Chapter 250: 250 : Opening Shop and Increasing Harem Members XXVII
---
John did not sleep like a normal person after that.
He slept like a man holding a cup of water in both hands while someone kept bumping his elbow. Every time his body started to sink into deeper rest, his mind snapped awake and checked the same things again. His mana. The anchor. The thin thread in his chest that now had a second weight on it.
He counted. He breathed. He held the line.
Fizz, for his part, slept like someone who had won a war and planned to brag about it tomorrow. He drifted in the air beside John’s bed, curled into a glowing ball, paws tucked under his chin. A little spark popped from his fur now and then, harmless and proud, like a fire remembering it used to be a star.
Ray Flame did not wake once. He snored, rolled, and mumbled something about "hot soup being a conspiracy" and that was it. If the world ended in the dorm, Ray would probably sleep through that too, then complain in the morning that someone moved his blanket.
John kept listening anyway.
The academy night did its usual rounds. A distant footstep. A door latch. A faint bell far away. Then nothing. Then another nothing. Then time, slipping past like a thief that did not even bother hiding.
Inside the void, the mana platform held steady.
Nyx slept.
John could feel it.
Not with eyes. Not with ears. With the same sense that told him where his void began and ended, where his black hole affinity hummed in his blood. It was like feeling an extra finger he had not had yesterday. Strange. Useful. Uncomfortable.
He did not like how quickly he was getting used to it.
Near the last third of the night, John finally gave in to the heavy pull behind his eyes and let sleep take him in small bites. His mana crept upward again, slow and steady, like a bucket filling from a careful drip.
Then, without warning, the thread in his chest pulled.
Hard.
John’s eyes snapped open.
His hand went to his chest like his ribs were a door he could slam shut.
Fizz jerked awake midair, fur puffed, ears sharp. "What. What is it? Is the baby walking? Is the baby biting? Is the baby taking my job?"
John swallowed and closed his eyes.
He focused on the void.
The platform.
Nyx.
Nyx was awake.
The tiny void ant had uncurled and stood on the mana platform, legs spread slightly, body low, like an animal that did not trust the ground yet. It moved with careful steps, not clumsy, not frantic. It was quiet in the way sharp things are quiet.
It walked to the edge of the platform.
It looked down.
Not down into a drop. Down into endlessness. Down into the void that had fed it. The void that had shaped it. The void that did not care if something lived or died.
Nyx leaned forward.
John’s mana tugged again as the anchor reacted, as if warning him that if Nyx stepped off the platform and drifted, it might follow the wrong current and vanish.
John’s mouth went dry.
"No," he whispered, though he knew Nyx could not hear the sound here.
Fizz whispered urgently, "Master. If it falls into the void, can we fish it out with a net? I have nets. To be honest, I do not, but I can pretend."
John ignored him and pushed his mana gently into the anchor, strengthening the platform’s stability. He did not want to force Nyx. He did not want to scare it. He only wanted it to not disappear forever on its first night alive.
Nyx’s body trembled once.
Then it stepped off the platform.
John’s heart punched his ribs.
The thread in his chest went taut. His mana drain spiked.
It did not feel like Nyx was falling. It felt like it was swimming. Like the void pressure held it the way water holds a fish.
Nyx moved in the air. In the nothing. It took slow steps in a place that had no floor, and yet it acted as if it understood the rules of this space better than John did.
Fizz’s voice shook behind the curtain. "It is walking on nothing. That is rude. I walked on nothing at first."
John hissed, "Quiet."
Fizz whispered, "I am whispering."
Nyx drifted a few feet away from the platform, then stopped and turned back.
It looked at the platform.
Then it looked in John’s direction again, head angled slightly, like it was tasting his presence.
John felt a small pulse.
Not dangerous. Not aggressive.
Curious.
Nyx moved back toward the platform and climbed onto it without effort. Then it walked to the center and sat down like it had completed an important patrol.
John let out a breath he had not realized he was holding.
Fizz floated close to the curtain and pressed his face to it, trying to see through the cloth with pure stubbornness. "So it can leave and come back. Like a cat."
John’s jaw tightened. "Yes."
Fizz nodded, then said quietly, as if speaking to himself, "Cats also steal jobs."
John reached into his pouch and pressed a small mana stone to his palm, drawing a gentle bit of energy from it to stabilize himself without draining too much. He hated using resources, but he hated the idea of his mana dipping near zero even more.
The system did not speak again.
But John could feel it watching, in its silent way, like a scribe waiting for the right moment to write.
Inside the void, Nyx moved again. This time it walked in a slow circle, touching the platform surface with its antennae, like it was reading the shape of its own safe zone. Then it walked to one edge and lowered its head to the platform as if sniffing.
A tiny piece of shell fragment, almost invisible, sat near the platform’s edge. John had not noticed it earlier because most fragments had dissolved. This one had not. It was small, dark, and carried a faint residue of void pressure.
Comments