Gateways of the Hidden Dimension

While Alex mulled about taking Yata's hands, the spider silk suddenly unravelled from his waist, propelling him into a free fall.

Everything was spinning around rapidly as he heard the screeching of the creatures growing louder. He was falling down into the pits of fire.

Alex shut his eyes tightly. The heat was now searing what felt like his skin, even though he knew he was dead.

"Useless spider," the mysterious husky voice grumbled. "Shoot a net, you stupid oaf."

It wasn't Yata.

In a panic, Alex wildly flailed his arms about in the free fall, only to be grabbed by a net and upwards he went again.

"Thanks, Shiro," Yata said.

Alex opened his eyes to spot the huge fangs of a spider dripping venom on him. Balled up in a tight, messy yellowish net, made from spider silk and with every slurp heard, he came closer to those sharp fangs.

"ARGHHHHH," he screamed as he watched the spider slurp the surrounding silk into the tiny mouth.

Big fangs.

Scary mouth.

And bad spider breath.

Not good.

"Quit being a baby. Shiro will not eat you. He just saved you," Yata said as he stretched out his hand. "Take my hand because the abyss below will continually suck you down."

"S-S-Shiro can… t-t-talk?" Alex stuttered as he watched the spider chewing on the silk placidly, like it was bubble gum while its fangs were still dripping balls of venom.

"Whatever are you on about?" An irate Yata asked as his hand grabbed Alex's before he could protest and dragged him into a sliver of light.

A blinding light flashed, and with a tremendous thud, Alex's bum hit the dusty ground, creating a mild dust cloud around. A grinning Yata stood over him had already released his grip.

"Welcome to deep within the hidden dimension."

Alex slapped his offer of a hand away and got up, dusting the shimmering sandlike particles off his clothing and rubbed his fingers, only to find it smooth, almost like silica sand.

"Don't tell me it's silica," he showed Yata the grainy particles on his hands.

"Yup, a raw material we have in abundance here. But we are at the gateways. That matters the most," Yata introduced with his arms flung open.

Then Alex looked up. The environment was entirely different from the earlier scene.

No clouds in the skies and he saw the clear blue skies but no sun. Or the other two spiders.

"Where are your brothers?" Alex asked.

"Back to the home ground of the shrine. They don't like the brightness of the gateways. Plenty of time to thank Shiro later," Yata said.

Around him was a vast desert-like area of pure white sand where many gates of various shapes and sizes scattered around as far as his eye could see.

Some of the nearby gates looked Romanesque, Grecian, Norse and even Aztec in design.

"Do any of these gates lead back to Earth?" Alex pointed at them.

"Huh? No. Just to our allocated territories within the hidden dimension. Going to Earth from our territory doesn't require a gate. You just slip through the veil."

"Veil?"

"You will know later. Too hard to explain without a demonstration," Yata replied.

There is no sight of a tree or blade of grass.

No forest.

What veil?

Alex could not see any buildings except for the several gates.

"Where's the sun?"

"Unless you wanted to be blinded by silica reflecting a glaring sun, nope, there is no sun here. We are in the hidden dimension. The atmosphere is unique. No planetary system unless you count the faux moon, which they placed in the capital, the headquarters, of our East Asian faction," Yata said.

"East Asian faction?" Alex queried.

"Don't tell me you forgot that fast? I told you that there are factions."

"Based on Earth? I thought there are other worlds?"

Yata shrugged and pointed to an enormous gate. "Each primeval group has their naming preferences - it can be after something familiar."

"So the primeval group of the East Asian faction likes Earth?" Alex thought, since East Asia was a subcontinent on Earth.

"Heh ours… heh… some of the Asian languages existed in other worlds before Earth," Yata chuckled. "The East Asian Faction just sows their influence all over."

"So all the beliefs in the many worlds links back to primeval beings, spreading their influence to those worlds?"

"Yup, not the other way around," Yata replied. "All these gates lead to a faction's capital. Within each capital, if they arranged it like ours, are gateways to other worlds."

"Why?"

"Nobody puts the main gate in front of each territory they hold. That's a poor strategic tactic."

Yata's explanation of the factions and strategic tactics made Alex wonder if there were conflicts in the hidden dimension were like the conflicts on Earth, like wars, sanctions, etc.

If so, did he just sign up to be part of some Spirit army?

Then Yata pointed to the Norse like gate. "They call their capital behind the gate, Asgard."

Pointing at the Aztec-like designed squarish structure, Yata said "Aztalan - thankfully easier for us to pronounce because their primeval beings chose long ass fucking names like Huitzi-iipowhateverchilisetil."

A resounding slap made Yata tumble over, landing with his face flat on the sandy ground.

"A little more respect for the neighbours. That's Huitzilopochtli, the supreme leader of the Aztalan beings." Kanghui emerged from thin air. "You don't mention their names when you can't pronounce them properly."

Alex snickered as he watched Yata splutter the silica sand out of his mouth with his hands up in surrender.

"Thanks for sending him," Alex tilted his head at Yata, who was rubbing the back of his head.

"Don't thank me so fast, once you enter our gate," she pointed at a huge wooden-like gate design which looked both Chinese and Japanese around 50 meters behind Yata.

Alex saw the impenetrable whitish haze, which filled the entrance, making it impossible to see nothing beyond the gate.

Yet he noticed that there was a small group of wanderers around the gate. They had no shadows. Translucent bodies of varying degrees, dressed in clothes of different eras in the vast desolate area before the gates.

A young man sat by the side of the gate, dressed as an ancient soldier, with scars still visible on his face.

Another small group to the side were petite yet bosomy girls dressed for an outing in tight skimpy dresses with their Prada and Christian Dior bags slung to the side.

The girls stood in branded three-inch heels which pushed their heaving chest out and emphasised their curvy bottoms that caught Alex's eye.

"I wouldn't be picking any of those broads up," Yata muttered, noticing Alex's gaze at the girls.

"Let him play," Kanghui said.

Yata tilted his head at her and asked, "Don't they lose those mating urges once they discard their bodies?"

"Depends on the soul built of the human and certain animals. Those urges follow some of them even if they are ghosts," she answered with a cool indifference. "And he kinda died a virgin."

Yata snickered at the last mention and then bit his lip. The make up of a soul was too complex for him to understand even after five centuries.

He glanced at Alex, still ogling the girls. Too obvious that the human had not much experience hooking up with strangers.

Nerdy - tick.

Clueless - tick.

And died a virgin despite his looks. Something is wrong with the human.

Yata rolled his eyes at the constant staring. Maybe he should lend the pathetic human soul a hand.

Yata called out to the girl. "Hey sweetheart, how's your day?"

Then he winked at Alex, who shook his head and said, "Dude, your pick up skills are crap. Observe…"

Alex's voice trailed off as his eyes widen at a girl.

Yata turned to look at where he was staring at.

One had turned around only to reveal a half mangled face with her eyeball swinging back and forth in front of her partially exposed skull and facial muscle, making them both cringe.

"H-h-Holy s-S-shit…"

"I expected something bad, but not eye-ball dangling mad. So don't pick up chicks here until you inspected the full deal," Yata said to a shocked Alex.

Alex turn his gaze away and pricked his ear at the mix of Chinese, Korean and Japanese being spoken by some individuals in the crowd.

A tingling in his hand caused him to lift his hand for a look - it was turning translucent along with the rest of his body were turning translucent.

Looking on the ground, Alex realised he had no shadow too.

"Are we done with the fun and games now?" Kanghui asked. "If you are ready, walk through these gates. If not, you can make friends with these ghosts here."

"They are ghosts?" Alex gasped in surprise. "Then what am I?"

"They are ghosts, hence unaccompanied. Not like you, but soon you will be because this area also shears a newcomer without training," she replied curtly.

"Some are waiting for the gates to open like those girls. They look fairly recent." Yata took a quick sniff. "Saturday's roadkill."

"The other, an old soldier who still refuses to believe he died in battle from a poisoned arrow. For the last few centuries," Kanghui tilted her head at the scarred face soldiers. "He haunted here since then."

"You knew how and when they died?" Alex asked incredulously.

Yata started a warning cough. "Don't *cough* ask her *cough*."

Ignoring Yata, Kanghui pointed to the earlier girl with half a mangled face, and said, "Take the roadkill gang, for example. A car swerved into them. See that one there… she suffered compound fractures of the right parietal and frontal bones. The impact depressed her zygomatic arch to where it hit the lacrimal bone causing a crushed eyeball…"

Yata cringed and nudged Alex in the ribs as a hint to keep his mouth shut as Kanghui droned on the gruesome details regarding the cause of death as she singled out each mangled girl in the group.

"… blunt brain trauma, multiple soft-tissue lacerations to the torso, inhalation injury from the fire, and extensive burns around 60% of the body."

Alex lifted his palm up to interrupt her. "Um… are we going to enter the gate?"

Yata burst into laughter, then stifled his laugh once Kanghui shot him a death stare.

"Keep close. Even within our territories, you face certain dangers," she said.