Chương 8: The Portal

The walk home that day was the exact polar opposite of that of the day before in terms of emotions. I was a certified skill user now, something that I thought was only possible in my dreams. I felt like I had achieved something in life. I felt like I had reached one of my goals in life. I was ecstatic. Giddy. My mother would never see me as happy as I was during that walk home. I turned the key in the lock on my front door while humming one of my favourite songs.

I had used the 'Recovery' and 'Healing' skills simultaneously to completely heal the injuries sustained by Theo and Ben's monster punches the day before. No more painful internal bleeding for me. Speaking of Theo and Ben, they must've also been grateful for the skills given to them, since their wounds from punching the reading bubble didn't close, and their knuckles continued to drip blood on the grass like raindrops. Everything that happened today and yesterday felt like a dream. Nothing felt real.

But I knew it was real since I continuously slapped myself in the face at least once every five minutes, and not once did I get up from my bed sweating and with an extremely high heart rate. I was a skill user. This was going to take some time to get used to. Like always, there was nobody in my house when I entered. My mother was out at work somewhere, and she wasn't going to come back until around midnight. I dropped my bag in the living room and headed upstairs.

Once I had changed into the clothes I usually wear at home, I walked towards my room. But once I turned the door handle and opened the door –"Agh!" What? How could I describe what I just saw? A boy and a girl were standing in my room nonchalantly without warning, which almost gave me a heart attack. It was Cayman and Ellie, who were both still in their school uniforms. They stared back at me, as if I had just intruded into their room and that I was in the wrong.

I thought there was nobody at home, so why were they here?

"What the actual heck!" I shouted instinctively.

"Why are you two in my room?" Cayman and Ellie were silent.

"What makes you think it's OK to barge into someone else's room without permission?" My social awkwardness emigrated to someone else's brain.

"W-we need somewhere to stay," Cayman stuttered. His brain was probably where my social awkwardness travelled to. Ellie nodded in agreement.

"Then what makes you think it's OK to break into my house? That's breaking and entering!"

"Well... Sorry." I sighed.

"Don't do it again in the future. How the hell did you even enter?" Cayman pulled a straight face as if he was implying that I was the idiot in the room.

"What do you think?" he asked me sarcastically. I knew the answer instantly. The teleportation skill Cayman gave us earlier. He must've used that to teleport into my room. I had too many questions in my mind to ask, and it was driving my brain crazy. Some guy I met just the day before was in my room, wanting a place to stay. Without my permission.

"Go find a hotel or something," I said.

"This house doesn't have enough room for two extra people." Cayman sighed again.

"You idiot," he said.

"Do you really think we don't have a place to stay? Use your brain for once." My brain officially shut down at that point.

"Then why are you here?" I asked.

"Follow us," Cayman said.

"I've got something to show you." Luckily for me, instead of him using that stupid teleportation skill, he left my room through the door, walked down the stairs and used the front door to leave the house. Ellie followed suit. The only thing I could do at that point was follow them, and it felt slightly strange that Cayman and Ellie had ended up in my room. How did Cayman know my address? Why were they in my room? And what the hell was that stupid prank he pulled on me?

Those were questions I might never get the answers to. Once we were outside, Cayman began talking.

"I really like this neighbourhood," he began.

"There are so many trees and nice houses. You don't get that at all where I'm from." Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work! At least he was happy. We walked for only a few minutes, and once we arrived at the local supermarket, Cayman continued talking about the differences between his neighbourhood and mine.

"Just you watch," he told me. So I watched. Cayman and Ellie walked up to the local electric substation, which, to me, looked like a giant beige-coloured cube, and as if it was an ordinary building, Cayman opened the door and went inside. I was baffled. Those two were staying in an electric substation of all places.

"What are you waiting for?" Cayman said to me impatiently.

"Follow us. Don't be distracted by the surroundings." It was hard not to be distracted by the surroundings. We were standing outside a supermarket with a large car park, and we were right next to roads that cars travelled on. Any person sitting in those cars, whether they were drivers or passengers, would see us entering the substation, causing them to wonder what the hell we were doing. Although I was slightly skeptical at first, I followed suit.

There was nothing like this in Night Hoppers, and it made me more and more confused as time went by. I could not deduce anything about the Cayman and Ellie in this world. I thought I was going to get electrocuted by the wires in the substation, but instead, the complete opposite happened. I was fine, and I didn't get shocked. Once I got used to the fact that I was inside an electric substation, I looked down at the floor and couldn't believe my eyes.

Amidst the mess of wires in that small confined space, there was a hatch. A literal hatch. Going down somewhere. Has that hatch always been there? I couldn't tell since I had never been inside that substation before. Cayman opened the hatch, which revealed a ladder going down to somewhere. It felt like I was being whisked into another world underground. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. This has to be a dream, I thought.

Why would someone be living under an electric substation, and why did it have to be the characters in my favourite novel? I thought I was losing my mind. Cayman started descending the ladder, and he beckoned for me to follow. I didn't have a fear or heights, nor did I have a fear of the dark. However, during the descent, my heart was beating like it was about to burst and I was sweating profusely. It felt like we were going down for ages, but eventually, we reached a stone floor.

"Turn around," Cayman said once we reached the floor. I did just that. I was in a weird torch-lit circular room made of stone. There were torches on the wall a few metres apart. This looked too fake to be under my neighbourhood; this looked like a villain's lair in a magic kingdom. Furthermore, there was a large circular thing with a frame made of pure gold which shone like the sun.

In the middle was a huge purple circle which was at least three times my height, and it looked like it was emitting some sort of purple smoke. Whatever it was, it carried the smell of fresh fruits. There was a screen to the side of the thing with a picture of Earth on it. And on top of the picture were the words 'Planet 500'. And next to the screen stood my new friends. Huh, friends. I couldn't believe I was using that term to describe the people I had just met.

"You've got some explaining to do," Theo said.

"Why did you suddenly gather all of us here out of nowhere? Where even are we?" Ben, who stood to the left of Theo, nodded in agreement. Cayman clapped, and all conversations stopped immediately. The clap startled me; the sound reverberated throughout the room causing a horrific echo which was enough to destroy someone's eardrums.

"Let's save the questions for later," he said when Ellie arrived in the mysterious room.

"You will need to know about this place as a skill user, so listen up." Here we go again. It was another one of Cayman's lectures.

"I think this is more important than the lecture," Maya said, "but why the hell were you in our bedrooms like a stalker? You were in a girl's bedroom!" So it looked like Cayman and Ellie weren't just in my bedroom.

"Questions later," Cayman replied, showing no signs of guilt or embarrassment.

"Were you not listening? All questions should be asked later." Maya bowed her head in shame, as if she did something wrong after having a boy intrude in her bedroom. Cayman pointed to the large thing in the middle of the room.

"This is a portal," he announced.

"This is what skill users use to travel between planets." All the emotions were sucked out of Theo, Ben and Maya. Only I displayed a calm, composed look. That sentence alone confirmed that Cayman and Ellie were not from this planet. They were, according to Night Hoppers, from this place called Planet Zero, and who knows how far that place is from Earth. Unlike the others, I was in awe. I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

This was one of those portals Hoppers use to travel to different planets, and I was standing just a few feet away from one. The portal was larger than I originally thought, and it was definitely more impressive than what Night Hoppers described it to look like.

"To be more specific, this is the portal room. In simple terms, a portal room is the room containing the portal. Every planet has a portal room, and it is placed at a random place in each planet, meaning skill users don't choose where the portal room is." That made sense; that could possibly explain why Cayman and Ellie appeared in our neighbourhood instead of a different city or country. Planet Earth's portal room was directly underneath our neighbourhood.

"You guys will be travelling through that portal in due time," Cayman continued, "but you're currently not qualified to do so. The skill users that can travel to other dimensions are called Hoppers. We make this distinction because there are differences between Hoppers and skill users."

"What is that difference?" Maya asked. I knew the answer, but I guess my 'friends' didn't know.

"I'm glad you asked," Cayman replied.

"Remember the Bali system I told you about earlier today? Skill users are people who can use skills. Anyone who can use skills are called skill users. However, Hoppers are skill users that are at least stage 3 or higher." Theo displayed an intrigued look.

"So when we reach stage 3, we can become Hoppers?" Cayman nodded, oblivious to the fact that Theo had just broken his number-one rule. Maybe some questions were more important than others, according to Cayman.

"When you reach stage 3, the system will ask you whether you wish to become a Hopper. If you accept, you will automatically become a Hopper and can use these portals." Theo, Ben and Maya's mouths were open wide; their jaws dropped.

"Like us, you'll be able to use portals and travel to different planets to complete missions," Cayman added.

"Portals use what we call mana to provide energy to travel to different planets. I might've already explained what mana is to you, but just remember that it's like magic. It has many uses, and it's the largest commodity in the skill user world." Maya pointed to the screen displaying a picture of Earth with the caption 'Planet 500'. She didn't say anything though, and I believed that it was because Cayman had publicly shamed her just minutes ago.

"Oh, that?" Cayman understood immediately what Maya was trying to ask.

"You type your intended destination in there and the portal takes you there in seconds, just like in a video game." At that moment, I wanted to ask why the words 'Planet 500' were written above the picture of Earth, but I refrained from doing so because I didn't want to suffer the same fate as Maya. But I didn't need to, since Cayman was going to answer my question.

"Back on our planet, this planet would be publicly known as 'Planet 500'. That's because this is the 500th planet we've travelled to. It's a systematic number system that helps us keep track of the planets that we have explored and claimed. But I guess you guys have a different name for this planet. Don't be offended by us numbering your planet accordingly." Cayman bowed his head. To Theo, Ben and Maya, all of that information was completely alien.

It was going to take at least a few weeks for the others to digest all of this information. For me, however, all of that information was already tucked away safely in my long-term memory.

"It'll take a while before that you all can understand that information, but you'll understand eventually," Cayman said, understanding Theo, Ben and Maya's flaws. It was going to take them a while to get used to this new life, the like of skill users and night Hoppers.

"Don't worry about it for now. That is all background information. What's more important is for you all to become Hoppers." Cayman led us to an area at the back of the portal room where there was a door. He pushed the door open, escorting us all inside. It looked just like an ordinary room, but I knew instantly that there was no 'ordinary' in this room.

"Welcome to my training facility," Cayman said.

"This is where you will complete the first part of your training as new Hoppers."