Vision or Dream (1)

A few minutes after the 'rescue' operation, Alex and the others were put in beds on the Orbital Ring. Sadly, some students, instructors and the spaceship crew were already dead.

The kind of death induced by the veil displacement phenomenon began with sleep. The target was put into a deep sleep, where their hearts eventually gave in.

For those who were still alive, falling asleep was only a matter of time, and soon, they would follow.

Alex was peacefully asleep in his allocated bed. As the medics went about their work in preparing the unfortunate ones to be sent back to their loved ones, Alex's body was undergoing subtle and unseen changes.

His heart rate was strong and slowing down, showing no signs of the unexpected. However, alongside these subtle changes, he experienced a vision when the Cosmic Mana Wave hit.

....

Alex slowly opened his eyes, but all he could see was darkness. He noticed his floating self in an empty void with no sense of up or down, left or right.

The last thing he remembered was the air-trains making their way down to the forest.

'Is this what dying feels like? I had kind of expected a state of complete nonexistence. Maybe this is the afterlife?' he pondered to himself, not sure what to do next.

There were no manuals on what to do after death. As he floated around mulling over what to do next, he sensed how the space around him felt heavy. It felt like being buried in sand, with the weight pressing heavily on his shoulders.

He also occasionally felt something wash over him like a breeze. Only this breeze felt warm and welcoming.

'Heavy and cosy. Not what I expected but okay.'

Gradually, he noticed a small point of white light. The point was so small that he nearly missed it if he hadn't been facing that direction. The small light point began growing until it occupied his entire vision.

'What the hell is happening? Can't a person die in peace?!' The brightness of the now spherical object reached a crescendo, forcing Alex to shut his eyes.

He wondered if this was what death was supposed to feel like. 'Wait, am I really dead?' He began to think to himself, slowly opening his eyes.

What greeted him took his breath away. Before his very eyes was an object he found difficult to describe. It was as large as the largest planet in his solar system, at least from his point of view.

The object appeared to be a slowly revolving cube at one moment, and then changed to a different shape at a different moment. In fact, all the shapes he was familiar with and ones he could not even begin to perceive were taken by the object.

It appeared a shade of silvery-black and produced a pulse every now and then.

But the strange thing Alex noticed was the massive chunk of its edge that had been bitten off? He wondered whether he was right in his assumption. No matter what shape it took, that bitten-off portion was always revealed.

His vision then shifted downwards, past the massive object, moving at speeds physically impossible for a living being to achieve.

When his vision settled, he beheld an ocean wherein what appeared to be small, floating disc-shaped constructs illuminated like the images of the universe he had seen on the network.

And from what he could see, there could easily be trillions upon trillions. He observed no end in sight. Furthermore, these constructs displayed numerous cracks on their surfaces. 

Furrowing his brows, Alex wondered what exactly he was looking at. However, before he could make any guesses, the space above him lit up in the same hues.

It seemed as though he had been positioned in the central space of the disc-shaped constructs. Moreover, he could still feel the pulses emitted by the massive object continuously.

'Just what exactly am I seeing?' At this point, he was almost sure this was not some afterlife or anything along those lines. Not knowing exactly what to do, he waited for whatever was moving him around to do its thing.

As if on cue, his body was moved upwards, towards the layer above. And like before, he could see cracks all over the disc-shaped constructs. This time around, he was moved really close to the constructs, and they enlarged the closer he was moved.

That was when he saw the creatures, creatures he instantly recognised as void creatures. They had no definite shape and could be anything, from small to exceedingly large, slipping into the cracks of the constructs.

At this point, Alex didn't have to be a genius to know what was going on. There had been multiple theories about the origin of the void creatures he had read about.

Some theories suggested that the void creatures came from the farthest reaches of the universe, reaching humanity as a result of the Cosmic Mana Wave's displacement.

Others hypothesised that the creatures originated from an alternate dimension, a dimension from which the magical energy they now utilised also came. 

This theory had the strongest ground due to the benefits their 'blood' and cores provided.

Suddenly, Alex's heart began racing. He knew he had stumbled on the origins of the void creatures and how they appeared in the universe.

Building on that line of thought, he once more gazed at the disc constructs and ultimately reached a conclusion, a conclusion that made him swallow hard.

UNIVERSES...

He was sure of what he was seeing, and the shock of the discovery left him frozen. There had also been theories about a multiverse, but with no substantial evidence to support them, it was simply speculation.

After struggling to regain his composure, he took another look; a long, hard look. Suddenly, it felt as if time had sped up multiple times.

He had no idea how long it had been, as he had no means of measurement. However, when everything began to slow down, the universes below him seemed to transform into motes of light before vanishing. 

'The universes are dying!' He figured out what was happening to the constructs.

And from how the destruction began from below, he understood the universes were placed in strata, with the ones below disappearing first.

This prompted him to find out if he could find his universe, but there was no such luck.

Once again, the force that moved him around took him upwards. Assuming he was returning the massive object from before, he waited for what he was to be shown next.

Unfortunately for him, what he expected to see was not what he saw.

Before him lay an endless cluster of void creatures encircling a small, shiny object. Remembering the bitten-off piece from that enormous object, he realised that this was the missing piece. 

'Are they trying to eat it or what?' he asked himself.