[You recovered pretty fast, huh?]

"..."

Waking up from her deep nap, Hazel immediately found herself kissing the floor hard. She wasn't hurt that much, just a slight crack in the skull and a broken neck. Whether it was from the impact or whatever, Hazel looked quieter than before.

Having just woken up from her sleep, Branik assumed that Hazel was just not fully awake yet. Her consciousness was probably in another realm, wandering around without direction and purpose. Therefore, Branik decided to leave it as it was for the moment. It would be better, he thought, if Hazel could already accept her body when she was fully awake later.

The girl looked at the exotic valley below her. The scenery reminded her of the alien planets she often read about in fiction books. Even if she looked again carefully, she was in a place similar to the Great Barrier Reef. With her night vision, she could see fish-like creatures swimming in the air.

"Where are we..."

Hearing her voice, Hazel felt her mouth sour slightly. She had promised in her dream to be able to accept it, but it was indeed rather difficult for her. Her current voice was the same as when she was a child, it was a low-pitched feminine voice. Given how she looked back then, it made her a very androgynous boy. It pleased her to see people confused when they saw her for the first time.

Which was a good thing... at least.

Hazel only had to think if her current body shrank to her childhood self. She realized that by doing so, she could get rid of her feelings of alienation and hatred.

But still...

"I can't believe this... I did 'that'... I did that in a place like that!!!" She thought, how immoral was she to have to do that at that time?

[But hey, the good thing is that you're all better now!]

Listening to the babble of voices in her brain put her in a slightly good mood. Although she didn't like the way he was acting, she had to admit that without him she was screwed. If trying to forget it was so difficult, then she just had to distract herself.

"Uh... where are we right now, Branik? Shouldn't we currently be at the bottom of the ravine? I've fallen to the bottom of a cliff before, and I remember exactly if it wasn't like this."

[Do you want a good answer or a bad one?]

"Huh?... The bad one?"

[Alright then, let's start with my analysis first. We are currently, in short, in another dimension. Worse, we are in a dimension with the most dangerous entity in the universe; The Void."]

Indeed, the name sounded familiar to her ears, but if it was Branik who mentioned it. Then Hazel would confidently believe it with all her heart.

Branik always convinced her to think of him as a guide. That way, she could be comfortable and get used to his existence. She used to love reading fantasy books that she found intentionally or unintentionally. Most of them were generic fantasy stories, about someone being sent to another world.

Some of the main characters often found themselves a gift in the form of a 'system'. Each story sometimes has its way of describing or versioning the system. Like those in games, systems can easily provide direction, information, or statistics to the user.

So, Branik might be categorized as one of them considering he is a source of extremely deep information.

Hazel just had to ignore the fact that Branik could also easily see inside her head...

She has no privacy.

"So... the abyss is the gate? So what's with this Void? Is it more dangerous than Cief?"

[If we were to meet it right now, it is certain that we would die within seconds. It's not a matter of how strong, the abilities our opponent will have are extremely dangerous. It can take lives and strengthen itself, just like you."]

"Take a life? If you mean killing then I can indeed do that." She said while puffing out her chest proudly.

[No-no, what I mean is that it can easily pull your soul out of your poor body. It can do it easily without you even realizing it. How to put it... ah, it's like taking something out of the cupboard without having to open it."]

"Ck, if that's all I am too-"

[Or destroying the cupboard, like an angel of death to be more precise.]

"..."

[Understood?]

"..."

[?]

"Er... more or less, I see. So it plucks out a person's soul and strengthens itself, like a soul eater? I read tons of books about fantasy creatures, or anything related."

[Exactly! I can't believe you can understand this quickly.]

"Hehe, of course, I do— Do you think I'm a monkey?!!!"

[If it's a monkey then I can understand it. But you're supposed to be a creature with a standard level of intelligence.]

Hazel clenched her fists as hard as she could, listening to Branik was not very useful at the moment. She thought Branik had a personal grudge against her, mainly because of one thing.

Memory erasure.

Letting out a sigh of relief, Hazel warmed up to flex her stiff body. Her regeneration ability was at its worst when it came to joints. Often her joints and spine did not heal properly. They often ended up in strange positions or places that caused her pain. She always ended up having to manually correct their position in the end.

But in extreme cases like the spine, she had to go to a masseur.

"Well, rather than that... we are indeed stranded in another world huh. I guess my dream came true too, though not exactly."

[We can't expect much more with something like that. For now, we are at a safe level in this dimension, we can still survive with the bare necessities."]

"As rough as it is... does that mean we can still forage for food here? I hope we have some unique or exotic food, you know what? I don't care about that, I'm so hungry right now. I feel as if I can eat everything that fits in my mouth."

The instant the words left her mouth, she experienced a tingling sensation in her head. She swore that she heard Branik laughing silently inside her head. She decided to stand up and see if there was anything she could eat in the vicinity.

She was currently in a place filled with cylinder-shaped boulders scattered everywhere. The absence of light would also probably eliminate many details, given her limited vision. Her night vision was limited to the rough shapes of objects, it did not allow her to see the surface texture.

But to her, that was more than enough...

"Ah, look over there... doesn't that bastard look like a Wendigo? Heh, it's also very small."

In the distance, she could see a creature that looked very familiar to her.

"But is it a Wendigo? I guess they're supposed to be bigger than that?"

The antlers of the deer and their characteristic skulls at first made her doubt. There wasn't much meat to eat there, it was too skinny. She was too tired at the moment, cold, and also hungry.

Seeing Hazel's hesitation, Branik began to taunt her playfully.

[It's quite a distance, are you sure you can catch it? Catching a flying lizard alone will leave you battered]

As expected too, she ignited more easily than expected.

"Don't start that here, you fucking asshole. Yesterday it was your fault for not telling me if the gloves were still usable!"

[Who told you not to ask, you are the goat, right? A literal fucking goat.]

"You... just watch out! I'll catch that ugly guy right now!!!"

[Ugly? I don't think you have the right to call it that. Because you're uglier anyway-]

"SHUT UP!!!"

She had had enough of Branik's taunts and decided to ignore him. She ran towards the creature that seemed to be running away from her. The creature was only running on its two legs, much slower than Hazel.

She angrily smashed into all the stone structures that were in her way. Using both her legs and arms, she sped like an unstoppable train.

[We won't get enough of this, buddy.]

"Fuck it, I just want to eat!!!"