Victor walked calmly through the halls of the high school, heading toward his classroom.
On the way, as usual, he was subjected to repeated mockery from certain students, but he paid no mind.
If it made them feel powerful, so be it.
It didn't concern him.
And compared to the repeated abuse from his parents over the years, these various insults could almost be considered compliments.
He took his seat at the back of the room and sat down, taking out some of his belongings.
He had to at least pretend.
The class was composed of about fifteen desks, each accommodating two students, as well as the teacher's large desk.
All the students stood when the teacher, Mr. Styles, entered the room.
Well, everyone except Victor, who couldn't care less about this symbolic gesture of politeness.
The English teacher seemed used to this behavior, so he didn't reprimand him, merely greeting the students and beginning attendance.
**
A few tens of minutes after the start of class, Victor's brows were furrowed to the extreme, the heaviness in his stomach had only intensified until it was almost unbearable.
He suddenly stood up, knocking his chair backward. Several dozen heads turned toward him in surprise, a few people even jumped at the unexpected noise.
He opened his mouth, intending to tell the teacher that he didn't feel well and wanted to be excused to the infirmary, but he didn't get the chance.
The world suddenly turned gray, as if frozen in time.
Victor's eyes widened as he looked at the frozen expressions of his classmates.
They were immobile, like simple wax statues.
The young man tried to move but found himself pinned to the ground, his legs refusing to obey his brain's commands, as if disconnected.
In fact, none of his limbs seemed willing to respond to his nervous commands; only his eyes seemed able to move, even his mouth was stuck open under his mask.
Suddenly, a dark green flash illuminated his retina, displaying a small holographic text in front of him.
[System loading. Please wait.]
A flat, emotionless voice, whose gender was impossible to determine, echoed in his mind.
If he could have shouted in surprise, he would have, but he was completely paralyzed.
[Downloading planetary information. Please wait.]
The boy's thoughts could be summed up in a single phrase.
What the hell is going on?
[Generating Cubes. Please wait.]
He didn't think he had eaten anything that could cause such hallucinations.
And yet…
Dozens of messages scrolled at a frantic pace before his eyes, the voice in his head chaining sentences together impossibly fast, overlapping each other, he could no longer even hear his own thoughts.
A few seconds later, everything stopped abruptly, revealing a short text in red before him.
[Error]
[Administrator ID Detected]
[Error]
[Starting Emergency Protocol]
[Simulation Starting. Do Not Move.]
Calling the young black-eyed boy worried would be an understatement. He knew nothing about programming — or whatever could be called that — but the red text was never a good sign, not to mention the numerous error messages.
As for the last line… he couldn't move anyway.
He didn't have time to think further about the situation. The familiar setting of the classroom changed in the blink of an eye, revealing a gigantic forest. The trees seemed over two hundred meters tall, each leaf at least five times the size of his body.
But that was far from the strangest thing.
His vision had completely changed.
Victor felt as if he were observing the world through dozens of small eyes, everything had an orangish tint.
He tried to move his body, in vain. He had absolutely no control over his actions, only able to observe the world through these strange eyes.
For the first time in as long as he could remember, he wanted to call for help, perhaps hoping someone might hear him by some unknown magic, but he found himself unable to utter a single word.
He was trapped in a body that was not his own, only being able to think.
A few seconds later, it began to move.
With a sudden impulse, the body Victor inhabited flew into the air, moving further and further from the ground with each passing second.
The boy then remembered the last holographic message before arriving in this disproportionately huge place.
« A simulation… So I just have to watch? »
He wasn't sure, it could mean everything or nothing.
But anyway, he didn't really have a choice, so that's what he did.
He watched.
After a few moments, the flying entity seemed to have found what it was looking for, landing on a human body of enormous size.
But this body was already in an extremely advanced state of decomposition. The rotting flesh had turned green in places, the skin was riddled with numerous larvae lodged in every cavity.
It was the most disgusting and revolting scene the boy had ever seen.
Fortunately, of his five senses, Victor currently only had sight, otherwise he would probably have vomited everything he had eaten that morning.
The creature rubbed its small hairy legs and unfolded its proboscis, to the great surprise of its unwelcome guest.
« I am a fly?! »
Unfortunately for him, he was far from done.
The tiny fly slowly made its way to the stomach of the decomposed body, guided by its primal instinct to feed and reproduce while staying alive.
But everything changed when the dipteran entered the very intestines of the man, from which a faint orange glow emanated.
Perhaps it was instinct or luck that guided the insect that day, perhaps even fate, if that even existed.
A small crystal was lodged in the cadaver's plexus, its light reflecting on the hexagonal eyes of the tiny creature, which rubbed its legs once again.
It approached, deployed its proboscis, and came into direct contact with the crystal, slowly absorbing the smoke escaping from it.
The fly's body began to tremble, from pleasure or pain, no one knew, not even itself.
Soon, changes began to occur in its body.
Its size multiplied, reaching more than twenty centimeters. It pierced the ribcage of the lifeless body it inhabited. Its wings now seemed made of steel, and its legs, once hairy and harmless, shone with a metallic glint, resembling two perfectly forged blades.
But that was not the most astonishing thing, far from it.
It was Its intelligence.
Originally guided solely by instinct, thoughts began to appear. Though comparable to a two-year-old toddler, it was still unimaginable.
A new need now invaded its senses, previously concerned only with feeding.
The fly wanted crystals.
Many crystals.
It instantly developed an addiction to them, like an extremely powerful drug, where even the tiniest dose could make one crave more until death.
So the fly continued to seek more, stopping only to sleep or eat just enough to avoid starvation.
After an unknown amount of time, it found more crystals, some orange like the first it had consumed, others bright red or deep blue.
The brighter the color, the more euphoric the sensation after consumption.
After several years, it could think logically, no less intelligent than a human adult.
It now measured several meters in height, towering over the trees that once seemed enormous.
Its speed was such that it could go unnoticed despite its colossal size, animals only felt a violent gust as it passed.
Decades later, the creature had developed what it called abilities, it could control its kin and rot things just by touching them.
Gradually, its prey instinct disappeared, replaced by a merciless hunter, desiring nothing but to eliminate any life that might possess even the smallest of these crystals that drove it mad with joy.
However, its small hunting zone had limits, and soon it was exhausted.
So it ventured into unknown lands, villages filled with green-skinned creatures, cities of metal inhabited by hairless apes, vast mountain chains occupied by terrifying beasts.
To satisfy its insatiable need, the fly, if it could still be called that, braved every possible danger, surviving near-death countless times.
Soon, the entire continent, now its territory, was no longer enough. Only the fly and its offspring populated lands previously full of biodiversity.
Then it did what it did best.
It expanded its territory to satisfy its ever-growing need for power.
It had understood long ago.
It was not the crystal that had intoxicated it that day.
It was the feeling of its growing power, the sensation of becoming stronger and stronger until it could dominate everything without exception.
And barely a few months later, the second and final continent on the small planet it inhabited was completely consumed.
All that remained were lifeless bodies and the ruins of ancient cities built over generations.
Everything was destroyed and consumed because of a single creature, once so insignificant that no one would have even noticed its existence.