Chapter 95: The List (15)
Lucien shifted on the bed, the void pressing down on him in its suffocating silence.
The sheets rasped beneath his fingers as he braced his arms, intending to push himself up.
If he stayed sitting there, staring at the vague outline like a fool, he was going to lose his mind.
But the moment his muscles tensed, the silhouette beside him stirred. Its head tilted, the grin briefly dimming.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
Lucien froze.
“…Why not?”
The figure’s voice lowered, turning grave, almost ceremonial.
“Because it is… unwise.”
Lucien blinked.
‘That was it?’
‘Just unwise?’
“That’s not an explanation,” he muttered, his voice taut.
The entity leaned back as if shrugging off the demand.
“Some things don’t need explanations, boy. They’re fundamental. Bedrock. Common logic.”
“…Common logic?”
Lucien repeated flatly.
“Yes,” the entity said with a patient nod, as though it were a schoolteacher tolerating a dim student.
“The fundamental principle of the universe. The glue that binds all things, visible and invisible. Magic. Souls. Existence itself. Everything bows to it. That is what I mean.”
Lucien’s lips twitched.
“That’s still not an explanation.”
The grin flickered back onto the silhouette’s mouth.
“Fair enough. I’ll humor you.”
It leaned forward, hazy elbows settling on hazy knees.
“Magic, more or less, is tied to the soul. An extension of it. An echo. I’m not entirely sure how it works for humans specifically, but the threads are there. Tug one, the other quivers. A ripple effect.”
“More or less…”
Lucien arched a brow, his dry tone slipping through despite the unease gnawing at him.
“…For a god, you sure do guess a lot.”
The entity let out a long, exaggerated sigh that distorted the void around it, like sound pressing into water.
“Do you know what omnipotence means, Kim?”
Lucien bristled slightly at being called by his old name, but he didn’t interrupt.
“No?”
The entity continued.
“Let’s put it into perspective. You, yes, you, might know that chocolate kills dogs. Correct?”
Lucien frowned.
“…Yes?”
“But,” the silhouette’s grin widened, “do you know why it kills dogs? The specific chemical reaction? The precise biological pathways? The toxic dosage per kilogram of body weight? The enzymatic deficiency involved in canine metabolism?”
Lucien’s mouth opened, then closed again.
He stared.
“…Well?”
“…No,” Lucien admitted reluctantly.
“Exactly.”
The shadow spread its arms wide, triumphant.
“Knowledge of outcome does not always mean knowledge of mechanism. That is the difference. I know a great deal, but not everything. Even gods have their limits.”
Lucien rubbed his temples.
“Great. So you’re basically a divine guess machine.”
The grin twitched upward again, amused by his irritation.
Still, despite the sarcasm, Lucien leaned forward, listening, because the weight behind the figure’s words pulled at him.
“Now,” the entity continued, tone dipping back into seriousness, “your predicament. Mana and soul are entangled. And tied to them? Emotions. That’s the bridge. Your emotions fuel your magic. Your mana agitates your soul. And an agitated soul…”
It stood suddenly, its hazy form unraveling upward, unfolding into height.
With a flourish, it spread both arms, encompassing the infinite blackness around them.
“…causes this. You can call it an immune response.”
Lucien’s breath caught.
He glanced around again at the void, endless and cold, the bed his only anchor in the dark.
“This…” he muttered.
“…is my soul?”
“Not exactly,” the entity replied with a half-shrug.
“More like… the fallout of what happens when your soul trips over its own shoelaces. A mana flare-up can trick your body into thinking the soul inside it is foreign.Well, you and I know that it is, but somehow, most of the time your body doesn’t. But on the off chance it does.., You can say, it panics, it pushes back. Rejection. Ejection. Like spitting out a bitter and burnt piece of meat..”
Lucien’s stomach clenched, unease sinking like ice into his ribs.
“…Will this happen again?”
He asked quietly.
His voice had lost its edge of sarcasm, this time it was heavy, almost pleading.
The figure wagged a finger.
“Maybe. Maybe not. Best not to bet your life on it.”
Lucien gritted his teeth.
“…You don’t know.”
“I don’t know,” it agreed easily.
Then, after a pause, “But if I were you, I would maybe… not lean too hard on resentment as my motivator.”
Lucien blinked, tension prickling under his skin.
“…What does that even mean?”
The entity leaned forward, grin thinning into something almost rueful.
“I already explained the concept of agitation.”
It sighed, but nevertheless continued its explanation.
“Your soul isn’t native to this body. It doesn’t belong here. It fits, but imperfectly, like wearing shoes that were made for someone else. When you burn resentment, when you push hate to drive yourself forward, the body reacts poorly. To it, resentment feels like corruption, like malice. It reads you as something you are not. A vengeful spirit trying to hijack the flesh.”
Lucien’s chest tightened painfully.
The thought of being mistaken for some parasitic spirit, spat out of his own body like an intruder, hollowed his insides with dread.
His hands trembled against the sheets.
“And when the body thinks its soul has been hijacked…”
The figure gestured lazily at the void around them.
“…this happens. Shutdown. Eviction. Welcome to your own personal purgatory.”
Lucien swallowed hard.
His voice came out strained.
“…So you’re saying if I use resentment as my fuel, my body will keep… ejecting me?”
“That’s what I think,” the entity replied, shoulders rising in a careless shrug.
“It’s my best guess.”
Lucien’s eyes narrowed, but his earlier sarcasm faltered under the weight of real fear.
“…Your best guess?”
The grin returned, all too pleased with itself.
“Correct.”
“You-” Lucien’s voice cracked in disbelief. He pressed his palms to his knees, trying to ground himself.
“You’re supposed to be a god!”
“I never said I wasn’t,” the entity replied, tone dry.
“But divinity doesn’t equal omniscience. Again, chocolate. Dogs. Try to keep up.”
Lucien slumped back against the pillows, exhaling sharply.
His voice dropped to a bitter mutter.
“…Then what actually happened to me? Why am I even here?”
The figure tilted its head, then huffed in a way that carried both amusement and faint annoyance.
“Your body shut down. Simple as that. Your soul slipped loose again, and I- being generous, benevolent, and frankly underappreciated -slipped in to make sure you didn’t completely unravel. I found you in here.”
“…In the void,” Lucien muttered.
“Yes. Which is fascinating, really.”
The grin dimmed, turning thoughtful.
“I don’t know why there’s a void in your soul, Kim. And I don’t know how you end up wandering into it. That part remains… elusive.”
Lucien glared faintly.
“…So in short: you don’t know.”
“In short: you should be happy for divine intervention instead of bickering with the one providing it,” the entity retorted, folding its arms with mock gravity.
Lucien groaned, dragging his hand down his face.
“…Fine.”
He forced his voice steady, measured, polite.
“Then, do you at least know a way out of here?”
The shadow looked at him for a long moment.
Then it shrugged.
“Just wake up.”
Lucien blinked.
“…That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
A muscle twitched in Lucien’s jaw.
He ground his teeth so hard his molars ached, his composure unraveling.
“…You couldn’t have said that earlier?”
Lucien buried his face in his hands and muttered a prayer to whoever was above this so-called god.
***
Lucien rubbed at his temples, the void’s silence gnawing at him until the only sound was his own pulse thudding in his ears.
He finally let out a long breath and asked,
“Alright then… how do I ‘wake up’?”
The silhouette tilted its hazy head, as though considering the question with grave seriousness.
Then its mouth stretched into a grin.
“Pinch yourself.”
Lucien blinked.
“…What?”
“Pinch yourself,” the entity repeated, entirely straight-faced.
“Classic method. Works in all the plays and stories, doesn’t it?”
Lucien stared at it for a beat, then gave a resigned sigh.
He reached down, pinched his arm hard enough to make his eyes water.
Nothing.
“…Nope,” he muttered.
“Try harder,” the entity advised.
Lucien glared but did as told, digging his nails in this time.
A sharp jolt of pain shot through his arm, and he yelped.
“Damn it!”
Still nothing.
“Hmm,” the entity mused, tapping its chin with a finger of shadow.
“That doesn’t seem to work. Have you tried slapping yourself?”
Lucien’s eye twitched.
“You are kidding, right?”
“Go on, humor me.”
Grinding his teeth, Lucien slapped his own cheek, the sound ringing embarrassingly loud in the emptiness.
His face stung.
His dignity stung more.
Nothing happened.
The entity opened its mouth to say something, but Lucien snapped first.
“Do you even know how this works, or are you just experimenting on me like some kind of lab rat?”
The grin widened, faint static shivering through the void.
“Ah. You caught me.”
Lucien’s jaw nearly unhinged.
“Unbelievable.”
He jabbed a finger toward the shadow.
“You- You claim you’re a god, but everything you’ve said so far is just guesses, half-truths, and-”
The entity lifted a hand as if to respond.
“-No, don’t even start,” Lucien cut it off, voice rising with raw frustration.
“Are you a god, or do you just enjoy watching me suffer?”
For a long, tense beat, the void swallowed his words.
Then the entity threw its head back and laughed.
The sound boomed and fizzled, like radio static mixed with thunder.
“Both,” it admitted cheerfully.
“I’ll admit, there’s some… entertainment value in watching you.”
The grin dimmed to something softer, though not entirely kind.
“But if I didn’t want to help you, I wouldn’t have bothered diving in after you the last time. I wouldn’t have explained any of this. I’d have let you unravel. Poof. Gone.”
Lucien clenched his fists, torn between anger, fear, and reluctant gratitude.
The entity sighed, then began to move closer.
The void seemed to ripple around it, each step bending the air with static that whined in Lucien’s ears.
His breath hitched as dread crawled down his spine.
“W-what are you-”
“Relax,” the entity murmured, though its distorted grin made the word anything but reassuring.
“How about… we try what worked last time?”
Before Lucien could ask what that meant, a shadowed hand shot forward, icy and alien, closing around his ankle.
Lucien’s eyes widened, panic flashing raw across his face.
He instinctively tried to kick free, but the grip was iron.
The silhouette loomed over him, savoring the expression with a smile far too wide.
“You remember this part, don’t you? Hold on tight.”
Then, without warning, it flung him.
The world turned into a blur as Lucien was yanked violently upward, hurtling toward what might have been the roof of the void, his stomach lurching like a rollercoaster without tracks.
The static roared, drowning out his scream, and for a split second he saw the grin, small, smug, far below, before darkness consumed him again.
