"Ugh... Where am I?"
Jin looked around. He was supposed to have been inside Pegasus 1, but now he was all alone.
"Reiko!"
He called out for his incomparably loyal automata, but there was no response. Even the manacam function of the Fellowship Bracelet on his wrist failed to elicit a reply.
"Does this mean... I've been 'spirited away'?"
A chill ran down his spine as he imagined the worst-case scenario.
A localized space vibration had occurred inside Pegasus 1. He remembered seeing the harness snap during the tremors and thinking, This is bad. The "spirited away" phenomenon must have happened at that exact instant. He had been caught in an event with an astronomically low probability.
"Even so, I'm lucky the air is breathable..."
It was a small mercy that he hadn't been teleported into the vacuum of space, a scorching volcano, or a frigid wasteland. Gravity felt like roughly 1G. The temperature was a bit cool, but well within the tolerable range.
"But still..."
He surveyed his surroundings again. The situation was incomprehensible. He appeared to be on a plain; the ground beneath his feet was generally level, though the rock was rugged. Nearby lay piles of what looked like trash, and rocks resembling meteorites or space dust were scattered here and there.
"Maybe these are other things that were 'spirited away' before me?"
Jin speculated that the junk might be the waste products that had reportedly vanished from the relay base.
"The air pressure feels a bit high. And it's incredibly dry."
The air was so arid it made his throat and nose prickle.
"So, what should I do now...?"
Jin was surprised by his own composure. It was strange, in a way, that he wasn't spiraling into a panic.
"Maybe humans just give up once they realize there's nothing they can do... Or maybe it's because I've already survived an experience where I should have died..."
After standing still for a while with no change, Jin decided to walk around the area a bit.
"There's no sound, either..."
The only things he could hear were his own breathing and footsteps. It was so absolute that a phantom ringing hummed in the depths of his ears.
"There really is nothing here."
Aside from the objects that had seemingly arrived through the same phenomenon, there was nothing of note; only a desolate, endless plain stretched out before him.
"I won't last long like this."
Jin stopped walking and returned to his starting point. He reasoned that if the space were to become unstable again, the location where he had first appeared would be the most likely spot for a way back to open.
Furthermore, he knew that if he had been spirited away, Laojun and Reiko would do whatever it took to find him. For now, waiting was his only option.
"I'm a complete castaway."
Returning to his original position, Jin sat down on a suitable rock, using it as a chair. He looked up at the sky. Whether it was cloudy or just a featureless void, it was a uniform gray, with no sign of a sun or a moon.
"Come to think of it, there's no wind, either."
Was this a world of nothingness? Just as Jin let out a sigh, it happened.
[Has a thinking existence fallen here?]
A voice echoed in his head. No, it wasn't a voice—it was a "thought" with that meaning resonating within him.
＊ ＊ ＊
They were a very, very ancient race.
Their original nature was peaceful, and they were strangers to conflict. Because their desires were modest, they had no history of war, and their population growth was gradual. However, because of that, the pace of their cultural and civilizational development was also slow.
Nevertheless, by accumulating vast ages—equivalent to tens of thousands of years in Earth time—they eventually reached the pinnacle of material civilization. Normally, after reaching the peak, there is nowhere to go but down. But the next path they chose was a transition toward a spiritual civilization.
And so, another several hundred thousand years passed. They finally succeeded in discarding their physical bodies and becoming purely spiritual entities. Since spiritual entities use sub-ether as their energy source, they no longer knew hunger and were able to live semi-eternally.
Millions, then tens of millions of years passed. Living through this near-eternal time, They gradually began to grow bored. It was then that their universe began to undergo superposition with others.
During these moments, the universes would occasionally "connect." Since the density of a universe is extremely low when viewed from a higher dimension, these connections were brief—lasting only milliseconds or nanoseconds. However, objects from the other universe would sometimes cross over during that time. To the bored spiritual entities, these were the perfect playthings.
Another tens of millions of years passed, and in that time, they superposed with ten different universes. Through dozens of contacts, objects were brought into their realm. In every case, the matter moved from the other universe into theirs.
Having nothing to do but contemplate, they reached a conclusion: "There is a difference in potential between universes." Their world had a low potential; therefore, matter "fell" into it during contact. They named such a movement of matter "superposition contact."
Initially, they enjoyed it, but around the time they had superposition contact with the sixth universe, they began to feel regret. This was because among the objects that "fell" in, there were some that were clearly living beings. These creatures could not adapt to this universe's environment and perished in an instant.
To their sensibilities, this was unbearable.
Since the locations of the superposition contact and the subsequent "falls" were consistent, they decided to stabilize the environment in that area. They analyzed the biological components of a creature that had "fallen" during the seventh contact and created a suitable habitat.
That meant an atmosphere of 21 percent oxygen, 78 percent nitrogen, and 0.03 percent carbon dioxide, with a pressure of 1100 hectopascals. Gravity was set to 1.02G, and the temperature to 290 Kelvin. It was an environment almost perfectly suited for creatures living on Earth-type planets. However, since they hadn't specifically adjusted the water vapor pressure, the relative humidity remained low, around 5 percent.
Despite these efforts, the creatures that "fell" during the eighth and ninth superposition contacts were not intelligent life-forms, and communication was impossible. They lived out their brief, fleeting lives and vanished.
And now, the tenth superposition contact.
Not just matter, but a single living entity had "fallen." They decided to observe that entity closely.
It was emitting sounds in an incredibly low frequency range. Judging by the shifting frequencies and waveforms, they determined it to be "speech." Since a certain level of logic was evident in its actions, they inferred that it possessed some form of intelligence.
Finally, their Representative decided to try and make contact.
[Has a thinking existence fallen here?]
The Representative spoke using mental waves, a universal medium for communication...