Chapter 233: Greedy Bastard

When Sage opened his eyes again, he found himself in a strange and unsettling place. There was no ceiling above him, no mana lamps casting their pale glow, and the familiar scents of herbs and iron were absent from the air.

Gone were the comforts of a bed, the presence of Cassian or Mina, and even the walls or floor that typically defined his surroundings.

Instead, he was enveloped by an infinite expanse of darkness stretching endlessly in every direction, a void so profound that it felt less like emptiness and more like a complete absence of existence itself.

This wasn’t night or shadow; it was something deeper, an ancient blackness that consumed light before it could even be conceived.

For what felt like an eternity, Sage struggled to comprehend his situation. There was nothing to see yet he was acutely aware of his own existence, suspended in a formless state that refused to anchor itself to anything familiar.

He instinctively tried to breathe but realized there was no rise or fall of his chest. Panic brushed against his thoughts as he attempted to lift his hands or look down at himself for reassurance, only to find no sensation of limbs responding no weight, no physical resistance.

Yet paradoxically, he still felt as though he occupied a body. It was an impossible contradiction: a presence without form, an identity without flesh, a consciousness adrift without gravity or ground.

The realization settled over him slowly and uneasily like cold water seeping through cracks in his understanding: he couldn’t discern whether he was dreaming, hallucinating, or experiencing something far stranger, something beyond the physical world he knew.

His thoughts moved sluggishly at first, heavy and disoriented, as if they too had to adjust to this unfamiliar state.

The last thing he remembered was the ritual: the crushing pain, the sensation of his soul being pulled apart through chains of mana, the suffocating pressure urging him to stay conscious for Mina’s sake.

He recalled Cassian’s chant, the spiraling wind around him, the final pulse of grey light and then… nothing. There hadn’t been a gradual fade into sleep; just a sudden drop into silence.

And now this: a void devoid of sound or movement, the absence even of comforting darkness.

He tried to call out but found that his voice didn’t echo through air nor vibrate against walls. Instead, it seemed as if his thoughts themselves carried his intent outward in an intangible ripple.

“Hello?”

The word formed more as an idea than a sound. No reply came back, only that endless emptiness remained.

The stillness pressed against him like a heavy blanket suffocating in its quietude. He attempted once more to move, to push himself forward through this void as if swimming but there were no directions here: no up or down; no forward or backward.

It felt like trying to walk on air with nothing beneath him, a growing fear clawed at him sharply as he considered being trapped here alone in nothingness without escape or even without the passage of time, settled over him like a suffocating weight.

Time itself appeared to lose its significance. There was no sun to rise or set, no shadows shifting, and no sounds to mark the passage of seconds.

His awareness expanded, drifting through moments that felt like minutes, minutes that could have been hours, and hours that might have been mere heartbeats.

He could not ascertain how long he remained in this state of suspension, floating, disoriented, increasingly restless and uneasy.

The silence did not offer comfort; rather, it gnawed at him, pressing in from all sides and threatening to engulf his thoughts entirely.

He began to call out again, more urgently this time. His thoughts coalesced into words infused with desperation rather than curiosity:

“Cassian? Mina? Anyone?”

The names echoed only within his mind, reverberating against his consciousness without eliciting any response.

There was no answer, no presence acknowledging him, no indication that this space contained anything beyond his own awareness.

Fear deepened within him, morphing into something sharper and more primal. Was this the fate of a fractured soul? Had the transfer failed? Was he experiencing some lingering side effect, a liminal space between worlds where his mind had become adrift?

He attempted to focus and steady himself by recalling Cassian’s warning: endure whatever comes, do not lose consciousness.

This memory provided a slight anchor amidst the chaos, offering something to cling to. If he was still aware, then he had not died; if he had not died, then this must be part of the process, an intermediate state or a byproduct of the soul transfer.

This logic momentarily steadied his thoughts but did little to dispel the unease creeping through him, the growing sensation that he was not meant to remain in this place for long.

Then it happened.

Initially subtle, a faint tug at the periphery of his awareness, it felt like a distant current pulling at something unseen.

He barely registered it as real but soon realized that the sensation intensified around him with increasing force.

It did not feel physical; there were no hands gripping or ropes pulling him back but rather an insidious force ensnaring his very existence in a way he could neither see nor resist. The pull escalated abruptly into an overwhelming surge that sent a jolt of alarm coursing through him.

The void twisted.

There is no other way to describe it: darkness warped inward toward an unseen center as though reality itself were being drawn into a vortex.

The sensation of movement struck him all at once, violent and overwhelming, as if he had been seized and propelled forward at impossible speed.

His awareness stretched painfully under pressure until it felt as though his very essence might splinter from the strain.

Instinctively attempting resistance proved futile; there was nothing against which to brace himself, nothing tangible to hold on to. The force was absolute and relentless, dragging him through the void with terrifying momentum.

Panic surged within him, raw and uncontrollable, as he experienced a simultaneous sensation of being pulled apart and compressed.

His thoughts scattered under the weight of this disorienting motion. He found himself unable to breathe, think, or maintain his sense of self as the world around him collapsed into a blinding rush.

Then everything turned white.

This was not a gradual brightening or the soft emergence of light from darkness; it was an instantaneous and overwhelming flood that consumed his vision entirely.

The blackness vanished, replaced by a pure, searing brilliance that obliterated all other sensations.

For a single disorienting instant, he felt as though he had been torn from existence and thrust into something incomprehensible.

And then, just as abruptly as it began, it ceased.

The pull dissipated. The pressure lifted. The blinding light faded enough for his awareness to stabilize, although the brightness remained, diffused and strange, like standing in a place where light had no source and cast no shadows.

He struggled to orient himself; his thoughts reassembled slowly while his sense of identity snapped back into place piece by piece.

When his perception finally steadied and the white glare softened sufficiently for him to comprehend what lay before him, his expression, if he still possessed one, became utterly still.

Shock flooded through him: deep and absolute, erasing every trace of confusion or fear that had plagued him moments earlier. His mind grappled with processing what he was witnessing, attempting to reconcile it with reality, logic, and everything he believed possible.

He had anticipated various scenarios: perhaps a return to his body or the sight of Cassian; even another vision of the void seemed plausible.

But this… this was something entirely different.

He could scarcely believe it.

His awareness trembled between disbelief and awe as he gazed at the scene unfolding before him, striving desperately to understand, to make sense of this impossible sight.

Before he could gather his thoughts or begin questioning where he was or what he observed, a voice resonated throughout the space.

It did not emanate from any specific direction nor vibrate through air; instead, it resonated directly within him, threading through his consciousness like a blade sliding effortlessly through silk.

The sound was ageless, neutral yet ancient beyond comprehension, carrying neither warmth nor hostility but possessing a weight that pressed against his very soul.

It was not loud; it did not need to be.

Every syllable struck with absolute clarity, reverberating through his being as if the words themselves were etched into the fabric of his existence.

“Finally,” said the voice in calm steadiness. Each word bore an unusual familiarity that eluded identification: “we have met… greedy bastard.”

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