It was not a flash. It was suffocation. A sheet of light pressing against his eyes, his chest, his thoughts. Luis tried to scream, but the sound stayed inside.
Then, darkness.
When he opened his eyes, he was no longer at the university.
He found himself in a large, ruined hall, with no clear walls. The only light was a faint beam falling from a hole in the ceiling, illuminating dust suspended like ash. Chains hung above, moving with a low creak. In the distance, wooden frames without purpose rested like the skeletons of something that no longer existed.
And, floating near the ceiling, there were creatures similar to bats.
Motionless.
As if they too had been caught by an invisible force.
Luis breathed heavily.
'This is definitely a dream.'
He forced himself to believe it. It was the only way not to panic.
'If this is a dream… I should be able to control it.'
He tried to close his eyes. He imagined a beach, warm sun, waves, and random laughter.
Nothing changed.
He opened his eyes and the ruin was still there.
"Damn it," he muttered. "Why can't I dream of a Caribbean beach?"
"I regret to inform you that this is not a dream."
The voice arrived soft and deep, refined… and at the same time artificial, like a message broadcast from a speaker with no owner. Luis's skin prickled.
He turned in every direction. "Who's there?!"
Silence.
Then the air tore.
A crack appeared in the middle of the hall, like an open wound in reality. The hum returned, identical to the one at the university, and the crack widened until it allowed a white orb through, bright and perfect.
"Just what I needed," Luis spat.
The orb floated in front of him. It had no face. It had no eyes. And yet, Luis felt it watching him from the inside.
"Welcome, chosen one," the voice said.
Luis let out a short, disbelieving laugh. "Chosen for what? To scare me?"
"You may call me Sorore, the ancestral," the orb replied. "Do not be afraid. It is not my intention to harm you."
Luis clenched his teeth. "Funny. Because I really feel like punching you."
"You will," said Sorore, with a calm that was almost a provocation. "And it will change nothing."
Luis felt the blood rush to his head.
'What kind of joke is this?'
"If thinking this is a dream helps you, that is fine," Sorore added. "It will make things easier."
Luis stood still.
'Can it read…?'
"Yes," the voice replied, without waiting for the question. "I can."
Luis's stomach tightened. He stepped back.
"Fine. Sorore," he said, forcing himself to sound firm. "Let's say this is real. Why did you bring me here? What do you want from me?"
"You have been summoned to stop the advance of the darkness that consumes worlds," Sorore declared. "There is a devourer. Aberoth."
Luis opened his mouth to answer with sarcasm, but the word "devourer" left a strange cold feeling on his tongue.
"And what are you? The one in charge?" he challenged.
"I am the guardian," said Sorore. "I watch over the balance. I protect the cycle."
"Then do your job," Luis snapped. "Stop your Aberoth yourself."
"We are energy," Sorore replied, without emotion. "Unable to fight without destroying the framework that supports the worlds. If we were to clash… the result would be total annihilation."
The hall vanished.
Luis found himself suspended in space. Stars everywhere. And in the distance, a planet similar to Earth.
A pillar of violet light rose from that planet and opened a crack. From the crack came a cloud of cosmic dust, dense, slow, inevitable. It covered the world.
And when it withdrew… only a gray rock remained.
Luis felt his body go cold.
"W-What was that…?"
"The end of a world under Aberoth," Sorore replied. "When a herald fails, nothing remains. Not even memory."
Luis's chest tightened. He thought of his parents and friends. Of everyone who could disappear without anyone even remembering their name.
"So my role is…?"
"To be my herald," said Sorore. "An agent. An obstacle. An answer."
Luis swallowed. "And if I refuse?"
"You cannot," the voice replied. "You are here."
The anger returned like a wave.
"Are you using me?!"
"I am giving you an opportunity," said Sorore, and the orb floated closer. "In exchange, your world is kept out of the devourer's immediate reach. A fair deal."
Luis felt disgust.
"Fair?" he repeated, and the word came out like poison. "You play with lives like they are pieces on a board?"
"Lives have always been pieces," Sorore answered. "Now you simply know it."
Luis trembled. Not from fear, but from helplessness.
"When you are finished, you will return to the instant you were summoned," Sorore added. "For you, it will have been a brief dream."
"That's suicide!" Luis shouted. "I'm not going to—!"
"The key to victory lies within you," Sorore cut him off. "You have tools. If you do not know how to use them, that is your problem."
Luis clenched his fists.
'No. I won't accept this. I won't kneel.'
"What happens to me if I fail?" he asked, his voice breaking.
"You do not want that," said Sorore. "You will be consumed. And every trace of your existence will be erased. Have you ever felt that you remember someone… and there is no evidence they ever existed?"
Luis stepped back, as if pushed.
"No!!" he roared. "Choose someone else. Someone who has nothing to lose."
"There is no other human who can take your place," Sorore replied. "And your resistance only proves what is expected: your species does not understand until it hurts."
That last sentence was the breaking point.
Luis drove his fist into the orb.
The light shattered like porcelain, exploding into white shards that disintegrated before touching the ground. Luis felt no pain. He felt satisfaction.
A laugh rose from his chest.
But it did not last long.
"Does that make you feel better?"
The voice sounded behind him.
Luis turned.
The orb was intact… and now there were two.
"Shut up!!"
He struck the first. It shattered. He struck the second. It shattered.
And four appeared.
Sorore did not scream. Did not defend itself. Did not punish him.
It only multiplied its presence, again and again, like a passive response to violence.
"Your species is so primitive," Sorore said as the orbs filled the air. "It vents its frustration with useless blows."
Luis kept punching. One. Two. Three. Ten.
Each destruction was a mockery.
Each new appearance, a rope tightening around his patience.
Until his strength left him.
He fell to his knees.
And he cried.
It wasn't cowardice. It was anger and humiliation, at being unable to control anything.
Sorore waited. As if even that was part of the process.
"Good," it finally said. "Enough catharsis. Let us waste no more time."
The orbs began to spin around Luis, raising a current of air and light. The hall creaked. The chains rattled like broken bells. The hum returned, louder, deeper.
Luis screamed, but his voice faded, swallowed by the whiteness.
His consciousness faded as well.
When he woke up, he was alone in the ruined hall.
But it was no longer the same.
The chains moved with the wind. The bats screeched, alive, restless. The world had started moving again… without him and against him.
Luis pushed himself up, his eyes burning.
"Bastard," he muttered, spitting on the ground with contempt.
He hated Sorore. He hated it with a new, absolute clarity. And yet, part of him understood the worst truth: to the guardian and the devourer, the future of any world meant nothing. It was not kindness or evil. It was only duty.
And he… was the tool.
Luis clenched his teeth.
He had no idea where he was, nor what dangers awaited him outside. But there was only one thing that mattered to him:
Going back.
Without looking back, he stepped into the darkness, searching for a way out.
And this time, fear was not going to stop him.