Turning his head back toward the door, Ben watched as it began to open, bright light bursting through the slowly widening divide, using his hand to cover his eyes, Ben waited several seconds before the door was in its fully opened state, with his eyes now beginning to adjust to the blinding light he began to hear and feel thundering footsteps heading towards him.

“Hm?” Ben moved his hand from his eyes to reveal a large figure standing before him, standing at least 13 feet tall, with a strong body to match his stature, covered by a simple plate armour. Other than his body he possessed no other outstanding features, with another glance over, Ben noticed a humongous great sword on his back which was almost twice as long as Ben was tall, as well as being around 3 feet wide and several inches thick, if it didn’t have its sharpened edges it wouldn’t even resemble a functioning weapon. The giant man looked down at Ben, meeting his eyes, he then raised both hands, forming a fist with his right, and a palm with his left before launching his fist into his palm, creating a small shockwave and bowing his head lightly; he greeted Ben with a warriors salute.

[Hello, young one, you must be Ben, correct? I am General Morn, one of the 10 saint generals that guards the Index, I have been tasked with delivering you to the Glass Scholars, please follow me]

With a deep, booming voice that shook Ben to his very core, General Morn, introduced himself. Quickly composing himself Ben returned the salute as best he could “Thank you General, though may I ask why someone of your standing would be asked to escort me?” Ben found it strange that a high level military commander would be tasked with such a simple escort duty.

Seeing Ben return his salute, General Morn nodded with a light smile ‘it’s good that he knows respect’ with just that simple gesture Ben had gained the Generals acknowledgment, taking note of his name for the future.

[It matters not why I am the one to guide you, just know you are in safe hands, now follow me, we mustn’t keep the esteemed scholars waiting]

With a wave of his hand he indicated for Ben to follow him. General Morn performed a swift turn and began to walk into the sea of white within the open doors. “He seems like a good man” Ben thought before hurrying after him, having to jog alongside as the sheer size difference made the Generals strides much larger than the average human, making it difficult for Ben to keep up.

To Bens relief it was no more than a minute before the General came to a stop. Before Ben could even begin to take in his surroundings he saw General Morn lower himself onto one knee, clearly showing respect to someone.

[General Morn reporting, I have escorted the requested individual to the esteemed scholars, please excuse me, I will now take my leave]

[Mm, very well, thank you for your services]

As The General finished relaying his report a serene but slightly mechanical voice sounded out, sending the General on his way as he quickly disappeared into the white passage. Ben took a few seconds and began to scan his surroundings before landing in the direction of the serene voice.

Ben’s current surroundings were quite the spectacular sight, as well as being quite a simple one, it wasn’t a very large room, it was even smaller than the waiting room he was just in, but this space was made from a material that could only be glass, and perfectly clear glass at that, besides the seams from the supports, you wouldn’t be able to tell anything was even there.

However the glass walls allowed for quite a spectacular view, the room seemed to be submersed within a nebula, home to millions of stars and a vivid array of colours, a scene that would calm and stimulate the mind just by observing, a truly wonderful spectacle.

Ben stared wide-eyed and slack-jawed at the available scenery “I really hope this isn’t a dream” even pinching himself to check if he was asleep, Ben breathed a sigh of relief when he found he wasn’t.

“hah, I don’t think even heaven would look this good” a wide grin appeared on his face from his excitement, he then recalled the voice from earlier and span his head to face the centre of the room there were fifteen chairs placed in a semi-circular pattern, and seated upon these chairs sat fifteen strange beings.

Each being possessed a similar quality, while also being slightly different from each other, their bodies were almost completely transparent, similar to lightly tinted glass, their eyes sparkled like gemstones and the most prominent feature hid within the insides of their bodies, although they all possessed the exact same body, the insides were different.

Within each glass body was surprisingly a small galaxy, a moving, swirling galaxy filled with stars and bright colours. Each being had their own galaxy and each galaxy pertained to a different colour and shape, creating a beautiful array of colours, vivid, but not overly bright. The majority of the colours were red, blue and yellow, with ten of the fifteen possessing one of these colours, although they were a different shade, shape, and intensity from the others, making each one unique.

The most prominent colours were the other five beings, which were situated in the centre of the fifteen perplexing beings. Besides the centre most being, the others were, green, purple, pink, and Orange, these four had a much greater presence than the others, only being outshined by one other.

The centre-most being was the most perplexing of the fifteen, while all others followed the same rule of emitting a colour depending on their galaxies light, the centre-most being did not emit any light, instead light seemed to bend around the being itself, because of this strange phenomenon, the galaxy inside it seemed to accentuate it even further, while it possessed a perfectly white body, the galaxy itself had no form, the only thing that could be seen were the stars that used to make up said galaxy, all the other beings had their galaxies fixed in place, while this white being was covered in pitch black wandering stars with no recognisable pattern, this contrast of light and dark created and incredibly surreal scene, even when sat next to other similarly strange beings.

“What the hell are those things? how can something so strange exist?” The more Ben studied these beings the more perplexed he became, every detail of these beings was strange, incredibly strange, something like this shouldn’t be able to exist! Ben even started to become slightly frightened at the prospect of these being sentient creatures.

[Greetings to you, young human, we are the Glass Scholars, it is a pleasure to be able to speak to another being after all these years]

“Pleased to meet you, my name is Ben. What do you mean, did you not just talk to General Morn?” Ben replied not with his voice, but his mind, when the scholars spoke to him, they spoke through telepathy rather than verbal speech, and strangely it instantly became second nature for Ben to converse in such a way.

Ben was confused by their words; he had clearly heard them speaking to the general mere moments ago?

[Ah, yes, you are new to the index are you not? I, Verda, the speaker for the Glass Scholars shall answer you. We are not of the mortal realm, we are but simple souls, souls that have been compressed and crystallised upon the death of our old mortal bodies. only those who possess what is called a Void Core, or perfect soul can achieve this form after death, although it comes at a great cost. The fifteen of us were geniuses of our time, a time when a Void Core was not all that rare, but alas, it has been more than eighteen Billion years since the last of the perfect souls disappeared from existence, it is comforting to see the emergence of another after all this time. As for General Morn, what he and you heard was a mere recording, we cannot speak to those that do not possess a perfect soul, as it could result in the destruction of their soul]

“Eigh-Eighteen... Billion... years? How is that possible?” Ben didn’t know how to react to this statement, one moment he was shocked, the next bewildered, and then finally a look of disbelief appeared no his face “that can’t be true, the universe hasn’t even existed for that long, it hasn’t even existed 14 billion years yet” Ben’s mind went into turmoil trying to understand how these scholars could say that 18 billion years had passed with such a casual tone, there’s no way it can be true, right?