Sleep deeply.

Though Queen Catherine II allows use of however many rooms you desire, both of your party members insist only one is needed.

Now you lay here, cozy in a bed fit for a couple, though you're sharing it with two others. All three of you are beneath the blankets, garbed in nothing but what the world gave you. You feel the warm touch of their embrace--skin smooth and soft, smelling sweetly after such a pleasant bath. While pajamas were brought on this journey, evidently they aren't needed. Nyllia holds your left, partly down your body, with an arm tight around your side. On the other end, Xiaoqing has her head nestled by your neck. There she snuggles up against you, embracing beneath your chin. You won't be moving anytime soon.

You sink into the bed and drift off into a deep sleep.

Earlier in your adventure, you remember the sensation of levelling up. While you do miss it, you've grown in more fantastic ways. 10th Level Demon King. That's the class given to you by dark experimentation. It's unlikely you and William where the first attempts, though you're likely the only ones which succeeded. No matter how much you grow and move past Elok Daven, and how many other titles you gain, your very self is branded with this class. That's how GOA's system works. Not everything or everybody has one, though it offers one the ability to ascend past ordinary limits. Your very existence is a betrayal of it. While it does as was stated, this was not a gift from GOA at all. Your class was the result of somebody playing god, and definitely not with good intentions.

A man from Earth, frustrated that in this new world, he couldn't even have a class of his own, dedicated to playing Absoterra like a game, climbing to the top, and becoming stronger than anybody else, to then return home and do as he pleases. As William said, you both have the potential to do the same. Breiah is likely the mastermind behind much of it, though you have many other allies with varying talents.

So what are you doing here?

It wasn't your decision to come to Absoterra, but it's certainly been a trip. You didn't have to live the frustration of feeling disconnected because of Elok and Breiah's experiments. You had a class, albeit a fake one. You had control of your mana. You wonder how things would have gone if you fell into this world without any of that.

Isekai Theory. People have occasionally appeared in Absoterra from Earth throughout history. Perhaps sometimes intentional, most times not. Whenever it's happened, the person has had to live with a disconnect. Maybe they lived normal lives, just like any other commoner without a class--someone who doesn't adventure, or become a protagonist of a grander story. It could be where certain clothing styles came from, or maybe recipes for food. There's no telling what influence Earth has had on this world.

On the other hand, maybe there have been other ways--methods unknown to even Breiah in her long life. Absoterra is large. There's an entire land across the sea to the east for example, and if this world is as large as Earth, there's a substantial amount you haven't seen or even heard about. Maybe Elok Daven's path was less about necessity, and more about reckless ambition.

There's always another way. Not only that, but you're the one who came out victorious.

You open your eyes.

It isn't morning yet. It's actually pitch black. I must have barely slept if--Wait, but I'm standing up. Where's Nyllia, and Xiaoqing?

When you look down, you see your hands clear as day, though everything else is an endless void. It takes a moment for your mind to fully awaken, but you catch on quickly after what's happening. Then you move your eyes back up, and you see a familiar shape manifest in a blurry flicker.

Her body is a bare silhouette, likely to be invisible within this abyss without the texture of shifting stars and colourful galaxies--a nebula seen through her like a hole in space. Though she has no mouth, her eyes are stunning, bright orbs of moonlight. A head of hair, though it looks more like clouds of glittery mist, wafts to the side from atop her head, appearing as swirling vortexes of purple and blue. When she speaks, her voice echoes from all directions. There are no lips to move, though you've kissed her regardless, and one far more than that. Compared to the first time she came to you in your dreams, this feels different. You can feel her warmth, and while she does float before you like an anomaly of magic, you know far more about her now--that she's an etherite, that she designed the Trial of the Erotrain, that in your embrace she doesn't feel that different than any mortal girl, and that she has a sister called--

"Nae is missing," speaks Aris with urgency.

You remember. She was working with Elok and Breiah--an etherite of course, though a slimmer build, and her nebulous hair was up in pigtails. She trapped you within her domain, though after defeating the illidrake, you managed to escape.

"What do you mean?" you ask.

You blink and you miss her. Suddenly she's gone, though you turn your head to the right, and spot her a mere foot from your face. She then takes your hand. Upon such close proximity, you lose yourself for a moment in just how alien yet strikingly beautiful this woman is. "You're... as gorgeous as the night sky," you mutter. It causes her to move back, though her hand squeezes tighter.

Then she wraps her arms around you into a passionate embrace. Her hair is impossible to describe--supernaturally soft, yet your hands also pass straight through.

"I've missed you," she says. "I'm sorry that my return is for something bad."

"It's all right. What were you saying about your sister?"

"We sealed Nae away after what she did. But not long ago, she was freed from her cell. Nobody knows where she went, but she will be hunted. I know she's done terrible things, but it makes me heart ache to know that Nae is in danger. Does that make me a bad person?"

"No. I understand. These people hunting her down, they're etherites too then I assume?"

She nods. "Just be careful. I don't know if Nae has any sort of grudge against you or not, but I'm coming to Castle Phoenix soon, just in case. You're powerful, but our abilities are often difficult to deal with, especially if you don't know we're coming."

"If you pull me into your own pocket dimension, would that keep me safe from hers?"

"I suppose."

"Then if she attacks, pull me into your domain, and we'll just kiss until she leaves."

In a glitch of static, Aris vanishes from sight. Though at the same moment, you feel her touch from your opposite site. By the time you turn, she's already swung to your front, and your lips meet where hers should be. But she pulls away and giggles--glowing eyes flashing directly into yours as she stares. "You're silly," she says. "I can't wait to see you in the flesh again."

She may have kissed you a few times more, but you can't remember. Everything is a blur, like a dream you only remember in segments, and you begin to question which parts you made up entirely. Though you open your eyes again, and this time, the sun is shining in through the window above the bed. Morning has come.