(Miklaus)

The once empty void above the planet we originally arrived on was now a beautiful starry sky rife with galaxies. It had taken us a while to get the balance right for stars, but once we did our progress exploded. We lost ourselves in our work and might have gone a little overboard.

After star systems we had to populate it with planets of course. A feat which turned out to be nearly as complicated as the stars themselves. We had to adjust the planets positioning based on their masses and the different planets already in a stable orbit around the stars. We left many asteroid fields in our wake as failed attempts generally ended up with collisions. We debated destroying those but ended up keeping them, as a show of progress that only we would ever see.

All of our practice resulted in each of us being able to create a fully functioning star with a snap of our fingers and to generate the planets with perfect orbits with another. We had created much more than we originally planned but once we started it was too damn fun to even consider stopping. But now, we had other things we wanted to try.

“Are you sure you want me to punch you as hard as I can?” Reiji asked.

“Yeah, right in the chest!” Hikarus reaffirmed.

We had noticed pretty quickly that our power wasn’t limited to creation and durability. Hell, I had destroyed a few, okay a lot, of planets by just moving too fast while forging their surface layers. Before we moved on to the next, perhaps final goal, we had to find out what we were capable of if we went all out. That somehow led to Hik telling Reiji to just punch him.

Reiji shrugged and took his stance. A thick white aura clung to his skin as he got one more reassuring nod from Hikarus who stood enveloped in his own golden aura. I centered all of my senses on Reiji to not miss a thing yet when he struck, I still missed it. His body twisted and his arm extended. I saw each movement. Yet space shook and Hikarus was sent flying before his punch landed.

“Did you just…” Heaven said, trying to find the right words.

A flash of golden light flared up to my side with a laughing Hik stepping out of it.

“You just punched me so hard that your hit landed before you even finished your swing.” Hik cleared up.

“I’m more impressed that I didn’t leave a mark on you, Hik.”

Hikarus rubbed his chest and shook his head.

“You did, it hurt like hell too, but the wound closed up almost as fast as it had appeared. Quite remarkable.”

I looked down at my hands and considered injuring myself to see this regeneration but we stopped by Hik moving a short distance away, laughing again.

“I have something I’ve always wanted to do.”

He placed his hands together and opened his palms into a very familiar pose we’d all seen in an anime growing up. Oh no.

Golden energy crackled around him as a ball of pure energy coalesced between his hands.

“Ka…”

The fabric of space around me began to crack as he condensed more and more energy into his palms.

“Uh, Hik..” I said, bracing myself from the wisps of energy colliding with each other.

“Me…”

Space warped and stretched to its breaking point around him, threatening to shatter.

The three of us moved at the same time. We appeared next to Hik and placed our arms through the burning energy around him to get him to stop.

He blinked in surprise and absorbed the energy back into his body.

“I might have gone a little overboard there,” he chuckled, a little embarrassed.

We just moved on a little disappointed that we wouldn’t be doing it either.

“We can’t test our abilities here, not really.” Reiji stated.

“Why don’t we just go into a pocket dimension?” I asked.

The three of them looked at me, clearly confused.

“How would we do that?” Hik asked.

“What? Just make a portal.”

They continued to stare at me, even more confused.

“Can… can you guys not do that too?”

They shook their heads in unison. It was a bit creepy how they mimicked each other.

Smirking at my ‘win’, I got to work. The rune on the back of my hand lit up as energy began spiraling before me. The whirlpool of violet energy grew faster and skinner until it was the width of a single hair. I spread my arms and the whirlpool reacted. It froze in place and fizzled slightly then tore apart, taking space with it. What appeared to be a shimmering pool of violet water lay within.

“Shall we go inside?” I asked, already walking through.

As I entered my pocket dimension for the first time, I quickly looked around to see what it was like. As I looked, I noticed this pocket dimension I had created looked exactly like the space we’d spent our time in.

Although it didn’t replicate the creation we had done, now it was just an empty space of black, purple and stars.

Then suddenly I watched as the entire space I was in started to warp. Pictures from my past life started moving throughout the stars, playing videos like TV screens.

Videos of my mom and I going on vacation, her hanging up my accomplishments on the fridge when I was a kid, my father and I going on fishing and hunting trips, family vacations I had taken with my friends and their families.

I watched as countless images continued to pass by, but I noticed they were all going away from me, and as they did I could feel something inside of me eroding away. But I couldn’t bring myself to look away or leave this dimension.

The videos kept playing for what felt like an eternity, until one image stopped in front of me.

It was the same image that had haunted me when I first traveled to this world, my mother on her knees crying with my gravestone next to my father’s.

But the image quickly evaporated out of existence as I heard movement from behind me.

Trying to push what I had just seen to the back of my mind, I turned around to greet my friends as they entered.

“Miklaus, why are you crying?” Hikarus asked, a concerned expression crossing his face.

“Oh? Am I? I didn’t notice.” Quickly wiping the tears off my face. “Anyway, what do you guys think?” Holding out my arms, as I turned around to look around the dimension once more. Hoping it’d change the subject

“It seems like you just created a blank copy of where we’ve been spending our time. But It’ll work for us to test our powers, after all anything we destroy here won’t destroy what we’ve spent so long creating.” Reiji said, also taking a look around.

“Speaking of that, we said we’d test our powers but what are we going to do first?” Hikarus asked, putting a finger to his lip.

“Ooooo we should make some weapons!” Heaven quickly chimed in, an excited smile across her face.

“Why?” Reiji asked, looking a little disgusted at the notion.

Heaven looked at him with a raised brow. “Because we all aren’t freaks like you who want to hit people with their bare hands.”

Reiji just rolled his eyes but didn’t protest further.

With the flourish of her hands Heaven summoned a basic rapier into her hands. It had a simple silvery blade and polished wooden handle. Smiling, Heaven took a stance which looked a little odd as we were still floating in empty space but no one commented. Her hand tightened around the handle before she struck out and it exploded in her hand, sending out a barrage of metallic and wooden shards in a nova around her.

I had to stifle a laugh at her almost comical expression of surprise and reddening cheeks. While we were all but impervious to damage we weren’t freed from embarrassment.

To make things worse for her, Reiji and Hik began applauding. Hik had summoned some popcorn and everything. Heaven just hung her head and mumbled something under her breath.

“We’ll need to find a material that can withstand our own powers it seems,” Hikarus stated like he had already known. Actually, he probably had.

“I tested most materials from Earth that I could think of a while back and found them to be rather, well you’ve all seen the result.” He continued, ignoring the glare he got from Heaven. “We’ll need something that can withstand an enormous amount of force and whatever this energy we now have can be classified as.”

“What about the star left over after a supernova?” Reiji asked eagerly.

Hikarus shook his head.

“That’s not how it works unfortunately. That material is only in that state because of the immense density and gravity. If you were to take some of it away, it wouldn’t be compressed by those forces anymore. Even with how quickly we can create, even we can’t create that on its own.”

“Then we can create them from a direct source and reinforce them with our energy.” Reiji countered.

Hikarus’ eyebrows shot up and he looked at Reiji for a moment. “Your energy reinforces the material you inject it into?”

He nodded. “I can bypass structural and physical limitations that way, I was using it on some of my creations earlier. It takes a lot more focus and time, but it allows for more elaborate and controlled creation.”

“Hm, that could work…”

“I can handle the star,” I jumped in, we had been creating for so long that I couldn’t help but want to finally blow something up.

They all nodded to me and I flew a short distance away.

Creating stars was easy by now but I had to make it large enough to not take ages to collapse but not too large to be left with a blackhole. Before my thoughts even finished, a massive blue giant star was illuminating the vast darkness in this separate space I had created.

I wasn’t done. I sent my energy throughout its massive celestial body and felt a deepening connection to the dense gravity it was generating. I let it tug on my senses until I found its core where hydrogen was fusing to support its stability. I could stop the fusion if I wanted, but I had something else I wanted to try. Something deeper.

I traced the gravity to the absolute center of the core and let the concept flood into my mind. My senses expanded. I no longer saw the star or even the void around it, I imagined the structure of space itself before me. The stressed space was warped around me in an indescribable 3-D funnel siphoning into a single distorted point in the center. The effects on space lessened as it expanded out but the effects seemed to stretch out forever.

I shook the distraction from my thoughts and again focused on the central point. The energy I had sent through the star was now aligning with the impressions and space, all the way to the center. When I felt ready, I pushed.

My energy flowed towards the center point, pulling space along with it. The central point writhed at the influx of space and energy and began to bubble out and crack. I pushed harder until the point froze for an instant and then was overwhelmed by an influx of the space around it flowing in.

“Collapse,” my voice came out deep and raspy as if it had been scorched.

My vision shifted back to normal just in time to see the outer edges of star ripple from the increase in gravity and then that too froze for a moment, like everything was trying to correct itself to my alien changes. I heightened my senses to the extreme and time slowed down. I watched the star closely for it to begin to collapse. I didn’t want to create a black hole here so I had to time it right. And the time was now as soon as the star began to compress, something that was near imperceptible at this speed, I pulled my energy back out and compressed it around the collapsed point to restabilize it.

I eased off my heightened focus and enjoyed the celestial fireworks celebrating my success. Only a blinding blue-white sphere no larger than ten miles wide remains in its center.

I turned back to my friends with a beaming smile and bowed.

“You sure feel the need to go overboard don’t you?” Reiji said as he floated towards me before putting his hands out. “Well whatever, everyone tell me what you want.”

Hikarus and I gave a brief description for what we wanted, but Heaven on the other hand was a different story.

“Well, I think I’d like something like scissors Oh-oh, but instead of just scissors, make it so one handle can pull out to become a sword Oh and not just that, but also make it so you can pull out the handle and turn it into a bladed whip!”

“Anything else? You’re almost making it too easy on me” Reiji asked, the sarcasm in his tone clearly evident.

“Well, actual…”

“No Heaven, shut up, you’re done.” Reiji said, quickly cutting her off before she could add anything else to her abomination of a weapon.

I watched closely as Reiji closed his eyes, and felt his power grow in his hands as the weapon creation began.

I could see his face change into different expressions as he tried to figure out how to perfectly make the weapon, before his expression would soften, probably meaning he’d figured it out.

Then suddenly a massive flash of light lit up the black void of face, before disappearing as suddenly as it appeared. Noticing three weapons now floating in the sky.

The first weapon to be made was a beautiful katana with Japanese letters that glowed violet on a black handle. The pommel had a pristine, violet-sapphire gem embedded at the bottom and the guard was in the shape of a dragon.

Then came the blade.

The blade was a sleek, violet that faced into black the further down the blade it went, and polished steel with purple lightning running up and down the sides. I couldn’t suppress my smile seeing the amazing weapon my friend had created for me.

Next was Hikarus’s weapon, which was a Polearm.

The polearm itself was in the shape of the typical Chinese dragons from Earth. It was an elegant jade-green with golden engravings that seemed to accentuate its beauty.

The polearm was double-sided so, as such, there were two blades. The blades were a clear, metallic silver with golden edges that gave off a subtle glow.

The last to be made was.. well how do I even explain that mutation of a weapon. I swear that Heaven, where does she even come up with these weapons?

From what I could explain, however, was a golden handle wrapped in a green, red, and blue cloth. The pommel and the shoulder of the tang were akin to an Egyptian Pharaoh mask that could be seen on both sides.

The blades were… complicated. From the top of the hilt, two blades of pure gold broke from it and split, giving the weapon a scissor shape.

The weapon itself was able to split from the hilt into two arched swords of sorts. The hilt was cut in half leaving one half of the Pharaohs mask on each blade.

From there, the blades themselves could detach from the hilt, connected by the cloth, and turned into a whip.

The weapon could be wielded as one sword and one whip, two seperate swords, a scissor blade, or dual whips. Truly something odd with Heaven written all over it.

“These look amazing, Reiji!” Heaven yelled out, her face gleaming with excitement as she held her new weapon, before a grin crossed her face. “However, I think we need to test them.”

I watched as Heaven retook her stance from before, and quickly let her aura build up before yelling and swinging her blade down, and the last thing we expected to happen, happened.

The pocket dimension cracked into dust from the full length wound left behind. As we were forcefully returned to the main universe we looked on in a mixture of horror and amazement. The massive gash had extended outside of the pocket dimension and destroyed everything in its path, leaving a universe length strip of nothingness where there had once been light.

“That’s insane.” Heaven said with a slight smile.

“Just how powerful are we?” Hikarus asked, staring at his new weapon.

I couldn’t help, but feel excited. This sensation bubbled inside me, begging me to let it take hold. The drive to test out all my powers. It was unlike anything I’d felt before, which gave me a bright idea.

(Heaven)

“Hey, let’s go back into the pocket dimension. I have a great idea.” Miklaus suddenly said with excitement as he recreated the portal.

“Didn’t we just destroy it though?” Reiji asked.

“I can create as many as I want.” Miklaus answered back, as he stepped into the portal.

We all looked at each other and shrugged before joining him.

As I entered, I saw he was right. He had perfectly recreated the dimension I had just destroyed.

“It’s pretty amazing you’re able to recreate the dimension so quickly, but why did you want us to come here?”

“Tapping into my power caused me to discover somethings, and I want to test them out.”

“What could you poss…..” I tried to ask before I suddenly felt the entire dimension shake stopping me in my tracks.

I watched as jet black scales started to form all over his body, then his hands turned into claws with sharp, violet claws at the end, as his body continued to grow larger and larger and more of his physical features changed until his transformation had finished.

The man who once stood before me, was now a breathtakingly beautiful jet black and violet dragon that must have stood around 125 meters tall.

“What do you guys think?” Miklaus asked, though it was now a booming baritone voice that felt like it could shake the entire dimension alone.

“That’s quite the transformation, but how did you figure out how to do it?”

“Honestly, I had wondered since I arrived if I could possibly turn into a dragon. However, once I started to use my powers, I began to feel this, how to describe it.” He answered briefly pausing as he thought about what to say.

“I guess you could say it’s like an instinct. Something that you can feel tugging at you from the inside. Can you guys also feel it?”

Now that he mentioned it, ever since I had taken that swing with my sword I had started to feel something inside me, the same tugging feeling he had described to me.

“I have felt that at times, though I’ve mainly tried to brush it off.” Reiji responded looking deep in thought.

“Why not try to tap into it?” Miklaus asked, his eyes seemingly piercing through us.

“Well I guess it couldn’t hurt anything, we’re here to try out our powers as much as possible anyway right?”

I watched as everyone began to close their eyes and try to let their instincts take over them so I did the same.

The longer I let it go, I felt this sense of warmth inside me, a feeling like something was being released and everything was being made more clear. Then it finally clicked.

I felt something burst within me as if fireworks were going off in my mind, and then I finally opened my eyes.

Where Reiji had once been standing, was now a beautiful light blue and white Phoenix, that stood around 75 meters tall.

Then where Hikarus had once been, was now a beautiful golden Pegasus with silver lining along the edges on the feather of his wings.

But everyone seemed to be staring at me, almost looking like they were laughing.

“Hey, why’s everyone looking at me?”

“Your transformation, well it’s just…. You’re a hummingbird.” Reiji said, slowly turning his head away as he finished his sentence.

“So what? This could have great uses for something.”

“Oh I’m sure it will.” Hikarus answered, not trying to hide the sarcasm in his voice.

“Well whatever, what do we do now?” I asked.

“Actually I had a great idea.” Miklaus said, as he turned towards Reiji. “Hey Reiji, why not a little Phoenix vs Dragon fight?”

“That actually sounds like quite the interesting idea.”

“But won’t that just break this place again?” I asked, thinking back on my swing.

“We’ll hold ourselves back this time. It’ll be easier now that we’ve seen some of what we can do.”

“Are you really sure about that?” I asked.

“Trust us, are you ready Reiji are you ready?”

Knowing Reiji’s response, I quickly backed up just in case Hikarus followed alongside me.

As soon as I turned around, Miklaus let out a ferocious roar that caused shockwaves throughout the dimension before violet flames that had black lightning running up and down came out of his mouth.

Reiji followed up immediately letting out a loud screech, as blue and white flames shot out to intercept Miklaus’s incoming attack.

I had expected the entire dimension to be destroyed as soon as their flames intercepted each other, but surprisingly all that happened was the dimension became lit up by the flames, and seemed to become warm from the heat the two produced.

“That’s quite the beautiful light show aye Heaven?” Hikarus asked, the lights from the flames reflecting off his face.

“Just like the fireworks from back home, although I’d say these flames are just a little more dangerous.”

Hikarus only gave a nod to show his agreement, before both of us went back to watching the two battle it out with their flames.

It kept going for a few minutes, before I started to notice something.

The longer the two went, the heat from the flames kept increasing drastically, almost as if their powers were constantly growing passively. And as the powers grew the dimension started to crack.

“We need to stop them before they do what you did.”

“You’re right. Alright Miklaus, Reiji I think that’s enough.”

Reiji and Miklaus both stopped firing their flames, and began to change back into humans.

“That was quite fun, huh?” Miklaus asked, with a face I could only describe as emotionless.

“I agree, although it would seem our powers grow without us trying.” Reiji said as he pointed to the cracks that had started to appear around the dimension, before turning towards Miklaus with a worried expression that I couldn’t explain.

“Well, I’d say that’s enough testing our powers for destruction. We’ve gotten a good idea that our capability for destruction is pretty much boundless.” Hikarus said, walking towards the exit.

“Are you guys coming?” Hikarus continued as he reached the portal.

Reiji and I both nodded as we began walking towards the portal.

“I’ll catch up with you guys in a bit. I have some things I want to do here first.” Miklaus said, keeping his back turned towards us.

“Understood, we’ll be waiting for you then.” Reiji answered as the three of us exited the dimension.

As soon as we left the dimension, the entire mood seemed to change from Reiji and Hikarus both.

“Reiji, did you notice it?”

“I had been getting a feeling before the fight, but during and as the fight went on it became more clear to me.”

“Wait, what are you guys talking about?” I asked confused about what the two could mean.

“We’re losing our humanity. I could feel it in all of us, but it’s happening drastically faster to Miklaus. I’m not sure if it’s because of the powers he got, or because he’s used his powers more than us. But he doesn’t have long before he’s lost all emotions.” Reiji explained.

“You can’t be serious. That’s insane to say.” Refusing to believe what I was hearing.

“It’s true, Heaven. Didn’t you feel different after using some of your powers in that swing you did?”

I opened my mouth to argue, but I couldn’t. He was right, I had felt something start to change inside of me afterwards. It just hadn’t felt like such a bad thing at the time.

“Even if that’s the case, what are we supposed to do?” I asked.

Hikarus seemed to be in deep thought, but it was Reiji who answered.

“I believe we were brought here to start a new world, create life, create a civilization anew. We have the power to do whatever we want, but I believe creating life from the beginning of time is our ultimate goal.”

“That’s reasonable, after all it would be interesting to observe the humans we create, develop and change over time.” Hikarus added

“Then that is what we will do when Miklaus comes back. Although we will all be using our powers, meaning we will all lose our humanity more than likely, so it’d be better if we watched from far away.”

“You’re probably right about that. But we can decide on everything when Miklaus is back.” I said.

“Then it’s decided, our new and final goal will be to make life.” Reiji said.

With our final goal in mind, we all patiently waited at the portal for Miklaus to come out. But I could tell that, inside, we were all scared for what was to become of us.