Brilliant Man/Vir Clarissimus (Latin)

Chapter 20 Brave New World

A single thought burned at the heart of his mind – overtake Zed. This, he knew, was the reason for his visions and was an essential piece in the mortality game of humanity. These thoughts were with him while climbing up the spiraled, glass steps leading up to the mysterious door.

After reaching the top, Ozwald leaned against a base, enjoying the high of his victory; he traced his eyes down the stretch of glass steps all the way to the beginning. What did Zed mean by saying the "clever, daring, brave, and adventurous."

Driven by curiosity and unable to further contain it, Ozwald burst through the golden door, entering its marvelous, toasty contents. The cerulean sky was stamped with an orange sun and streaked in puffy, pale-white lipstick. Under this horizon was a spanning country of turquoise ponds, flowers covering nearly every inch of the place, and anxious spruce trees – their leaves ceaselessly trembled and the trees were packed in a way which resembled soldiers scared for battle.

For once in these games, Ozwald permitted to feel his feelings. A delinquent grin spanned the length of this country while he bounced and dancing around, embodying a thirsty man quenched by the fountain of youth. He spread his arms out, looking as though he expected God himself to reach down and pluck him off the floor, away from the unpredictability, coincidences, and mundane life he existed in. In this, maybe - just maybe – he could reunite again with Brittney and their family, his comrades, and celebrate with rounds of Corse and speak about life's dealings.

~

Only seconds later, by an invisible force, Ozwald's stomach folded inward as he was unexpectedly ripped off from the ground and flung into the sky. Mid-ascent, he experienced a distinct pang – one of defeat – which implied only one thing.

Zed had infiltrated his mind again.

Burning with anger, he looked down, watching his beautiful paradise be consumed with urban chaos. The view was censored by the clouds and even the highest trees were just specks through his translucent view.

Would he stay alive? Ozwald thought, growing more anxious the further up he climbed. "Simulation" this was, its effects were very realistic; his survival desire wasn't exclusively just fear, but also feeling anxious. The literal sun was on his left while his head floated above the clouds.

His shoulders, teeth, and legs trembled raucously as the wind came. Ozwald had suddenly halted, still unsure whether a 'height limit' was set or he was suffering a symptom of his pending, mental breakdown. During this time, goosebumps had stretched to all areas of his body. From his chest, they explored his arms, back, and finished with his legs. However, despite being fully aware of the cold, Ozwald stoically planted himself where he was, resolving to do away with his flimsy lab coat.

This sensation of temperature... is this not merely a simulation, one where I have power over my mind? Ozwald thought. When he released his coat, the clouds had expanded to eat it up, then closed again.

Without a coat, his clattering teeth naturally grew louder, but he didn't care.

Peace softened his eyes, cleared his mind, and focused him on the dark world of his imaginations. First, he summoned a pile of tinder and twigs, drawing up a spark which trailed toward this pit, setting the java-brown hearth ablaze as steaming, vermillion spray spilled out from its sides. As he manifested more kindling, greater in color and size his hearth grew, its spicy, acid touches of red, yellow, and dark orange making up the blazing cocktail. As his final command, Ozwald visualized a siege of steadily running water spilling from out the corners of this room, infiltrating the house of flames through its crevices and soiling its many twigs.

In mere moments, these heat-and-cool forces converged, forming a mysterious, matte-tar product, the only remaining evidence of their clash. Ozwald froze, staring down at the dark-colored goo. One word hammered in his mind that entire time.

Onyx oil.

~

He returned his awareness to up in the quiet sky.

Almost instantly, a chill ran through him, yet this time he was unperturbed. He'd already recognized that his mind played a role in winning this game, but two interesting things had happened since that development. For one, by accepting the cold weather, he could decide now whether he perceived it as either 'hot' or 'cold,' but most of all, a static, powerful surge was coursing through him. Ozwald felt like he was at the seat of power, stoic master of his own universe, and in whatever way he had, Ozwald had created this adrenaline, making him feel like a constantly-static electric bolt. And it felt good.

An idea of how to utilize this energy came to Ozwald. He mowed through a few of Zed's random signs and gestures, stunned to find that a weight had dropped from his shoulders and he was free from stillness.

His descent quickened after the first layer of clouds, which were like breeze; their poofy remnants clung to his legs and boots, but not his face which was tipped directly into the wind. Looking down, all the colors transformed: red became poppies, dark-green landscape became sentinel forest, and gray-white replaced the sky with horizonal mountains. And before Ozwald became history, a miraculous, intervening force halted his fall, stationing him slightly over the ground.

Curiously, he snapped his fingers, canceling this effect and sending him flat-faced onto the dirt floor. Not only did he stink, but now Ozwald was covered in brown smudges.

After gaining the strength to get up again, he embarked on no particular path. Here, he weaved through a muddy trail before entering a dense thicket with broad-branched trees, exotic vegetation, and poisonous berry bushes.

Though blissful, familiar country was only inches away, Ozwald was curious to see the ominous place. Upon entering, the sky changed from baby-blue to a more suiting purple; branches canopied above, rooted from their crooked, matte-black supports; and even the grass lost its familiar green, instead dressed in the same solemnity of the trees. Its deficit of color separated the forest from the remainder of the bright outside world; stepping out, like a light switch, the sky turned blue again.

This ended his forest play. Ozwald left its foreign air, forlorn sky, and lost, alien trees.

His focus was extended to his fingertips; by exercising his energy twice today, magical calluses were ridged onto them. He looked back, wondering what use the grotesque forest had in this utopia.

With a slightly narrower look, Ozwald observed that from these calluses, he produced queer, gossamer strings. They looped around his fingers from the tips, fluidly creating a bridge of almost invisible links.

Curious, he shook out these blurry lines, revealing vague bursts of orange, green, and red when they caught the wind. Ozwald untangled one of these strings from his ring finger, drawing the line up along his forearm.

Then, in a finishing motion, he faced the purple forest, brought back his arms, then threw them forward, deliberately clung to his little wire of fire.

Spontaneously, a yellow spark fell from the tip of his index finger, following his line of gossamer up to the forest. Then it threw itself onto an insignificant, hunched trunk, setting it ablaze. Very soon, everything was torched; Ozwald had issued a wind which blew burning leaves everywhere in the forest, catching the ground and surrounding spruce on fire. Ozwald laughed, watching his yellow-orange firestorm run rampant.

Before the fire ceased, older trees transferred their heat to the much younger trees. It was a brutal genocide; in only one spark, he had cleared the flammable, purple race from this section of the utopia.

A grin of knowledge spread on his face, for both his lost and the item gained.

Power.