'Where am I...?'
Alex felt disoriented and confused, not entirely sure what happened. The last thing he recalled was absorbing the energy from the void core.
Even with his muddled senses, he recalled that he tried to absorb more energy as it felt as though he wasn't having enough.
Similar to feeling an intense thirst for water and finally getting the desired water. It would be difficult to try and hold yourself back from taking more gulps than you should.
That was how he felt, so he went ahead and followed his instincts. That was when he felt a very strong attractive force coming from his chest and abruptly, the energy he desired, he got.
But then, he realized it shouldn't be possible as the core was just from a Class F void creature, and there was no way it should have that kind of void energy to give away.
He opened his eyes to take a look and saw a veil tear right before his eyes. He panicked and tried to get out of there as quickly as possible.
In his rush, he failed to realize that the energy coming from the veil tear had no negative effect on him.
Unfortunately, everything he had learnt since he could remember was that veil tears were dangerous things to be around.
It was then that he heard Julia's voice, causing him to fear the worst, but again, his mind was not in the right place.
He thought she and Ross were still around and had to urge to protect them from the veil tear when it suddenly produced a powerful attractive force that pulled him in.
For many minutes, Alex remained unconscious and unaware of his situation or surroundings.
He struggled to move, but couldn't feel any solid ground under his feet or his back. He shook his head to clear the fog.
*Oh shit!*
He exclaimed when he recalled what happened just moments earlier. His eyes abruptly opened to look around, but he only saw darkness; absolute and unbridled darkness.
*Huh?*
Alex closed his eyes and reopened them several times but still saw nothing but black. For a moment, he thought he had gone blind.
Then another thing caught his attention.
*My voice… I can't hear my voice.*
He spoke out loud, he knew he did, yet he heard nothing; nothing at all.
'Now I'm blind and mute!'
His heart began racing, fearing the displacement might have taken his senses from him. Even now, he could not feel any solid ground under him.
'No… this is something else.'
He tried to take deep breaths and felt nothing in his lungs. There was no air wherever he was.
"…"
'A veil tear…. A veil tear…. That means I've been displaced and if I can't see or hear anything, it could probably mean…'
*Gulp*
He was afraid to come to the conclusion, but he knew what it was.
'I'm trapped in a veiled space.'
A shiver ran down his spine, and as the realization set in, he understood why he couldn't feel any solid ground around him.
'I'm floating in space… but how am I still breathing?'
Naturally, he was glad he was still alive, but to remain alive with no air support or anything when he was still a Class F awakened was just ridiculous.
With the imbalance caused by the pressure difference, he should be feeling extreme discomfort or worse, pop like a balloon, yet nothing of the sort was happening.
'But I have survived something like this before and the reason I can't see anything is because there is no light source in my surroundings.
'Getting out of here should be my first priority. But I can't even move.'
He thought about his family and how they might be feeling at the moment. His best friend, Ross, and then there was Julia.
He felt his gut twist in pain thinking about how they would think he was dead and thrown somewhere in the universe.
He feared what might even happen to his parents, especially his mother if she did not take the news well.
'Haa… I could be anywhere in the universe at this point, and who knows how long I've been in here, floating around aimlessly.'
He had no idea where his left or right was, and up or down didn't matter either. His sense of direction was completely shattered.
*Xex?*
'Right. No sound…'
He tried to bring his watch over to his face but still saw nothing. Even if the watch worked, which he doubted, Xex wouldn't be active as there was no form of connection in here.
'Let's try the suit.'
With a thought, the nanites of his suit moved over his body as they formed the outline of his combat suit and helm.
'Ha, Finally!'
The HUD of his suit came on as it was powered by a larger bit of power than his smartwatch.
The basic data in the suit system like the time and date appeared and also came with a bit of light, but was not capable of collecting any data around.
"Xex!"
He called a second time.
Lord Zol gave him a present during his birthday celebration with his friends, and he was lucky he got something like that.
It was a new system designed just like the nanite storage to fuse the AI system to the suit's functions once it was worn.
That way, even if one lost their smartwatch, they could still have their AI assistants.
[…]
Unfortunately, it was still a radio silence.
Normally, even when one was outside the network range of the empire, the AI systems could still be functional, albeit only as a local system that relied on already gathered data.
But the thing was there were more than just assistive agents; they were friends who could keep their partners engaged in conversation to help them stay sane in conditions like what Alex found himself.
But for whatever reason, the system was unresponsive.
*Haa…*
Only after several seconds of thinking did he notice something he had missed earlier. He was in a veiled space, and that meant, vast amounts of void energy and mana.
'Hm. The very thing I was searching for, I now have in abundance. But what I want right now is to leave this damn space.
'Not to mention, what if there are void creatures lurking somewhere around here?'
With no ability to see, he was a sitting duck.
Then it hit him.
'For fuck's sake, what is wrong with me today?!'
He cursed his stupidity as he recalled an ability he had kept hidden since his awakening.