The Shadow of Eudaimonia

Chapter 20: Not From Around Here

ISLAND

"Calvin, come on, we have to find food."

Even before Calvin can open his eyes, he could already sense the bright glaring sunlight. He needed to squint before he could open his eyes. That's why it hadn't dawned in him immediately what was wrong. "Who the fuck are you?" he asked the man who had just woke him up.

"What are you talking about Calvin? It's me Henry." Calvin's face soured. The guy calling himself Henry looked nothing like the angelic face of Lazzi. He was kinda good-looking too but at the same time nondescript, which Calvin couldn't understand.

"Where's Lazzi?" he asked. "And how did you know my name?"

Henry's eyebrows furrowed. "Lazzi? Who's he?"

"He's Shijian, the Obelisk of Time."

"But I'm Shi...oh, you're not from around here, aren't you?"

"What?" Calvin looked around and confirmed what he thought last night. They were on an island, hopefully a habited one but from the signs of it that might be wrong. "Of course not!" he answered sharply. "I'm not Tarzan,"

"No, I mean, you're not from this reality."

"Wait what?"

"Wake up Calvin," Henry said before his vision got dark once again. And a few moments later, the light from the sun licked his eyelids open once again. "Calvin, you awake? Come on we have to find some water."

"Lazzi!" Calvin sat right up from his sandy bed. "What the fuck is happening?"

"Why? What's wrong?"

"There was this boy! He said he's Henry and he said he's Shijian and uh—"

"Shhh, hey it's okay," Lazzi sandwiched Calvin's perplexed face with his hands. "You must have jumped from a different reality. You can do that, remember?"

"That was fucking trippy man!"

"It's cool though, right? You must have jumped from a reality where I wasn't the one who won the title of the Inheritor."

"Yeah..." Calvin replied, but his mind was now focused on the calloused hands of Lazzi, fingers pressed slightly but with firmness on the edge of his jaw. He had no choice but to shove it away.

"Your Obelisk is getting more active. That's a good sign."

"What if I got stuck there though?" Calvin's thought swirled. "Or what if this isn't the reality I should be. How could I know?"

Lazzi furrowed his thick eyebrows and reoriented his hand now on his chin, massaging it firmly, which reminded Calvin of classic detective movies he had watched before. "I don't think you'll be stuck in a different reality. I read before that you need to bridge the four Obelisks together to live in an alternate reality permanently."

"That doesn't make me feel any better, what if I wake up with a similar looking Lazzi and it turns out it wasn't my reality?"

"I guess you'll have to figure that on your own. Come on, we have to find water. And then hopefully we can build a place we can sleep for the next night."

Calvin scratched his head. "Wait, we're staying here? We don't even know where we are. Ophelia might be in danger."

"We have to. Ophelia gave us time to recover and prepare for Ortus. And she'll be fine. She can teleport easily to escape, remember?" Lazzi began to walk away, his hand supporting the aching side of his stomach.

"How can you tell that?" he asked. "If she can escape, why hasn't she come to us?"

"I don't know. But I do know, Ortus wouldn't kill her yet. She wouldn't kill any of us not until we gave our Obelisk to her."