The Outside of the World was empty.
Utterly, completely empty.
In the truest sense of the word, there was nothing here.
Not even the concepts of time or space existed in this place.
For a human being, stepping into such a realm would immediately cause their consciousness to shut down—unable to perceive time or space, they would lose all sense of meaning in their existence, eventually dying unaware, assimilated into the void itself.
The moment Taigong Wang entered, his consciousness briefly flickered. Fortunately, he had already prepared a bounded field beforehand, imposing a vague sense of time and space within its confines, allowing him to quickly regain his senses.
He turned to look beside him, where his Master should have been, safely enclosed within the same bounded field.
Or so it should have been.
"...Master?!"
Taigong Wang was stunned.
There was nothing beside him.
Where was his Master?!
Where did his perfectly good Master go?!
This shouldn't be happening!
Panic surged in Taigong Wang's heart. He had definitely brought his Master in with him, enveloping them both in the same bounded field. There was no way his Master could have just vanished without him noticing anything wrong!
"Master!"
"Master, where are you?!"
His frantic shouts echoed through the Outside of the World.
"If you can hear me, answer me! Don't you dare lose consciousness! You still have a grand ideal to fulfill—you can't just die halfway through…!"
Meanwhile, Roy floated in the endless void.
Here, there was no space, no time—none of the fundamental constructs that allowed sentient beings to maintain their sense of self. Worse, he had no bounded field to sustain even a semblance of these concepts.
His consciousness had completely stalled, unable to react to anything around him.
In this emptiness, he drifted.
And drifted.
And drifted.
An unknowable amount of time passed.
It might have been an instant.
Or hundreds of millions of years.
Then—something appeared before him.
A colossal entity.
A being so vast that Roy's tiny form was like a single drop of water compared to an endless ocean.
The creature had a slender, vaguely humanoid shape, with two soft protrusions resembling female breasts on its chest. But its face was monstrous—a gaping maw lined with razor-sharp fangs, stretching all the way to its cheeks, as if it could swallow the entire world in a single bite.
Fortunately, its eyes were closed, and its chest rose and fell rhythmically.
It was sleeping.
The creature floated in the void until, at some point, as if sensing something, it slowly opened its eyes.
Eyes like blooming cherry blossoms—dreamy, pink, and filled with starlight.
The moment those eyes opened, they locked onto Roy's insignificant form.
"You've come…"
A low, feminine murmur reverberated through the void.
Her massive form rapidly shrank, and after an immeasurable span, her gargantuan size and terrifying appearance melted away, leaving behind a figure indistinguishable from a human woman.
Her features were like the finest masterpiece of a Primordial Mother Goddess—every inch of her radiated serene beauty. Long, silvery-white hair cascaded like the finest silk down her back. Her voluptuous figure was barely concealed by scant strips of cloth, leaving vast stretches of skin exposed, the teasing ambiguity only adding to her allure.
She approached Roy, her gaze falling upon the blue orb in his hand.
Tilting her head slightly, an almost childlike innocence flickered in her pink eyes.
"Bad thing. Not good for children."
She reached out, plucked the orb from Roy's grasp, and—
Gulp!
Tossed it into her mouth, swallowing it whole without even chewing.
A satisfied smile graced her lips.
Then, her form shimmered like a mirage, and she floated forward, merging with Roy's body as seamlessly as a pebble sinking into the ocean.
"Wake up, my child… Mother is calling you to rise…"
Suddenly.
Like jolting awake from a nightmare—
Roy's eyes snapped open.
Disorientation flickered in his gaze before clarity returned, and the full weight of what had just happened crashed down on him. A cold sweat broke out across his body.
"What the—Taigong Wang, where the hell are you?!"
"Where did I even end up?! Is this still the Outside of the World?!"
A thousand curses burned in Roy's mind.
Taigong Wang had promised to bring him in safely within a bounded field!
But now, he was alone—no Taigong Wang, no bounded field in sight!
In a place like this, a normal human—no, even a homunculus like him—couldn't withstand the absence of time and space. If he hadn't woken up, he would've died here without even realizing it!
Roy's heart swelled with resentment toward Taigong Wang.
What kind of fraud claims to have the qualifications of a Grand Caster but can't even maintain a proper bounded field?!
When I find him, I'm giving him a piece of my mind!
Grumbling internally, Roy swiftly got to work, using Runes to construct a makeshift bounded field around himself. It was flimsy, barely imposing any sense of time or space, but it was better than nothing. At least now, he could maintain some level of awareness.
"Come to think of it… did I hear someone calling herself my 'mother' earlier? Was that a dream?"
Roy rubbed his head, muttering to himself in confusion.
There was nothing around him.
No trace of anything unusual on his body.
Must have been a dream, right?
"If only all of this really were just a dream…"
He let out a bitter laugh.
After years of suffering in this world, losing one thing after another—who would want this kind of life?
If this is what transmigration is like, even a dog wouldn't take it!
Then—
"Do you truly despise everything you've experienced here so much?"
Like a flash of light crossing infinite distances, Roy suddenly found himself standing before an immense boundary.
It had no physical form—stretching endlessly in all directions, so vast that his mind short-circuited trying to comprehend it. The only thing he could process was the certainty that this was a boundary.
A figure materialized before him.
"...Aoko?"
Roy froze.
"No. You're not Aoko."
The woman before him had the same vibrant red hair and alluring figure as Aozaki Aoko.
But no matter how he looked at her, Roy couldn't associate her with Aoko.
His brain simply refused to make the connection, as if the information had been forcibly implanted the moment she appeared.
"Correct. I am not Aozaki Aoko."
The woman shrugged—a gesture eerily identical to Aoko's.
"I am the Root of this world. Or rather, a simulated personality crafted specifically to converse with you."
***
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