Lord Of Beasts

Flames consumed a tropical rainforest.

Rowan ran barefoot across burning earth, carrying two heavy buckets of water from the nearby river. Smoke filled his lungs, and his eyes streamed with tears, but he didn’t stop or hesitate.

”No...”

He dumped the water onto the flames.

Steam hissed, but the fire barely slowed, as the dancing sparks quickly consumed the ancient trees. Animals screamed, birds fell from the sky, and worst of all, his village was burning alongside the forest he had spent his entire life protecting.

”No!”

He sprinted back toward the river again.

Again.

Again.

Again.

Each bucket felt heavier, each trip slower, and each time scorched his body.

But he didn’t give up.

Not that it mattered, with the fire continuously spreading and Rowan helplessly trying to save his village and home from it. It was like an endless cycle as everything was destroyed before his eyes, and he sank deeper and deeper into despair...

-

Seraphina’s nightmare was rooted less in her trauma and more so in what she was so afraid of losing.

She screamed.

Her left leg refused to move.

It dragged uselessly behind her as she desperately crawled through a snow-covered forest.

”No...”

She clawed forward.

’Please...’

She needed to run.

Running was everything to her, and even before being a Titled, she had been an accomplished sprinter. Her Title, which allowed her to reach incredible speeds using a unique pink energy, was the perfect ability for her vibrant personality and ambitions.

But now she was crippled.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, she was in a predicament where she literally had to run for her life.

A howl echoed in the distance.

Then another.

She could hear the shuffling of shrubbery before seeing grey wolves emerging between the trees, their glowing eyes locked onto her.

”No...”

She dragged herself faster, trying to crawl away with all the strength she could muster.

The wolves caught her effortlessly.

Pain exploded as their teeth tore into her flesh...

Everything went black.

Then she woke up again, still crippled and in this damned forest, trying to crawl away from the same pack of wolves.

-

Ethan was probably one of the few who could claim they had truly experienced being eaten alive by beasts or animals, and now Seraphina could too. But what he couldn’t claim was experiencing a war like Darius had.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Gunfire deafened Darius as mud exploded beside him.

”Medic!”

He ducked back into the trench and turned to see that his closest friend had lost both legs.

Another explosion consumed three more soldiers.

Blood rained from the sky on a battlefield that stretched endlessly.

Smoke.

Fire.

Bodies.

He fired because everyone else fired, he stabbed because someone charged him first, and he wasn’t even sure who the enemy was anymore. But what he did know was that he didn’t want to die here, as corpses of both friends and foes piled up around him...

-

Liora wasn’t fighting anyone or running from any danger; she had simply become tiny, much smaller than she already was.

She gasped.

Everything around her was enormous.

Cars.

Buildings.

People.

They towered over her like mountains.

She looked down at herself and realised that she stood barely taller than an ant.

”W-What...?”

Thud!

A shoe slammed down where she’d been standing a heartbeat earlier.

Liora dove sideways.

The impact sent a powerful gust of wind rolling over her tiny body, throwing her across the pavement. She hadn’t even recovered when another foot descended, nearly claiming her life and crushing her like an actual insect.

Then came another.

And another.

Each careless step threatened to crush her without its owner ever noticing.

And it wasn’t like they could hear her cries either, with her voice coming out comedically high-pitched and drowned out by the noise of the city.

’Smaller body, smaller voice, I guess.’

She ran desperately between cracks in the pavement, only for another gust of wind to sweep her off her feet.

”No!”

She slid helplessly into a storm drain.

Darkness swallowed her as she landed in filthy sewage water with a splash, barely managing to stay afloat. It was a mission in itself to get to the edge without drowning, vomiting, or both at the same time.

But she couldn’t relax just yet.

She began to hear squeaking as rats approached her.

Such animals were disgusting, yes, but to someone her size, they also looked like towering monsters.

One lunged at her.

She screamed and plunged back into the rushing water, trying to swim across to the other side.

Not that it helped.

Everything was a threat to her at this size.

Cockroaches crawled across the walls, centipedes slithered through the darkness, and the sewers were riddled with rodents.

No matter where she ran, there was always another danger waiting.

She couldn’t rest, stop, or breathe.

The nightmare simply never ended, and it was ironic that she feared being small so much despite actually being small.

-

Then there was Kaela’s nightmare.

Unlike you might expect, hers was the least exciting, which was perfect for someone like her and made it the most unbearable. There was silence, complete and utter silence, while she sat inside a perfectly white room.

No doors, no windows, no furniture.

Nothing.

She punched a wall, and nothing happened.

Her violent purple energy had disappeared, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t find it.

She punched harder, and still nothing.

”What the fuck is going on?”

She laughed, and there wasn’t even an echo in response.

Sighing, she lay on the ground, not exactly having anything better to do, but that was the start of her demise.

Seconds became minutes.

Minutes became hours.

Hours became days.

Days became weeks.

Not that she was able to keep track of time.

And in that whole period, she had no external stimulus, only being accompanied by her heartbeat. Thankfully, she didn’t feel hunger or thirst, but that didn’t change the fact that she mentally felt starved of the sensations of food and drink.

It was literal torture, especially for the woman who sought thrills in every moment.

Eventually, she started talking to herself.

Then arguing.

Then laughing.

Then crying.

The endless silence slowly devoured her mind, and she would’ve traded places with any of the others in a heartbeat, which she had gotten sick of hearing her own.

That left one person.

Elara.

And though she also endured her own torment, she wasn’t experiencing a nightmare in the same way the others were...