Nighttime had fallen already, and Eleanor was currently passed out on top of a bed. She had bruises still all over her body and face, but compared to the bleeding that the demoness put her through, Eleanor was looking quite fine. It seemed like Annaleth was serious about helping Eleanor, since after every beating, she would heal her completely, before forcing her to fight once more.

At the end, she decided to leave just a few bruises so Eleanor wouldn’t forget the pain of training and what could happen if she didn’t pick herself up and learn to fight, but that was just for this day, and it seemed like Annaleth had other plans moving forward.

The room that Eleanor was given was small, with just one bed, and a small space for her to put her things. There was a small window on one side, covered with a piece of wood that could be easily removed if she wished to, but having learned from the previous night at the previous base, Eleanor made sure to create her own protections all around the room; including the floor.

A smart thing to do.

However, it seemed like the people in this base didn’t seem to have any ulterior motives, judging from what I could see at the moment.

In the middle of the base, in the small ‘Living Room’ that they had, Dom was also currently passed out with his face down on a table and a wooden cup carelessly dropped close to his hand with the red drink that they took from the base leaving a few marks of drops that spilled out on the table. The man’s face was flushed red, and it seemed like he wouldn’t wake up for a while.

In the room closer to Eleanor’s was Grool. He was currently awake and dressed the same way as when we met him, with a small fireball floating in the air for illumination, and a few tools strewn about on top of a table.

One of the weapons that he used, the loud one that looked like a metal tube, was currently disassembled, and he was carefully cleaning each piece of the weapon, picking each one, and closely inspecting it, before putting it down with a nod.

Next to this room was Jul. There were all sorts of books in that room. Knowing where he got them inside this Void Dungeon was a mystery at first, but… Upon closer inspection, it appeared like they were nothing more than carefully crafted leaves and pieces of wood made to look like books.

I couldn’t open them to see if he had written anything on them, but besides that, there were only snacks and things to drink, and a bed where the little goblin peacefully slept with his body stretched out and drool falling from the side of his mouth.

Finally, in the middle room of this base, was Annaleth. She had removed almost every piece of cloth she had been wearing and carelessly left it on the ground beside the bed, the one where she loudly snored like a man.

She had gotten pretty close to Dom once they finished training, mostly because he carried those drinks, which she happily took a lot for herself, so even in this room, there was a wooden cup with the drink that only Dom knew how to make. Besides that, her room didn’t have a lot of things. Just a few colorful flowers and nothing else.

It appeared like there wasn’t any danger this time for Eleanor among these people. At least, for now.

I looked down at her sleeping face. She still chose to sleep with her armor on and weapon close, but this time, she didn’t even have the energy to tell me to watch over her. She did everything she needed to ensure she wouldn’t fall prey to another trap, even if these defenses were likely going to be easily destroyed by the people beyond these walls.

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This time, I think she might be able to stand up and fight in time—regardless of how hopeless it would be for her against the group of demons; one of whom already managed to make her bleed a lot today without even having the intent of killing her.

While considering Eleanor’s sleeping face, I thought about the outside world. Right now, I had no reason to stay here, in the middle of the night, watching her sleep. If anything were to happen, the rest of the people in this base were more than enough to deal with it, and if they weren’t, then even if I were to wake Eleanor, she wouldn’t stand a chance.

But something like that wasn’t likely to happen. So, I chose this opportunity to let go of this cat-like body and return to my body. It wasn’t going to die, and I should still be able to return to it whenever I pleased, but it was going to go into a state of hibernation, like sleeping. It would be best to leave it somewhere where it wouldn’t be forgotten, so I walked on top of Eleanor, laid the body down on her chest, and finally, let go of it.

Hopefully, I’d be able to make my way back into it after looking at the outside world.

* * *

I opened my eyes inside my Godly body once more. The feeling of world-shattering power coursed through my body, and I allowed myself to rejoice in it as I let go a few pulses of energy. I still had to be careful not to allow that energy to hit the world, so I held it back, and retrieved it before it crossed the world’s atmosphere.

The first thing I wanted to make sure of was the location of my cat-like body, so I closed my eyes once more and searched for it.

Hm… There was some resistance from the entrance of the Void Dungeon, but I could follow the trail of the path that I took, so going back into the body wouldn’t be an issue when I do it… However, I couldn’t pinpoint its location in the world itself—like underground, an ocean, or a mountain.

It seemed like there were a lot of strange things surrounding this Void Dungeon…

But it didn't matter for now. I just wanted to make sure I could return to it.

With that out of the way, I turned my attention to the world itself. There were a few storms going on here and there, but nothing that didn’t come with the seasons, and nothing that was caused by an outside force, so I could ignore them.

I shifted my attention over to the continent of demons. There were usually a few interesting things going on there.

I looked at their capital city, the place Annaleth called ‘Nobsua’. It hadn’t changed a lot from the last time I saw it since it had only been a few days I’d been following Eleanor, so the tall buildings, and straight wide roads that they had been constructing lately continued to stretch in every direction.

These were full of all sorts of demons, from small ones like Jul, to ones that could hardly fit inside the doors of buildings; all of them living close to each other while trading, working, and trying to do their best every day.

Nothing strange there, so I moved over to the next kingdom, close to the demons.

This one wasn’t quite as complex as the demon’s city, as their buildings weren’t quite tall, most of them were made from wood, and their people dressed in colorful clothes that stretched to the ground in a lot of cases. They had shrines and temples dedicated to their own Gods; ones that they seemed to have come up with, since neither the Goddess nor me were like what they depicted.

Having their kingdom so close to the demons also caused a few different issues with their people, as some chose to trade with demons, and others chose to war with them. Doing one or the other depended mostly on who was in charge and what their beliefs and desires were, but at the moment, it seemed like they weren’t sure about what to do.

Such was the Kingdom of Yuuyake.

Far from them, across a dark desert and an ocean that was just as dark, going almost all around this world, was the continent where Eleanor used to live; the one that was mostly dominated by the empire she used to belong to: the Holy Empire of Althusia.

Curiously enough, it was daytime in this place at the moment, contrary to the nighttime of the Void Dungeon when I left it. The empire had hardly changed, as it was expected.

There were a few neighboring kingdoms trying to resist the empire’s influence, while there were a few that were giving in to them... It seemed like hardly anyone could escape their will.

There were few who had the will to stand up and shout what they needed or wanted. Among those, there was a small man, currently standing by the gates of one of the biggest Duke estates of the empire, with a face full of rage and indignation as he demanded answers.

This man was none other than Eleanor’s father.