Pitter Patter
As the heavy rain continued to pour down for an unknown amount of time, daylight finally shone brightly at an alley.
In the alley, a man dressed in a suit finally began to show signs of movement. Their limbs started to twitch for a while, and before long, the man's eyes slowly opened.
"Ungh, damn it. That pain and heat was killing me." Damien gritted his teeth, still feeling the residue of the burning effect. What was shocking enough was that his eyes felt clarity like never before.
"Was my vision always this perfect?" He muttered in disbelief.
Suddenly, a horrible recollection nearly stunned him on the spot. He tried his best to compose himself, but he was definitely positive about one thing.
'My eyes were definitely bleeding heavily. But my vision didn't worsen but became greater?' His body shivered uncontrollably at the mysterious events that occurred to him.
First, there was a shiny object penetrating his body. Second, there was a Joker laughing. And finally, his vision became crystal clear. Not to mention, his body felt lighter than before.
"Right, my money." He exclaimed and turned to the side, only to notice a different type of briefcase was next to him.
The briefcase wasn't colored black, but was of brown color. Not to mention, the design and texture of it were unfamiliar to him. It didn't even appear to be filled to the brim.
He had a bad premonition, and sure enough, it came true the moment he opened the briefcase. There was no cash stored inside, and only some paperwork.
A dazed look could be seen on Damien's face.
'Did I get robbed and taunted?' He wondered. He browsed through the paperwork and his confusion only increased further.
[Velgrave: 3 victims so far. Killer(s) on the loose. Possible Transcendent involved.]
'Killers on the loose? Transcendent? What kind of nonsense is this?' The wording listed in the paperwork made zero sense.
He got up and patted his clothes, shaking off some of the excess water from the rain. It was only then he realized his clothes also happened to be changed.
His suit vanished, and what he wore appeared to be a long coat type. The situation continued to baffle him.
"Ugh, let's just leave through the tunnel—" Damien paused when he noticed the discreet underground tunnel was no longer present. "Ah, someone must have played a dirty prank on me."
Without needing further investigation, Damien was positive that he was ambushed and the shiny object must have been an injection shot of some sort. Otherwise, how could it have made him feel an excruciating amount of pain, followed by a loss of consciousness?
The only grateful part was that it appeared the enemy didn't wish to take his life. They simply toyed with him, changed his outfit, and snatched all of his hard-earned money from the scums.
'Well, money lost could be earned.' Damien thought. He wasn't going to rant and throw a fit when none of those actions would salvage the situation.
Nevertheless, that didn't mean he was going to forgive whoever did this to him.
'Leaving me alive is going to be their biggest mistake.' He placed all the paperwork back in the briefcase and held it tightly. Although dangerous, he was going to retrace his steps and inspect the possible flaws in his route.
Yet the moment he exited the hidden alley and was blinded by the daylight, Damien's eyes widened in disbelief. "W-Where the hell am I?"
What greeted him wasn't the familiar streets, but a completely new environment. The streets were filled with people in unique clothes and carriages pulled by some lion-creature beast.
Amidst Damien's confusion, nearby people who spotted him held an astonished look before sidestepping to walk around him.
In response, Damien scratched his head and wondered if these pedestrians were wary of him.
He attempted to do a small test and step into the center of the street. Sure enough, the people quickly avoided him like a plague.
Startled and alarmed, he wanted to ask one of them about the situation but got distracted. Mainly because there was a more unbelievable scene happening. He witnessed some people floating— no, it was more accurate that these people were flying in the sky.
His mouth was left agape at the spectacular sight.
'Am I in some kind of a fantasy genre television show as an extra?' He wondered, searching for the green screen and the exit door. Additionally, he wanted to find the film crew. After all, such magical elements were impossible to exist.
Naturally, Damien knew he was just deceiving himself and was using it as a coping mechanism to avoid reality.
Whatever mystery incident that occurred to him last night, had inadvertently transferred him to another dimension. There was no other possible explanation.
'I'll need to understand the geography here.' Damien recollected his thought process and set up a few objectives.
Crying over spilled milk was equivalent to wasting time. So rather than doing that, he needed to ensure his information and knowledge were up to par. Otherwise, he won't even know how he might meet his demise.
Since he required some geographical knowledge of his current location, Damien decided to ask the people on the street.
He chose a person and asked, "Do you know where this place is?"
Almost immediately, the person's face turned pale white. His mouth was trembling and his eyes seemed to have lost some color.
"Oh dear, that person got involved with a Transcendent Investigator?"
"Shush, you want to be taken in detainment and never see the daylight?"
As the nearby passerby noticed this scene, they quickly hastened their speed and fled the street. Within the blink of an eye, the originally crowded street turned somewhat desolate, with only very few people who had no choice but to cross this street.
Meanwhile, the most bewildered of them all was none other than Damien.
'Transcendent Investigator? Who is that?' He was startled and had a feeling they were talking about him. However, that didn't make any sense to him. All he did was stop a person and attempt to ask for their location.
Why in the world would the person react as if they were a criminal who got caught?
"I-Investigator… Please don't toy with my heart. We're at Velgrave City, a city of Tatum Kingdom."
"A city of the Tatum Kingdom, Velgrave?" Confused, Damien slightly tilted his head. He was trying to comprehend if there was ever such a location in his memory.
Amidst his silence pondering, the person who was stopped by him could no longer endure further. Their legs were shaking heavily and they plopped to the floor.
"Investigator, is there anything you need from me?" They asked anxiously.
"Point me the direction that has a general map of this location," Damien demanded. Since the other party was visibly afraid of him, then he might as well exert some dominance to get what he wanted.
Sure enough, the person seemed to be relieved of what appeared to be doomsday and they hurriedly gave all the directions explicitly to him.
Afterward, the person bowed and excused themselves.
When Damien witnessed how scared the person ran away, he furrowed his brow in response. 'So many magical elements at present but they are afraid of me?'
He shook his head and proceeded to turn toward the North direction. The streets were all labeled quite neatly with the VN being in front.
VN 32th street, fifth avenue
VN was an acronym for Velgrave North.
It was confusing at first, but once Damien got used to the street naming, he became accustomed to it.
There were five stages of acceptance: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
He had already gone through denial and skipped over the other three to acceptance. By now, he already accepted that he might be in another dimension or realm.
"Too many unknown variables." He murmured. In an equation to solve the unknown variables, one must do it step by step without trying to skim through it.
The first unknown variable was his change of location.
The second unknown variable was the pile of paperwork in the unfamiliar briefcase.
The third unknown variable was the meaning of Transcendent.
Finally, the last unknown variable was the status and identity of a Transcendent Investigator.
Four different unknown variables, each one more complicated than the previous one.
'If I knew this would be the outcome for gambling, then I would have stopped when I won big and called it a day.' Damien lamented inwardly.