Somewhere Outside of Time and Space.
The Imaginary Space.
No Time. No Place. No End.
In the beginning, there was nothing.
And then, because nothing was boring, something decided to exist.
That something was a thought.
The thought was: "I'm hungry."
And because the Imaginary Space was what it was—a realm where thought and reality were the same thing—the hunger immediately manifested as a bowl of ramen.
Veldanava, the Creator God, the source of all existence, the being who had once shaped the multiverse with his bare hands, picked up the chopsticks and began to eat.
THE PRISON
The Imaginary Space was supposed to be a prison.
That was what Rimuru had intended, anyway—a dimension outside of time and space, where the Creator God would be sealed away forever, unable to harm anyone.
What Rimuru had failed to consider was that the Imaginary Space was also infinite.
Not just infinite in size.
Infinite in possibility.
It was a realm of pure potential, where imagination and reality were indistinguishable. Where thought became matter. Where dreams took physical form.
And Veldanava, the Creator God, had a very active imagination.
"Too salty," he muttered, pushing the ramen away.
The ramen immediately became less salty.
He picked it up again and continued eating.
This was his existence now.
He had been here for fifty thousand years.
Or maybe fifty minutes.
Time didn't exist in the Imaginary Space, which made tracking the passage of moments somewhat difficult.
But he had found ways to keep himself entertained.
THE LIBRARY
After finishing the ramen—which had now become perfectly seasoned—Veldanava stood and walked.
The space around him shifted.
One moment he was in a small dining room that looked like a ramen shop from some mortal world. The next, he was in a vast library, its shelves stretching infinitely in every direction.
The books were not real books.
They were manifestations.
Stories from across the multiverse, gathered by the Imaginary Space itself, waiting to be read.
Veldanava had read a lot of them.
He had opinions.
He pulled a book from the shelf.
The cover read:
"A Wild Last Boss Appeared!"
He settled into a comfortable chair that appeared beneath him and flipped it open.
Three chapters later.
"This is ridiculous," he announced to the empty library.
The library didn't answer, but it did create a small cup of tea on the table beside him.
He picked it up and sipped.
"The protagonist is supposed to be the strongest being in existence, and yet she gets flustered by every minor inconvenience. The pacing is inconsistent. The power scaling makes no sense."
He turned a page.
"And why is everyone so obsessed with her? Just because she's beautiful and powerful? That's not how social dynamics work."
He read another chapter.
"...I'm going to finish this series."
THE VOICE
"You always say that."
Veldanava looked up.
She was standing between the shelves.
Pink hair that fell past her shoulders.
Blue eyes that held the warmth of a summer sky.
Pale skin that seemed to glow faintly in the soft light of the library.
Lucia.
His wife.
She was holding a book of her own, a small smile on her face.
"You complain about every story you read," she said, walking toward him. "And yet you always finish them."
Veldanava's expression softened.
"I finish them so I can complain about them properly."
Lucia laughed.
The sound was like bells.
"You're impossible."
"I'm a god. Being impossible is part of the job description."
THE TRUTH ABOUT LUCIA
She wasn't supposed to be here.
When Veldanava had been sealed away, Lucia had been dead.
Her soul had been fragmented—scattered across countless worlds, countless timelines, countless moments. It had taken Veldanava centuries of searching to find even a fraction of her essence.
But he had never given up.
And neither had Rimuru.
[Somewhere in the multiverse, in the depths of Rimuru's soul, a voice stirred.]
"The fragments of Lucia's soul have been collected."
Ciel's voice was calm, clinical.
"All particles have been gathered from across every world. The soul is complete."
Rimuru's internal voice was surprised.
'Wait, really? All of them?'
"Yes. The fragments you contained. The fragments Chloe contained. The fragments scattered across the void. All of them have been brought together."
'And you used Turn Null to...?'
"To restore her. Not as a copy. Not as a recreation. As herself. Her original soul, fully intact."
Rimuru was quiet for a moment.
'That's... actually kind of beautiful, Ciel.'
"It was a logical decision. She deserved to exist."
'Still beautiful.'
THE REUNION
When Lucia had first appeared in the Imaginary Space, Veldanava had not believed it.
He had thought she was a hallucination.
A cruel trick played by his own mind.
But then she had touched his face.
And he had felt the warmth of her fingers.
And he had wept.
For the first time in eons, the Creator God had wept.
"How long have I been reading?" Veldanava asked.
Lucia sat down on the arm of his chair, peering at the book.
"Long enough to finish twelve other books and start this one."
"Time doesn't exist here."
"Then why do you keep track of how many books you've read?"
Veldanava considered this.
"Fair point."
THE CRITICISM CONTINUES
"Anyway," Veldanava said, gesturing at the book, "this one is about a girl who wakes up as her video game avatar. She's supposed to be the final boss, but she's more concerned with collecting rare items than actually doing anything villainous."
Lucia tilted her head.
"That sounds fun."
"It's mediocre. The power system is arbitrary. The characters are one-dimensional. And the author clearly has no understanding of how actual divine beings would behave."
He turned a page.
"I'm going to finish it anyway."
Lucia smiled knowingly.
"Of course you are."
THE PRISON THAT WASN'T
The strange thing about the Imaginary Space was that it wasn't really a prison.
Not in the traditional sense.
There were no chains.
No walls.
No guards.
Just infinite possibility.
Veldanava could create anything he wanted—food, books, entire worlds, entire universes. The only limitation was his own imagination.
And he was the Creator God.
His imagination was vast.
"It's better than heaven," he said suddenly.
Lucia looked at him.
"What is?"
"This place." He gestured at the infinite library, the endless shelves, the soft light filtering through nonexistent windows. "It's better than heaven. I never told anyone that, but it's true."
He paused.
"Heaven was boring. All those angels, all those rules, all that... structure. It was suffocating."
He looked at Lucia.
"Here, there are no rules. No expectations. No duties. Just... existence."
He smiled.
"Just us."
Lucia's expression softened.
"You're saying you like being sealed away?"
"I'm saying it's not the punishment Rimuru intended." Veldanava shrugged. "He thought he was imprisoning me. Instead, he gave me the one thing I always wanted but could never have."
He reached out and took her hand.
"Peace."
THE OFFER
"Rimuru offered to unseal you, you know."
Lucia's voice was quiet.
Veldanava nodded.
"Two thousand years ago. I remember."
"Why didn't you accept?"
Veldanava was silent for a long moment.
Then he laughed.
"Accept? Why would I accept? Go back to what? To the world that killed you? To the angels who feared me? To the duty of being the Creator God?"
He shook his head.
"No. I'm done with that. I was done with it long before Rimuru sealed me away."
He looked at Lucia.
"Here, I have everything I need. You. Books. Infinite possibilities. No responsibilities."
He squeezed her hand.
"Here, I can just... be."
THE WORLDS INSIDE
The library was not the only thing in the Imaginary Space.
Beyond the shelves, beyond the reading rooms, beyond the infinite corridors of manifested thought, there were other places.
Worlds within worlds.
Entire universes created by Ciel's experiments with Turn Null.
Turn Null.
The ultimate, primordial energy of absolute destruction and creation.
The power that preceded the universe itself.
Ciel had used it in the Imaginary Space to test the limits of existence—creating and destroying infinite worlds in an endless cycle of experimentation.
And in the process, she had filled the void with life.
Countless civilizations had risen and fallen within the Imaginary Space, unaware that they existed inside a prison for a god.
Some had even developed their own gods.
It was, Veldanava thought, deeply ironic.
"The worlds inside this place are strange," he said. "Some of them are beautiful. Some are terrifying. Some are just... weird."
Lucia laughed.
"You've been exploring them?"
"Of course. What else am I supposed to do? I'm a prisoner with infinite time and infinite possibilities."
He paused.
"Besides, some of the stories they generate are actually better than the ones from the outside multiverse."
Lucia raised an eyebrow.
"Better than A Wild Last Boss Appeared?"
Veldanava looked at the book in his lap.
Then at Lucia.
Then back at the book.
"...Most of them, yes."
THE ANNOYANCE
"Speaking of Rimuru," Veldanava said, his expression souring slightly, "I heard he's been telling stories about me."
Lucia tilted her head.
"What kind of stories?"
"Lies." Veldanava's golden eyes narrowed. "Complete fabrications. He told some demon princess that I tried to destroy the multiverse. That I mind-controlled my own daughter. That I started a war between angels and demons."
He stood up, pacing.
"He made me sound like a villain! A cartoon villain! Like I was cackling and twirling a mustache while plotting the destruction of everything!"
Lucia watched him with amusement.
"To be fair," she said, "you did try to rewrite the multiverse."
Veldanava stopped pacing.
"That's different!"
"Is it?"
"I wasn't trying to destroy anything. I was trying to improve it. Remove the concept of evil. Remove suffering. Remove pain. Create a perfect world where no one would ever have to experience what I experienced when I lost you."
He paused.
"And maybe remove the concept of free will too. Just a little."
Lucia's expression flattened.
"Just a little?"
"Just enough to prevent people from making terrible choices!"
THE PERFECT WORLD
The argument was old.
They had had it a thousand times.
Veldanava's plan, at the height of his grief, had been simple: rewrite reality so that evil no longer existed.
No evil meant no violence.
No violence meant no murder.
No murder meant no one would ever die the way Lucia had died.
It seemed so obvious to him.
But the others—Rimuru, Milim, the Patrons, the Devils, even the angels—had all opposed him.
They had called it tyranny.
They had called it the destruction of free will.
They had called it madness.
"They didn't understand," Veldanava muttered. "They never understood."
Lucia stood and walked to him.
She placed her hand on his cheek.
"I understand," she said softly. "I understand why you did it. I understand why you wanted to create a world without pain."
She paused.
"But they were right to stop you. A world without free will isn't a world. It's a prison."
Veldanava looked at her.
"Like this place?"
Lucia smiled.
"This place is different. We chose to be here. Well... I chose to be here. You were sealed."
"That's just a technicality."
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE SEAL
"Honestly," Veldanava said, sitting back down, "Rimuru thinks he won some great victory against me. He thinks he's a hero who saved the multiverse from a mad god."
He picked up his tea.
"But the truth is, I let him win."
Lucia raised an eyebrow.
"Did you?"
"Of course I did." Veldanava sipped his tea. "If I had truly wanted to fight, if I had truly wanted to win, the battle would have lasted forever. Rimuru's abilities are excellent, but so are mine. We would have reached an impasse."
He set the cup down.
"But I didn't want that. I didn't want an eternal war. I wanted peace."
He gestured at their surroundings.
"And peace is what I got. In the form of an infinite void with no time, no space, and no responsibilities."
He smiled.
"Best defeat I ever suffered."
THE LETTER
"Rimuru doesn't know, of course," Veldanava continued. "He still thinks he beat me fair and square. He tells his little stories about bleeding and starving and fighting for three days."
He rolled his eyes.
"He's such a liar. I almost respect it."
Lucia laughed.
"He's just trying to create a legend. You know how he is."
"I know how he is. He's insufferable. And now he's in some mortal world, telling a demon princess that I'm a monster."
He shook his head.
"At least he had the decency to put me somewhere nice. If I'd been sealed in some bleak prison dimension, I might actually be angry."
He looked around the infinite library.
"This, though? This is paradise."
THE MESSAGE
A thought occurred to Lucia.
"Do you ever wonder what he's doing right now? Rimuru, I mean."
Veldanava shrugged.
"Probably causing chaos. Starting a business. Adopting some orphans. The usual."
He paused.
"Actually, I heard he's in a world called Earth. Some version of it. And there's a doctor there who can see through invisibility arts."
Lucia tilted her head.
"That's unusual."
"Very unusual. It suggests she has a connection to the supernatural. Perhaps a past life."
He frowned.
"I should send someone to investigate. Not because I care about Rimuru's business, but because if there's a human who can perceive things she shouldn't... that could have implications."
Lucia smiled.
"You're just curious."
"I'm always curious. It's my nature."
THE BOOK AGAIN
Veldanava picked up A Wild Last Boss Appeared! again.
"Anyway, I need to finish this. The plot is finally getting interesting."
Lucia sat down beside him.
"Is it?"
"No. But I've already invested this much time. I might as well see it through."
He turned the page.
"And then I'm going to write a scathing review. In my mind. Where no one can read it."
Lucia laughed.
"I'll read it."
Veldanava glanced at her.
"You'll have to. You're the only one here."
"Then it's perfect. An audience of one."
THE PEACE
Outside the Imaginary Space, time moved forward.
Worlds rose and fell.
Civilizations flourished and crumbled.
Rimuru opened cafés and fought gods and told lies to demon princesses.
But inside the Imaginary Space, there was only this:
An infinite library.
A comfortable chair.
A book of questionable quality.
And two beings who had finally found peace.
"I love you," Veldanava said quietly.
Lucia leaned her head against his shoulder.
"I know."
AUTHOR'S NOTE
And so we see the other side of the story.
Veldanava, the Creator God, the being sealed away by Rimuru's own hand, is not suffering in some dark prison. He's living his best life in an infinite void filled with books and tea and the wife he thought he'd lost forever.
He's not plotting revenge.
He's not planning an escape.
He's just... reading isekai novels and complaining about the power scaling.
But don't let that fool you.
The Creator God is still watching.
And he's very, very curious about the doctor who can see through invisibility arts.