Just as those thoughts echoed in my mind, the Night Dimension—filled with an endless dark ocean and illuminated by the faint yellowish-orange light of the eclipsed sun—transformed into a manifestation of luminous brilliance.
Two equidistant horizontal cracks opened wide enough to form two giant oval holes, through which boundless light emerged as if two new suns had appeared in this dimension. This divine light burned away all traces of night, boiling the entire endless dark ocean.
'Oof! If I were just a few seconds late I would've either gotten boiled by the dark ocean water, vaporized by the divine light or sucked into the cracks by the whirlpools.'
I disregarded all those thoughts and tried my hardest to levitate towards the eclipsed sun. It took a bit of time and all my energy to keep levitating and rise to the heavens.
Unlike normal physical activities, the act of levitation made me tired like it was consuming a finite resource in my body. It was especially hard because the momentum from the water pillar eruption was slowing down faster than my illusory soul body was 'drying'.
Meaning I could not depend on levitation, and instead would have to rely on latching on to the sun or the moon, and that is exactly what I tried to do.
Soon, I was finally close enough to see the true state of the eclipsed sun. But what I saw was completely out of my expectations.
I imagined the eclipsed sun would just be like the real-world eclipsed sun where a moon covers the sun creating the eclipse, just a much smaller replica.
Indeed, I was correct about this dimension's sun being an illusory replica that was much smaller and closer to sea level than the real one.
But the moon… the moon did not exist, and instead there was a giant pitch-black circular hole in space—better known as a portal…
This portal hindered sunlight by exactly aligning with the unmoving sun above it, even though it was noticeably smaller than the sun, they aligned just well enough to cause a eclipse.
But one thing puzzled me, 'how could an obstruction smaller than the sun, be able to completely eclipse it to the point that it shadowed an entire endless ocean? Even on Earth, only a small portion of the world could see a complete solar eclipse, then how did this nightmare dimension have a complete solar eclipse to an infinite range?
'Was the ocean not truly endless? Were only the first two whirlpools on my left and right the real ones, and the rest just rows of illusion—well illusions among illusions haha? Or was there something special with the sun or the portal?'
Because of all these questions, I was extremely sceptical about this pitch-black portal and wanted to stay away from it as much as possible.
Unfortunately, I still wasn't completely weightless and my upward momentum was coming to a halt; I had to grab onto something unless I wanted to fall back into the now boiling water of the dark sea.
So, against my better judgement, I swayed a bit to the left by using my partially awakened levitating ability and grabbed the damn portal's left edge.
To my surprise that actually worked, I'm not sure if I could grab it because I was an illusory soul body or if the edge of the portal was made out of something completely tangible. But I surely wasn't complaining…
Out of stupid curiosity, I tried to put my hand into the portal, and just as I thought it went in and came without problems, lessening my worries a bit. And then I tried to put my head in. What I saw was both shocking and expected at the same time.
The portal led to the same abyssal limbo realm of eternal darkness that led me here after an eternal fall…
I thought the dark colour of the portal was just like an overpaint. I expected to see something different on the other side of the portal, like a different more colourful and adventurous new 'level' for me. But to my dismay, I just had to return to where it all started.
'So this nightmare dimension is in fact a different dimension than the abyssal limbo realm, but at the same time, it's technically also the bottom of the abyss due to the existence of the portal… So if I'm my guess is correct, I fell an unknown distance into the abyss and at its bottom was this 'hole' in the fabric of space and time that served as an entrance to the nightmare dimension. Interesting...'
As I was motionlessly hanging on the portal thinking about what I did to deserve this hell, I felt a gradual rise in temperature.
I was nearly weightless by now, so hanging on the edge of the portal was not that hard but the cracks below the ocean were still widening more and more. Letting in more and more divine golden light which was slowly cooking the entire nightmare dimension.
I had to do something before the cracks completely opened up or else I might get burned even at this height. I looked around to see if there was any other escape but all I saw was my hopes getting crushed even more making my frown deepen.
At this great height, where I could observe this world far more vastly; I saw true horror, a glimpse of infinite disaster.
Initially, I believed there were only two lanes of infinite whirlpools, one to my left and one to my right. However, while observing this world from an altitude that reached its moon—the portal that replaced the moon—I realized that there were not just two lanes of whirlpools on my right and left, but also an infinite number of lanes in front of me and behind me. Two vast grids of country-sized whirlpools stretched parallel to each other, reaching to the horizon and beyond. And in between these two parallel grids of infinite whirlpools was me—an infinitesimal soul hanging on for dear life.
I was about to fall into hopelessness, but a weird observation kicked me out of my reverie before I could, 'Why are all the whirlpools in the right grid rotating clockwise, whereas all the ones on the left grid rotating counterclockwise?' He lingered for a bit and then continued his train of thought.
'Given that the ocean is truly endless and filled with countless dark whirlpools, I wonder how a complete eclipse functions, even on Earth only a relatively small area experiences a complete solar eclipse, and the rest of the world is only partially eclipsed by the sun or isn't at all. So shouldn't the far reaches of this endless dark ocean be bright and shimmering with the full illumination of the illusory sun's light? Instead, all of it is just dark, well except for the parts of the beaming pillars of light coming through the endless number of cracks below the whirlpool. I need to think about this later when I'm not hanging at the edge of death… literally.'
I looked down only to see my previous haven, the centre between the first right and the first left whirlpool was now a death pool of boiling water. The only way left to escape certain death was to go through the portal and get back to eternal falling.
I tugged at my mind as much as I could and thought of different ways to get out of this predicament, I moved to the side, a little beyond the left edge of the circular portal, and looked past it to see the full sun.
It was nowhere near as big as the real sun but it was still just as radiant from so close and looked giant compared to my soul body.
There was no way I was going to survive trying to reach it. It would be no different than getting cooked by the divine light of the cracks.
While looking at the sun I also pulled myself up from the edge of the portal a little and saw the back side of the portal; which was also a hole—this was a double-faced portal, and both faces led to the same pure dark abyssal limbo realm.
Realizing there was no other option, I braced myself to go through the sea-facing side of the portal and start another eternity of endless falling.
I had chosen the sea-facing side of the portal because I believed there was a small chance that this 'face' of the portal existed at the bottom of the abyssal limbo realm, and I had just fallen through it to reach this nightmare dimension.
Henceforth, by going into the sea-facing side of the portal hole, there was a small chance that I would at least have a solid floor to stand on in the abyssal limbo realm.
Before I could finish my thought, The cracks on the ocean floor completely opened up, letting in boundless light.
I reacted quickly and pulled myself up to get propelled into the portal. Inside it, I was struck by the eternal pitch-black darkness once again, with the only source and project of light being my own soul body.
I looked around and saw nothing that resembled a bottom floor, so even though I had successfully escaped certain doom, I was back to eternally falling.
'I was at least safe from the nightmare dimension…' I thought.
As I was careening up into the space of the abyssal limbo realm, I wanted to check if I could stand on the edge of the portal on this side, There wouldn't be much room but still better than literally nothing. So I tried to levitate to move sideways—And I couldn't…
Because there was absolute darkness and no air resistance in the abyssal limbo realm, I thought that my levitation still worked but it just didn't have the way to sense it.
Then the realisation exploded in my illusory brain. The abyssal limbo realm didn't just pull my soul body down, or it didn't just stop my ability to levitate… It did fucking both.
It not only negated my ability to levitate but it also pulled me down at the same time, and not just that it pulled me towards the damn portal as well.
'No!'
This was completely beyond my expectations, If it was only one of the two problems, I could've solved either in two ways.
If I was just being pulled down, I could've levitated sideways and landed on the portal's edge. If it just negated my levitation I could've leveraged my momentum from pulling myself up, to land on the portal's edge.
But all failed, and I fell again; this time going through the portal. I tried to grab the left edge but it was just beyond my reach.
And just like that, my hopeless illusory eyes lost all their lustre as I fell to my doom…
The infernal divine golden light emanating from the fully open, oval-shaped cracks overwhelmed the nightmare dimension itself, causing it to crumble.
The 'Sky' folded and twisted until it finally collapsed, and the entire dimension, along with the very fabric of space and time, fell into two elliptical holes. In my horrified state, I too was drawn toward the left oval hole.
What surprised me, despite my fear, was that the dimension was cude-shaped as it collapsed. while falling It was further divided into two cubes, each falling through the cracks beneath the first two whirlpools on either side.
My illusory skin got burned to a crisp by the boundless divine light. I uncontrollably screamed as loud as I could to cope with the unbearable pain, but no sound came out. But I still covered my head with my arms to protect my eyes. For some reason, I felt like there was something I needed to see.
Just before I was enveloped by the divine light, and closed my eyes forever—I caught a glimpse of what lay through and beyond the left oval hole...
It was a mirror, and it reflected the left eye of an unfathomable cosmic existence, within that eye, was I…
Before I could comprehend anything else, I was completely enveloped by boundless divine golden light and got vaporised out of existence.
All my efforts were gone to waste, my hope to go back home was destroyed, my desire to reunite with my friends and family was burned to dust, and my wish to make the best of my situation and maybe enjoy an adventurous journey in another world was nothing but naive delusion. I was dead…
///
'Wait… if I died how am I thinking? What the hell is happening?'
My eyes slowly regained their composure, I was confused as much as I was ecstatic.
I saw the scenery before me, it was similar to the one I had seen beyond the oval hole. The same mirror and it reflected the same left eye.
This time, I noticed more details. The cosmic entity had a face—a human face with one nose, one mouth, two eyes, and two ears.
As I concentrated, I began to notice more details about the entity and its surroundings. Tears streamed from its eyes, but surprisingly, its expression was not sad or sorrowful; in fact, it looked quite pleasant.
I noticed that this entity closely resembled a human. It had two legs and two arms. When I moved the entity's hands closer to my face, I saw ten fingers. Leaning forward to look down at my feet, I noticed ten toes, just like any other human being.
'Wait 'I' moved the entity's hands? The cosmic entity whose eyes contained this whole dimension was… me?'
.......