Chapter 2

Time passed.

Or an equivalent of it any, down in this endless stream of souls.

Well, it could have been many other things, but considering that I'm fully aware of myself, I would presume it to be. Whichever the case, there was a whole lot of nothing.

It gave me time to think, and I would really rather not, but thoughts are all that I could do.

….

I am dead. That much I am certain.

“I’m dead. I am Elisa Mary Grant. I died when I was fourteen.” I chanted to myself, as if it can bring me back into the white.

Naturally, it didn’t.

How ironic. I’m suicidal even in the afterlife.

I am not particularly religious, but I am pretty sure that Heaven should not be… this. At this point, I highly doubt that this is the actual afterlife —this stream of something that is also nothing. Not empty, but what they hold seemed to be as insubstantial as nothing to me. I do not have eyes, being made of a bundle of pure thoughts I naturally do not have a “body” to move around with.

Maybe not having a body should be freaking me out, but somehow it seemed perfectly natural — seeing how I’m dead after all, and being stuck in a bed for over six months would get one used to be a vegetable.

Despite not having eyes, however, it was clear to me that near me is a whole lot of nothing, a lot of nothing that seemed to flow forever, extending in every metaphorical direction.

Do souls have a destination? Why does something like this exist?

If it was a river, does it have a shore?

I found it doubtful, but I tried anyway.

…..

How do I move?

…..

Nope, just thinking about moving wasn’t working.

I tried doing what I did with the “hooks”. Maybe, tugging back at the “water”, pulling myself toward it? — with an awkward tilt, I found myself gradually “moving” along. Along what exactly, since it was all just blank around me. I do not know how I know I am moving with nothing to reference from, but it seemed that I am.

It came with this really vague sense of motion, like a sense of losing your balance that comes with falling. However, I don’t have a body to feel vertigo with, so what exactly is this sensation?

Whatever.

I supposed that {tugging} was more efficient than my legs. However, I decided that just squirming along like a slug was rather inefficient. If this was a river, I supposed I would need some kind of propulsion…? I had never actually seen the sea before or saw a fish swimming in real life. I once saw this documentary on tuna or something though, so I generally understood the concept of “fins and tails”. I’ve drawn plenty of fishes before, so I know how a proper, generic fin looks like.

But where ever I am, I know that it is technically not a river, and that I don’t have limbs to actually do anything with. I am not even sure if I actually have a shape, there are no references around me to know how large, or small, I am.

Can I even change what I look like, being made of nothing?

Suddenly, I felt a “tug” again, which I immediately shrugged off with surprising ease.

Screw off. I’m in the middle of something here!

…

Whatever.

Let's give it a shot.

I visualised a ball first since a circle is the easiest shape to imagine. I imagined squeezing myself into this shape, becoming a ball of identity.

I felt a queer sensation as if I had suddenly lost integrity and immediately reformed, like curled fingers that had suddenly clenched into a fist — oomph!

Abruptly I felt myself congealing somehow, tightening into a very definitive shape.

I am a ball now, apparently. A ball so perfectly round it would probably be not possible in real life, with physics and whatnot. More importantly, I could somehow now accurately feel things, which was the great empty flowing just like water around me.

To be frank, it was easier than expected, which was stupid since I created a maybe-almost physical form in a world full of flowing white nothing. I giggled to myself, feeling absolutely absurd, Elisa Mary Grant became a ball. This felt like a terrible story, fit to be read to children instead — but then, I’m not exactly human now, am I? I’m a freaking disembodied soul.

I bobbed in the river, doing nothing, ecstatic over having something physical and existing — despite it being just a ball. In the time that I had spent doing absolutely nothing, I could sense absolutely nothing other than this odd flow across my mind.

Right, I can’t really move yet. I reminded myself. Fins…. where exactly should I put them? My form, being a ball was not exactly bendy — oh right, almost forgot to make sure the body was not rigid, pure ingenuity, Elisa. Somehow, I could sense my body in all its completeness, aware of everything on the smooth surface and the way it housed me.

Wait a moment. If it’s a “container”, does that mean I’ll spill out if it got broken?!

“Heck no!”

Having a ball for a body is a terrible idea. I briefly made a list of things I need to be in my mind.

1. I need to be able to move and sense things.

2. I need to find a way to not get spilt.

3. I need to be able to defend myself. After all, if I can do this, there must be something else out there that could do the same, right?

That seemed about it.

Well, I supposed since there was literally nothing else to do, I should probably get working. Creasing my metaphorical eyebrows, I attempted to look into my spherical shell. True enough, despite having a “skin”, everything inside was the same bundle of indescribable “thought”.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“How should I go about this…”

Perhaps, I could try thickening the shell, squeezing the bundle — me, into a smaller space with a thicker outer container. Tugging onto the shell with a thought, I pictured the ball shrinking, the “thing” that the shell was made off shrunk and condensed.

After a while, I stopped, somehow mentally exhausted. There was no headache, but my attempts at trying to focus failed in a cascade of scattered attention. It seemed that shrinking the size of my [soul stone], as I now name it, could only be pushed so far.

Huh, like a skull and brain, I mused. This brought to mind the question of where my memories are. I don’t have a brain, after all.

Now, I need to make limbs — and some kind of body instead of my glorified marble. What things can swim, and grip things at once?

A fish will work, but then I don’t know if I want to create an opening that allows the stuff I bite directly in… Hold, up —

What about adding some octopus arms to the face? I can swim and grip things without having to bite it. Seemed like a rather fair compromise.

Once again, I imagined something else forming over the marble that is me. Some kind of faux, softer flesh that was like plastic. Slowly, gradually, odd white things began to appear above my surface, inexorably linked to my being. I felt each bit as it was grown from me, but yet I knew that despite being me it was far from being my truest identity, my soul.

What am I, wax?

In time, a simple oblong body formed, taking the shape of a simple fish, complete with flippers like a dolphin. Compact fins and tails of traditional fishes were a bit too complicated for me now, so simple flaps will do. My two octopus limbs, protruding from around my mouth floated freely around me. Even though I probably do not have scales or any “pigment”, it hardly mattered since it was exactly the same everything around me — completely blank, like a backdrop made of just light.

Right. I should probably give my queer afterlife a name. Maybe… [Soul Stream]? [Underworld]? [Beyond]?

[Beyond] sounds fine, let's stick with that —

I gave my new body a few experiments, wriggling the fins and tail, the tentacles waking through the faux water. I don’t have any idea how the body moved since I didn’t create any muscles as the body was just an imitation made of congealed thought, but it did so anyway. Would eyes work? I got no idea how to build an eye, just like any other human.

Time to give it a spin~ I sang to myself as I readied my mind. Giving the fin a mighty push, letting the tail whip up and down, I felt the sensation of the “river” flow around me to make way for my strange form. I blasted through the white with a single-mindedness, settling into a comfortable pattern of flap’n’kick.

My speed didn’t seem to be that fast but it hardly mattered at all. The fact that I could somehow travel in this not-physical space that seemed to only obey a few laws of physics — so where the heck am I? — was nothing short of a miracle. More importantly, I got limbs! I can move!

I did not realise how much I missed being able to move at all. The wiggling of my fins, the tail — there are no aches, no cramps — I hadn’t been able to leave bed for months! Granted, these aren’t proper arms and legs, or that I looked like a dolphin/Cthulhu hybrid, but who cares?

Lost in my moment of joy, I paddled as hard as I can, swimming through the [Beyond] like a torpedo of wax.

Bump!

What was that?

For a moment, I “felt” something that seemed to have bumped into me when I was lost in my thoughts. I swivelled my attention upon the unexpected intruder and attempted to “look” at it.

Oh.

It was a small clump of… something, tainted grey. However, it seemed to have some kind of “consistency” to it, unlike everything else around me. In the great blank nothing of the [Beyond], this [Grey Blob] was a godsend.

With this, I can maybe figure out how to… I don’t know.

If I don’t hold onto it, the stream might carry it away again, so I attempted to [tug] on it, which succeeded in drawing it closer, but not much. Tentatively, I raised one of my mouth-tentacles and gently curled around the small Grey Blob.

Then, I crushed it.

In shock, I watched as the blob shattered into tiny motes, somehow glinting in the [Beyond].

A bit of it landed in my “mouth” — EWWWWW — which I tried to spit out to no avail.

Fuck! It got into my mouth! Bleh!

Blehhh—?

Wait a moment?

I frowned my fish-brows above where my eyes would be as I processed this queer “taste” that appeared on my fishy tongue, which I was quite certain I did not make. Against all odds, the fragment of the [Grey Blob] somehow registered as “sweet” in my mind, and was surprisingly pleasant due to my prolonged sensory deprivation.

Huh.

I was taught to not eat suspicious things by my caretakers, but I hardly think that it would matter in this scenario. It’s not like I got any issue against dying again, which was my main goal after all. It can’t “harm” me.

Besides, who else is there to tell me what not to do?

Hesitantly, I [tugged] onto the free-floating motes, which responded with ease. When it came within range, I swallowed the thing.

Sweet!

I don’t know what the grey thing was, but it tasted ridiculously good, almost like a fresh pear or an apple, and better too.

Whatever it was, I knew at that moment, I need more.

With certified gusto, I [tugged in] every mote within range and chomped upon it like a glutton. They had no consistency beyond being slimy but it hardly mattered. Before long, there was nothing left of the [Grey Blob] that I had accidentally crushed.

Dejected, I reflected upon how eating a mysterious grey thing was probably a terrible idea by anyone’s standard just because it “tasted” good.

Great job, Elisa. You popped a bubble and then ate it. A great shining example of humanity.

In haste, inspected myself — nothing changed. [Soul stone] intact, good.

I didn’t feel “full” at all, but there was a curious sensation within me. It’s like I’ve somehow became… bigger, on the inside. I felt somehow more substantial than before, as if more of me was solid.

How curious.

I tried “looking” around me for more, but there was nothing left, just the empty ol’ [Beyond]. My “looking” range really wasn’t that far, so maybe making an “eye” might help? There is no light here, so making an imitation of one seemed mildly pointless.

But the fins worked, and there is certainly no water around ye.

Good point, me.

So, should I just…?

I focused my thoughts again. This time, I tried to think of an eye, a circular, disc-like eyeball to appear in my “forehead”, right above my mouth. I summoned all my memories of “seeing”, reliving the moments and thoughts of how images travelled to me to give me a concrete image.

Just like a squid.

Gradually, along with that tingly feeling I began to associate with changing my form — I should probably call it [Self-mould] or something — a single slit appeared. Slowly, it opened, revealing —

SHIt shisiha aa f —

Fuck.

I forgot that I’m looking at myself, and was not prepared for it to work immediately. Unexpected senses assault my mind, giving my non-existent brain a [Soul Stone] ache.

Ow.

I’m an idiot.

Whatever that was out there, for a moment I saw something utterly incomprehensible. Vague shapes that folded into each other, lines of light that tangled and angles and prisms, the infinite end of the world and myself again and again —

Calm down, calm down, I chanted to myself, That’s a riv — no, a sea. It’s just the sea. Right. Turbulence only.

…

Well, the idea worked at least. I am seeing something, just not what I expected. Numbly, I [self-mould] my “eye” to a smaller, less ambitious size.

…

…….

Let’s do that again, and avoid getting surprised.

Again, I slowly opened my eyelids, allowing just that tiny bit of faux-vision in —

Agh!

It… was unpleasant, but bearable. I waited for my mind to settle down, before opening another bit.

As I spent my time slowly getting used, I reflected the changes in my sight. For one, the weird, prism-light-ray festival which seemed to overlap itself several times in the same “space” that assaulted my mind had disappeared, replaced with the much more familiar back-drop of blankness.

However, there was so much more then what I had originally settled with.

Out there, around me and in far-away places of white, I could see that it was peppered with so many [Grey Blobs] like fish in the ocean. Shifty mirages of white folded into tunnels that lead to other, infinitely shifting “areas”, the grand flow that ushered the white forward, the distance fading away into blankness —

It’s all just there.

With my new mouth, I found myself being slacked jaw as I stared at the unlikely sight.

…

Just a sea, huh?

Shut up, me.