Completing my chapter : author and finisher of my faith

Where Sam stood, the remnants of what seemed like a once-beautiful city lay before him, a stark contrast to anything he had ever seen before. And It didn't seem it had any life form in it, and for ages.

Extremely freezing even without snow or rain just the air alone made the whole view and feeling, a cold abandoned wasteland. And it was easy to feel the cold just having a sleeveless and his underwear on.

"W…w..what's going on?" Sammy muttered to himself staring around the landscape as he shook like a drenched cat: his dark and moist roughened hair falling over his eyes as he observed his surroundings.

"Where the hell am i?".

Stretching his hands before his face he noticed they were pale: the cold environment already having its effects on his skin. His breath vapor becoming thicker and thicker by the minute.

He let his hands down by his sides again, shaking his head as he took a good look around. His confusion only grew as he observed more. But his mind reeled on the possibility of what he saw when he turned around.

"What in the name of….."

A faint line divided two entirely different landscapes, separating the graveyard of crumbling skyscrapers and rubble-filled streets from endless dunes of sand. A scorching desert more preferably.

He couldn't have noticed this if he didn't turn. The division was so clean, it didn't reflect in the other in any way.

The desert, too, was a wasteland of sorts – a vast expanse of land littered with the discarded remnants of civilization with dried visible bones and millions of them approximately.

Twisted metal, shattered glass, and concrete rubble stretched towards the horizon, bathed in the golden light of the scorching sun.

Yet, just a few feet away, where Sammy stood, the city's ruins basked in the soft, ethereal glow of the moon.

"I must be dreaming…"

It all looked like a drawing in a very expensive beautiful french art work to Sammy. But this was different: he was actually in it.

The two light sources coexisted, neither intervening with the other, creating an surreal, otherworldly atmosphere at the same time.

It was unbelievable at sight.

The sun's warmth seemed to stop at the dividing line, giving way to the moon's gentle illumination. The effect was almost magical, as if two distinct worlds existed side by side – one of decay and destruction, the other of eerie shattered beauty and livelihood

The sky above was a deep, foreboding grey, on the moons side and a white-faded blue on the sun's and the air was heavy with an eerie silence, on both sides.

Not even the vultures hovering in the deserted landscape made a sound. Unbelievable silence in such open grounds.

"Have I finally lost it? Is this what the afterlife looks like? Is this paradise?".

Even Sammy wasn't sure of his words because none of those questions he asked himself made any meaning to him.

He knew paradise as a beautiful place of joy and outstanding beauty, peace and satisfaction in unmeasurable lengths….. not a place of utter confusion and impossibility… at least not this way.

"This can't be hell… is it?" He argued with himself till he couldn't take the shivering anymore.

"Whoohhh… shhh". He shivered : standing in the moonlit city ruins, he craved warmth more than anything at the moment.

But his curiosity more than his craving pushed him to move towards the division just about 32 feet away from him.

Finally getting to the point where it was all divided, Sammy looked up at the different skies then poked his finger into thin line of opposite lights of the desert feeling the warmth in it instantly.

"Wow.."

It was unbelievable but still felt like a strange dream he wasn't sure if he wanted to wake up from. With full courage, he stepped in immediately as his body appreciated the heat.

Looking back at the city like landscape from the other side was even more beautiful.

But with time, the heat got to him as the sands burnt his barefoot making him move back into the cold city atmosphere.

He was short of words and at the same time worried and curious.

But just as he was about to fall back to the thought of how he got here, a voice interrupted his thoughts right on time.

"It's wonderful isn't it".

Sammy shrieked as he immediately turned around in alert but still saw no one.

"Whose there? Wh… who said that?" Wh.. where am I? Please! Is anybody there?".

Sammy quickly asked a heavy silence followed suit for some seconds.

Suddenly, a figure appeared like materializing into visibility from the distance behind a huge piece of rubble – a male figure clad in red, his hair a glowing golden fall to his back same color as his eyes and a pale skin. But with a sword of flames piercing his chest.

"Who are you? Have you been here the whole time?".

Sammy asked taking steps closer to him: his eyes fixed mainly on the flaming sword through his chest.

"Samuel Wynter..." the young man called out, his voice weak but urgent as he tried getting on his feet. But at all attempts, he fell back on his elbow before he could lift himself.

"Ah! I've been waiting for you".

"Who are you and how do you know my name?"

He crawled towards Samuel, his movements labored and painful.

'What the hell is going on' Sammuel thought, his head pouring out with many questions.

But before the figure could speak, the ground began to shake as he noticed the man's eyes locked onto something behind him as his struggles intensified.

With a final surge of strength, the man reached Samuel's feet and stretched out his hand.

In his palm, out of thin air materialized a slender pen, very bright and adorned with ancient inscriptions that shimmered with a golden light and with a white smoke like aura rotating around it.

Sammy gasped. Wondering if he should touch it observing it's strange appearance.

"Please take it from me and leave immediately..ugh….they are coming," the figure before his feet spoke, his voice barely audible.

Samuel's confusion gave way to his alarm as he turned around he saw the reason for the ground shaking.

An army of creatures, each a twisted variation of the man that lay bleeding before him, charged towards them from the deserted wasteland.

"Who are you? What am I doing here what is happening? Samuel turned back, quickly asking, with a shaky voice.

"I am Zara, The present Author of Faith," the figure replied, his eyes filled with a deep sadness.

As Samuel looked back up, he saw the creatures of different sizes and calibers closing in and their figures became clearer to him this time.

Some of them ran on four legs, some flew, others, the had body of a snake, dinosaurs and others were engulfed in flames that didn't seem to consume them.

"They are my creatures". The figure spoke.

Most had creature like features in one part of their body or the other. They were like from every aspect of a horrible imagination.

"Please, take it, kid before they get here". Zara urged, his hand trembling as the pen levitated above it.

Samuel still confused and terrified, took the pen, feeling its weight. Why is it so heavy.

You'll get used to it Zara said like reading his thoughts as he tried getting up.

"Are they coming for you?" Samuel asked, bending to help Zara up. Still confused how someone who had a sword of flames in his chest was still alive.

"Yes, but you have to leave," Zara said, managing to stand.

Then a sudden burst of energy, he levitated immediately about 30 feet high. And just then, the air around him rippled and pulsed, as if absorbing energy from the atmosphere itself.

Zara screamed in a language Samuel didn't understand, unleashing a massive surge of energy towards the figures closing in on them with just a wide clap of his arms.

The blast was so massive it wiped out the approaching creatures, including everything around them not excluding the land they ran on leaving a black void like he shot through the world they were in.

"What kind of power is this?" Samuel wondered, awestruck.

Just then, Zara warned, "Watch out!"

A massive mutated hand like creature with eyes on its knuckles and a mouth under its palm, a bold illuminati tattoo like sign on its back, emerged behind Samuel.

The creature's eyes fixed greedily on the poor lad.

But as it pounced, Zara intervened, striking the creature with a blow from the energy still lingering in his hands, sending the creature a good distance away as it began to fade into smoke.

Then pulling the sword from his chest with a loud cry that echoed around the landscapes, Zara fell back to the ground.

"Arrrrgh!!!!"

This time his bleeding became way worse.

Samuel felt a searing graze from one of the creatures fingers, after its attack.

"That is it. You have to leave".

Zara cried tears of pain falling from his eyes.

"What do you mean. I don't even know how I got here. What am I supposed to do with this Sammy asked stretching the pen back to Zara.

"No take it.

"It all starts with a sentence…. that's all it takes.

With that Zara suddenly blew at his palm sending glittering dust at Samuel's face unexpectedly as everything became dim and dimmer by the second.

"Just don't make the same mistake I made lad. Always Use your heart …."

Samuel could see the same figures Zara struck with that immense energy surge before,

rush back at them double the multitude this time as Zara stood up to face them again.

Words and sounds muffled along with the lights fading away as Sammy's vision became blurry; his gaze fixed on the bleeding young man looking back at him with a painful smile, till he blacked out.