NOVEL NEXT Chapter 5: Powers
"Ahm, so, Alia, would you like to come with me? We can, um, like, take this journey of life together... if you don't mind," I said, stuttering nervously.
"Why not? I don't even have anyone left, so it sounds like a good idea!" she replied, her tone suddenly cheerful and jolly
.
I held her hand and started to move.
"So, what is your power? I mean, everyone gets one after the nightmare," I asked, curious.
"Hmm, I'm a Battle Creator," she replied.
"What's that?" I asked, intrigued.
"Hmmm, I can't do much yet—it's new—but look, I can create soldiers and weapons. Right now, my limit is just one soldier," she explained.
"Omg, that's great! I mean, it's very good!" I said, impressed.
She smiled happily, clearly pleased by the compliment. After all, every kid loves a compliment. I remembered how much I liked them when I was her age. But then, something clicked in my mind. I couldn't quite place it, but I remembered—I think she was there... one of the greatest fighters.
I just now realized how much of a great character I was looking at.
"You're going to do great things," I said with confidence.
"I was born great," she said confidently.
Such confidence, I thought to myself
.She asked me what my power was, and I thought, yeah, I should check mine too. The power was written on our watches that we wear. So, I checked my watch to look at the power information, and to my surprise, there were two powers listed. I had two powers. I was confused because everyone was supposed to have just one power, which they could use in many ways, but I had two. I wondered about it and decided to ask the help button, which was there for people who were confused about something. They told me that the girl who died had this power. One of the powers was hers, and the other one was mine.
So, the first power I used—although mistakenly—when I was fighting the spider was called Domain Creation. The other power, however, was labeled as "locked," which meant I had to wait for it to unlock, much like the first one, but subconsciously.
A basic guideline for the power was also provided. It explained that I could enter my domain, and time would not pass inside it—not at all. For example, I could spend five hours inside the domain, but in the real world, no time would pass.
We continued to walk, and an idea suddenly struck me. In an apocalypse, everything would be falling apart, and food would be hard to find. It would take a lot of effort to get even the basics. So, why not store food in my domain? That way, I could save food, clothes, and other essentials, and not have to worry about running out. Life is meant to be easy, right? Make it simple. Yay! I shared this idea with the little girl, and she was just as excited, eager to go and collect stuff from malls for free. Yay!
We went to the biggest mall we could find. Of course, along the way, we had to hide from the monsters because, right now, we had no real strength. The girl's power could only fight small monsters, and I was pretty useless in a fight myself. We would have to train for that later, but for now, our first priority was to find food and clothes—just to survive as long as we could in this situation.
We managed to fill more than 15 or 16 cartons with food that didn't require refrigeration, since time wouldn't pass in the domain, but frozen items wouldn't stay frozen without ice or temperature control. We also gathered clothing, essential knives, lighters, power banks, and many other things that could prove useful in the future, no matter how unexpected the circumstances might be.
The little girl was overjoyed because, well, which girl wouldn't enjoy a shopping spree—especially when you don't have to pay for anything?
For me, too, it was the first time I was going on a shopping spree at a mall, and it felt kind of strange. People usually go to malls, even if they're poor, but this was truly my first time shopping like that. I didn't realize how such a small act could make me this happy.