I was led out of the government building and back into the bustling plaza occupying the center of Lophan. Even though I’d been reassured that it was no problem, I had once again apologized for spreading my slime all over their nice carpets in the office. But, with that little hiccup behind us, Nimma led us down a street not too far from the offices, quickly arriving at a rather quaint house.

Most of the buildings in Lophan, and the seventh layer as a whole so far, had been highrises. In contrast, the two-storied house with a fenced-in yard stood out rather heavily. It retained the brown coloration of the bigger buildings and had a whole bunch of colorful flowers climbing up its walls, but that’s about where the similarities ended. The grass surrounding the building had a red hue and there were some chairs set up around a table for people to relax. The house itself sported several large windows to let in the light of the red sun above, although the skyscrapers put a bit of a bummer on that by blocking out most of the natural light.

Nimma pulled out a key from her inventory and unlocked the gate, the rest of us following after her like little ducklings. “This is the house that we have reserved for visiting travelers,” Nimma explained as she fumbled with the key to open the large, red-painted door. “While you’re staying in Lophan, this will act as your residence. We’ll also be living here for the duration of your stay since we’ve been assigned to help you out in any way we can.”

“Wait, so you guys will have to constantly accompany me everywhere I go?” I asked, suddenly a bit concerned about my privacy.

“Not at all,” Nimma finally got the door open mumbling something about a rusty lock as she stepped in and out of the way to let the rest of us in. “We’re neither bodyguards, watchdogs, nor babysitters. As the team that brought you in, we have a duty to assist you and make your stay as pleasant as possible. We stay in the same house to provide you with easy access to our help. There will always be at least one of us present in the house, and if there’s anything you need you can avail yourself of our services easily and conveniently.”

“And what do these services include?” I inspected the large room we’d just entered, which doubled as both the foyer and living room. A large table had been set up to the right of the entrance with six wooden chairs. Beyond it, I could spot another open door that led to a kitchen. To the left was a comfy-looking area with two couches, two armchairs, a coffee table, a fireplace, and several bookshelves. The two sides of the room were separated by a set of stairs leading to the upper floor, where I suspected the rooms would be.

“Guide work around the city, translation of both text and spoken word, shopping for things you need, managing a quest board for interested citizens that want to give you quests, accompanying you on said quests to provide additional firepower or knowledge on how to track and find your targets, inter-city travel facilitation, general trivia answers, cooking of meals…” Nimma rattled down an impressive list that she had no doubt practiced beforehand. “More or less anything you could want or need, really. As long as it’s reasonable and within the rules, of course.”

“That’s quite a lot,” I couldn’t help but be impressed. “Isn’t that a bit of a hassle?”

“As long as you keep the requests reasonable?” Nimma asked while plopping down in one of the armchairs. “Just another day at the office for us. In fact, it’s most likely less dangerous… and better paid.”

“I love the better-paid part of doing this,” I heard somebody call from the kitchen along with some rustling as they scoured the kitchen for something edible. “Makes it so that Andrius can lose more of his money to me. I’m essentially getting paid thrice for the work.”

“Hey!” Andrius called out offended while spreading himself out on a couch. “I can hear you, you know?”

“I’m sure you can,” the voice, now identified as Orbos, called back. “Also, this kitchen’s empty, we’ll have to go shopping today, or I’ll literally starve.”

“I’ll go buy some stuff,” Redax replied and I almost jumped.

He had been lingering by the door after entering last, and I’d almost completely forgotten about him. I watched his back as he left, wondering if he also had some stealth skills. I only knew that he was an archer and that he had some pretty nifty skills, but I wouldn’t be surprised if an archer had some stealth capabilities. I looked at Nimma and Andrius who had made themselves comfortable while Orbos was still rummaging through the kitchen cupboards, a bit surprised by how quickly they’d flipped their switch. Just a few moments ago they’d been all business, and now they were just so… normal.

“Well don’t just stand there looking pretty,” Andrius said, his head barely lifted off the couch to look at me. “Welcome home! You said you wanted to relax for a while right? Go ahead and pick a room upstairs, take as much time as you need. If you want to go somewhere, we’ll be here.”

“Right… right…” I couldn’t help but be amused at how flippant this whole affair was. I’d sort of expected to be led around like I was some sort of VIP, but on second thought, I think I preferred it like this. “I’ll go upstairs, try and catch some Zs”.

“Don’t worry about the bedsheets or anything, it’s fine, really,” Nimma called after me when I was halfway up the stairs and I just let the statement stand.

The stairs led to a hallway that lined the back of the house, windows across from every door leading to a room. I counted six doors in total, two of them at the ends of the hallway. Not entirely caring about what room was going to be mine, I simply opened the first door on the left of the stairs. The room was fairly simple, a window opposite the door shedding light on the large bed tucked into the far right corner. The bed was probably made with an Asphon in mind, so it was way too big for me. There was a desk across from the bed, several writing utensils neatly arranged on top of it. A wardrobe was to the left of the door, which I most definitely wasn’t going to use. I wondered why it was even there, since all travelers would be monsters, and the Asphons didn’t seem to wear clothes as well.

A simple room, for sure, but still more than enough than I needed. For over a year now I’d been sleeping in the dirt, in trees, and in other places that were equally as fantastical as they were uncomfortable. I hesitated for a bit before jumping on the bed, still at odds with the whole mucus situation. The bed was comfy, the soft material a sensation that I had almost forgotten. Perfect conditions for a nice, relaxing, sleep.

Well, it would be.

Tim’s drink that prevented me from sleeping, a massive boon before, now turned out to be a massive pain in the ass. I finally had a chance to relax, sit back, and sleep off all the stress I’d been building up in a safe area. Alas, the effect would still be active for some twenty-odd days. I’d really been cutting it close with my evolution, as less than a month had remained before I would have been forced to evolve. Sure, maybe I’d been able to go for a few extra days since I didn’t need that much sleep at my current strength, but I was afraid that the sleep I’d been missing out on would cause me to crash as soon as the magical drink effect wore off.

I briefly considered resigning myself to my fate, going back to the living room, and trying to do a quest or two when I got an idea. Thanks to my fancy new crown, I could go to the void whenever and wherever I wanted. I could just go and visit Tim, thank him for his amazing support, buy a few drinks, and maybe even get him to lift the no-sleep effect. Not wanting to waste any time, I dove into my system-given knowledge on how to operate my crown and got to work.

ERROR!

All teleportation between layers, planets, and dimensions has been restricted.

ERROR!

I stared in confusion at the red flashing system notification in front of me, denying me the break I so craved. Was the system conspiring to deny me my rightful sleep? Just to make sure, I tried once again to similar effect. I wondered whether that was normal. Technically I’d never physically been in the void. My dreams of the void skill merely projected me there… somehow. No clue whether it had been my soul going there or some weird magical construct, but my body had always firmly remained on Suigoss.

The saving grace was that I officially didn’t have to wonder and scratch my head at every new confusing thing. Now? I could just ask somebody about what I needed to know.

I hopped off the bed and swiftly made my way back to the living room where Orbos had joined Nimma and Andrius in the couch area. Their conversation died down when they saw me clear the entire staircase with a single hop, wetly splotching on the floor. I cringed a bit, realizing once more that I was spreading mucus everywhere but quickly dismissed the feeling.

“Hey there, everything alright with the room?” Nimma asked.

“Oh yeah, the room is great,” I hastily confirmed. “It’s just… I tried hopping into the void real quick, but I got a system message telling me that I wasn’t allowed to teleport, anybody know what’s up with that?”

“You can casually hop into the void?” Orbos asked, disbelief evident in his voice. “Just like that?”

“I’m supposed to,” I confirmed. “But, again, the system is telling me that teleportation between floors, planets, and dimensions has been restricted.”

“Oh yeah, there was this big incident about a year back in one of the layers above, I think it was a void invasion or something. Crazy stuff.” Andrius was idly leafing through a book and suddenly stopped. “You wouldn’t have anything to do with that, right?”

“Maybe? Kinda… sort of… I guess I did?” I wasn’t entirely certain if I should admit to this, but it probably wouldn’t hurt to put some trust forward if I was going to spend lots of time with these guys. “It’s complicated. But what does that have to do with the restriction?”

“System isn’t happy about the void invasion,” this time Nimma answered, as the other two were busy staring at me. “They’re called invasions for a reason. The way the voidlings get here is quite unrefined and violent and it hurts the fabric of space… or something like that. I didn’t quite pay attention to the more technical aspect. The point is, there’s time needed to let that stuff heal up nicely and the system prevents further damage by completely shutting off teleportation in the affected area. Short-range teleportation is still allowed, but if you try anything bigger, the system will stop you.”

“Rats,” I couldn’t help but curse at the news. “Any idea how much longer this restriction will be active?”

“Depends,” Nimma shrugged. “Once the fabric of space has sufficiently healed, the system will lift the restriction. There’ll be a notification, so you’ll know when it happens.”

“What did you want in the void anyway?” Andrius asked. “I hear that place is beyond scary and can drive you mad just by being there.”

“He’s a voidling you dingus,” Orbos replied. “It’s probably more like going home for him, than going to the nightmare dimension.”

“There’s a nightmare dimension?” I asked, curious about what other dimensions there were.

“Yeah, it’s called the void,” Orbos deadpanned, and we spent the next few seconds just looking at each other in silence.

“I guess I can agree with that,” I replied slowly. “There are some nightmarish things in the void.”

“That begs the question: What did you want there anyway?” Orbos asked.

“I… wanted to visit a friend and grab a few drinks.”

“You can grab drinks in the void?” Andrius asked, suddenly interested. “What kind of drinks could you possibly get in a dimension full of nightmare fuel?”

“Pretty good ones, if you know where to look,” I answered cryptically. “Anyway, for reasons I won’t go into, I had to drink a special drink that prevents me from sleeping for an entire year. The reason why I had to drink it is not relevant anymore, so I thought I’d drop by and see if my friend had an antidote, so to speak. I’d love to actually sleep again…”

“You haven’t slept in a year? That can’t be healthy,” Orbos shook his head.

“It was a lot healthier than the alternative,” I deadpanned. “But well, now that I can’t even go to the void, I’m kind of screwed. I can’t even sleep and properly relax like I wanted to. You wouldn’t happen to have some shops selling antidotes to mystical stay-awake potions, wouldn’t you?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Andrius answered, most likely because as a mage he’d be the one who would know if there was a place like that. “We do have bars, though. So if you just feel like getting shitfaced, it can be arranged.”

“Thanks, but I don’t think I’ll take you up on that offer,” I said, remembering all the times I’d gotten drunk in my previous life. I’d often drown my worries in alcohol, which I often did with stolen booze since I’d lost all my money at the casino or other unsavory and less legal forms of gambling. “Not sure what I’m going to do now, actually. Relaxing sounds fun, but that doesn’t exactly involve staring at a wall for hours while being unable to sleep.”

“I could take you to a spa, if that’s something you’d be interested in,” Nimma suggested. “I personally go about once a month, and it is pretty relaxing.”

I let the idea bounce around my head, considering it for a while before answering. “I don’t see why not. Not like I got a better idea. Do you think your regular spa treatment will work on a “nightmare fuel” creature from the void?” I shot a pointed look at Orbos, which he pretended to not notice.

“Maybe not all of it,” Nimma admitted. “You don’t have claws like us, and no exoskeleton to polish, but I’m sure even you can appreciate a soak in hot water and a massage.”

“I guess there’s only one way to find out,” I shrugged. “Lead the way?”

“For sure,” Nimma slowly got up and stretched for a bit. “You two wanna come with?”

“Nah I’m good.”

“The spa is too girly for me.”

“Suit yourselves,” Nimma chuckled. “Let’s go then. I know this great place that’s only a few minutes away.”

“I’ll trust you on that.”

I followed Nimma out the door, and within short order, we were back on the bustling streets of Lophan. I might not be able to sleep, but damnit if I didn’t at least try to relax for a bit.