Masteria Online: Shattering the Dark God's Grand Scheme

"Let’s go-" Her yell was entirely cut off. As soon as Lena jumped into the cloud, her world exploded into agony.

The moment her body made contact with the swirling mass of condensed magical energy, electricity surged through every nerve in her body. There was no build up, nor time for her to prepare. One instant she was jumping through open air, and the next, lightning was tearing through her from the inside out.

Her muscles locked up instantly. Every single one of them contracted at once, seizing so hard she thought her bones might snap from the pressure. Her jaw clamped shut with such force she bit through the inside of her cheek. Blood filled her mouth.

The pain was beyond anything she’d ever experienced.

It wasn’t localized. It wasn’t something she could compartmentalize or push to the back of her mind. This was total, complete, all consuming suffering that radiated from every cell in her body simultaneously.

The magical energy swiftly coursed through her, forcing its way into her muscles, her organs, her bones. Lightning arced through her nervous system like it was a highway specifically designed for electrical torture.

Her vision went white. This wasn’t from the bright lightning of the cloud, but from the sheer intensity of the pain overloading her brain’s ability to process visual information. Her thoughts scattered, fragmenting into disconnected pieces that couldn’t form coherent patterns.

She wanted to scream.

She needed to scream.

Her mouth opened, her throat contracted, her lungs tried to force air through her vocal cords to produce some kind of sound, any kind of release for the agony consuming her.

Nothing came out.

Her body was completely locked. The electrical current had seized control of every muscle, every nerve, every voluntary and involuntary system. She couldn’t even draw breath properly. The lightning dictated when her diaphragm moved, when her lungs expanded, when her heart beat.

She was a passenger in her own body, forced to experience every excruciating second while having absolutely no control over anything.

The baptism continued without mercy.

Wave after wave of magical energy surged through her. Each pulse brought a fresh cascade of lightning that carved new paths of pain through her nervous system. Her skin felt like it was burning and freezing at the same time.

Her mind tried to retreat, to disconnect from the sensations, trying to find any escape from the torture.

It didn’t work.

The pain was too all encompassing. It chased her thoughts, invaded every corner of her consciousness, refusing to let her find any refuge.

She couldn’t think. She couldn’t reason. She couldn’t do anything but exist in a state of pure suffering.

Time lost all meaning. Seconds felt like hours. Minutes felt like days. She had no idea how long she’d been in the cloud. It could have been ten seconds or ten minutes or ten hours. There was only the endless NOW of agony.

Her health bar was dropping. She could see it in the corner of her vision, the numbers ticking down steadily. Not quickly enough to be merciful, but not slowly enough to give her hope.

[HP: 487/639]

[HP: 461/639]

[HP: 438/639]

The damage came in irregular bursts. Sometimes a large chunk would disappear at once when a particularly intense surge of lightning tore through her. Other times it would tick down gradually as she was slowly cooked from the inside.

She’d planned to cheat this.

That thought managed to surface through the pain for a brief moment. She had actually jumped in with an idea. She was a priest, wasn’t she? Then, all she had to do was just spam Heal, right? It was as simple as keeping herself alive through the baptism, coming out stronger without actually risking anything.

Damn!

How naive she’d been.

How absolutely stupid.

She couldn’t cast anything. She couldn’t move. Neither to cast, nor drink a health potion. She couldn’t focus her mind enough to channel mana. She couldn’t even if she’d wanted to.

It wasn’t even the pain. The pain merely made her miserable, but she could cast through pain. What happened, the magical energy flooding through her body disrupted everything. Her own mana was being drowned out by the overwhelming force of the cloud’s power. Even if she could somehow focus enough to attempt a spell, the interference would make it impossible to complete.

There was no cheating this. There was no clever trick or exploit that would let her bypass the suffering.

This was pure, unavoidable, baptism by torture.

She saw now why this was truly RNG. You either survived or you didn’t. There was nothing you could do to influence the outcome once you were inside. You just had to endure until either the process completed or your health hit zero.

At least there was no fall risk.

As soon as she’d entered the cloud, it had grabbed her. Some kind of magical attraction or containment effect pulled her deeper inside, positioning her in the center of the swirling mass. She was being thrown about, tossed in random directions by the chaotic currents of energy, but she never left the cloud’s interior.

If she’d just fallen through and plummeted to the ground below, that would have been one thing. But no, the cloud held her. It kept her right where the baptism would be most effective, ensuring she received the full treatment.

How considerate.

[HP: 389/639]

[HP: 361/639]

Wait.

Something was different.

She’d noticed something changing. The longer the baptism went on, the more she could think. At first, she couldn’t even form thoughts. The pain had completely blanked her mind, reducing her to nothing but raw sensation and suffering.

Now, however, she was reasoning. She was observing. She was making connections.

She couldn’t do that before.

When had that changed? How long had she been thinking coherently?

It wasn’t like the magical power was running out. The surges of lightning continued unabated, pulsing through her body with the same merciless intensity they’d had from the beginning. The baptism showed no signs of weakening or completing.

She didn’t hurt any less now.

Actually, it hurt more.

That was the really messed up part. The physical pain had intensified, and yet she could think through it.

She truly didn’t want this. She would much rather simply dissociate from the experience. She had done that quite a few times before. Dissociating was nothing new. Yet, despite all this pain, she was fine? How come?

Could it be she was the type to be deeply impacted emotionally, enough to dissociate, but not with physical pain? That was so interesting. Whatever the reason, she was regaining the ability to process information even while the torture continued.

Damn...

She’d like to scream.

Wow, she’d really like to.

If she could just open her mouth, if she could just force air through her lungs, if she could just produce some kind of vocalization to express the agony she was experiencing, maybe it would help. Maybe it would provide some tiny release valve for the pressure building in her mind.

But she couldn’t. Her body remained locked, controlled by the electrical currents ravaging it.

Fuck, she actually wanted this over with.

Wow.

She was miserable. Truly miserable.

Holy fuck, this was so much worse than even when a bomb blew up on her.

She thought about that comparison she had just made in her mind. She’d experienced plenty of pain in Masteria. She’d been stabbed, slashed, burned, blasted, and blown up. She’d deliberately put herself in harm’s way, testing her limits, pushing herself to see how much damage she could take and keep fighting.

The bomb that had detonated while still attached to her belt had been the worst pain she’d experienced up until now. That explosion had nearly killed her, reducing her to near death leaving her unable to stand for several seconds.

But this was worse.

Why was this so much worse?

Lena pondered the reason. The bomb had hurt a mere portion of her body. Her left side, primarily, where the blast had been centered. The explosion had shredded flesh, burned skin, and embedded shrapnel. It had been excruciating.

Yet, it wasn’t her entire being. Just a side that was injured. Also, at least the explosion had killed some nerves. The worst of the damaged areas had gone numb almost immediately, reducing the overall suffering to something manageable.

Here, in the baptism, every nerve was getting fried. All of them. Simultaneously. With no relief. And worse than anything else, this was prolonged torture.

After the bomb blew up on her, she had been able to cast heal soon enough. This was not like that, the baptism just kept going. Second after second after second of unrelenting agony with no end in sight.

Lumi!

LUMI!!!!

LUMI HELP!

She couldn’t speak the words, but they rushed through her mind.

Didn’t Lumi know how much this would hurt? Why did he make her do this? Was this a punishment? Was she bad? Lumi, damn it!

Why would you do this to me!?

W-wait... he... trusts me. Wait. I’m being a crybaby. I’m being weak. It’s just some pain... damn it hurts! But she’s, she’s... a hero! She’ll save...

...

It hurts...