Chapter 2 Two

Chapter two

The moment Lucas reached the office building, an odd uneasiness settled deep in his gut , a warning he couldn’t quite decipher. He paused at the entrance, scanning the surroundings with a faint frown.

Something felt terribly wrong.

“I don’t know what this feeling is… it’s not the air,” he murmured, rubbing his arm as though his skin could sense what his mind could not. “It’s different.”

The rain had stopped, but the sky remained heavy with thick, motionless clouds, dark and swollen as if holding back even greater storms. The streets were unusually empty; most people had stayed indoors after the intense downpour. At first glance, the city looked unchanged , yet Lucas couldn’t shake the strange sensation crawling across his skin. It wasn’t exactly dread or fear. It felt more like the world itself was holding its breath.

Or perhaps, in some bizarre way… everything was finally about to make sense?

He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. “It’s probably just the meds messing with me…”

“Someone,please! Help! Help!!”

A woman’s terrified scream shattered the quiet before he could finish the thought.

Lucas jerked toward the sound. In front of the small burger shop beside his office, a young woman knelt on the wet pavement, desperately clinging to a man sprawled at her feet. Her boyfriend, most likely. His body convulsed violently, limbs thrashing in uncontrolled spasms as if trapped in a brutal seizure.

“Help! Somebody help us!” she cried, her voice cracking with raw panic.

Lucas swallowed hard. “I want to help, but… I can barely stand upright myself…” His whispered admission felt pathetic, but it was the truth. His fragile body wasn’t capable of assisting anyone.

Calling for help was impossible anyway. For more than a week, all wireless communication had collapsed , phones, internet, everything. No emergency services worked. They were all trapped in silence.

That eerie sensation from earlier surged through him again, stronger this time. It swept over him like an invisible wave, shifting the very atmosphere. A cold gust whipped past, immediately followed by a warm draft, as though the weather itself couldn’t decide which season it belonged to.

His heartbeat spiked, pounding erratically against his ribs , fast, irregular, almost painful.

Then it appeared.

A translucent blue display blinked into existence right in front of him, floating in mid-air.

Lucas froze.

[A solar system with a viable star and planets has been identified in the Milky Way galaxy, Sector Omega-8.]

[Searching for lifeforms capable of awakening evolutionary traits…]

[Two planets hosting such lifeforms have been found.]

[Registering solar system with central database. Star designation: ‘Sun.’]

[Initiating planetary awakening. Releasing otherworldly essences into the atmospheric layers…]

Lucas stared wide-eyed, his breath caught in his throat. He didn’t dare blink. The messages continued scrolling like lines of code from some vast cosmic machine.

Then the world around him began to change.

From the cracks in the pavement and through the soil itself, thin waves of colored mist began rising , purple, red, green, black, gold, and shades he couldn’t even name. They bled into the air like shimmering smoke, surging upward in enormous columns before sweeping across the sky and fading completely.

Gone in an instant.

But the effect lingered.

The air in the city thickened as those strange energies mingled with the atmosphere and sank into every living thing , humans, animals, everything. The same phenomenon spread rapidly across Earth… and across another red planet Lucas had never heard of.

A strange sensation coursed through his body. A chill crawled over his skin while a subtle warmth radiated through his bones. It wasn’t painful, nor pleasant , just alien, indescribable, and profoundly wrong.

Before he could process it, the ground bucked violently.

A powerful tremor ripped through the city.

People screamed. Car alarms blared. Streetlights shook, threatening to topple.

“What , what is happening?!”

“It’s an earthquake!”

“Oh God, I’m going to die,!”

Lucas clutched his throbbing chest, barely able to breathe. Panic clawed at his lungs. He didn’t have the strength to help anyone , not even himself.

Pure, desperate instinct took over.

He turned away from the office entrance and stumbled , as close to running as his weak body allowed , toward an open area away from buildings and parked cars. The last thing he needed was a collapsing structure burying him alive.

He dropped into a cross-legged position on the trembling ground, hands clamped tightly over his ears. The world around him roared with crashing sounds, shattering glass, and terrified shrieks. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to make himself as small as possible while the earth shook beneath him with relentless force.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the tremor faded.

Lucas opened his eyes.

And froze.

“What… what is that?”

In the heart of the city, an enormous cylindrical tower now loomed, tall enough to pierce the darkened clouds. It hadn’t been there moments ago. No construction noise, no explosion , nothing. It had simply… appeared.

Dark shadows spread across the sky, turning day into an unnatural dusk.

“What the hell…?” Lucas whispered.

Around him, voices rose in frightened confusion.

“What is that thing?”

“Where did it come from?!”

“Is this some kind of attack?”

The tower stood silent, ancient, and ominous , an object that did not belong on Earth.

And it wasn’t alone.

All over the globe, identical towers had materialized. Every hundred kilometers, another one stood , on land, in oceans, even in remote wildernesses untouched by civilization.

For the first time in history, the entire population of Earth , every continent, every nation , stared at the same impossible sight.

Then a new message appeared in Lucas’s vision.

In everyone’s vision.

[The System has arrived on your habitable planet, designated ‘Earth.’ Through forced metamorphosis, all inhabitants have gained the right to evolve.]

[In five seconds, monsters from countless realms will invade Earth.]

[Remaining Time: 5 seconds.]

Gasps erupted around him.

“Monsters?!”

“This has to be a prank! It has to be!”

“Someone tell me what’s going on!”

But the messages didn’t stop.

[You may now view your attributes, talents, abilities, and skills by thinking about them.]

[Remaining Time: 3 seconds.]

Lucas’s breathing quickened. His chest tightened painfully. His vision blurred at the edges.

The world felt unreal , too vivid and too distorted at once.

“Monsters…?” he whispered, the word barely reaching his own ears.

A strange familiarity tingled deep inside him , an echo he couldn’t explain.

[Remaining Time: 1 second.]

“W-What is that?” a man beside him choked out, pointing toward the street.

Lucas followed the trembling finger.

A massive green circle , glowing and crackling with sparks , materialized in mid-air. Its edges rippled like liquid energy, forming a portal that pulsed with a sinister rhythm.

“This… this is bad,” Lucas muttered under his breath.

[Remaining Time: 0 seconds.]

[Monster invasion has begun. Good luck.]

The moment the final message appeared, Lucas felt his stomach drop.

The convulsing man from earlier was no longer on the ground.

He was standing completely still.

And utterly transformed.

His skin had deepened to a dark, blood-red shade. His fingernails had lengthened into sharp, talon-like claws. His eyes , once human , were now pitch black, bleeding at the edges, empty and soulless.

A guttural growl rumbled from his throat.

Then came the portal.

Massive beasts poured out , hulking creatures shaped like wolves but standing upright on two legs. Their yellow fangs glinted wickedly, their claws curved and enormous. They growled as they surveyed the humans around them with hungry, predatory focus.

Beside Lucas, the woman who had been holding her boyfriend earlier sobbed uncontrollably. Tears streamed down her face as she reached toward the creature he had become, as if she could somehow pull the humanity back into him.

The monster lunged.

His jaws clamped down on her neck, tearing out a huge chunk of flesh. Blood sprayed violently as he swallowed the piece whole.

Her body collapsed.

Lucas jolted backward in horror , but it wasn’t over.

The woman’s corpse began to twitch.

Her limbs contorted. Her skin darkened. Her nails sharpened. Her eyes rolled open , black, empty, monstrous.

She rose.

What followed was nothing short of hell.

Across the city , across the entire planet , humans and animals alike twisted into grotesque abominations, attacking everything around them. From the portals, new horrors emerged, creatures born from realms never meant

to touch Earth.

Screams filled the streets.

Blood painted the ground.

Humanity, as it had existed moments ago, vanished.

Earth was no longer just a world.

It had become a battlefield.