Chapter 18: 2.2

Kid woke up to see a ceiling he didn't recognize.  Too many nights of sleeping in a tree had gotten him used to seeing the sky filtering through the treetops as his first view.  Seeing well placed stone held up with a support beam spanning across it as his first sight was probably a first for him ever.  He started to get up and found that his body had a few more cricks than he was used to.  It seemed kind of strange how getting used to something that most would find uncomfortable, like sleeping in a tree, could make something that most found comfortable, like sleeping in a bed, feel uncomfortable. 

As he stood next to the rather plain and simple bed, he looked around the room that sepulcher supposedly be his for the next month or so.  The bed was placed in the corner with the headboard directly opposite of the door.  Against the wall and next to the door was a small and simple wooden desk and chair.  In the last corner of the room was a wardrobe, which he had haphazardly thrown his backpack into before faceplanting on the bed and falling asleep. 

He decided that he should probably take his few clothes out of his pack and put them into the wardrobe like a civilized person and then if he n needed to grab his backpack quickly there would be space for him to put things.  Once he was done with that, he left the room and found the living room looking exactly the same as the time he had seen it before going to bed.  He let out a small sigh at having his hopes of getting to eat before having to deal with his new guardian, Terisa, dashed.  Resolving himself for the unknown, he walked up and knocked on the door next to the one he had just come out of. 

Not even 5 seconds later the door swung open so quickly that he swore he heard the cracking sound of it breaking the sound barrier.  Terisa stood on the other side with a smile, looking the same as she had before.  He could clearly see her standing still in front of him but somehow his mind told him that she was practically bouncing up and down in excitement.  The few moments he took to look at her without speaking seemed to be all she needed to start the conversation herself. 

"Hey!  You don't sleep for very long, do you?  I got you some food but no paper yet.  Hungry?"

"Uh.  A little, ya."

"Cool."

Kid watched in near horror as Terisa lifted one side of her dress and reached the other hand under it as if searching for something. 

"On second thought, maybe I'm not too hungry at the moment."

Terisa busy out laughing as she pulled both hands away from her body and held them up to show that they were empty. 

"That was just a joke.  Your food's under the cabinet over there.  It's as fresh as I could get it and only lightly cooked.  I put it in there pretty quickly, too, so it should still be fresh and warm with the storage there having slowed time."

Kid went and checked where she had pointed to and opened the little cabinet portion to find nothing but darkness.  He looked back at her and saw that she seemed to be completely unperturbed so he reached his hands in and saw what looked like a ghostly version of his status window.  The main difference was that instead of words there were pictures, one of which was of a plate that held some kind of red meat.  With barely a thought he felt the plate in his hands and was able to pull it out of the darkness, making the ghost window disappear.

He had heard Randy talk about spatial storage but this was the first time he had experienced using one himself.  He looked back over at Terisa, who was now sitting on the couch facing him.  He sighed and and brought his meal to the couch across the table from her and sat down to start eating.  Once he had set the plate on the table, he looked around and realized that he didn't have any eating utensils.  He stood back up and checked in the spatial cabinet again but couldn't find see anything that looked like a knife and fork.  He turned to Terisa to ask her about it and saw that there was now both a fork and knife sitting next to his plate.  He briefly considered asking about it but upon thinking that it might have been another of her jokes he decided to just sit down and start eating without mentioning anything about it.

"So, I thought I'd show you around the sanctuary today.  Usually you're supposed to be a follower before being allowed into a god's sanctuary but you're kind of a special case for several reasons.  I bet you'll have plenty of fun there, too.  By the way, do you have any idea of what skills you need to work on or are there any you're trying to get?"

Kid finished what was in his mouth at the moment before answering her.

"Actually, I wanted to try and level both my species and class first.  I'm thinking on going the rare route I read about and trying to get the full Sorcery skill all at once.  After that there's a couple of other big skills I read about that I want to try for as well but I thought about it and figured trying for Sorcery first would probably be best."

"Wow.  Aren't you an ambitious one?  You do know it takes seven slots, right?  Can you use your class slots?"

"Nope.  Going to have to get more slots some other way.  If I remember correctly, getting my species to a hundred will give me a total of seven slots so I thought I'd just use all my general skills to work on that until I'm done.  The only other skills in my general slots can go into my class slots, anyways."

"Well who am I to say anything against that.  Unfortunately I doubt I'll be too much help with that since I can't use magic.  I was kind of hoping you'd have some gun skills or something you wanted to learn since that's something I can help with."

"Oh?  You're a gunner?"

"Yup.  One nice thing about my species is that there's a few weapons that we're kind of naturals with and guns are one of them.  I think I have most if not all of the base skills that work for guns as well as quite a few of the more advanced ones."

"Well, I guess if you want to help then I do want to try and get Bullet Time and Critical.  Maybe there's some more recommendations you can give, too.  I mean, I won't start really working on it until I finish off Sorcery but it would be nice to have all of the base skills ready."

"Sure!  We can do that!  Alright, now I can stay excited.  Hurry up and finish eating so we can start the tour."

Kid tried to hurry with the last of his food.  Once he was done he stood up and picked up his plate, unsure of what to do with it since he couldn't see any place to put dirty dishes.  Terisa held out her hand as if she wanted the plate and utensils.  He held it for her to take and as he let go they all disappeared.  It took him a second or two before he came to the conclusion that she must have her own personal spatial storage that she stored it in.  Once she had done that she stood up as well and swiftly walked over to the left door of the back wall.

She made no motions to indicate that he should follow her but since she had been seeming so excited about guiding him around he figured that she meant for him to follow her without her saying anything.  He briefly thought about grabbing his backpack first and then through the thought away since he didn't want to annoy Terisa too much at the moment.  He walked over to where she was waiting by the door and as he got within arm's reach she finally opened the door and stepped to the side while motioning for him to enter first.

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What he saw once he went through the door felt like he was looking at the strangest impossibility.  It could best be described as if someone had built one of those weird gravity rooms where stairs and walkways went to and from all sorts of other stairs, walkways, and doors but defied gravity.  It was like a three dimensional maze that required walking on the walls and upside down in order to traverse.  Then someone took that room, the size of which had to be at least 100 meters from wall to wall, and stuck it inside of a multicolored lava lamp.  It was an incredibly surreal sight that boggled his mind and he doubted that he would ever be able to explain exactly how it looked in words to anyone he would ever meet in his life.

"Pretty cool, right?  Our god, Triemo, supposedly got bored for a while and ended up making this place to amuse himself a long time ago.  Some time after that he forgot about it while he was focusing on his followers and all that.  Then his sanctuaries got invaded and attacked and a lot of his followers died.  Since he wanted to prevent it from happening that way ever again, he stuck this old art project of his here.  Each door leads to some place under his control and it takes something special to be able to navigate the place properly.  

Now, even though there are quite a few doors that will go to other layers, you obviously can't go through them since you aren't qualified to be there.  There are some special exceptions, though.  The insides of a dungeon when not tied directly to a layer, such as being part of trial or something, are considered their own space.  So if someone happens to have ownership of a dungeon and a way to get to that dungeon without actually going to the layer that the dungeon is supposedly on, well..."

"So, your god owns a dungeon?"

"Oh no no no.  That would be against the rules.  Randy and I both own several dungeons, though.  We're also quite the followers of Triemo and have dedicated most, if not all, that we own to him and his service.  So since we are considered under his control and the dungeons are considered under our control then in an indirect manner the dungeons are under his control even though they don't actually belong to him.  I can't show you any of that old dwarf's dungeons since I'm not in that chain but I can show you the ones I own.  Well, some of them.  Most are probably way too much for you right now.  That's for later, though.

For right now I'm just going to let you enjoy the view as we head to the center.  You're going to need a little something while you're here.  Hopefully it'll also make you see Triemo in a positive light and consider choosing to follow him, as well."

"Aren't you supposed to be less blunt and more...I don't know...suave when trying to convert people to your faith?"

"Why?  Triemo's already pretty great even though people misunderstand him.  Just because he's trying to make a good impression and you know about it won't change that.  Why should I bother not admitting that he wants to make a good impression, then?  It's not like he'll suddenly turn all bad and mean if you do become his follower.  Plus, he's already probably the only god...maybe...that not only doesn't care about you being an unintentional enemy of Aeon just by existing but thinks that it's great and wants you as a follower even more.  Wait.  I think that came out wrong.

Okay, he doesn't want you because you're an enemy, exactly.  He wants you because you don't seem too bothered by people thinking that you're an enemy.  He's just as much against actual enemies of Aeon as much as any other normal god."

"I got it.  You don't have to keep explaining.  I still want to check out other gods, though.  I mean, I'm at least leaning in his direction already but just always immediately picking the first option presented seems like a bad way to survive without incredulous amounts of luck."

"No, ya.  That's fair.  Just, uh, be real careful about who sees your status and all that.  Etherai and Blood Demons were hunted down so much for a reason and several gods are still looking to continue those hunts.  Enough of that.  How do you like this place?  DId you even notice that we're upside down from the door we came through, now?"

"Wait, really?  I was just following you..."

He looked back and saw the still open door on what looked like the ceiling now.  He had been so focused on the conversation that he had somehow missed how they ended up being upside down.  He looked around and tried to trace their path but his eyes got confused by the convoluted ways everything seemed to be put together and had to look away when he started to feel dizzy.  He looked back at Terisa and saw her holding back a laugh.

"Don't worry about it.  It's supposed to be confusing.  Just enjoy how pretty and cool everything looks.  There's actually a lot of cool stuff just floating around in here.  You might be able to see some of it while we're walking.  I am taking the scenic route so you can enjoy the view."

Kid smiled a little at that.  Even though he was more of being forced to than being allowed to, it was nice to relax a bit and take in the beautiful and wondrous scenery.  Every since he had first appeared in that white space he had been rushing in some manner or another.  Actually taking his time for once and not feeling like he needed to be hurrying was a good way to relieve some of the stress he only now realized had been building up.  His shoulders started feeling a little lighter and he didn't try to think of anything other than enjoying the strangeness he could see.  That included the occasional object that seemed to come out of nowhere and fly off to somewhere.

He actually lost track of time as they walked and it wasn't until he saw a something completely different from everything else in their path as they turned a corner that he realized they had been walking for more than an hour.  The only way he was even able to figure that out was due to the nifty countdown clock at the edge of his vision.  The thing in front of them that they were walking towards looked like a glowing green seed the size of his head made out of crystallized energy.  It probably wasn't the most descriptive way he could have explained what he was looking at but he felt that it was the most apt.

Terisa walked up to it and touched it gently, almost in a reverential manner, before turning towards Kid.

"Alright, come on.  This is the center of the sanctuary and this thing here is called the Conduit.  Every god's sanctuary has one.  Think of it as...a communication crystal of sorts.  It will allow you to talk to Triemo for a bit.  Most gods are a little more stingy and won't allow anyone except their highest ranked priests and followers to ever get near their Conduit but Triemo is a pretty relaxed guy and wanted to talk to you for a bit.  All you have to do is touch it."

"So if I touch that I'm going to talk to an actual god?  Is that really normal?"

"Ya.  That's how anyone except an apostle has actual conversations with their gods.  Otherwise it's more vague and often hard to understand.  Usually, anyways.  Now touch it.  Come on."

"Fine..."

Kid reached out and hesitated slightly just before his fingertips reached the crystal.  In a way it was kind of hard to imagine that he would be speaking with a god.  He took a moment to think about how he should behave first.  After all it would probably be a bad idea to be rude to a god.  He took a final breath and set his determination as he finally moved his hand the last few centimeters to touch the crystal.

The entire world seemed to darken, even to his night vision.  He could also see that some of the flowing and moving stuff around seemed to stop, almost as if time itself had stopped around him.  He tried to look around more but found it hard to move.  He considered trying to take his hand back off of the crystal when he heard a voice that sounded like it belonged to a young boy.

"Yo!  Hi there!  Hello.  I'm happy we get to talk, finally.  I'm Triemo, by the way."

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