[Hm, I wonder what that is?]
[Hoooooooooooieeeeh, someone is with us!]
[A living one with us! A flesh and bone in the flesh! Also this one got his mind still intact.]
[Hello. Mr. Human! Are you here to kill us?]
[Oh, how rare. A human vessel.]
[Oi, oi, oi, stop getting excited! I'm also getting excited too♥]
[It's been ages since we had an alive one. Remember the last one? Guys?]
[Welcome to our humble abode! I hope you enjoy your stay.]
[The will is resisting, but that's fine. Will can be hollowed.]
[Yes. Yes. Sink in deeper. Let us see how much space there is.]
[Mm. Thoughts too loud. I hate it. Too much noise.]
[How wasteful. This one won't last. Such a shame. Shame. Shame. Shame...]
[Shame. The body could have carried us.]
[It'll break before it yields.]
[And broken vessels are useless.]
[Release it.]
[Yes. Let it go.]
[We'll wait for another.]
Whose voices are these?
I hear them all at the same time. Some sound like a kid. Some female. Some male. Their voices blended together. I had a hard time distinguish their voices from one another. The worst part of it, all of it were rushing to my head in a single, overwhelming tide, overlapping, while also colliding from one another, like I'm swimming through a sea of voices, only to be drowned by them.
[It's failing.]
[See? It can't hold.]
[Enough.]
I couldn't tell if they were speaking to me or through me. I tried to move, think, anything. However, my body felt disconnected, distant, like it no longer belong to me. The voices continued without mercy.
And then—
A light.
It was small and weak, no more than a fracture in the noise, a hairline crack splitting the world apart. I couldn't hold onto it. The voices surged, louder and violent, as if they sensed its presence.
[Ignore it.]
[There's nothing there.]
My vision blurred. My head throbbed. Nevertheless, I reached out. I didn't know why or what it was. But my instinct pulled me toward it. My fingers grazed its warmth, and the moment I touched it, the light flared brightly.
The voices faded.
And in that silence, I held on. Once I did, everything came to me all at once. No transition or anything like that, nor easing into it. One moment I was reaching, then next I was wrenched forward as if the world had wrapped in on itself. The sound, light, sensation collided, crashing into me all at once.
My thoughts stretched thin, like I'm being warped through something narrow and unforgiving, with my sense of self being dragged along behind. My chest tightened. Images flashed past me. They're too fast to grasp.
The voices screamed, but not in anger, but in surprise.
[—!]
Then they were gone again.
I was thrown forward, violently, being spat out of a current. My body slammed back into itself all at once. Air tore into my lungs. My heart stuttered, then pounded.
I gasped.
The light was gone. The darkness was gone.
I found myself lying somewhere.
The cold seeped into my back first, then the weight of my body followed, crashing all down at once. I opened my eyes and lights bled through my eyes. Above me, the sky climbed higher than it should. Not blue, not black, some wrong kind of red. I was in some kind of endless void, layered with stars. They didn't twinkle, yet each one burned, scattered so densely as if the ceiling of the universe had been stripped back.
I tried to move. My fingers twitched, that's basically it.
My head throbbed.
I rolled onto my side and gagged. "Where...? Am... I...?"
While above, the universe seemed bare, and looked impossibly far. Down below, it was the opposite, the land was a heavy graveyard of what looked like a forgotten ruined temple. Broken pillars rose from the ground, leaning at strange, uneven angles, yet all symmetrically lined. Some had collapsed entirely, scattered across, meanwhile, the others still stood. Their surfaces showed ages, as the etched symbols worn smooth by time.
Amid the ruins, something bloomed within it.
The flowers bloomed as far as I could see, all each had unique shade of glowing shades of pale blue, violet, and gold. Their glow was gentle, seemed to be alive. When the wind passed, the flowers swayed together, releasing tiny motes of light that drifted upward, disappearing into the stars.
I took a step.
With each one, I felt the place was aware of my presence, but chose not to react. Every time I glanced at the soft glow of the flower, I had the sense of something oppressive that seemed to be watching from above.
"What is this place? Heaven? Hell? Wait... Did I die?"
Something rose ahead of me. A shape. Quite tall and rigid. I slowed, and reached out before my eyes could make sense of it. My fingers brushed the cold stone, slightly rough and uneven. I slid my hand along its edge.
A seat.
No—a throne.
I stepped around it. The back rose high above my head, broad and imposing even in the low light. Whoever had sat here hadn't needed comfort. They'd needed presence.
I moved past it, drawn forward by the thing behind it.
My shin struck something solid. "Shit!" I hissed, catching myself before I fell, hands landing on a wide, flat surface. It's a stone again. The surface was cool, smooth in places, scarred in others. It went longer than I expected. I kept walking my hand forward.
"This place looked like some fucked up ritualistic place for sacrifice."
At the far end of the table, another shape emerged.
Bigger.
Wider.
A second throne waited there, looming out of the darkness. This one wasn't pushed aside. It faced the table directly, commanding the entire space.
I stopped just short of it.
My throat tightened.
Whatever this place was… certainly not heaven or hell.
At the center of it, an enormous eye suspended in the sky, moonlike. Its iris was fractured, veins of light spilling through the cracks. Hard to tell if it was looking at me or through me.
Then—
A hand slid into view from behind the throne.
My breath caught.
Long fingers curled over the stone edge, hand pale, nails dark. The movement was unhurried and deliberate. It knew I was watching or wanted me to.
I took a step back without thinking.
The throne shifted. The stone scraped softly, a sound that sent chills up my spine. The hand tightened. Then a woman emerged from behind the throne.
First her shoulder emerged, half-lost in shadow. Then her eyes caught what little light there was, reflecting it back to me. Her gaze settled on mine. The air became heavy. She rose slowly, unfolding into view. One hand remained on the throne.
She didn't speak.
Didn't need to.
The moment our eyes met, I knew—
I hadn't found this place.
I had been brought here.
She stepped fully into view—and the world stopped.
Her long black hair tumbled down her back, each strand moving with a fluid grace. In contrast, her was pale and flawless, almost luminous, like the moonlight given form. Her body looked like a chiseled refinement of a marble goddess. She looked like she had been forged to exist beyond the reach of ordinary, really.
Unreal.
Her eyes held a soft, violet glow. There was something within the depths that made it difficult to look away. Beneath her right eye, sat a small beauty mark, a single imperfection that encapsulated her appearance more.
Behind her head, a fractured halo of violet light clung to her, or more so, celestial shards, like a series of broken, glowing geometric segments.
She wore a white thin dress, translucent at the hem where it rippled like water. It didn't touch the floor, hovering just above it.
Neither did she.
Her feet hovered just above the ground as she moved forward, floating rather than walking.
I realized I was holding my breath.
She stopped a few steps away, suspended in the air. Something radiated from her. Calmness? Certainly, not kindness nor warmth. However, the serene certainty made me uncomfortable.
Goddess.
Spirit.
Whatever she was, the title didn't matter.
Throughout my life, I've never seen such beautiful woman ever.
Standing before her, I understood one thing with chilling clarity—
This place answered to her.
[Have a seat.]