Theodore POV

The smack stung his neck and Theodore stumbled forward, more from surprise than force, his hand instinctively going to his stinging neck. He turned to glare at Seraphina.

"What was that for?" he demanded.

"You were thinking too hard," she said simply. "It was disrupting your mana flow."

"So you hit me?"

"Would you have preferred I let you implode?"

Theodore opened his mouth, then closed it. She had a point. The dimensional fold he'd been attempting to create had been getting unstable.

Still.

"You could have just told me to stop."

"I did. Three times. You were too deep in your [Parallel Processing] to hear me." She tilted her head, studying him with those unsettling eyes. "Your mind fragments when you think too hard. Interesting defense mechanism for having a skill like that this early, but useless if it makes you deaf to warnings."

Right. [Parallel Processing]. Sometimes he got so caught up in running multiple thought streams that his main consciousness missed things. Like his teacher telling him he was about to blow himself up.

"Again," Seraphina said. "And this time, try not to overthink it. Dimensional magic is more instinct than calculation."

"That's the opposite of what you said yesterday."

"Was it yesterday? Time is subjective here. Perhaps it was last week. Perhaps it was an hour ago. Does it matter?"

Theodore decided not to answer that.

***

"Your stance is wrong."

Theodore barely had time to process the words before Seraphina's foot swept his legs out from under him. He hit the ground hard, the breath knocked out of him.

"I wasn't aware dimensional magic required stances," he wheezed from the floor, because that "attack" of hers had sent him hurtling through dimensions until he slammed into the ground of one of the dead ones. "Get up."

He did.

"Show me the [Blink] again."

Theodore focused, felt the space around him, found the fold he wanted, and—

Seraphina caught him mid-teleport, literally caught him. Her hand wrapped around his neck as he materialized, using his own momentum to slam him into a mountain wall several dimensions over.

"Predictable," she said, releasing him. "You calculate the most efficient path. Stop that. Sometimes the inefficient path is the one that keeps you alive."

"How did you even—"

"I've been doing this longer than your civilization has existed. Again."

***

Theodore ducked under the spatial blade, feeling it slice through the air where his head had been. Another one came from the left. He twisted, [Blink]ed two feet back, then immediately had to dodge again as Seraphina appeared behind him.

"You're learning not to rely solely on your magic."

"Hard not to when you keep sealing it," Theodore muttered, parrying her next strike with the sword she'd given him.

"If you depend entirely on magic, what happens when you face someone who can negate it? Or when you run out of mana? Or when you're in a null zone? Besides, your swordsmanship is atrocious. Who taught you? A drunk goblin?"

"Self-taught, mostly."

"It shows." She disarmed him with a flick of her wrist, his sword clattering across the floor. "We'll have to fix that."

***

"Eat."

Theodore looked at the plate she'd set in front of him. It looked like normal food—bread, some kind of meat, vegetables. But nothing was normal in this dimension. He'd learned that in the months he'd spent here.

"Is it safe?"

"Safe is relative. It won't kill you."

"That's not reassuring."

"Eat anyway."

He did. It tasted like nothing and everything at once. They sat in what Seraphina called her sanctuary—a bubble of normal space within the chaotic Dimensional Gap. It was the only place that had furniture, walls, a ceiling. Almost like a real room, if you ignored the way the edges sometimes flickered and showed the writhing unreality beyond.

"You're progressing well," she said after a while.

Theodore nearly choked on his nothing-everything food. "Was that a compliment?"

"An observation. Don't let it go to your head."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

Silence fell again. Theodore had gotten used to these quiet moments. Seraphina wasn't much for conversation, and when she did talk, it was usually to point out something he'd done wrong or to give cryptic advice that only made sense three days later when he was about to die.

Or three months later?

He couldn't tell. He'd been hopping around dimensions far too much, and she had a spell around them constantly, which he had been suspecting of being a time spell for quite a while now.

Regardless, he'd been through more dimensions than he cared to remember, thankfully most were dead, and none had life similar to humans, according to what Seraphina said. It was like back on Earth, there were galaxies and planets, but they hadn't really found life. It was quite similar here in that regard, the only difference being you could actually travel to those dimensions, most of which deadly.

"Can I ask you something?" Theodore ventured.

"You can ask."

"How old are you?"

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She looked at him, really looked at him.

Whoops.

"Old enough to have forgotten more than you'll ever learn," she said. "Old enough that the empire that gave birth to my homeland is dust, and the empire that conquered it is dust, and the empire that rose from those ashes is dust too."

"That's... very old."

"Yes."

"Does it get easier? Living that long?"

"No. It gets quieter. Everyone you knew dies. Then everyone who knew them dies. Then everyone who remembered them dies. Eventually, you're the only one who remembers entire civilizations. You become a library of dead languages, extinct customs, forgotten names."

Theodore didn't know what to say to that.

"But," she continued, and the moment of softness was already fading, her usual composure returning, "you find new things. New students to disappoint you. New magic to master. New ways to not die of boredom."

"Am I disappointing you?"

"Constantly. Where I'm from, children are better than you."

Theodore decided to take that as a win.

"Why dimensional magic?" he asked. "Why teach me this specifically?"

"Because it's dangerous," she said simply. "Because most who try to learn it die horribly. Because you have just enough talent to maybe not die horribly, and I'm curious to see if I'm right."

"That's comforting."

"I'm not here to comfort you. I'm here to teach you. Whether you survive the teaching is entirely your problem."

She stood, the moment of conversation clearly over.

"Back to work. You're going to learn ##### today."

"What's that?"

She looked at him in confusion. "Oh… I need a dictionary."

***

Time worked differently inside than it did outside.

Theodore had figured that out pretty quickly, but knowing it and experiencing it were different things. In this dimension—this pocket of folded space Seraphina had created—there was no sun, no moon, no stars. No way to mark the passage of time except by counting his own heartbeats, and even those seemed unreliable.

He didn't know how long he'd been training. Weeks? Months? It felt like both forever and no time at all since he'd had that one and only actual conversation with her, if it could qualify as a conversation.

His only measure of progress was the spells he'd learned, the slots he'd filled in his [Basic Dimensional Magic].

Four spells now. Four out of five slots.

Two of them were dangerous enough that he'd almost died learning them. Multiple times. Seraphina had watched him nearly implode, nearly get pulled inside out, nearly scatter himself across seventeen dimensions, and each time she'd waited until the last possible second to intervene. "You learn better from near-death," she'd tell him. "Fear is an excellent teacher."

One spell had been so dangerous he'd had to manifest it as a sword outside his body, then seal it immediately. Wrapped it in pieces of his soul that he'd torn out—and that had hurt worse than any physical pain he'd ever experienced. The soul-fragments had taken the form of black cloth, binding the blade that shouldn't exist. Even sealed, he could feel it humming with wrongness.

Theodore had learned four spells and finally understood the difference between spatial and dimensional magic. They were twins, in a way. Related but distinct. Spatial magic dealt with the three dimensions everyone knew—length, width, height. Making distances shorter or longer, folding space, creating pockets within normal reality.

Dimensional magic was... more. It dealt with the spaces between spaces, the dimensions beyond the normal three. The places where physics went to die and reality was more suggestion than rule. Dimensional magic could reach into those spaces, pull from them, push into them. It was stronger than spatial magic in some ways, but also far more dangerous. One wrong move and you weren't just dead—you were scattered across realities, existing and not existing simultaneously.

His first spell was [Blink]. Spatial, not dimensional, though it drew on both. He could use it, teleport short distances instantly. But it wasn't the casual, effortless teleportation Seraphina displayed. Every [Blink] required all his parallel thought processes to focus on calculations. Distance, direction, destination, possible obstacles, mana cost, spatial stability at both ends. For short jumps—a few feet, maybe across a room—he could do it almost instantly now. But for longer distances? If he wanted to [Blink] back to Holden, for instance? That would take serious preparation. Multiple jumps planned out, rest points calculated, and enough mana to fuel it all. Hours if not days of preparation for what Seraphina could do with a thought.

The second spell was [Dimensional Siphon]. This one was pure dimensional magic, and probably the most useful thing he'd learned. It let him connect to a dimension full of mana. He was actually pretty proud of this one. He had learned it himself after all, instead of her teaching him.

He had virtually infinite mana now, as long as he could maintain the connection and draw it in fast enough.

Virtually infinite was a massive overstatement, though. The connection was like trying to drink an ocean through a straw. Sure, the ocean was there, endless and available, but he could only pull so much at once. And maintaining the connection while doing anything else was exhausting. Still, it meant he'd never run completely dry in a fight.

Probably.

His third spell was the dangerous one. So dangerous he'd put it on par with his purple fire, but—

Theodore stopped breathing.

He'd sensed vibrations through the ground. Tiny, rhythmic, getting closer. Instantly, his body began to shift, [Slime Manipulation], evolution of [Slime Control], activating as naturally as breathing used to. His form collapsed, spreading out, hugging the surface of the ground. His color shifted to match the strange non-stone of this dimension's floor.

Perfect camouflage.

This dimension had inhabitants.

Dangerous ones.

The vibrations got closer, and Theodore remained perfectly still.

The creatures came into view, and Theodore would have cursed if he had a mouth.

Ants.

Space ants, or dimensional ants, he wasn't sure which term was more accurate. They were about the size of large dogs, with bodies that seemed to shift between existing and not existing, their edges fuzzy like reality couldn't quite decide where they ended and space began. Their mandibles gleamed with a sharp unreality that could cut through almost anything.

They hungered for mana. This dimension was completely devoid of it naturally, so anything with mana became a beacon. A snack. Seraphina had dumped him here specifically because she wanted him to use his mana more responsibly.

Desperate to survive when he'd almost died, he'd created [Dimensional Siphon], which let him pull mana from other dimensions. She hadn't forbidden him from using it—probably because it just made him a more attractive target. A teaching method, he supposed.

Very Seraphina.

That's why, for the past however-long-it-had-been, he'd been very careful with his mana usage. Fighting when necessary, training constantly, even managing to level up his Race and skills despite the constraints. The lack of mana use had forced him to rely on his sword again—not the sealed one, but a regular blade he'd requested from Seraphina.

She'd given it to him, of course. In exchange for not using magic at all for what felt like weeks. Weirdly, she hadn't let him use his purple fire at all. Hadn't taught him anything about it either. Every time he asked, she'd literally beaten his ass and said, "Ask when you can leave a scratch on me."

He hadn't managed a scratch yet.

The ant scout moved past, its antennae twitching as it searched for mana signatures. Theodore remained perfectly still, perfectly flat, perfectly camouflaged. He'd gotten good at this. Had to. The ants were everywhere in this dimension, constantly searching, constantly hungry.

The scout was almost past when it stopped.

Shit.

Its antennae twitched more rapidly, its head turning back and forth. It had sensed something. Maybe a tiny mana leak from Theodore's core, maybe just instinct, maybe—

Theodore's mind splintered, [Parallel Processing] spinning up multiple thought streams instantly. The ant's mandibles started to open, probably to release pheromones to signal the colony—

Theodore [Blink]ed.

The sensation was still weird, even after all this practice. Reality folded, he stepped through the fold, and suddenly he was behind the ant. His sword was already moving, guided by muscle memory and the parallel process dedicated to combat analysis. The blade hit the weak spot where the ant's head met its thorax—one of the few places their quasi-dimensional chitin was vulnerable.

The ant died instantly, its head severing cleanly.

No pheromone release. Whew.

Theodore solidified back into his human form, breathing out slowly even though he didn't need to. Just habit. He stood there for a moment, sword still extended, watching the ant's body flicker and fade as it lost cohesion with reality.

Then he noticed something.

Oh.

Oh no.

This was part of a hive mind network. The kind that shared sensory information in real-time across the entire colony. Which meant—

High-pitched, reality-warping screeches that made his teeth hurt and his mana core fluctuate. It came from everywhere and nowhere.

"Oh... fuck..."

Sure enough, the skittering started. Hundreds of legs moving in perfect synchronization. The vibrations came through the ground, through the air, through the fabric of space itself. They were coming. All of them. And there were big ones too. The soldiers, the size of horses. The guards, the size of carriages. And somewhere in the distance, something massive enough that its movement made reality hiccup.

A queen, maybe. Or something worse.

He absolutely fucking hated ants.

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