Rhys snapped awake with a jolt and immediately sat upright before he even comprehended where he was or what his eyes saw. For a second, he sat there dazedly, gazing into the middle distance, and then his brain slowly kicked in, and his eyes narrowed to a squint. I'm outside… in a field… a few hills… the weird feeling of the void nearby… I'm in the secret realm that was full of trash! Why?

A second later, the memory hit him. Stealing the secret realm. Pulling it through the void to his exits. The conversation with Daran, and everything the man had revealed.

Daran… He looked around. No sign of the Demon King. He scrambled to his feet, then sighed and dusted himself off. The man vanished all the time. There was no need to worry about him.

A thought struck him. In the moment, he hadn't thought about it, or rather, he'd been so concerned with stealing his secret realm that he hadn't considered it, but, well, he hadn't planned on passing out after stealing the realm, and he had no idea how long he'd been out, or even if he could leave this realm. It could have been hours. It could have been days. That, and he'd effectively abandoned the girls, even if that hadn't been his intent at all. Hopefully they had the intelligence to run off, but if they stuck around to try to help him escape…

No, no. If nothing else, Lira would have the presence of mind to tell everyone to get the heck out and go home. It should be fine. He rubbed his forehead. What was he thinking? Going after this realm without telling anyone anything…

He knew what he'd been thinking. He'd been thinking he could do it, and it would be hard, but not that hard. He'd just take the realm away with him, that easy, and return to their side without any problems.

Right. Because 'taking the realm back home with me' is totally compatible with the idea of leaving out the front door and regrouping with the girls. He rolled his eyes at his own stupidity. He should be honest: he just hadn't been thinking. His greed had gotten the better of him, and now he was paying the price. Hopefully none of the girls were paying the price. He needed their power for the upcoming battle.

No. They're intelligent. They'd get out of there. He ran his hand through his hair, then rolled his eyes at himself again. He could just leave and check. He'd brought this thing here so he could easily exit and enter it. It should be right by his void exits. All he had to do was hop out of the realm, and he'd be right back home again.

He jogged to the edge of the realm and looked down. From here, he could see the layers of the earth—the topsoil, the deeper clay, then the stones and bedrock below that. The sky darkened to night at the bottom of the realm, until he could see artificial stars twinkling far below him. Rhys frowned, contemplating his course of action for a moment. If he jumped down there, would he fall through the realm? This realm did have some form of gravity, after all. Did it function with real physics, or in other words, if he jumped, would he just get sucked right back into the clump of earth? Or would he just fall off the edge of the world? How real were physics, around here?

Rhys glanced at his feet, standing soundly in the dirt, then snorted. They had basically normal gravity in this tiny realm with a tiny clump of earth that definitely should not demand normal gravity, so if he had to guess, physics were not being stringently obeyed. They were more like an afterthought… and, of course, this was a place that had magic. Things could just happen, whether physics agreed that they should or not.

He stepped forward, hopping off the edge of the realm, and plunged down into the darkness. Something flashed by in the corner of his vision, but by the time he turned, it was too late. He was outside the realm, floating in the void once more. Rhys turned back, gazing up at the realm from outside, but from outside, the false sky wrapped the land in an opaque bubble of light. The realm glowed, bright and beautiful, like a shiny soap bubble, but he couldn't see anything within but the faint outline of the chunk of land.

Rhys shook his head. Useless. Oh well. I can go back later and get a better look at the land. Whatever he'd seen, it didn't seem urgent… not as urgent as leaving the realm and checking on the girls, anyways. They're fine. They're safe. He hurtled toward one of the gaps in the void he'd built, one of the ones connected to a trash can, and peeked out.

Business proceeded at normal. People cooked chips. Soda was brewed. His obedient workers ground along, wasting their life away for minimum wage, and he felt the warmth in his heart that all franchise owners felt upon seeing their underlings burn all their energy for a base, worthless purpose. Lira walked by, and he stepped out and into the room. "Lira."

She jumped, then grabbed her chest. "You gave me a heart attack. What happened? Where'd you go?"

"It turns out you could only enter that realm if you had karma with something within… or at least, that was the condition on getting through the maze they put in front of it. And then I stole it, but I'm back now. Did everyone get out okay?"

She stared at him, processing everything he'd just told her, then sighed. "You're insane. And what do you mean, 'stole it?'"

"Don't worry about that. Are Sable and Mouse okay?"

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Lira waved her hand. "They're fine. We tried to get through for a while, but kept coming out the same door we entered through rather than arriving at the realm. Three tries of that later, we were debating whether to give up and run for it or try one more time. We went for one more try, but this time, the darkness in the hut didn't go anywhere. It was just a normal stone hut."

"Oh," Rhys said.

"So anyways. Mouse started freaking out, but I said it was probably just you getting up to some bullshit again, and after I calmed her down, we got out of there. We could use a heads-up next time, you know. It's been a week."

"A week? Jeez," Rhys muttered, half to himself. He nodded at Lira. "Sorry about that. I saw an opportunity and got a little carried away. I thought it would only be an hour or so, and then I'd be able to apologize to you guys, but a week? I'm sorry. I wouldn't have done it if I'd known it would take so long."

"You wouldn't have?" Lira asked skeptically.

Rhys sighed. "Okay, I would have still done it, but I would've told you guys to go home first."

"That's more realistic." She shrugged. "I've been a mage a long time. I know what it means when someone vanishes in a magical realm. You were just practicing something, weren't you? Got lost in the practice and forgot everything, even the passage of time?"

"Yeah, I mean, no, but basically," Rhys said, tilting his hand back and forth.

"Close enough?"

"Close enough."

"Sable doesn't seem bothered, but I'd apologize to her. Mouse was all messed up and anxious, so make sure you're gentle with her, okay?"

"Got it," Rhys promised.

Lira took a deep breath, then paused to think. She twisted her lips and tilted her head. At last, she shook it. "That's all. Everything else is going fine. Potato chips and soda coming along well, everything's in good shape."

"Have you heard anything from Bast?" he asked.

"No, but also, would he contact me? He knocked us out last time. I'm pretty sure he's only going to talk to you, no matter how unfair that is," Lira complained.

Rhys considered, then nodded. "That sounds right."

"So go apologize to Sable and Mouse, and then go hang out somewhere lonesome so you two boys can have a private boys' moment together and do whatever two boys do when they're alone."

Rhys gave her a look. She returned the look.

He sighed. "Alright, alright, fine. I get it. Spread the word that I'm not dead, or whatever."

"I think the only one who thought that was Mouse. I kept telling her this was totally normal mage behavior, but she just wouldn't listen."

"You're making me feel so bad," Rhys said.

"Eh. Honestly? It's on Mouse."

He waved at Lira and headed down into the basement, where Sable liked to lurk. She didn't need to stay down there with the criminals mostly taken out, but she seemed to like the dark, and he wasn't complaining, either, because if there were criminals, Sable made sure they never got past her. He dropped into the darkness, and immediately found himself at bonepoint.

"Hi, Sable," he said, putting his hands up. "It's me."

Red eyes burned out of the pitch black. They were all he could see of Sable's body with his eyes still stunned by daylight. "I know."

"Oh."

"No fighting. When will we fight?" she growled, her eyes narrowing.

"Soon. Really, really soon, there will be so much fighting that you'll be sick of it. I promise. It's almost time."

"You've said that many times."

"I have, but it's true this time. I promise you, we are going to be fighting our asses off very, very soon. In fact, I might even be hearing about it tonight, so really, you're impeding your own chance of fighting."

Sable stared at him, her narrowed eyes boring into his. Slowly, he could make out more in the darkness, her contours and the bony legs holding her to the ceiling. "If there is not more fighting soon this time, I will fight you."

"You know what? That's fair. I accept that," Rhys said, nodding.

Sable hummed deep in her throat and retreated.

"I'm sorry I abandoned you!" Rhys called after her.

"I don't care about that. Give me battle," Sable rumbled from deep within the darkness.

Rhys gave her a thumbs up. "Message received. Hey, where's Mouse?"

No reply.

Yeah… why would she know, after all? Rhys retreated from the basement and headed back to the kitchen. "Hey, Lira, where's Mouse? Has anyone seen Mouse?"

"I…I'm right here."

Rhys turned. For a second, he only saw an empty room, and then Mouse appeared, hands clasped to her chest, gazing at the floor. He smiled. "Hey, Mouse."

"Hi." She shuffled her feet closer together and kept looking at the floor.

"Sorry about leaving you behind at the hut. I didn't mean to do that. I just got so wrapped up in something that I totally forgot about… well, everything. You guys. The world. Everything."

"I know. That's what Lira said. But…" She scuffed the floor with her foot. "I was worried. It was the Empress's. What if it was a trap? What if you were stuck, or hurt, or in danger? I couldn't just pretend like everything was okay."

Rhys's chest tightened. He looked at the floor too. "I'm sorry. It was really fucked up of me. I shouldn't have done it. Or… or I should've let you know what was happening, first."

"No. It's okay. It's… I can't get in the way of your enlightenment or leveling up. It would be wrong of me to do that, just like it would be wrong of you to do it to me. I understand that. But I worried. I was so scared." Mouse glanced at him at last, then managed a smile. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have been worried. But I… you know. I got scared."

Rhys looked at the ground, then at Mouse. "How about this? Just know, if I ever vanish again, that it's my doing. I'm the one who's vanishing, and there's nothing to worry about. Even if there is, I'll handle it. I can take care of me, and that's that. Abandon me, and don't feel bad about it. I'd prefer it that way."

She nodded resolutely. "Yeah. I'll believe that. I will."

"And if you ever go missing… I probably won't even realize you're gone, isn't that right?" Rhys said, looking at Mouse.

She shook her head. "No, you wouldn't."

"So it's all fair, right?"

"Yeah."

"And none of us have to worry about any of the rest of us."

"Right."

He patted her shoulder. "We're good?"

She sniffed, then nodded. "We're good."

"Alright. Glad to hear it." Smiling, Rhys waved goodbye and headed out to his next destination: a quiet place where boys could be alone, or whatever it was Lira had said. Probably something more salacious. It was probably too early to expect to see Bast again, but it didn't hurt to give the guy a little space, and see if he showed up.

Behind him, Mouse watched him go, then slowly closed her eyes and faded away. "No. You won't know," she whispered.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.