The misshapen lines stretched, and a space at the center opened.
"How are we getting in there?"
"The warp sucks in only people with queer energy like the sentry. Since I still have the slightest of the sentry power, there's a possibility, and about you, I don't have to mention."
Is this crack a living thing that it sucks only a specific type of thing? That was what it seemed to me; nevertheless, it didn't matter.
I felt a force pushing my body towards the space within the crack. With a shove, we soared in the sky and into the crack. Bentend cried like a child; I never expected him to be valiant in the first place.
My vision for a brief moment turned purplish before returning to normal. As the purplish color faded, we were greeted by a gloomy city. The sky was cloudy, and we saw no humans around.
Bentend held his head, grimacing.
"This is the place." I said, "It's mostly normal."
Bentend then explained this was the space gap. When two worlds are connected with each other, a gap separates them, and the space gap is made by the combination of two powers. Like a mini world of two different worlds, containing half of what one world had and the other the other half.
The city now was similar to the one back on earth, but there was nothing that could be identified as from the opposite world.
"It's only a light-tier space gap."
The space gap had tiers; the light gaps usually seemed normal, the medium-tier gaps were chaotic, and the heavy-tier gaps were a disaster. This one seemed normal; nothing unusual was yet it was just a light-tier gap.
"Light-tier gaps have weaker monsters, and the space itself isn't vast; within fifteen minutes we can explore it entirely." Bentend said, looking at the poker face. He rubbed his nape, smiling. "You know information is crucial; you never know when such a time would come for you."
We explored most of the area and found nothing. Bentend grew uncertain if this was even a light-tier gap or an accidentally formed space gap. Such a thing never occurred before, but it can be possible.
"There was one part of the city left; I can tell there might be something wrong there." he said, looking to his north.
I used my own senses to seek out the presence of an individual. It was faint energy that was wafting in the air. From what I could tell, whatever monster it was or they were, the strength and power they had was far weaker.
We strode in the vicinity and hid behind a building.
"Follow me." He said, trailing the energy.
I halted and quickly hid again; there were voices. One was thin and hoarse, and the other was scratchy. When I peered, I noticed several humans clad in armor and cloaks circled small-sized squid-like creatures.
"Shot Alizaria." The bald man shouted; he had a plain sword in hand, striking one of the creatures.
The woman named Alizaria used her staff and cast some kind of magic bullets, shooting the monsters and perforating their bodies with holes.
"They are sentries." Bentend said, squinting to have a closer look at their chest; he was looking for something. "They have no group badge."
Whatever group a sentry joins, they receive a group badge for better identification. Them having none meant they didn't belong to any group.
Bentend and I had a similar question in mind: How did these people enter the crack? If they had entered via warp, then their team would have encountered us the second we entered.
It was as if they were inside the crack before it appeared. But such a possibility wasn't settling with Bentend.
"Once a warp closes, then there's no way it's returning. When the warps appeared in the start, several sentries were trapped in these warps, but the same warp never appeared, and the trapped sentries never returned."
If such is the case, then either the sentries entered through a different method or they were already here from the start. The best we could do was to watch.
"We will wait until they are finished. We can reveal ourselves and converse with them." Bentend said.
"No, it's a bad idea. We wait and see what exactly they will do after killing the creatures. We follow them."
Another five minutes passed; they were done with slaying the creatures. The bald man looked about him; from his expression, he seemed concerned about being exposed.
"Hurry up; the other sentries could be here at any moment."
They hacked out the imperative material from the bodies of the creatures and sprinted away, out of the city.
As we followed them, we reached the corner of the city, the dead end. There they were vanishing as they touched the unseen wall.
When the last one vanished, we came out. I approached and tried touching it; there was something there, invisible to our naked eye, but one could feel it.
"Move back." I said, my sword raised skywards, and when moved downwards, it cut the invisible space wall. It was torn like fiber, and another space was disclosed to us.
As I entered the space, a cavelike structure greeted us. It was cavernous and vast. Warps were here and there, and machines that I had never seen were producing energy to support these warps.
The place teemed with humans. Some wore white coats, and some were kitted out in attire and armor like those we saw before.
Too many to notice us. "Stop right!" or maybe not, a voice shouted.
A man came rushing, his hair disheveled, with pale skin and blue eyes. Cheeks speckled in light red dots. His attire was plain, and on top of it he wore a white coat.
I clutched my sword's hilt, ready to slice it into a thousand pieces, but that wouldn't be necessary.
He wasn't telling us; rather, it was the sentry team, and then his gaze moved towards us, but we were already gone from the scene.
"That was close, but how did you do that? It was fast." Bentend said.
We were walking in the throng of sentries and the white coats. They seemed unbothered by our presence; it's as if they didn't notice us at all. Even Bentend found it strange.
"Which group are you from?" A dwarf stood in front of us, demanding an answer. "Never seen you around here; are you new?"
Bentend voice faltered, "Yes! We are newbies here."
"Your D-badges." He stretched his arm; his eyes found us suspicious.
"We haven't received it yet. Another week would be needed before we get it." Bentend said, making up a completely new thing.
"Don't take me for a fool; I know you aren't from here. Your clothes are enough evidence. Why don't we go to the records? We will see if you're listed in there."
We have to run from this place; I was ready to hold Bentend from the back and dash into one of the warps. It wasn't a big deal at all.
"Yes, you're right. We aren't from here." Bentend said.
That baffled me. What was he trying to do? Something was on his mind.
"Try, we came here to join you."
I whispered in his ears, "What are you saying? This whole place is like confidential, and these people—."
"Have faith in me, if these people are who we think they are. You will be able to get your hands on the intiverse you're looking for."
"We will still check your records first." The dwarf said, "Follow me."
Bentend heaved a sigh of relief.
"They have no data on me, and there's nothing special about you. You think on that basis they will concur on accepting us?"
"Mostly like. I find it strange, very strange, that they didn't care anything about our identity, as if we were no intruders or threat to them."
When the records were checked, only Bentend information was shown on the screen. The dwarf found nothing amusing; when they searched for mine, there was only a blank screen on the computer.
"Queer thing," the dwarf said, whirling on his feet. "The only information we don't have is on Intiverse. Happenstance, are you an Intiverse?" The dwarf's eyes curiously looked at him; he wanted an answer, a real answer.
"What if I am?" I said.
The little guy laughed, and everyone around us glanced at him.
"Let me ask you something: has the government tried to recruit you?"
I folded my hands and frowned, "Never heard of such a thing."
"He just arrived five days ago," Bentend interrupted and said. I frowned at him; he was revealing too much information, although there was a mixture of lies and truth in it.
The dwarf was suddenly excited. "No time waiting; we are going to meet the head director now."