Lucien woke up after a restless night of sleep.
Though the city of Tokyo appeared unchanged from the day before, a shift had taken place within Lucien his mind and body.
What once felt familiar to him now seemed foreign and distant
His hands still trembled. Lucien felt a cold feeling under his ribs.
The name that he heard yesterday echoed inside of him: The God of Vengeance.
He was confused. Why did it choose him and not someone else?
He woke up and jumped naked into the puddle of water in the middle of the park and drifted into Shinjuku's flow, past the izakaya steam and the vending machines.
People moved like robots. Lucien saw a salaryman with a briefcase that was most likely empty and just for show.
All of their faces were blank, but all of a sudden their minds spilled into him. At first, it where tiny mundane things.
He could hear that someone was late for a meeting. Then he heard that she didn't reply. Or that he needed to work overtime.
The thoughts Lucien heard tasted like old tea and made his head ache.
He couldn't control this newfound and because of that Lucien could hear every thought of every single person that was nearby.
Lucien clenched his jaw and forced himself to focus on his own mind and body and because of that Lucien came to exclude all thoughts of other people.
The movements he made also felt a lot lighter since he jumped into the puddle of water in the morning. It felt like a second engine lived in his legs.
It was 12 o'clock in the afternoon. Lucien had found a narrow backstreet and he tried to test what was inside him.
He had found a small coin on the ground. He picked it up and dropped it on the concrete. He imagined it lifting without touching it.
Nothing happened.
He tried it again after he took a deep breath.
The coin started to tremble, rolled a hair's breadth, then jerked and clanged against the wall. A passerby saw it and laughed at him; Lucien flinched.
He didn't give up. A hairband spun, then toppled. A cigarette butt rose. It came off the ground for a very short time before gravity reclaimed it.
Sometimes the objects moved on his command; sometimes they ignored him.
Lucien his concentration broke every time another person's worry slipped into his head.
Testing his new powers left him bloody and raw. He tried to run up a fifteen-foot wall and hovered for a single breath before gravity remembered him and reclaimed him back on the ground.
He landed steadily and laughed it off once. Lucien felt like he was stronger but clumsier at the same time.
At this point Lucien was a broken kid holding a loaded gun he did not know how to aim.
A couple of hours later Lucien sat down with his new cardboard sign near an entrance to a subway station.
He begged for money. People walked past him like he didn´t exist. Their thoughts flowed through his mind like a background hum.
Such a dirty kid, don't touch my bag or I will call the police. Is he contagious? Should I give him some money? Nah, I'm already running late for work.
After two hours a tall woman slipped three coins onto his cardboard sign without meeting his eyes.
Another man in his seventies thought aloud how charity made him feel clean and happy.
When evening came and it was almost dark outside.
A group of ten thirteen-year-old boys circled Lucien. They were loud and had cruel faces.
They shoved him and Lucien fell onto the ground. One kicked his ribs. Lucien stood up with something new and tense.
He moved without thinking. His speed quadrupled and pulled him through them; a shove sent one of the boys flying into a konbini.
Another reached for his cardboard sign and tried to tear it apart but Lucien's hand closed like iron. He punched him back hard enough to make his nose bleed.
The boys were shook. For the first time in months, Lucien did not taste defeat.
The kids ran away. Lucien stood with his heart banging in his throat and his knuckles bleeding.
He had finally survived an attack.
By nightfall, Lucien walked back to his bench. He wandered into the edge of the industrial district.
The city didn't come here anymore. It was an abandoned place. Even the dirty rats and stray dogs seemed afraid of this place.
After a few steps, Lucien stopped walking. He felt it. Something was watching him. He turned around and saw it.
It looked like a shadow twice the size of a man, with an iron body that looked like it couldn't be broken and six green glowing eyes.
Its limbs and muscles were wrong and jagged.
When Lucien looked at it he saw a dead beast stitched together. It didn't even walk. It looked like it slid across the ground like a reptile.
Lucien took a step back to analyse it.
He started with mind reading...
He reached into its mind and he recoiled instantly.
There was no language for him to read. No thoughts. Lucien could only feel the hunger and violence. It wasn't an animal. It was a monster.
Lucien had heard of these kinds of creatures before but he never thought he would encounter one.
Monsters are sometimes strong enough to endanger entire nations. This was one of them and it had found him.
The creature roared.
It was a deep and scary sound that cracked a nearby streetlamp. Without any thought, Lucien his body jumped back.
The monster stood up and lunged towards Lucien. Its claws were as big as a small baseball bat slicing through the air.
Lucien moved aside just in time.
His speed kicked in like a new engine.
In an instant, he was behind the monster. His fist was filled with all the power that he had. He slammed his fist into the monster its spine.
Boom.
A right fist landed against the monster's side. The impact of Lucien his punch sent the monster flying across the pavement. Leaving a crater when it landed into a wall.
Lucien's knuckles bled.
"Shit... that's all I got?" The monster stood up. Its spine snapped back into place with a sickening crack.
Lucien raised both of his hands. He tried it.
Telekinesis.
He reached into the air. Lucien grabbed a hold of the metal debris that was around him and hurled it toward the monster.
The monster twisted and charged through them like they were nothing.
Lucien tried to dodge the attacks but the monster was getting faster and sharper and then a claw ripped across Lucien his chest.
His blood sprayed everywhere.
He got slammed into a dumpster thirty feet away.
Pain exploded through his whole body. His vision was blurred with his own blood.
"No... I'm not done..."
The monster slowly walked toward him.
Lucien's eyes glowed faintly.
He tried to use his mind-reading power and dove into the creature's brain again. He did not try and read it this time, but he tried to crush it.
He reached for its instincts and its source.
His body surged forward, speed breaking the ground beneath his feet.
He jumped and collided with the monster mid-air. Both of them crashed into a factory wall, destroying it completely.
Lucien recovered first and landed on top. His fist was raised in the air and he was breathing heavy.
He punched the monster in the face.
Once.
Twice.
And a third time.
Then the monster grabbed his arm and broke it Lucien his arm.
Lucien screamed in agony. All of his strength went away in an instant. The reptile threw him into a stack of metal poles. Lucien couldn't move.
Blood soaked his white hoodie. One eye was swollen shut. His ribs were shattered into pieces.
The monster slowly walked forward.
Lucien tried to stand up one last time. He failed miserably and fell back down.
The divinity that was inside him awakened, but did nothing to help him. It was dead silent.
Was this it?
A cloud fell over Lucien his body. The monster raised its claw in the air.
"You are the vessel of vengeance remember...Do not die here, my child." He heard someone say.
Lucien looked up through his blurred and bloodied eyes.
He saw the claw descending toward him.
The screen went black.