Zeel's POV

I could feel my skin melting; the gravitational forces of the supermassive black hole had crushed my internal organs.

Alice and Elizabeth were also severely injured, but like always, I took the brunt of the forces since my master nanites were much more efficient when it came to self-repair.

Exiting the cosmic wormhole with beyond momentum unparalleled, I turn to a half-melted Alice and Elizabeth, I knew their lives were in no danger but it still made me a bit anxious to see their current conditions.

Then I made a mistake I was thought never to make – take care of yourself before anyone else. This to me was akin to the commandments for religious fanatics – something that should never be broken.

I was surprised when I found myself waving my hand outwards causing two stasis pods to materialize and latch onto Elizabeth's and Alice's bodies respectively.

With the stasis pods wrapping their bodies, I breathe a huge sigh of relief, not worrying about the massive amount of energy I just expended to ensure their safety over my own.

Then I realized what I had done, didn't I just use the majority of my remaining energy to encase them in stasis pods? What about myself?

I have enough materials to create another stasis pod in my storage dimension, but not enough energy reserves to build it.

Our lives were not in danger because we had the materials necessary to preserve it, but now I had nothing. Without a stasis pod, I would slowly die after I pass out with this radiation still present in my body.

The nanites were miraculous, but not omnipotent. It could not save a life without the necessary energy to do so. I was already dying due to the chains on my soul, but I guess death would greet me a lot sooner than I planned.

I had tried to remove my limiters, but to no avail, as my body was currently flooded with life-threatening amounts of electromagnetic radiation.

I also tried resonance but found Alice's and Elizabeth's nanites to have already entered a dormant state, with full processing power being focused on repairing their bodies – no doubt this would take years upon years since the supermassive black hole had messed with the calibration somewhat.

Adjusting to a totally new universe was also not helping the nanites repair time, since each universe vibrates at different frequencies.

I slightly chuckle to myself 'When had I become so stupid? What is wrong with me? Why would I care about their safety more than my own? Had I become weak? Why did my body react without me noticing?'

These thoughts and more flooded my brain for a nanosecond, after which I used my remaining energy reserves to strip nearby Earth and pull it towards myself with some added rotational force.

This in turn allowed me to encase myself in a covering of earth, I made it as compact as possible to avoid any annoyances as my nanites would enter a semi-dormant state to repair my failing biological processes.

Sadly, the particulates of the black hole were also wrapped into my Earth shell alongside me. Now it was all but guaranteed that I would die within a few days at most.

I could feel myself falling somewhere deep below the earth for a while, then my consciousness gave in and I entered a deep slumber.

Even in a semi-dormant state, my nanites were master nanites and hence some functions would always be available regardless of the circumstances.

I tried to reach out for Alice and Elizabeth's consciousness but found nothing – this told me that they were also okay but still asleep.

The days turned to night, and vice versa. Eventually, I lost count of how many days passed after getting to one hundred days, or was it two hundred? I can't remember.

The embrace of death never came; the energy of the particulates was not causing additional damage to my failing biological processes. Instead, it felt as if the energy of the particulates was being absorbed by something else.

However, I was taught to always take what is offered – a commandment of mine that I would prefer not to break for Elizabeth, Alice, or anyone else.

After day two hundred passed, I had begun drifting in and out of consciousness fairly often, but at that moment I noticed something peculiar.

Upon regaining my faculties, I began using my senses to focus on everything near me. It was at that moment I felt it, a beast similar to one I had encountered before, it was both strong and weak at the same time which baffled me to no end – do they also have Schrödinger's cat in this Universe?

As the days passed, my drowsy state faded as I regained more and more clarity. By now two years had passed at the very least, I concentrated my senses on the slumbering beast that was now wrapped around my stasis pod as if claiming ownership of it.

Then I began to panic internally, my mind had not been clear before so I didn't notice that my energy was leaking out into the underground environment.

I was still connected to Lorien through the Multiversal current, so our (Alice, Elizabeth, and I) excess energy would be siphoned by Lorien, but due to the semi-dormant state of my master nanites, the energy transposition rate had decreased by a marginal amount.

This meant that whatever this creature is, had been siphoning my excess energy in an attempt to wake up from its energy-deprived, slumbering state.

I could only imagine how much cosmic force concentrated energy I had been releasing over the past two years. At least, now I know where the particulate energy of the black hole was going.

With no better options, I broke another one of my commandments – never associate with unknowns or entities you can't fully control.

I began re-absorbing all excess energy back into myself, which also included the energy present within the nearby beast – this was a taboo since depending on the source, some energies could become tainted with erroneous characteristics.

The energy that was reintroduced into my body, had not only become more refined but also carried with it the feeling of an ancient species of my homeworld.

One that went extinct millions of years before any humans were born, my civilization later found traces of Dragons after the space exploration era.

The energy held in the Dragon race's bones were later dubbed 'Draconic Energy', it was later banned due to its violent nature and tendency to cause strange mutations in Homo-Superior biology.

The Draconic Energy was faint, if I had to guess it would come from a Dragon less than a couple of thousand years old.

The older a dragon is, the more powerful it becomes, some were even said to be as massive as galaxies and even the weakest had the potential to become planet-sized.

The strength of Dragons in my Universe was peak amongst species during their time of reign.

However, not all dragons in the Multiverse are that strong, but given the cosmic force partially absorbed by the best, I had no doubt that it could kill me with a slight movement of its paw.

Dragons were known for their uncanny ability to absorb and change almost any type of energy in Draconic Energy.

The Draconic Energy was faint, but it came from a dragon nonetheless. It began rampaging in my body causing my recently repaired organs to once again melt. Like this, I began to drift in and out of consciousness year after year as the cycle repeated itself.

I would sleep causing my internal energy to leak outside, the nearby slumbering Dragon would absorb the energy in an attempt to awaken, I would later wake up and re-absorb the refined energy that had a hint of draconic energy inside, causing my body to once again break down.

Over the next 26 years, it became a battle between the Dragon and me to see who would adopt first. Every time I would re-absorb my energy from the Dragon, a small amount would remain behind.

Likewise, every time I absorbed the Draconic Energy, my body would become stronger and more resistant to violent tendencies.

This process between man and beast continued in an unhindered cycle, truth be told, I was getting a bit anxious since the Dragon was beginning to stir awake faster than I could adapt to the damaging Draconic Energy.

Then I felt it for the first time in many years, Alice and Elizabeth were nearby. I didn't have the luxury to check their conditions over the years since I had to fully devote my attention to this ongoing battle when awake.

Once in a while, I would get flashes of their appearances in my consciousness.

Over the last couple of days, the flashes intensified as I saw a vision of Elizabeth's awakening, and then Alice's subsequent awakening.

I knew the girls were coming for me today, so I began re-absorbing as much of the Dragon's energy as I could.

When I sever the cycle with it, I didn't want it to be jolted awake. Luckily, I have a gadget in my storage dimension that could drain specific energies from an environment.

Now, I just hope that Alice and Elizabeth could hurry and recover me, if this Dragon awoke it would become a battle we can't possibly win – well at the very least we could run an entire Universe away.