Everie hadn’t swum very many times before. She’d scarcely even seen large bodies of water before - the world she knew was a dry waste, populated sporadically by giant cities of brass. Cities that arbitrarily worshiped gods, just as the cult of Zabaniya worshiped Demons.

Still, as she floated along the silvery fluid the Crying Demon had cast her into, Everie did her best to keep her head above water. At least, until the rest of her body burned away, dissolved by the corrosive properties of the stream; at that point, she didn’t have much choice but to let her head fall into the... water.

That she didn’t die from that wasn’t much of a surprise - not at this point. What did intrigue her was that she could still see - and feel, to a minimal extent.

And it had burned. The river had been like a raging fire at the start, and it had devoured her very much like the actual thing. But now that her entire body had been dissolved, and she was this non- physical thing, the sizzling had cooled down to manageable levels.

It still hurt, though. For some reason, Everie didn’t think living beings were supposed to touch this substance.

She couldn’t move at all. Her vision, though, now extended three-hundred-sixty degrees - the kind of awareness that she’d trained to get subconsciously for her entire life. Everie could see everything: from the sluicing silver of the river to the sheer blackness and empty space that surrounded the stream.

There was no bank or beach to hem the river in. Just an empty universe, disturbed only by the presence of what looked like an infinite number of different streams of silver, flowing from the confluence the demon from before had been guarding.

Everie was floating down one of them now.

Besides the pain, it was... kind of nice, actually. It had been quite a while, she thought, since I last had so much time to myself like this.

Life without fear of capture, or loss. She twitched. Well, ‘death’, I suppose.

She wasn’t entirely sure what her current state would be described as, but it certainly wasn’t living.

Everie sighed, internally. It was quiet. The view was beautiful. She’d been floating for a long while yet already, and she didn’t feel any tell-tale feeling of boredom.

Why would she? One way or another, Everie had lost her life.

She sighed. Maybe it would be best for her to let things end, like this. Struggling would be but an avenue to more suffering, and thereby greater struggle - it had seemed, once, as if every action she had taken and could possibly take wrought equal and opposite punishment upon those she held dear. And now that she had no body to command, only her... soul, it wasn’t like she had a great many avenues of action available to her.

I mean, what am I supposed to do in this state? Wriggle around?

Everie sighed - internally, of course. Maybe this really was the end.

But... What is this? What’s this feeling?

Everie felt her mind shudder. There was a... light, permeating her form. But... that was impossible. Her body was long gone. As far as she’d been aware, she had been floating down this stream in an entirely incorporeal form.

But now? Everie was shining. Upon inspection, she realized she still didn’t have a body; instead, the light that she felt suffusing her form had coalesced into a little ball of colorless energy.

Everie stared at herself in fascination. It felt... strong. The energy had depth to it. And she had no idea at all what it was.

I’m confused, she groaned. What is this? I’ve never seen anything like it before.

Cautiously, she extended mental... feelers, and tried to move the energy around. Everie didn’t really know what she was doing; she simply thought about pushing the glistening, little ball of power, and her consciousness responded in that form.

She soon found that it wasn’t really a part of her - more like it was locked into the space that composed her form, but hadn’t been absorbed into her body. It only moved slightly as she pushed it around, before gravitating back to the center of her form.

Whatever it was, it felt comfortable. Despite not being part of her body at all, it didn’t feel out of place.

Everie sighed. She stopped her probing attempts, causing her mental feelers to fizzle out of existence. The ball of energy stopped, shuddered - then shot back into the core of her being.

She felt exhausted, even though she wasn’t really. It’s not like I can really be physically exhausted anymore, anyway.

She looked around her again. The same old blackness; except, the light emanating from her... soul - that was the state Everie was trapped in, in all likelihood - seemed to illuminate the space. Like a beacon.

That was attracting something to Everie’s position. Something huge.

Everie yelped as a massive behemoth erupted out of the darkness. Rivers of soul shattered into silver splinters as it passed, raining down through otherwise pitch-black space.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

What in the- Everie cursed.

She’d never seen anything quite so large. It was even larger than the Crying Demon - she couldn’t see the end of it, even from her faraway vantage. Streams of silver ran down its sides, percolating and hissing off its hide.

The residue also lit up the beast sufficiently for Everie to see its features properly. But all she saw were eyes.

Millions upon millions of milky white eyes, all glaring towards her. Hungrily.

Everie cursed. She twisted, and leapt backwards - or at least, she tried to.

Right. Can’t move anymore.

She paused.

Well, what in the hell- I mean, what am I supposed to do now?

The beast roared. It was - literally - a soul-shaking quake, resonating across miles of roiling black space to reach Everie. From its mouth emanated distortions of space that caused pain to erupt in Everie’s consciousness as it tried to construe the non-euclidean fractals the ruptures created.

But however strident this beast sounded, its cries were nothing compared to the strange, arcane language the Crying Demon had spoken to her in. And she’d acclimated to that quickly enough.

That’s not going to save you from being eaten, though, Everie thought, anxiously. What is it with strange monsters wanting to consume me? That Demon from earlier tried to do the same thing, too.

Everie sighed. She’d just died. And… despite everything, Everie was growing to realize that she did not want to experience a repeat performance.

Everie considered indifference. There was nothing really left for her, anyway. But... something about watching the soul streams shatter in the wake of the beast’s passing made an ugly sensation coil in her heart.

Fear. That was an emotion Everie hadn’t truly felt in quite some while. It was not as if she had been able to escape the base instinct entirely. But before, even when the Crying Demon had manifested before her, her fear had been borne more of shock and disequilibrium from having been confronted by such an unknown.

Fear of death. That was what Everie had lost, on that fateful day all those months ago, when she had killed a part of herself with her own two hands.

Resignation. To her own death. To everyone’s death. Nihilism had prevented her from feeling such a human thing as fear. But if she was afraid now, then-

-do I want to live? Everie frowned.

Her instincts were flaring at her to run. To do anything to survive. To live.

-Fight back, Everie-

Everie shuddered, chuckling.

Well. This is quite an unexpected development.

Fine, she thought to herself. I want to live, then. The thought sent a chord of relief down her… soul? As well as a tinge of guilt.

Perhaps dying once had renewed her desire for survival. The events of the past hour were, after all, the sort that could raise religions and cults - a life-changing experience, no doubt. But once again, what could she do? Everie couldn’t move - not in this… soul-state, at least.

Think, she mused, watching the beast approaching her with wary eyes. How did you survive last time? That... Eye earlier wanted to consume me... or something. And the one that killed it was...

Everie gasped. Right. The one that had sent her here had killed that demon-thing with a... rift, or something. She didn’t quite understand how whatever brand of power these beings used worked, but if she was right...

Hey, Everie thought. Seeing as how you decided to spare me, I assume you have something planned for me. Then I need you to protect me, Demon.

She paused, waiting a few seconds - for what she didn’t really know. It wasn’t like Everie knew how to transmit messages from her brain, after all.

Truth be told, she felt a little silly.

She couldn’t help but let a little sarcasm creep into her voice as she ‘transmitted’ her thoughts, either. What was she doing? There was no way this would work. No way-

A tear in space erupted. The beast had reached uncomfortably close to her - a mile away, at most - when it careened to the side, before exploding into a vortex of black blood and mist.

Everie would have blinked if she still had eyes. Huh.

Then another roar resounded in the darkness.

And another.

Everie sighed, but couldn’t help but let a dewdrop of relief stain her thoughts. Well, she thought to herself. Might as well sit back and watch the show.

—

How long had it been?

Time flowed irregularly in this place. Everie might wait then observe her surroundings to find that mere seconds had passed, or that years had already flown by, or - on a few rare occasions - she was somehow floating in a section of the delta she was certain she’d seen hours before.

Everie watched, impassively, as another rift ripped through one of the massive creatures that were trying to consume her. Some of them were larger than others, although none really measured up to the first one she had seen. There were different variations of them too; some were spindly, others bloated, but all of them had more eyes than she could count.

She did notice that the tears in space were growing fainter as she traveled further downstream to hell-knows-where. Either it was due to the sheer distance Everie must have covered in all her time drifting, or the beast was getting tired.

So, she thought, that thing isn’t all-powerful after all.

That was both reassuring and worrying. For one, Everie felt glad that she wasn’t quite as small as she’d originally presumed compared to these behemoths - they were mortal, too. But Everie was also completely dependent on the Crying Demon for her safety in her current state, and any sign of it flagging could be a portent of her doom.

She could only hope that the Demon’s strength would persist ‘till she got to wherever the Hell it was sending her to.

Everie startled. Something was there, downstream. She peered towards it, straining the limits of her consciousness.

It looked like a whirlpool - only made of fractals of silvery light, instead of roiling fluid. Upon closer inspection, it looked somewhat similar to the... thing the Demon did with the rifts it used to transport her and kill the behemoths.

That was her ticket out of here. All Everie had to do was wait for it. But then, there was a screech.

And the darkness around her splintered, and exploded.