Hoffa walked into the empty compartment and sat in a corner, staring out the window.
The storm raged on. In the distance, the Scottish mountains and fields of wheat blurred like a gray Impressionist painting, indistinct and hazy, rendering everything unclear.
The stifling feeling of being constrained by rules seemed to lessen, bringing him a rare moment of comfort. Like a parched, stranded blue whale finally diving into the pitch-black depths of the ocean, his thoughts and senses grew increasingly sensitive.
The more sensitive he became, the more exhausted he felt.
The more exhausted he felt, the more he longed to rest.
Then, he heard a voice resonating from deep within his chest:
"Do not resist."
Hoffa felt himself being pulled into a void—not an external one, but one within himself. He no longer felt fear, allowing himself to sink into that emptiness.
It felt as though he had traversed a long and arduous journey: countless enemies, countless worries, countless trials, countless tasks, countless failures, all leading to this moment.
A voice echoed in his mind.
Rest now.Rest for a quarter of an hour, Hoffa.
He glanced at the long lounge chair beside him and, almost involuntarily, lay down on it.
The wooden chair seemed to transform into soft cotton candy beneath him.
As soon as he lay down, he began to sink.
One meter.
Two meters.
Three meters.
Ten meters.
Twenty meters.
Thirty meters.
A hundred meters.
Two hundred meters.
The descending blue whale pierced through the oppressive ocean, sinking endlessly amidst countless bubbles, like a body in free fall.
The acceleration of gravity.
His speed increased, faster and faster, until it seemed like he was a meteor hurtling toward Earth.
He fell into the depths of the Earth.
Through the darkness of the planet's core.
In that darkness, a pair of enormous, mottled eyes gazed at him.
He met those eyes briefly but felt no attachment to them.
He continued to fall, arriving in an unfamiliar space.
Here, vibrant and ever-changing colors swirled—red, yellow, blue, purple—softly blending into one another in a dazzling display of beauty.
Everything he desired seemed to be here.
Future meals, McDonald's, KFC, pizza; headphones, phones, music, televisions—all of it. The screens displayed countless unfamiliar yet oddly familiar faces.
On closer inspection, he realized those faces were all versions of himself. Their lips moved, speaking incomprehensible words.
He glanced at those strange figures and continued to fall, diving through cells, molecules, atoms, atomic nuclei, protons, and quarks. His speed accelerated further, approaching the speed of light.
Then, he saw the Void.
A boundless world stretched before him, containing nothing but a single lounge chair.
The chair was the very one he had just reclined on.
Yes, he was about to lie back on it.
Even if it meant abandoning everything behind him—
All reality, all emotions—
He had to lie down.
Closer.
Closer.
Closer.
Snap!
A pair of large hands grabbed Hoffa's arm, yanking him up from just a centimeter away from the chair.
The hands pulled him through layers of intertwined spaces, forcibly dragging him back into the real world.
Hoffa's mind jolted, like the sensation of falling from the edge of a bed while asleep. He woke up with a start, drenched in sweat.
The person who had pulled him back was the skinny boy smoking at the door. The boy stared at Hoffa coldly and said, "Do you want to die?"
Hoffa stared at him for a few seconds before closing his eyes without hesitation, slipping into a meditative state.
Inside his mental realm, his consciousness had become a kaleidoscopic ocean—a sea formed of countless faces.
Those faces, identical to his own, screamed, wailed, and twisted in rage, becoming indescribably grotesque.
His sense of self had been reduced to a solitary island in the middle of that ocean.
The sight was almost enough to make him faint.
He realized something was deeply wrong with his mind. Otherwise, he wouldn't be plagued by such frequent hallucinations.
He began to reflect, wondering when he had experienced his first hallucination. As he thought about it, his mind drifted back to the moment he was chasing Norbert Hagrid and saw that colorful dragon egg in his house.
That must have been the first time he hallucinated.
But back then, he hadn't given it much thought.
This time, however, he could no longer afford to ignore it.
What exactly was the object Norbert Hagrid had taken with him? Something so bizarre it could influence someone's mind without them even realizing it—Hoffa had never encountered such a magical artifact before!
Before he could delve further into his thoughts, the dense faces began to split and multiply like cells.
His memories, his life, all his secrets were laid bare, as if drawers filled with documents had been flung open and exposed to the grotesque faces.
The more they observed, the more those faces began to resemble his own.
They were assimilating him.
A shiver ran down Hoffa's spine. In that moment, he remembered the monstrous creatures he had seen in Helheim during his first year. These faces seemed to share similar characteristics.
Seeing his mental world on the verge of being completely devoured by the sickening faces, Hoffa gritted his teeth and entered a deeper meditative state.
He severed all perception of external stimuli, withdrawing his spirit entirely into his body. The thunderbird markings on the back of his hand quickly spread across his entire form.
In his mental realm, flashes of electricity erupted, forming sharp blades. Like a surgeon, Hoffa began cutting away at the intruding faces in his mind.
Each slice brought excruciating pain to his brain, as though he were carving his own flesh.
Even more terrifying was how, the moment a face was cut away, it would take root upon hitting the ground and reappear, multiplying even faster.
Hoffa's entire magical power, even his very life force, transformed into the charged magic of the thunderbird. After what felt like an eternity of struggle, he finally managed to purge the terrifying will invading his mind.
When he awoke, the sky outside had turned completely dark.
The silver-haired boy in the plaid shirt was sitting on the table in the compartment, the floor littered with cigarette butts. The choking smell of smoke hung so thick in the air that it was almost suffocating.
Hoffa coughed a few times, his face pale as paper. While he was grateful the boy had pulled him back from the brink of losing himself, the overpowering stench was unbearable.
"Do you understand the Void?"
The boy flicked ash from his cigarette and asked nonchalantly.
"The Void?" Hoffa was puzzled.
"What do you mean? Can you explain it more clearly?"
"Explain it clearly? No, I can't."
The silver-haired boy exhaled a puff of smoke, letting it blow directly into Hoffa's face. "After thinking for a while, he uttered just one sentence: 'The Void is this world.'"
"What do you mean?"
"Exactly what it sounds like."
The boy responded indifferently.
Hoffa pondered for a long moment and then asked quietly, "Am I sick?"
"You could put it that way."
"And how do I cure it?"
"There's no cure."
The boy shook his head. "You've been cursed by awareness."
Hoffa was taken aback, stunned into silence.
The smoker continued, "The Void is the essence of this world. Beneath the rules lies a crude and hidden reality. Powerful wizards with strong mental fortitude can sense it, but no one can escape it."
The boy lit another cigarette, took a deep drag, and exhaled deeply.
"It's like death—we all face it. Whether it's sooner or later, death is death."
At that moment, the train let out a whistle and began to slow as it approached a station.
He patted Hoffa on the shoulder and hopped off the table. "Don't think too much. The train has arrived. If you still want to make it to the banquet, you'd better go get changed."
With that, he casually strolled out of the compartment.
Hoffa jolted to his feet. "Hey, what's your name?"
But the boy didn't answer. By the time Hoffa chased after him, he had vanished, leaving only a stomped-out cigarette butt on the ground.
(End of Chapter)
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