Chapter 10: Chapter 10 - New Ways, New Worlds, New Dangers

There was a pause, heavy and almost condescending.

“For beings such as you...” there was another pause, as if it was being very careful with its words. “Anyway, your methods are still barbaric.”

Neither of them spoke, so the whale continued.

“Let me ask, has any Celestial ever gone beyond unlocking the third chamber of their heart?”

“None,” Rein answered, his voice quiet.

He didn’t know how the whale knew that no Celestial had ever opened the fourth pneuma gate. Among the elders, the third was the highest any had reached, already a legendary feat, but still not enough to reach the peak. But with how casually the whale spoke about Celestials—and even mentioned swallowing one before—it had clearly encountered them in the past.

“As I thought,” the whale rumbled. “Listen closely, both of you. Pneuma and ousia are far more complex than you’ve been taught. Even with all the ages I’ve lived through, I haven’t fully grasped them. But through the mastery of healing, I was able to open all four chambers of my heart.”

He let that statement hang in the air, like a secret he was daring them to grasp.

“You’ll understand in time, when you reach your destination. In the Underworld and the Overworld, you’ll see how they use pneuma and ousia in ways far more refined than what you’ve been taught. But it is not my place to teach you their paths. My methods are different, too different. So I will teach you only what I know best.”

There was a pulse in his voice, a kind of gravity as he concluded:

“Healing.”

Rein’s head throbbed with everything he had just heard.

The ways of pneuma and ousia—so rigid, so dull in the teachings of Rigel—suddenly shimmered with a brilliance he hadn’t seen before. What once felt like lifeless, colorless stones now glittered like gold. Maybe the problem wasn’t the path itself, but how it had been taught to him. Monotony had drained the wonder from it.

But now… he imagined a vast, endless ocean stretching out before him, filled with mysteries waiting to be uncovered.

This was what he had been looking for. The rush of discovery. The call of freedom. The reason he had wanted to leave Rigel in the first place. That flame had been dimmed by everything he and Morin had endured. But now, it sparked again, burning bright in his chest.

The thrill of it was so intense that his body moved on instinct. From lying down, he suddenly sat upright, the blood in his veins pounding like a war drum. But his battered body betrayed him. Pain exploded through his limbs and down his spine like wildfire. With a sharp cry, he collapsed again, the back of his head knocking against the stone beneath him.

It was enough to calm the fire, for now.

The whale let out a low, thunderous sigh that echoed like distant tremors across the chamber.

“Let us begin,” it rumbled. “I will teach you the way of healing the body. But first, tell me, do you trust your body?”

“Absolutely,” Rein replied without hesitation.

It was the only thing he truly had control over. His own body—scarred, bruised, broken—was still his. That was one of the reasons he disliked ousia. It was external. Foreign. Something that didn’t belong to him, that resisted his will. Trying to force it into his body, trying to command it, it never sat right with him. Maybe that was part of the reason he couldn’t break through his second gate.

“Then that makes this even easier,” the whale replied. “Trust in your body is the first step toward mastering it. At your current level—and with the extent of your injuries—you will not be able to heal everything at once. So for now, choose one spot. Focus your pneuma there.”

Pain surged across Rein’s body like a storm without direction, each injury flaring and fading in chaotic rhythms. Some he could identify; others simply throbbed in the background like dull, forgotten bruises. It was a choir of pain, dissonant and overwhelming.

He needed something specific.

His thoughts drifted to the moment when Morin had caught him, when her hand had clamped down around his to stop him from falling out of the whale. That pain was sharp, clean, and clear. Something he could trace without uncertainty.

He moved his fingers slowly, testing them one by one. His index and pinky throbbed with a deeper pain than the rest. Fractures, he realized.

He chose the pinky.

Focusing his breath, he gathered his pneuma and directed it toward the small broken bone.

As he began the process, he asked, “What else is there to healing besides just gathering pneuma into the injured spot?”

Stolen story; please report.

“The body heals on its own, you see,” the whale began, its voice steady and deep. “And the source of that natural healing is the heart, where both blood and pneuma originate. But there is a way to hasten the process.”

“So if I understand it right,” Rein said, “there’s something in the heart that promotes healing… and blood and pneuma carry that through the body via the veins?”

“Correct,” the whale replied. “But let me be clear: one must never tamper with the flow of blood without deep knowledge. Altering its speed or direction, even slightly, can damage the body beyond repair. Blood is precise. Delicate.”

“Pneuma, however, behaves differently. While it often travels alongside blood, it is not bound by the same laws. It is more malleable, less intricate, and it can even pass through solid matter if directed properly.”

If that was how the body processed healing, then there was a clear opportunity: accelerate the delivery system.

He didn’t know enough about his own body to dare interfere with his blood flow, but if pneuma could carry the same healing essence from the heart then perhaps…

“So, if I increase the speed at which my pneuma flows from my heart to the injury,” Rein said, “I can accelerate healing?”

“Exactly,” the whale confirmed.

Rein almost smiled. It made sense. The whale wasn’t just a being of speed in movement, but in recovery too. Everything about it seemed to revolve around motion and momentum.

Wasting no time, Rein began. He was already used to cycling pneuma throughout his body. He had practiced it until it became as natural as breathing. But increasing the speed of that cycle was another matter entirely.

He tried to command it, to will his pneuma to move faster from his heart to his injured finger.

But it was like asking a calm stream to become a raging river. He knew how to ask, but the stream wouldn't obey just yet.

Rein felt his pneuma flow through his veins like a cold wind whispering through long, narrow tunnels. He urged it forward, trying to accelerate the cycle from his heart to his injured finger. But no matter how much focus he poured into it, hours passed and the increase in speed was negligible, barely milliseconds faster.

Still, it was progress.

And progress, no matter how small, was a step forward, especially compared to the rigid method he had been taught in Rigel: to simply gather pneuma at the injured site and wait. This was different. Active. And even if the process was still repetitive, the challenge of pushing his pneuma to flow faster gave it a kind of thrill. There was now purpose in every breath, every beat of his heart.

Nearby, Morin seemed to have grown tired of zipping around on the golden scale. Her excitement had dulled, the thrill wearing off.

So Rein called out to her and suggested something else, something more productive.

“Start cycling your pneuma around your body,” he instructed. “Focus on reinforcing your strength and senses, just like we were taught in the fundamentals.”

He explained that if what the whale had said was true and the Underworld lacked usable ousia, then they would have to rely entirely on their own pneuma. Using blood again to simulate ousia might work, but it was too risky, too dangerous to be a regular option.

Maybe she saw the determination in his eyes. Maybe she was simply inspired by his own silent struggle. Whatever the reason, she nodded and began cycling her pneuma without complaint.

Rein hadn’t instructed Morin to train just to pass the time or prepare in case a fight broke out. It wasn’t a precaution anymore. It was a necessity.

He remembered the million whale’s words clearly:

“I have mentioned before that because you are both Celestials, your pneuma will attract others to it like fire in the dark, just as it did for me and that mad serpent. And like us, their reactions will vary. Some may follow you, others may befriend you, some may try to exploit you… or even take your lives. The same will hold true in the Underworld, and the Overworld, should you go there. So be prepared.”

The idea had settled heavily on Rein’s mind.

This journey—this escape from Rigel that once glowed with the promise of freedom and adventure—would not be some lighthearted excursion through distant lands. Danger would follow them like a shadow. Their very existence would provoke it.

Still… despite it all, Rein couldn’t suppress the quiet thrill that pulsed in his chest at the thought of meeting creatures from different races. The mysteries of the Underworld, the legends of the Overworld. He wanted to see it all.

Even if it meant fighting for every step forward.

They would face whatever came. Together.

Along the way, Rein, Morin, and the whale spoke of many things.

Morin, predictably, was mostly interested in food and anything she deemed fun, her questions flitting from flavor to sensation like a butterfly with no clear pattern. Rein, on the other hand, asked about anything that could deepen his understanding of the universe. Its rules, its creatures, its history.

One question he posed had lingered in his mind for a while: if the million whale was truly as massive and ancient as it seemed, traveling across the universe for eons, why were there so few records of it? So few mentions in the texts he'd studied?

The whale’s answer was simple, almost smug in its delivery.

“Because I move too fast for the eye to see. Most who witness me merely believe I’m a great wind passing through. A weather phenomenon, nothing more.”

That, Rein had to admit, was oddly satisfying. A creature so grand it left no trace. Not because it was hiding, but because it simply existed beyond perception.

He also learned that the only reason he had been able to see and hear the whale in the first place—its trumpet-like cry reverberating through the air—was because it had deliberately slowed its journey. It had caught the scent of the rich, sweet pneuma leaking from his body and had grown curious. Curious enough to deviate from one of its million ever-branching paths just to investigate.

But not every answer was satisfying.

When Rein asked about Kael Riven, the legendary figure, his inspiration, who had once supposedly traveled aboard the whale, the creature paused, then let out a rumbling breath.

“The name sounds faintly familiar. I believe he may have ridden me... but only for a short while. Long enough to leave a name, but not a memory.”

Rein didn’t know why, but that answer stung a little.

They had grown so absorbed in their conversation that Rein was completely caught off guard when a deep rumbling echoed all around them. For a moment, his heart clenched. Had the golden serpent somehow followed them into the Overworld?

But the whale quickly dismissed the concern.

“We’ve already left the Overworld,” it said. “This is the Underworld.”

Rein blinked, confused. He hadn’t even realized they were transitioning again.

Apparently, unlike the barrier they had passed through from the Outerworld to the Overworld, entering the Underworld required something else entirely: a descent into a place called the Mariana’s Trench—the deepest abyss in all the Overworld.

The rumbling wasn’t from another giant beast, but from the Underworld itself.