only help with minor injuries. Broken bones and deep cuts cannot be healed, nor can anything life threatening. The hunger and thirst will appear in three days.”

I tilt my head, “Testing.”

The doctor frowns, “What an interesting way to test vocal cords.”

I give him a light smile, “I don’t know if this is some sort of joke, but what I do know is that you are under a lot of pressure. I’ll help you keep fooling those guys.” I use my eyes to motion over to the corner of the room. I am still not happy about the fact that the UKC had a hand in the death of my mother and I wish I could do something to get back at them, but I know now is not the time to make a scene. This doctor and the others in the ‘Lab’ clearly have decent intentions, even when acting on orders.

It would take someone who knows absolutely nothing not understand the hints up to this point.

The doctor checks his watch again, “This is the last we will be able to talk normally. We will have to use roundabout means in order to talk. I hope you can look past this. When you start to take your revenge, I would like to keep my head attached to my shoulders. Anyways, I’ll take my leave. You are being sent out in the next couple of days.”

I frown, “Where am I being sent?”

The doctor starts to smile sadistically, “An Idiot like you wouldn’t ever truly appreciate where you are about to go! You should be truly grateful to us here at the UKC! We are going to send you on an all-expense paid vacation towards a different planet! You will be spending seven months in space before crash landing onto the planet ‘Numonos’.”

I give him an angry smile, “F*** you! Who said I wanted a trip into space!? How would you even get me to a different planet!? Space travel is so inefficient!”

The doctor laughs deeply, “You think a ship travelling at near light speed would be slow? I have more important things to do than to talk with trash like you. Be good and try not to kill yourself while in space!”

---Two days, Three hours, Five minutes and Thirty-seven seconds later---

I was staring at the clock on the wall. Bored out of my mind.

Today was the day I was going to be put into the ‘spacecraft’ and sent off to the planet known as ‘Numonos’.

Throughout various conversations, the doctor told me about the planet itself, and how the actual landing was going to work.

The planet was actually colonized and was a researching planet. It had a real atmosphere and was in a solar system with a real sun. It was similar to what was taught in the fake world, ‘Earth’. Except, it was roughly twice the size. The gravity was about twice as much as the current planet ‘Behemoth’. That doesn’t really mean much for people that are past the second realm.

There are many cities on the planet, but also a large amount of wilderness and monsters.

The largest city was thousands of kilometers long. It was ‘Pneumatic’. I wonder why it was called that.

Anyways. The landing procedure is extremely complex. The spacecraft will slow itself by disintegrating. That means as I enter the atmosphere, I will get progressively less and less protection.

I am scared for when the day comes, but I should be fine for now. I should really think about how to get through that sooner rather than later though.

For now. I wonder what the ship will look like.

Two large men come in to the room and start to unstrap me from the chair, “So Ryu. It is time for you to board the spacecraft. Are you going to cooperate today, or will we have to strap you to another chair while you float off into space?”

I smile gently, “I will cooperate today. If I make the wrong move, you guys will knock me unconscious without a moment of notice. So I figure it would be best to cooperate and be allowed to walk like a normal human.”

The men both nod while looking at each other and unstrap the restraints on the hospital bed.

I slowly stretch my arms and legs before trying to use them.

The men guide me through the facility. One standing in front of me and one standing behind me.

After walking through the entire facility we leave through large double doors.

As my eyes adjust to the light outside I see the launch pad… and the abomination of a spacecraft that they want to put me in.

I… I have no words capable of describing this monstrosity. The person who designed this should be shot and killed… separately.

It was the most awkward, irrelevant, and oddly shaped object I have ever seen. For an object designed to travel at near light speed, it looked as if a tiny gust of wind would make it disintegrate.

I felt a small part of me die upon glancing at this ‘Spacecraft’.

“So Ryu. This is the last time we will meet for the next couple of years. How’s it feel?” This was the man who ordered my mother to be killed.

I take deep breaths in order to try and stay calm. I need to stay calm. Stay calm. Stay very calm.

I nod, “This is farewell sir.”

The man laughs, “Make sure you remember my face! While you are at it trash, remember my name! My glorious name is Hannah!”

I try my hardest to not laugh at his name. That is not a name a guy should have!

I just realized it. But his voice is so high pitched in real life, it almost hurts. He looks like a large pig walking on two legs… no wonder he is the lowest of the low.

I would say appearances don’t matter. But his personality is horrible too. This man… thing… pig?... has no redeeming qualities.

I’m holding back my laughter so much I start shaking.

He notices me shaking, “Ha! Scared of me now that you realize what you are looking at! Trash like you will never be able to reach me!”

The two men that escorted me earlier started to move me onto the ‘Starshit Galactiderp’. I just named it. I think it is the best name this thing will ever receive.

I sigh as I board the ‘Starshit Galactiderp’. The hatch is closed and I hear the spacecraft pressurize. I wasn’t given a space suit or anything to help with the G forces from acceleration.

The inside of the spacecraft was barren. It was just a bluish white colored metal without any design on it.

I get a single window to look out of… and… I was already in space…

WHAT!?

“Now isn’t this a piece of art?”

I recognize the weird voice belonging to Mr. Spatial Energy.

I look at him while still slightly surprised, “Fancy meeting you here.”

The figure shrugs its shoulders, “I guess you don’t remember that I am ‘Everywhere’. I am not a physical being… unlike you. Speaking of you… You’re in quite the situation.”

I make a disgusted expression, “No S***.”

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Well, my proofreader said he wanted a section to speak... so I gave it to him. He, for some weird reason, wanted to keep even his internet name anonymous, so I let him. Enjoy his section!

Hi Guys, I am Proofreader-kun who tries and mostly succeeds at proofreading for RagedEclipse. I've also been helping with some naming he needs...

I’m like the co-author who's an intern...

That makes me sad...

Anyways, this and the last chapter were especially fun to create mostly because of what voice we had given to Hannah before her/his/its name. I’ve also dubbed this scientist who gave Ryu ‘Medicine’ “Geoff”. Why? I felt like he was a Geoff. Also the Starshit Galactiderp, my best, stupid idea yet.

Now for my section!

It seems like chapter 24 was not well liked. Oh well, what's an author to do?

Anyways. Thank you for reading to this point and I promise it gets better! I promise there is planning until the end of this arc!

Have a nice day!