“BOXXY?!”

Fizzy let out an ear-rupturing screech as the eldritch abomination suddenly vanished into a spatial anomaly that had been hidden beneath a thin sheet of ice. She lunged at it as if to grab it, but was too slow. In her panic she reached her hand into the aberrant portal itself, desperately trying to grasp at the creature. However, the gateway collapsed in that instant, cutting Boxxy off from the world and taking most of Fizzy’s right forearm with it.

“No, no, no nononono! You can’t die on me again!”

The golem frantically scratched and pounded at the ground where the portal used to be with her stump and other hand, seemingly not realizing that she’d lost part of a limb. There was a loud impact and a low rumble from nearby as Jen slammed the ground with one of her taloned feet. She may not have uttered a peep, but it was clear from the way she was shaking that she was furious, most likely at herself. The Monk had sworn an oath to follow and protect that creature, and though it was technically no longer valid, she still felt as if she’d failed Boxxy somehow.

“Calm down, drama queens,” Xera rolled her eyes. “Master is perfectly fine.”

“How the fuck would you know?!” Fizzy snapped back.

“Because, bucket-brain, I’m Master’s familiar,” she tapped her forehead. “We are bound by our very souls. I’d know immediately if it was dead. Which it isn’t.”

The cocky, almost boastful attitude with which the djinn said that irked the golem, but she did have a point.

“… Right. Yeah. Of course,” the Paladin collected herself. “But if it’s still alive, then where is it?”

“There’s no way to know for sure,” Xera crossed her arms in thought. “If that spatial anomaly was anything like the one we found when we first got here, then Master’s probably drifting through the void of space right now. Best case scenario, it ended up somewhere a lot closer to the planet than I did, but there’s no way to know for sure.”

Fizzy stared at the demon blankly, her artificial brain tasked to capacity while it pondered Boxxy’s predicament. She recalled the event Xera was referring to and agreed with the djinn’s assessment. She then considered Boxxy’s odds of survival and reached a rather… optimistic conclusion.

“That’s great!” she relaxed and smiled. “Then we have nothing to worry about.”

“Indeed,” Xera nodded.

“… Explain,” demanded a thoroughly confused Jen.

“Oh, right, you weren’t there,” the golem turned to the harpy. “Remember the Atlas of Dreams?”

“You mean Derringer’s Divine item?”

“That’s the one. Over the years we got a few instant dungeons that lacked gravity and air, but Boxxy was insistent on exploring them for any rare loot. With that stubborn box being the way it is, it eventually figured out a way to survive that kind of environment.”

“Okay,” Jen nodded slightly. “How, though?”

It really wasn’t all that difficult with the right Skills and magical equipment. For starters, the various items that allowed one to breathe underwater also functioned in a vacuum. Dehydration would have been an issue, but Boxxy was a shapeshifter. It could encase its body in an airtight and watertight membrane to minimize fluid loss. It still needed fluid intake, of course, but that was easily solved with the aid of some Rehydration Tonics courtesy of the Pearly Dunes. Boxxy had all of this survival-oriented gear and more floating around in its Storage somewhere. It had brought those supplies with it because it wanted to be prepared for whatever absurd environment the Dragon Festival threw at it. The items in question didn’t take up too much space, either, so it had been able to pack away quite a few of them.

The biggest issue by far was going to be nutrition. There was, after all, nothing to eat in space, and hunger was much more difficult to satiate through alchemical means than thirst. That went double for Boxxy’s latest Rank Up, which required enormous amounts of energy to function. It could still feed off the sun with Hylt Metabolism, but that only went so far without anything to draw minerals from. Thankfully the shapeshifter had taken a bunch of Azzyth’s body parts with it just before the ether storm had hit. Even if not the choicest morsels, they had once been a part of an adult dragon. That alone meant they would be packed with all sorts of nutrients. Combined with whatever energy the monster could soak up with Hylt Metabolism, it could probably sustain itself for a few weeks, perhaps even a month if it rationed its supplies accordingly.

As for getting back to Terrania, that part was both the easiest and most complicated. Space was empty, which meant there was nothing to stop a shapeshifter in motion. If Boxxy were to launch itself at the planet as hard as it could, then it could coast on its momentum all the way home. The tricky part was going to be gaining enough speed to make the trip before it ran out of supplies. The abomination didn’t have any suitable means of propulsion at its disposal - it hadn’t thought that far ahead - so it would have to rely on its wide array of Spells and Skills to give itself a boost.

An obvious choice seemed to be the various gravity-based incantations at Boxxy’s disposal, but they were actually quite useless in a weightless environment. Momentum Anomaly, Magnetic Tilt, and Gravity Well couldn’t generate gravity, only manipulate it. They simply could not function in an environment where said gravity was practically nonexistent. Another option was to cause magical explosions that would push the malicious pile of flesh towards it destination, but that had its own myriad of problems. The dreadful accuracy and inherent unpredictability of this method was perhaps the most damning.

What Boxxy had figured out thanks to the Atlas of Dreams was that the most effective Spell in that scenario was actually Teleport, but with a twist. It could use the Spell normally and make its way towards solid ground one spatial leap at a time, but there was a much better way. Namely, by combining Teleport with a quirky little incantation by the name of Pandomenium. This second Spell, courtesy of the monster’s maxed-out Demonic Insight Skill, reversed the various properties of any other Spell that entered or was cast within its area. The interaction between it and Teleport was a particularly interesting one.

Normally the Teleport Spell would fold the space the caster currently occupied in order to instantaneously transport them a certain amount of distance in a particular direction. When ‘reversed’ the incantation would instead wrap the user in a cocoon of gravitational energy that hurled them with a certain amount of force in a particular direction. If this magic were to ever be refined into a Spell of its own, it would likely be named something like ‘Catapult.’ And since this effect relied on the elemental force of gravity to function, it could be influenced by the aforementioned gravity-altering Spells.

Therefore, the most optimal way for Boxxy to travel through space was to Catapult itself as hard as it could through an area where a Gravity Well and a Momentum Anomaly overlapped. This would result in Boxxy being flung at a speed several times faster than sound. Not only was this significantly faster than casting Teleport as quickly as its MP recovery would allow, but it required no effort beyond the initial Spell usage. It was far more energy-efficient, which was rather important in a situation where Boxxy had to conserve its stamina as much as possible.

Fizzy and Xera knew all this because they had both helped the shapeshifter work out the details during its tenure as Hero of Chaos. This had all happened well before Jen had been ‘recruited,’ so the harpy could be forgiven for not knowing about any of it. The golem would’ve gladly explained the rather intriguing application of magic and physics involved, but this was neither the time nor the place. Boxxy’s fan club was still in the middle of extremely hostile territory during one of the world’s most dangerous time periods, so for now the Paladin decided to summarize the details in a few words.

“Boxxy will survive because it’s Boxxy.”

“Understood,” Jen nodded firmly in response. “We should go.”

“Let’s,” Xera agreed. “This body won’t last long without Master here, so we should make the most of it.”

The three of them agreed that Boxxy would find its way back on its own then set out, entirely focused on leaving the Shattered Isles before the Festival’s conclusion. It wasn’t going to be easy, especially since the djinn would collapse and vanish in less than an hour and Fizzy was missing her dominant hand. The golem could easily craft a replacement and attach it with her newly unlocked Assimilate Skill, but that required time, tools, and materials she didn’t have. It ultimately fell to Jen to maneuver herself and her mentor through the treacherous skies of the Shattered Isles. Fortunately for the pair, the griffin-girl was a veteran flier whose speed and maneuverability had been improving constantly ever since her monsterfication. Jen had no trouble evading the various dragonoids and younglings she encountered, though she didn’t fancy her chances of outrunning an adult dragon. Thankfully the odds of randomly encountering one were quite rare, so she and Fizzy were able to safely escape the Dragon Festival about a day after Boxxy’s disappearance.

As for the shapeshifter, it had done exactly as Fizzy assumed it would. The watertight cocoon, the underwater breathing equipment, the Rehydration Tonics, and the adult dragon bits were all present and accounted for. The Catapult had gone off without a hitch and the blue-green planet in the distance was slowly but surely growing larger. However, unbeknownst to its faithful followers, the shapeshifter had encountered some… complications.

The first and most immediately apparent issue was that, for whatever reason, Boxxy was unable to access its Status. It could still use all of its Skills and Spells, but the lack of a Status made it much more difficult for Boxxy to accurately keep tabs on its, well, status. Not only was it incapable of monitoring its HP and MP, but it also wasn’t getting any of those helpful notifications. Because of that, it hadn’t noticed the second and arguably more pressing problem until it was far too late.

Boxxy had thrown every last bit of its magical energy into the Catapult while operating under the assumption that its MP would recover with time as per usual. Then, half an hour later, endeavored to cast a few Spells to accelerate itself a bit more. Only then had the creature realized that, for some unknown reason, its body was not generating MP like it normally did. This puzzled the monster immensely, as it had never experienced this sort of magical drought whenever it explored the pocket-voids of Bob’s Divine item. In retrospect it probably should’ve been more careful after its Status had stopped working, but hindsight wasn’t going to miraculously generate MP. Rather than berating itself over that mistake, it instead chose to focus on dealing with the consequences.

The good news was that Boxxy didn’t need MP in order to maintain its course. The bad news was that it needed MP in order to access its Storage and all the goodies within. Given the rate it was moving at, the abomination estimated it would take seven to ten days to reach Terrania at its current pace. This put the creature at serious risk of dying of either dehydration or starvation. Or so it thought. It wasn’t quite sure as to the limits of its body, but it was safe to assume the trip would be extremely unpleasant. The especially frustrating part was that Boxxy had a stash of high-grade mana potions somewhere in its Storage. It would’ve been completely fine if it had at least one of those, but it hadn’t known it would need them until after it had already tapped itself out.

Therefore, the only thing the monster could do was conserve energy and endure. It tried to remain completely still within its flesh-capsule. The only physical exertion it made were the passive undulating of its flesh and the clutching of Fizzy’s disembodied hand. The monster had noticed it floating around it once it had gotten its bearings and had snatched it for safekeeping. Though originally incensed at the idea that its most precious of shinies was damaged, it had since become somewhat appreciative of having a piece of Fizzy with it. However small or damaged the severed mithril limb was, focusing on the shiny allowed Boxxy’s mind to somewhat distract itself from the dreadful reality of its situation.

However, a small, lifeless memento was simply not enough to occupy its mind. Standing completely still for days on end might have been one of the shapeshifter’s greatest talents when it was still a dumb box in a cave, but those days were long past. For nearly four years now, Boxxy had always had something to do in its downtime. Whether it was bamboozling a busty elf, stalking the homeless for a snack, revelling in its colossal collection of shinies, or experimenting with new formulas and gadgets, it had always engaged in one activity or another. But, out there in the silent emptiness of space, there was nothing. Once the initial shock and panic had worn off, Boxxy began to grasp how mind-numbingly monotonous its week-long trip would be. It couldn’t even attempt to entertain itself as its survival hinged on conserving energy as much as possible.

Then there was the absolute and total absence of voices in its head. It was well beyond the range of any sort of telepathic communication it was capable of. For the first time in its life, Boxxy was alone with its thoughts. Well, technically, it did survive on its own for a few months before contracting Snack, but its mind at the time had been so basic that its mental functions could scarcely be described as ‘thinking.’ One could also argue that it tuned out much of the telepathic chatter to the point where it was just some background noise in the back of its head. Still, it hadn’t been ‘alone with its thoughts’ in the most literal sense of the phrase, so the shapeshifter decided its initial conclusion had been right all along.

Wait, why am I focusing on something that pointless? the monster grumbled inwardly. I should be figuring out a way out of this…

Of course, there was no such ‘way out’ to be found. Boxxy attempted to come up with something, but all that did was confirm that its current course of action - or inaction - was the best one available to it. Its inability to harness its MP shut down any other option it might have had. It still hypothesized quite a few solutions, though. The most inspired one was cobbling together some kind of rocket propulsion system to accelerate its return. It then considered what would happen if it hit one of Terrania’s three moons before reaching the planet. Would there be tasty things there to get its energy back? Or at the very least some shiny moon-rocks? The satellite called Tascuna did seem to be the brightest of the three, so maybe there were some undiscovered shinies to plunder over there?

But what if the moon was inhabited by a hitherto unknown race of space-monsters? In the past, Boxxy had heard a few crackpot theories about how the ‘moon people’ were secretly controlling the entire world. These were obviously nothing more than the ramblings of mentally unstable meals on legs, but there was a non-zero chance they might’ve been at least partially right. Admittedly it was difficult to imagine such creatures as tasty, but they would at least be edible.

Come to think of it, wasn’t Boxxy itself edible? It recalled reading about certain monsters that resorted to digesting themselves in order to survive under extreme conditions, a process called autophagy. Though the shapeshifter would never have even entertained the idea under normal circumstances, the onset of the abomination’s hunger pains were rapidly broadening its horizons. It had been eating extremely well for most of its lifetime, so it had all but forgotten what it was like to be truly starving. It might have experienced extreme hunger immediately after each Rank Up, but those cases had been remedied almost immediately. Its current streak of starvation, on the other hand, would find no relief for at least five more days. It would no doubt become yet another thoroughly unpleasant experience the monster would much rather forget.

Actually, would it be prudent to measure its trip in days? That measurement of time was invented to mark the revolution of Terrania around its own axis, but that was hardly relevant to Boxxy’s current situation. There were no sunrises or sunsets in space. There was a starry sky, though. A lot of it, in fact. Therefore, wouldn’t it make more sense to use nights instead of days? Then again, there was no sun at night, and Boxxy was undoubtedly getting plenty of that. It could always just translate the remaining estimated time into hours, but it didn’t like that idea. ‘Five days’ sounded like less time than ‘a hundred and twenty hours.’ Probably because the number was smaller. Yeah, that must have been it.

But then how come ‘sixty kilograms of meat and bone’ didn’t sound quite as appetizing as ‘one whole human?’ Was it because there was more to a human than meat and bone? Not in the spiritual sense, but the literal one. Cartilage, blood, fat, entrails, eyeballs, skin - there were plenty of diverse flavors to be found in the human body. To brashly summarize that tapestry of tastes into just ‘meat and bone’ was doing humanity a great disservice. Ah, that would explain why Boxxy found Fizzy’s use of the term ‘meatbag’ to be somewhat disagreeable. It, of course, never brought the issue up, as it was hardly something important enough requiring discussion.

And so on and so forth did Boxxy’s mind endlessly drift from one topic to the next. With absolutely nothing else to occupy its ever-expanding intelligence and curious nature, the shapeshifter latched onto every dangling mental thread it could imagine. As its thirst and hunger gradually grew stronger, it wound up retreating further and further into its own mind to escape the torments of its flesh. Moreover, due to the sheer volume of its mental Attributes, the rate at which it resolved its self-imposed queries was staggering. In just six hours it had come up with fifteen songs praising Fizzy’s shininess, invented a theoretical fuel source for a handheld flamethrower, and counted all of the stars within its mostly unobstructed line of sight. That last one came out to be a somewhat disappointing number at just 9,096. Well, 9,097 if one included the sun in that number, but Boxxy wasn’t quite sure if that qualified as a star or not.

Long story short, the shapeshifter found itself in a situation where having absurdly high Attributes was actively working against it. Its highly accelerated thought process made it seem like time had slowed to a crawl. The Tick Counter Skill continued to do its thing somewhere in the back of Boxxy’s brain, so it hadn’t actually lost grasp of the time. That knowledge did little to alleviate its anxiety, however. It only worsened it, if anything. What was initially deemed to be ‘just seven to ten days’ became ‘one hundred and twenty hours,’ then ‘five thousand nine hundred and two minutes.’

By the time it started counting down the hundreds of thousands seconds left, Boxxy had already exhausted all but the darkest and most dreadful of quandaries. It had attempted to simply turn its brain off before reaching that point. It had done so hundreds of times, but it was impossible. That was like trying to douse an active volcano by chucking a bucket of water into it. Not even sleep offered the creature’s mind any solace, as the demands of its body were too loud to let it rest. It didn’t even have the luxury of growing delirious as its MNT made sure the shapeshifter’s grip on reality was firm. Somewhat ironic, as the creature would’ve no doubt taken the opportunity to dismiss its ensuing thoughts as little more than a bout of temporary madness.

Spurned on by how tiny and insignificant the void of space made it feel, the monster spent the latter half of its silent voyage pondering the nature of life and existence. It did so over and over, at a rate easily ten times faster than the average enlightened mind. It found itself taking countless attempts at cracking the biggest enigma that had plagued rational minds since the dawn of eternity - what was the point to it all? And the more it delved into the subject, the more difficult it was to avoid the dreadful conclusion that there simply wasn’t one.

Granted, Boxxy was hardly a philosopher. In fact, it found the very notion of philosophy to be on the same level as morality, empathy, and honor - things it dismissed as ‘enlightened problems.’ If one such being was in its place, then perhaps they would have found some solace in the universe, something to justify their existence. But Boxxy was a monster, and as such its mind heavily gravitated towards pragmatism. It didn’t have a biological drive to reproduce, nor a spiritual devotion to some great entity. The shapeshifter was just a greedy little box that had no motivations beyond material things and basic survival.

So, Boxxy found nothing. It was forced to contend with the thought that it would eventually die. If not in combat or of old age, then from something else. After all, even gods could die, in a way. Sure, its soul would be reborn, but that existence would be wiped clean of all that it once was. Once that was gone, all of its acts and deeds would be made irrelevant by the ceaseless march of time. Sure, some things might last a few decades or perhaps even centuries, but ultimately every trace of the creature called Boxxy T. Morningwood would fade. If that was the ultimate outcome, then what was the point of suffering through life? All those battles, all that pain, all those dreadful experiences - just unpleasantries along the road to oblivion.

There were good things along the way, of course. Pleasures and indulgences could be found aplenty, but those were fleeting. Those moments only existed within the monster’s memory, but that would inevitably disappear when it passed on. Even the thought of immortality didn’t give the creature any comfort, for it knew that all things would end. There was a finite number of things that could be tasted, acquired, or otherwise experienced. Civilizations invented new sights and sensations all the time, but even the liveliest of cultures were doomed to fall and disappear eventually. Rivers dried up, resources were depleted, and plants and animals went extinct. Should Boxxy find a way to avoid death for eternity, it could see no other future than being alone on a lifeless gray rock where nothing ever happened. It would forever be alone, incapable of unburdening itself from the inevitable futility of it all.

Boxxy stewed in those depressing thoughts for what felt like a full month before it passed out from hunger. Its body hadn’t quite given up on life yet, however, and almost autonomously resorted to self-cannibalism in order to survive. The abomination drifted in and out of consciousness, a welcome reprieve from its self-inflicted mental torment. By that point it had reached the final stretch of its weightless voyage, merely twenty hours from its destination. The planet loomed massive and vibrant in front of the creature, yet for some reason it didn’t seem to notice it at all.

It eventually entered the planet’s atmosphere. Like a meteorite of flesh it hurtled towards the ground, its flame-retardant body refusing to ignite despite the enormous amount of friction. As it fell, its Status became available and its MP began to recharge. This confirmed Boxxy’s theory that a creature native to Terrania could not harness the power of magic if it was off-world. The shapeshifter had deduced as much during the early stages of its void-drift, but that mental exercise seemed all but forgotten now. The abomination barely even registered the sensation of itself splashing down in a stormy ocean, its mass sinking beneath the waves.

Its body began to act independently once more, driven by the shapeshifter’s unerring muscle memory. It greedily soaked up the water while filtering out as much of the salt as possible. Tendrils lashed out, catching and then devouring any fish or seaweed within reach. There even seemed to be an odd substance mixed into the ocean, a strand of deliciousness snaking its way through the currents like a wisp of smoke through the air. Whatever it was, the abomination’s flesh recognized it as superbly nutritious, so it eagerly slurped all of the mystery juice it could find. A fortunate find, to say the least. The space-faring ordeal had reduced the creature’s mass to about half of what it usually was, and that stuff went a long way towards stabilizing it.

And yet, even though it was rapidly regaining its strength, Boxxy refused to muster the energy to stop itself from sinking to the very bottom.

After all, what would be the point of that?