She felt utterly warm in her bedding that night. Her entire body was sweating like a water tap had been left open. Her lips let out faint groans and whimpers while her face turned left and right as if a nightmare haunted her.
In the darkness of night in the Holy Land, in a room shared by three women and a young girl, one had become the focus of attention. They tried to wake her up from the nightmare, but she couldn't, no matter what.
Her body sweltered in fever, and her lips began to turn pale from the lack of water in her system.
"Xye, wake up!"
"What's happening to you?"
"Looks like a seizure, Mother Xavia."
"No, it's not that. I checked her body, and there are no such signs," Xavia confirmed quickly and ran off to get her elaborate medical toolkit. "She's losing too much fluids too quickly. I'll have to give it through her veins. Isabella, inform the sick bay."
"Noooo…" Xylena suddenly roared with a teeth-biting grunt. "Help me… don't leave!"
Worried and scared, Xavia tried to calm Xylena with whatever she could.
But nothing seemed to help at that moment.
…
"Are you sure we're not lost?"
Inside the void, Sylvester and the others continued to move. Other than Sylvester, no one else heard those voices, nor any idea if they were on the right path. To them, even the eels were invisible, leaving them distraught.
"No, we're on the right path," Sylvester responded, focusing back on the voice as it became louder and more emotional. He could smell every single change in the feelings as well. On top of that, he noticed Miraj waking up and sniffing the void left and right while being stuck on his chest.
"What do you feel?"
"I don't know, Maxy. I feel like I wanna stay here forever. But I don't wanna stay here forever either because it'll be lonely," Miraj answered, his own confusing thoughts clouding his senses. "It's like I belong here."
Sylvester frowned, "Can you see the eels?"
"Heels? Whose heel?"
Sighing, Sylvester felt the mystery behind Miraj went even deeper the more he traveled in that space. 'The darkness of space can't be all filled with these eels. This has to be some sort of medium space that bridges long distances.'
"Could this be your place of origin, Chonky?" he asked, the possibility seeming highly plausible.
Miraj's furry white face turned in confusion. "Here? How? It's all black here."
"That's something we'll need to find an answer to, Chonky. But if you feel more at home here, then this place has to be related to you in some ways."
Miraj fell silent and simply looked left and right in wonder about himself. It felt ticklish in his belly by being there. He felt like he could control everything there just as he could control his belly and knew what he placed where, even though the extent of the space was unknown.
Sylvester kept moving, flying through the void towards the voice. No matter what, he felt some pity for whoever the girl was. The life she had experienced gave him the scent of her true hardships.
'I ran away again. I hate Roger! He tried to send me off with those bad people again.'
'The monastery grandpa is very bad. Why did he lock me here? Help! Can someone hear me?'
'Priest… I hate everyone! Everyone is bad. Everyone wants to kill me. They took Jane… my only friend… why?!'
Sylvester started to feel a headache from the information overload he was receiving from the cosmic voice of this girl. As time passed by, he did start to make an assumption, but until he could confirm it with his own eyes, he decided to remain skeptical.
'I ran from the monastery. They're all so terrible! I hate everyone!'
'I'm hungry.'
'I shouldn't have eaten garbage… ugh… belly hurts.'
'I wish that dream I saw comes true.'
'What's suicide?'
'My feet hurt.'
'Hehe… cats are so cute.'
'No! Puppies are cuter.'
'Both are the best.'
Sylvester sighed and tried to ignore the searing headache piercing through his head. It was taking far more time than what it took him to reach the Demon Realm. Somewhat scared and very alert, it took every ounce of magic he had stored in his body to look as far ahead as he could in the tunnel.
The sight of tangled eels moving and wriggling made his skin crawl. It was a good thing the others couldn't see it.
"Maxy, can I try to eat the space here?"
"Hmm?" Sylvester looked down at his chest, where Miraj was excitedly staring at him. "Why? It could be dangerous, Chonky. We have no clue about the nature of this place."
"But I feel like I can control it. It's like breathing. It feels like that…" Miraj replied, requesting even further. "I'll just open my mouth for a jiffy and then shut it. I wanna feel what the space here is like."
'Eels, that's what it's like.'
"I don't recommend it, Miraj. This place is so uncharted and confusing that if something happens, I won't be able to react. I don't even know if we could get out of here by following the voice. Let's try to focus on one thing at a time. Besides, I have learned spatial magic to a greater degree. I'll let you try this again later." Sylvester vetoed the request and continued the journey. Reaching home was the first and foremost goal.
Miraj sulked with mischief in his eyes. "But… what if I can control this space?"
"Yes, 'what if' is the word I'm worried about."
"But… Let me try a little."
Meanwhile, Zenith and Dalgan were being dragged by Sylvester. They noticed him muttering to himself, and it surprisingly felt like there was another person.
"Is he alright?" Zenith asked, worried about him and herself.
Dalgan shrugged, "I've heard the rumors. The Pope is known to be a little… eccentric, at times. Must be his way of thinking."
"Eccentric?" Zenith stared ahead. "If he wasn't so strong, eccentric would have meant mentally unstable."
"Empress, I've seen so many strange things in life that the Pope feels like one of the sanest at this point. I trust him."
"You're supposed to be on my side."
"There are no sides if 'they' are real and against us," Dalgan added, silencing the Empress, who was younger than him. "Nor am I in a position to suggest something else. I have no idea how we can even oppose creators and managers of reality."
Zenith agreed at that, "I have no clue ab—"
Her words were abruptly cut off when she felt they weren't moving anymore. Although there was no environment or gravity around them, she could still feel the subtle changes in position. But it was missing now.
"Where is he?!" Dalgan shouted, finding the chain connected to Sylvester now lost.
Zenith frowned and immediately tied the leftover chain with Dalgan's, "He just disappeared out of nowhere. As if… he got swallowed into something."
At last, real panic began to appear.
…
Sylvester felt the subtle but noticeable loss of weight being dragged behind him. He hadn't felt any change in the surroundings or his speed, but he looked behind.
"What?!" He came to a halt. "Where are Dalgan and Zenith?!"
Up, down, left, and right; he just realized something. There were no eels anymore. In a true sense, it felt like a void of darkness.
Immediately, something clicked in his head, and he looked down at his own chest. "Chonky, what did you do? Tell me!"
Miraj tried to avert his gaze in panic, shrinking his head in the harness as much as possible. "I-I tried to… eat the space."
"..."
His fingers combed through his blonde hair, and his lips released a sigh. Sylvester rubbed his face in annoyance and tried to make a sense of where he was. Miraj had already done it, and getting angry now wasn't going to help. His punishment was going to be handled later.
"Any idea where we are? Do you know exactly what happened?"
Miraj worriedly detailed everything. "I just opened my mouth to eat the space and feel what's in it. But then I felt tickles in my belly, and we got squeezed into somewhere. I'm sorry, Maxy."
"Leave that for later." Sylvester tightened the harness securing Miraj, and started flying in that void of space once again. "This place is different. We're not traversing space and time anymore. Do you feel anything different?"
Miraj bobbed his head vigorously, "I feel like I can control this place."
"..."
"Not that again."
"I'm very confident this time. No, I can do it!"
The worst had already happened, so Sylvester nodded. "Go ahead, see what you feel."
"Aye, aye." Miraj opened his sharp jaws as wide as he could and activated his magical belly. An endless dark pit formed inside his jaws, leading to somewhere unknown. "Yes!"
All of a sudden, there was a spark in the distance, as if responding to Sylvester's own body that had been shining since before. The spark kept growing, bigger and bigger. The more Sylvester made his body shine in light, the greater the spark ahead of him became.
"It's getting closer!" Sylvester realized and raised his hand to create a humongous flare to illuminate as much as possible. He looked down and noticed Miraj's mouth was still open. "What are you doing?"
"Unnngh…" Miraj replied with open jaws.
Clank!
Cank!
"That's…" For the first time in so many years, Sylvester felt his jaw drop. "It's gold… so much of it."
It was a massive sea filled with gold coins and mountains made of gold bricks, diamonds, precious gems, and various artifacts. Going higher than what he could see and farther than what was possible.
His feet eventually found themselves upon the surface of coins. He hadn't moved, the entire sea of gold had come to him.
"Ah, finished," Miraj commented.
Sylvester's brows rose when he looked at the markings on the coins. His gaze alternated between the gold, the void around them, and Miraj.
"Chonky, we're inside your damn belly!"
Thank you for reading the book. Gifts and GT votes are highly appreciated.
