He felt like he was asleep, yet awake at the same time. He felt as if his senses were useless, yet his mind had gone into overdrive. Like sleep paralysis while blind. But the voices hadn't stopped. If anything, without the outside distractions, he could only hear them louder. They were slowly eating away at his mind, trying to corrupt with images and chants.

Normally he would have tried to understand what had happened. Thoughts like 'am I dead?' or 'where am I?'. But the sounds override all conscious thoughts, while the images deform all thoughts and memories going through his head as if trying to destroy them. It was like his mind was being reformed to see and understand things it couldn't.

In the end, he started to become used to the pain, or maybe it simply got better, he didn't know. While the pain slowly subsided, the voices and images didn't. after a while he started to think again. he started wondering what had happened, why it happened, and what the hell these things he kept seeing and hearing meant. in the end, he learnt that nothing could stop them, they were relentless, to say the least. at least nothing he had on him could.

he decided to leave it at that and think about other things, like where he was. he didn't feel any pain, so at least he wasn't in immediate danger. he couldn't see or hear anything, which was unsettling, to say the least. the creature that ate him doesn't appear to have any way of killing him in here, so what should he do to get out? If he should even try, with that thing roaming around 'outside'.

'Is this outside of or inside? Maybe inside the gaping dragon?' He asks no one in particular 'Meh, who cares. Not that knowing will help me at all

After an unknown amount of time, he gave up. The voices weren't stopping, his eyesight wasn't returning, And he was extremely bored.

'Well this sucks' he thought to himself

After what felt like days of doing nothing, he decided to try and understand what the images, runes, and voices were telling him (or screaming, he couldn't tell anymore). He had nothing else to do, floating in the void and all.

he started to 'see' patterns with the runes, images and chants. He noticed that every time he saw an image or rune and thought 'i don't understand' or, the more usual, 'the fuck is that?' an image would fill his mind. He guessed that these images were the meaning of the rune or an abbreviation of the image if that is a thing. It wasn't the most beginner-friendly way to learn a language, it was kind of the same as asking what a word was, and they point at the object it identifies as. like someone told you "kyrka" (Swedish) and then pointed at a church. No way he was going to become a fluent speaker if this was all he had.

But that's where the voices came in. The voices were talking in the language, and as he saw an image, the voices would say its name. And as he saw a rune, the voices would say its pronunciation. He tried repeating what the voices said, thus getting his tongue familiar with the more intricate movements needed to say harder words. It was like speaking in tongues, but with actual meaning to the different sounds and phrases.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

After an unknown amount of time, the chanting, or voices as they were to him now, became longer and harder to understand, with more than one word every time it spoke. He understood that this meant that he was starting to learn to speak sentences, and how they are built up in this 'language'. Instead of just 'say the words, he now had to 'say the words in the correct order. This continued for a long time. Who would have thought learning an alien language would be so hard?

After another unknown amount of time, it started to ask him questions. He started to talk and have conversations with the voices. It kind of felt like he was talking to a volleyball on a deserted island, just answering in my mind, and with predetermined answers. Except at least that volleyball would understand those references.

And just like that volleyball, he started to grow attached to the voice. it became a friend he could always count on to be there when he needed to talk. And when he didn't. And when he didn't want to. The conversations started to grow longer and longer, with more and more complex words. And with attachment, the need for a name for the voices grew.

He named the voices Karlson. Named after a Swedish meatball-loving boy that lives on a roof and flies with a propeller hat.

'Ah... That brings back memories*

"What memories?" asks the voices. yeah, it could read his mind too. they, or 'It' i guess, was always happy to find a new topic to talk about. Karlson was surprisingly talkative for something speaking in probably the most terrifying language in existence.

"Hm? Oh, yeah. From my home, there was this..." And then a new topic hade started, this one was rather long, bridging from childhood movies to media in general. He got some help for some words he didn't understand, thus increasing his vocabulary even more. This almost infinite small talk had taught him to speak the language fluently. According to Karlson, he sounded almost like a native speaker, which is apparently surprising because 'the language wasn't made with human vocal cords in mind'.

This continued for a long time. No one knew for how long, as keeping watch of time in this abyss was about as useful as finding seaweed in the ocean. Not to mention that it's almost impossible to actually keep time, considering all you see is black, and all you hear in your own mind. And voices if you're a special snowflake.

After finishing their topic on how meme culture started corrupting the minds of children, or 'young flesh' as the direct translation says, Karlson said something Felix was dying to hear.

'So, you wanna go out now? As fun as seeing absolutely nothing is, I think you learned enough of the old tongue to understand your fellow 'eldritch horror' or whatever you call it ' thus confirming that he was inside of something.

"..." Felix started considering, there aren't many possibilities to be stuck in a void for who knows how long. "I don't know, I mean it's pretty lovely here. With all the black and void around, why would I leave?"

'I'll take that as a yes then. Don't worry, I will be coming with you whether you want me to or not. I mean, our journey is only beginning.'

As he says those final words, a rift opens in front of Felix, pulling him inside. the light in the rift burning his eyes

"MY EYES"

'Oops, forgot you weren't used to light anymore'