949 Chapter 949 - Faces in the Dark
Shang had no idea where he was or what he was.
An eternal darkness was engulfing him.
The darkness was seeping into his body and causing unimaginable pain.
The warping and moving darkness around Shang kept seeping in and out of his body. It was almost like Shang wasn't corporeal.
Faces appeared in the darkness.
They were smiling, crying, filled with hate, filled with love, and every other kind of imaginable emotion.
They screamed and laughed.
Millions of faces screamed and laughed as they passed through Shang's body, tearing him to pieces.
Shang was under unimaginable pain.
It had never been this bad before.
An eternity passed.
Shang still didn't know what he was.
Was he one of these faces?
Was he part of the darkness?
Shang had tried many times to escape, but the darkness around him was eternal and omnipresent.
Was the reason why he couldn't escape that he was simply part of the darkness?
But he didn't want to be part of the darkness.
It hurt.
It hurt so much.
It felt so horrible.
He had to leave.
He had to get away from here!
But it was impossible.
Pain and suffering were everywhere, and no matter what he did, it was impossible to escape.
It would only stop when he stopped existing.
Yet, as soon as Shang had that thought, something deep inside of him was violently revolting.
But it hurt so much!
He just wanted it to end!
No!
He couldn't let it end!
But it was so bad!
The inner conflict was eternal.
Shang wasn't sure why he existed or what he was, but he refused to stop existing, even if it was only filled with pain and nothing else.
He had to keep existing!
An eternity passed.
Nothing changed.
How long had he been here? He wasn't sure.
Ever since he had started existing, he had been in this eternal darkness.
Was this life?
What was life?
Shang wasn't sure why he had suddenly thought about a concept called life.
Where did that even come from?
Shang wasn't sure if he was alive.
Was he aware?
At that moment, Shang remembered something that came deep from within his memories.
Something he hadn't thought of in thousands of years.
"I think, therefore I am."
A quote.
Shang wasn't sure where this quote came from, but for some reason, he felt more secure in his existence.
He could think, which meant that he was aware.
Shang's existence was so vague and fickle that he hadn't been sure whether or not he existed, but now, he was sure that he actually existed.
He didn't know what he was or why he was, but he knew that he was.
The faces in the darkness kept tearing at him and moving through him.
The pain was constant.
It was horrible.
It had always been horrible.
It had never stopped being horrible.
Yet, why was it horrible?
Shang wasn't sure.
He just knew that it was horrible.
Something inside of him told him that feeling pain was bad.
Yet, with no reference, the feeling seemed pointless.
Was feeling pain really bad?
What was so bad about feeling pain?
What happened when he felt too much pain?
Would he stop existing?
Shang remembered that he had considered stopping existing due to the pain.
So, the pain was actually influencing his thoughts and directing them toward death.
Death.
Where did that come from?
First, Shang had suddenly thought of a concept called life, and now he was suddenly thinking about a concept called death.
Death...
Pain...
Pain was convincing someone to die.
At least, that was the only thing Shang could think of right now.
The faces in the darkness wanted to convince Shang to die.
What would happen when he died?
Would he become one of the faces?
As Shang looked at the faces, he could feel all the different emotions coming from them.
However, there was one thing shared among all of them.
Indignation.
Frustration.
Refusal.
The smiling faces were happy that they could cause someone pain, which made it easier to deal with their own frustration and indignation.
The angry faces wanted to share their hatred with others.
The sad faces were just lashing out because they felt so horrible.
All the faces hated Shang but showed it in different forms.
They were all individuals.
No face was like the other, and they were all distinct in appearance and personality.
And yet, all of them shared the same goal.
Force Shang to join them.
It was unfair that they were dead, and he was alive!
It was unfair that they couldn't do anything anymore while he still had his own destiny in his hands!
Why did they have to die?!
Why couldn't he have died instead of them?!
He didn't deserve to be alive!
They hated Shang because he was alive.
Slowly, Shang realized these things, and as he did, the pain became easier to bear.
Shang was still feeling the pain. In fact, it hadn't dropped at all in intensity.
Yet, one thing had changed.
Shang had become angry.
Just like them, he had become frustrated and indignant.
'So what?! You are dead, and that's why you want to kill me?! You think I feel bad for you?!"
"You died, and you deserved to die!
"You were weak!"
'Weakness is a sin!"
'And I refuse to comply with some weaklings that couldn't even protect themselves!'
Oftentimes, knowing that someone was trying to enrage someone made it easier to stay calm.
"They want me to become angry. Becoming angry is doing what they want."
This was often how emotions worked.
For Shang, something similar was happening.
He knew what the faces wanted and why they wanted it.
Dying would just be following their wishes.
Because of that, Shang's mind steeled, and he refused to give up and die.
Suddenly, something like an arm shot toward one of the faces and grabbed it.
The arm pulled back and moved the dark face towards Shang's opened mouth.
CRKSH!
