LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 12: Chapter 11: The Path That Should Not Exist
The moment Klein and Yeaia stepped forward, reality shifted.
Not like a teleportation.
Not like passing through a door.
But like falling through a thought that had never been spoken.
The world inverted.
Colors stretched and twisted. Klein's divine senses screamed in alarm, but there was no pain, no real sense of movement—only the overwhelming certainty that something had just rewritten their existence.
Then—
They landed.
It was soft. Not quite solid, not quite air. Klein's boots pressed against something that felt half-formed.
And around them—
The world took shape.
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The City That Wasn't
They stood on the edge of a city.
No—not a city.
A memory of a city.
The buildings towered around them, but they weren't real. They flickered between states of existence.
Some were made of stone, cracked and broken like ruins.
Some were made of words, sentences etched into the air, constantly rewriting themselves.
Some were made of images, like illustrations from forgotten books, still moving even after their stories had ended.
The streets stretched infinitely in every direction.
And above them—
There was no sky.
Only spirals.
Thousands. Millions.
All twisting inward.
Klein's divine senses burned.
This was not the spirit world. This was not the past.
This was—
"The place where forgotten things go."
Yeaia's voice was quiet.
Klein turned to them, but Yeaia wasn't looking at him.
They were looking at the spirals above.
And for the first time—
They looked afraid.
---
"You've Been Here Before."
Klein spoke the words, but he already knew the answer.
Yeaia's mismatched eyes flickered. Their lips parted, then closed.
Then, finally—
"I think I was born here."
Klein frowned.
That shouldn't be possible.
No Beyonder, no creature, no anything should be able to originate from a place like this.
Because this place—
It did not exist.
And yet, here they were.
And the Spiral was waiting.
---
The Meaning of Being Forgotten
Klein took a step forward, his golden eyes scanning the city.
Something about this place felt wrong. Not in the way of corruption or horror, but in a deeper, more fundamental sense.
This place was different from the Astral World, different from anything he had encountered even as The Fool.
It was not a prison.
It was not a ruin.
It was not a dream.
It was a concept.
A place formed not by what existed, but by what should have never been.
Yeaia inhaled sharply. Their fingers twitched.
"We shouldn't be here."
Klein raised an eyebrow.
"Why?"
Yeaia's answer was simple.
"Because nothing leaves."
---
A Voice From the Spirals
The air trembled.
A voice echoed—not in sound, but in absence.
"You do not belong."
Klein stiffened.
This was not a deity speaking.
This was not an Outer God whispering through time.
This was the Spiral itself.
A fundamental force, neither alive nor dead.
And it had judged them.
"Leave?" Klein tilted his head. "That's funny. I don't remember asking for permission."
He lifted his hand.
The Gray Fog surged.
The power of The Fool clashed against the Spiral's will—
And the city shuddered.
For the first time, Klein saw it.
The Spiral had a center.
A single point in space where all the spirals converged.
A point that looked like—
A door.
---
"If We Make It There, We Might Have a Chance."
Klein's gaze locked onto the door in the distance.
It was far.
Unreachable in a place where distance itself was a suggestion.
But it was something.
"Yeaia." Klein turned to them. "You said nothing leaves. How do you know that?"
Yeaia hesitated.
Then, finally—
"Because I tried before."
Klein's expression remained unreadable.
"Then this time, we'll do it together."
Yeaia looked at him for a long moment.
Then they grinned.
"You really are a stubborn bastard, huh?"
Klein smirked.
"You have no idea."
And with that—
They ran.
Straight toward the center of the Spiral.
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End of Chapter 11
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