The Sun was rising in the east. At least that was something people could rely on. Robert crossed the street to reach the hotel where he booked a room when the world around him darkened and all color drained from his sight.

His power had activated on its own again. Robert was back to the liminal void where he was doomed to spend ninety-nine percent of his life.

"Talk about mixed blessings," he grumbled to himself.

He turned around and looked in every direction including up. What kind of special guest would he get now? Mickey Mouse, again? But no, it seemed he was alone this time.

Assured he would not be accosted by fictional hallucinations and dreading the previous encounter was real even more, Robert put his plan in motion. He took one of the crystal watches he bought and set it on a store's window sill. Taking a step away, he stared at the glowing numbers. They didn't change. Nor did the one on his wrist. He sighed. Time didn't pass in the liminal void.

But if time didn't pass, how was he thinking, acting, and... breathing?

Just like that party trick people did telling others "you are not breathing manually", Robert's conscious mind took over control of his breathing muscles. He moved his chest and stomach up and down as normal but paid attention to his nostrils. The telltale feeling of air passing through them was absent.

A wave of fear passed through him but was gone soon after. He wouldn't choke and suffocate in this liminal void. He didn't before when he was talking to Mickey, why would it happen now? But it opened even more questions. If the place had no air, and time didn't pass, how did he maintain a conversation? Score one point to the "it was a hallucination" thesis.

The truth was, that Archhuman powers defied logic. How could a human weighing one hundred kilograms kick a twenty-ton monster and send it flying, while the human remained in the same place? Surely Isaac Newton was writhing in his tomb. Robert tried to believe his power was just as nonsensical or more. Feeling stupid, he wrapped his old shirt around his hand and punched the shop's glass window. He felt pain reverberate through his fist and arm but the glass didn't even budge. He also didn't hear the impact.

Perhaps he couldn't interact with the world outside the liminal void. Objects had a solid representation but he was like a ghost. Well, not like a ghost, he couldn't go through solid matter. He glanced at the watch on the windowsill. Same number. Not a change. The glow from the crystal remained the same. But if time was frozen, how was he seeing the light? Pure nonsense. Thinking about that was giving him a headache and he just stopped.

Robert's way of dealing with stressful things was to run away from them. Perhaps that's why he chickened out of using the Golden Bard on himself. He felt he didn't deserve the gift his parents chose for him. And now it got him stuck in a void. Where the only thing that could hurt him was himself. And the hallucinations of fictional characters. If they were hallucinations. He caught himself in this loop of were they, were they not about a few repetitions.

How long did he have to spend in there before returning to real life? Robert had no idea. What triggered a transition to the liminal void? That one was also a blank.

Robert stood up and set his backpack next to the watch. Exhaling deeply, he started doing jumping jacks. He kept doing them, counting the repetitions in his head. He stopped at two hundred. Fearful he would go bald, he stopped even if it could be the key to becoming the strongest one who could defeat any enemy with a single punch. He didn't feel tired. It was as if he hadn't exercised at all. Most likely, he wasn't physically in the liminal void, just a projection of his mind. If that were the case, none of the objects he left behind would stay in the liminal void.

And for a liminal void, the place was quite crowded. Was he in a shadow of the real world, a dimension in-between? What if he went deeper, further from reality? What eldritch... Forget about that. Robert's avoidant self-preservation instincts kicked in and he discarded that train of thought.

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Going back to his backpack, he sat on the sidewalk and started reading the book on Qigong martial arts. He read the book three times before he tried any exercise depicted in the book. Then he placed it on the sidewalk and started training the stances and movements. He went through the motions slowly, as recommended in the book. Every time he made a mistake, he went back and consulted the book. He went on and on, going through the moves of Qigong. Without the proprioceptive feedback of his muscles getting tired, Robert had no idea how long he spent training Qigong. He stopped when his conscious mind recognized he'd lost track of time. Robert wasn't winded, he felt no muscle fatigue.

Then he stared to the side. The book was floating in the air, in the same position it was the last time he used the book. It seems he was so focused on his training that he forgot to set the book down. In the normal world, it would just fall to the floor but time didn't pass for objects he let go of. A glance at his wristwatch reminded him that time didn't pass for objects on him either.

Robert jumped. He went about a foot up in the air and then fell down. Weird. Gravity worked fine for him. A question popped in his mind. How far did the liminal void go? Robert dashed down the street. Everything was frozen so he just had to dodge the vehicles and the few people who were out and about this early in the morning. They were like statues of ash or pencil drawings to his eyes. A world devoid of all color but for him.

He ran and ran, stopping only when a thought hit him. He had no idea how long he had been in this liminal void. Though time didn't seem to pass, his subjective time was measured by the definitions of his power. For each second spent in the real world, he was forced to stay in the liminal void for ninety-nine. Three months and change for every day. But he left his backpack behind with all the precious scrolls and the Qigong manual. Robert ran back to where he'd left his belongings.

He still had time left, it seemed. How long did he spend since his meeting with Mickey? The consultation took around two or three hours, then the visit to the Arch-human Supply Depot, another hour or so... To be conservative, he estimated three hours in real life. They translated to two hundred and ninety-seven hours in the liminal void. Twelve days, at least. But he had no way to keep track of time.

Robert had got carried away and almost lost his possessions. The watch by the windowsill was okay to leave behind, he bought it for that exact purpose. But his scrolls? The cash he got as part of the Prime trade deal wasn't enough to buy a single one of them. For an Archhuman, fifty thousand dollars was pocket money.

Sitting on the sidewalk, Robert tried to figure out how long he spent on his current visit. Perhaps a day or so. And he wasn't feeling hungry, thirsty, or even tired, much less sleepy. Hugging the backpack slung across his chest, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

*

*

Robert woke up feeling the earliest rays of the Sun hitting his face. He immediately sprung up and stood, still clutching his backpack. A glance to the sides showed him that the world was back in full color, and the shadows cast by the morning Sun were slowly moving. He was back to real life. He took a deep breath and then blew through his mind, feeling the hot air blow past his cheeks. He could hear his heartbeat, the sounds of civilization, and the rustling of leaves in the wind. In these posh districts, they had the spare room for vegetation, a luxury people in middle and lower-class districts could only dream of.

Glancing back at the windowsill, the watch he left there was conspicuously missing. Robert needed to take a second test. Closing his eyes, he tried to will himself back to the liminal void. He tried to reach toward his power, to activate it with pure willpower. Something he was lacking. Yet, when he opened his eyes, everything was faded to dark shades of gray.

More importantly, the watch was exactly where he left it. A wave of paranoia hit him and he looked around. Nothing moved, fictional or not. He focused on mentally counting the seconds, waiting to be sent back to the real world. On second thought, he moved ten paces down the sidewalk, away from the watch but keeping it in sight. Then he kept counting the seconds slowly, to the best of his ability. He lost count at around thirteen hundred. But soon the world grew brighter and colorful, like some artist moving a color-to-grayscale slider on his favorite image editor.

Robert checked his location. He was not at the same place he entered the liminal void. Immediately, he tried to trigger his power again. The world faded to gray. Robert dashed up the street, going past the watch. As he went past it, he noticed the watch was still stuck at the same moment he first left it. Compared to the one on his wrist, they lost synchronicity. Twelve paces past the watch, the world's colors returned. His wristwatch ticked and Robert smiled.

His power was broken. Not only did he have nigh-infinite time to think, train, rest his mind, and whatever else he could do, but he also had means of instant teleportation as he could leave the liminal void in a spot away from where he entered it. All at the cost of his patience and boredom.