The Breaking Point of Logic

{GET OUT OF THERE NOW!!}

The transition from absolute chaos to silence was as violent as the explosion itself.

(FLASH!!!)

Shija did not feel the impact of the fall, but rather the sensation of being "reassembled."

"¡¿?!"

The trails of stardust that moments before floated over the mansion's tar-like mud were sucked in by the doll's energy threads, forcing his essence to regain a physical cohesion that his own body could no longer sustain.

(SHHH-ZAP... CRACK!!!)

As a result, the pain was a multidimensional explosion that coursed through every atom of his being.

{RESIST!!}

However, thanks to the state of forced resonance with the doll, his bone structure began to expand violently; muscles were woven over nerves with the strength of steel cables tightening to the breaking point.

{Don't give up!}

His two-year-old body was stretched, torn, and reconstructed in seconds, returning him to his adult Zenith state through an alchemy of pure energy that defied all laws.

{If your will collapses, your essence will too!!}

In an agonizing and blurred state of consciousness that left him unable to think, Shija heard the doll's voice once again as he regained the "physical" sensation of his body...

(Gasp... Huff... Huff...)

However, the return to his physical form brought no relief.

"¡¡!!"

Upon opening his eyes, the first thing Shija felt was the absolute void in his lungs.

(WATER?!)

It felt as if he were submerged in the depths of an ocean of mercury, an infinite abyss where the water pressure crushed his ribcage.

(Plafff... Glup...!)

He tried to inhale, but the air refused to enter, as if his lungs had forgotten their function or as if the oxygen itself were too solid to be processed.

(... Air... I can't...)

His hands, now large and calloused again, closed around his throat in an instinctive gesture of desperation, while his vision blurred with flashes of violet and crimson.

{Don't breathe!}

Amidst that metaphysical asphyxiation, Shija sank into the blackness of his own consciousness.

{This is bad, bad, bad, bad...! Very bad!!}

In response to the critical situation, the panicked consciousness of the doll opted for a desperate tactic, wrapping multicolored energy threads around him, prioritizing the cohesion of his adult body, which threatened to crumble once again.

{Desperate situations require desperate measures?!}

The resonance with the doll was the only thing preventing Shija from turning into dust and being integrated into the rest of the soul...

(BOOM-BUM... BOOM-BUM!!!)

But the abyss of pain and trauma into which they had been plunged prevented him from breathing, drowning his consciousness once more.

{I'M SORRY FOR THIS!!}

So, with no other choice, using its threads, the doll forced Shija's "heart" to beat with a strength that made his ears ache, like a war drum in the midst of a sepulchral silence.

"¡¿?!"

And thanks to that, with a supreme effort, as if he were lifting a mountain from the bottom of the sea, Shija forced his consciousness to return.

(GLUP... SHHH-ZAP!!!)

But upon regaining consciousness, all he experienced was pain...

(IT BURNS... IT SEARS... ARGH?!)

As the doll's threads acted like invisible pincers, weaving his muscles and bones while the black liquid tried to seep into every new fiber of his being as he regained his mature form, Shija immediately felt the catastrophic weight of reality multiplied exponentially.

"Gulp... Mmmgh...!!"

He was submerged in absolute darkness, where the pitch felt like boiling oil and ice at the same time; where, in trying to breathe, he found no air, but only that viscous substance that represented pure suffering.

{Very well, he is breathing! Now what?!}

But without paying attention to Shija's critical state, the doll's consciousness began to panic, thinking alarmedly of a way to escape.

(Concentrate, concentrate, concentrate, concentrate, concentrate!)

On the other hand, Shija, trying to maintain his sanity amidst the pain and confusion, felt as if he were chained in the depths of a forgotten sea, while his eyes moved erratically in the infinite gloom, unable to see anything beyond the blackness or gather enough concentration to scan the area using his perception...

(AIR...!!)

And under the pressure, his lungs burned while his being was crushed by all the emotions that had been repressed for so long after having opened the valve.

(... No... I can't... move...)

The warrior's lungs burned in a silent agony as his limbs kicked frantically against the viscous density of fear.

"¡¡Glup...!! ¡Mmmgh...!"

His vision was staining red; oxygen was a distant memory, and his body began to tremble under the hydrostatic pressure of suffocating emotions that tried to claim him.

{Think, think, think, think, think, think, think, think, think, think, think, think... AH, MY HEAD IS SPINNING!!}

However, when all seemed lost and Shija's consciousness began to extinguish like a spark of light adrift in an ocean of darkness...

{Wait... Spinning...?}

... that was when a glimmer of hope flashed in the doll's consciousness.

{¡¡¡EUREKA!!!}

Then, in that critical instant, the energy threads connecting Shija's form began to expand and extend under the doll's epiphany.

{Come on... ROTATION!!}

In that moment, the threads multiplied by the thousands, glowing with a fluctuating light that cut through the ocean's blackness.

(SHHH-OOM!!!)

Only to then begin rotating around Shija's body at absurd speeds, defying the friction of the viscous liquid.

(VROOOOOOO-OOOM!!!)

As a result, the rotation generated a kinetic whirlwind of epic proportions.

{JET PROPULSION... I think!!}

In response, the pitch, once a solid prison, was violently displaced by the centrifugal force of the light.

(Vuosh-shhuuu-gluoop...!!)

Thus, the whirlpool created a negative pressure vacuum at its center, an artificial air tunnel that sucked Shija upward.

(SWIIIIIIIIISH!!!)

So, propelled by the whirlwind's acceleration, Shija stopped fighting the surrounding pressure of the space around him to become a projectile of light that took off in the middle of the darkness...

"¡¡¡!!!"

However, unfortunately, the ascent was so rapid that friction began to heat the black fluid, creating a trail of bioluminescent vapor behind him.

{... You know... Before you pull yourself together and we surface, I'll say this in advance... I AM SO SORRY...!!}

And amidst the chaos provoked, the doll's consciousness, inheriting traits from her "mother," proceeded to detach herself from all guilt.

(KRA-SHHHH!!!)

But Shija, unable to strangle the doll to release his accumulated stress while feeling his mind break in some way, could only remain silent before the vibration as the whirlwind broke the inertia of the abyss.

(KRA-TA-KOOM!!!)

Soon, the surface of the pitch ocean, resembling a membrane that resisted letting go of its prey, yielded to the force and speed of the impulse...

"¡¡Cough... Cough... Haaa...!!"

Thus liberating Shija, who emerged vomiting the black pitch from his lungs as he crashed through the mansion's roof with a violence that reduced the flooded beams to splinters of dust.

(BOOOOOOM!!!)

Immediately after, he continued to ascend, going higher and higher into the chromatic sky as the resistance suddenly vanished.

{... I overdid it.}

The change in density was so radical that Shija's body, propelled by the vortex's inertia, broke the sound barrier instantaneously, triggering a circular shockwave that expanded from his position, sweeping away the cotton-candy clouds for miles around.

(BANG... BANG... BANG!!!)

In turn, successive sonic booms cracked across the colorful sky as Shija kept ascending, becoming a streak of light...

"...."

And amidst that supersonic ascent, time seemed to dilate.

(To live...)

The roar of the engines of fate became a distant murmur, and Shija entered a state of profound reflection, a meditative void where the world's noise was extinguished.

(I have survived ambushes in cursed forests. I have slept with one eye open while mercenaries tried to slit my throat for a handful of copper coins. I have seen horrors that would make a bard swallow his lute... and yet, here I am...)

He looked down.

(Shot toward the firmament like a defective firework because someone, somewhere, made a "small mistake.")

In the air, looking down, Shija was under so much pressure that, finally...

(Look at you, idiot. Look at you down there. The world becomes small, but it is not a normal world. It is a giant chessboard where the trees dance the waltz. Is that a smiling cat floating in the void or is it that my retinas have finally given up and decided to project hallucinations to spare me the trauma?)

He suffered a dissociative catharsis.

(It's official: reality has broken up with me. We don't even try to pretend that the laws of physics matter to us anymore.)

Shija closed his eyes as his ascent began to curve toward its apogee.

(Goodbye, logic... You were a companion... I will never forget for as long as you lasted...)

The air up there was thin, almost pure.

(... I wonder... is it wrong that I want to punch that stupid doll...?)

For a second, Shija was on the verge of falling into darkness...

(NO, FOCUS!!)

Fortunately, however, reacting in time, Shija forced his consciousness to return, thus preventing the fall.

(Stay calm... Gather information... And once you know who to cut... GRIND THEM TO MINCEMEAT!!)

... Or maybe not.