Андрей Сопельник – Universe Аeternov. Book three: A Heart in Ashes (страница 10)

He didn’t speak. He just sat down next to me and waited.

One hour. Two. Three.

Alina sat with her knees pressed together, looking into the water, where it reflected not her, but her fear:

«You’re a mistake. Your world was erased because it was weak. You only exist because your father chose others.»

And suddenly – a tear. Quiet as the first rain after a long drought. She rolled into the lake, and the water around her shone with warmth, as if taking her pain in her arms.

«It’s okay,» Vladimir said, not looking at her. – Crying for yourself is not selfish. This is a confession: «I’m living. And it hurts me.»

Alina didn’t stop. The tears came one after the other – not out of pity, but out of liberation. She was crying for:

• the child she no longer remembered – herself in the erased world;

• The mother who watched her daughter disappear from reality;

• The father who chose the universe… and lost his family;

• the self who still didn’t believe: her existence is already a miracle.

Each tear fell into the lake, and the lake sang as if resonating with the rhythm of her heart. The wind rustling through the leaves seemed to echo her inner release, and the moist scent of the jungle was woven into every breath, mixing pain with healing silence.

The second cry: for peace.

When the tears for himself had dried up, Vladimir led Alina to the Roots of the Temple, where trees from frozen moments grew: the tree of the first kiss, the tree of the last «I’m sorry», the tree that grew out of tears that no one comforted.

«Now don’t cry for yourself, – he said. «Cry for those who can’t.»

Alina touched the bark of a tree that had grown from Knox’s pain. And I saw:

• a boy planting a flower for a sick mother;

• a man who loses everything in a fire war;

A villain who steals time not out of greed, but out of desperation.

«He’s not a monster, – she whispered. – He is a pain that no one has embraced.

And the tears began to flow again. Not from grief, but from compassion, from deep, almost physical empathy.

Her tears fell on the roots of the Temple of Roots, nourishing them as if reviving frozen memories.

The wind suddenly picked up, as if the jungle itself had sighed with her, filling the space with the aromas of resin, damp earth and blooming moss, enveloping Alina with warmth and sadness at the same time.

The birth of the tree: «Hope for the Darkness.»

The next morning, Alina returned to the Temple and saw a miracle.

A tree grew out of the ground, where her tears fell. Not immediately. Not violently. Gradually. Assuredly. It grew, as if time itself had slowed down to witness the strength of her trust.

Its trunk was silver, as if carved from moonlight, visible on the frozen tears. The leaves are dark blue, almost black, but with streaks of light, as if history and memory lived in each leaf. Each one has a name on it.: Knox, Chrono-Shadow, The Forgotten One, those who whispered: «Tell me more…»

«This tree is not for the light, – Vladimir said, coming up from behind. «It’s for the Dark.» It tells her: «You’re not alone. Even if the whole world has turned away, hope grows here… for you.»

Alina came closer. She put her hand on the trunk.

«It’s throbbing,» she whispered. «Like a heart.»

«You see, – Vladimir smiled. «You didn’t just cry. You trusted me. And in this trust lies every power of light.

Lesson of the month.

By the end of the sixth month, Alina realized that

Tears are not weakness. It is the language of the soul when words are powerless.

Crying means admitting, «I’m alive. I still believe that you can stay with pain.»

And the one who cries for the other… is no longer a hero. He’s a house.

Somewhere in the Black Abyss, Knox finished crying black tears for the first time in seven circles of time. His pain was no longer alone.

On the Green World, the «Hope for Darkness» tree was quietly rustling its leaves, in the rhythm of a pulse that had not yet given up.

And the wind through the jungle seemed like soft laughter, tears combined with the breath of the world, and Alina was overwhelmed by the feeling that everything alive, even the Darkness, could accept her trust.

Chapter 8: Colosseum of Sand and Tears

The target is in the ashes.

While Alina was walking the Path of Silence in the Green World, her father and mother completed the Path of Two Hearts. Alexey the Mechanic and Kitty the Lion were not idle. Their word was spoken not through silence, but through battle, not through tears, but through the roar of the stands.

They traveled all over the Cybernetic planet: runners through sandy deserts and cliffs, wrestling in the Zero Heart Arena, racing across lakes teeming with monsters, jumping from faith over the abyss of erased beans. But all this is just a warm – up. Their real goal was much tougher: the «Colosseum of Sand and Tears» – an arena where endurance wins not strength, where every step is a test of the spirit, where time itself whispered about the deadly responsibility for every breath.

What for? Not for the sake of fame. Not for the sake of blood.

For the sake of the crystals.

Each victory brought Eternal Pulse Crystals, the rarest currency in the multiverse. They could get everything from spare parts for the Core Heart to information about missing worlds, and sometimes even a personal order from Dr. Ziggy «Boom Boom» Future himself.

Alexey and Lev did not fight for the sake of weapons, not for the sake of conquests. They longed for the fastest freedom ship in all the universes.

«Not everyone has the gift of movement,» Alexei said, fixing an old clock in the dressing room. His fingers, exposed in titanium mittens, glistened with silver light. – Not every planet has a teleporter. But if you have a ship… you choose where to fly and whose hand to hold.

The lion purred, his fur shone with golden veins in the light, his laser eyes sparkled with turquoise-blue light, and his tail left a trail of chrome dust in its wake.:

– Mrrr… and if you suddenly need to urgently deliver a laser pointer the size of the moon, we are ready!

Colosseum of Sand and Tears.

The Colosseum did not stand on the ground. He hung in a rift between worlds where time flowed backwards, and the audience were not just cyborgs and mechanicals, but the spirits of fallen fighters who had come to evaluate who was worthy of living.

The arena was circular, carved from the frozen tears of a Chrono-Heart that fell on the day Knox first cried. The sand underfoot was not sand, but the crushed oaths of traitors. Every step echoed in my memory: broken promises and forgotten words were pounding in my temples like the ringing of bells.

The stands were cracking under thousands of eyes. The Victor’s Crystal shone in the center, pulsating like a living heart, emitting a soft purple light that made the shadows of the fighter’s tremble on the sand.

In the shadows, Three Abyss Gladiators were preparing, an elite squad of Absolute Evil:

1. Wrath-9 is a cyborg with saws instead of hands, who has survived cliffs and disasters. His metal body shimmered rusty red, every joint sparkled from old fights.

2. Shadow-Fang is a killer chameleon whose eyes changed color from green to black depending on emotions, and his skin shimmered like liquid metal.

3. The Mad Mammoth is a 4—meter tank with a chest pain reactor and a new scar from a laser pointer; the armor is covered with burnt symbols.

They came back, and this time there were no rules.

The battle begins.

The robot referee with Knox’s face (old model, before the fall) raised his hand:

– LAUNCH!

Wrath-9 exploded with the roar of a dying reactor, each saw making a crackling sound as if it was cutting through the very air. Alexey froze at that moment, straightened his shoulders, the silver breastplate on his armor reflected the light of the arena like a splash of sunlight on water. His gaze flashed, and he said,

«My chains are made of steel.» My oath is from the light.

At the same moment, Kitty the Lion soared into the air. Her fur sparkled with gold and turquoise sparks, and her tail left a trail of stardust and flashes of blue light that shimmered like a living outline. She did acrobatic somersaults in the air, each movement reflected joy and excitement, laughter burst from her throat and turned into light vibrations resonating with the sand of the arena.