[Location]: Commercial District · "Witch's Fried Chicken"
The establishment did not smell like arcane secrets or starry voids. It smelled, aggressively and unapologetically, of boiling oil, heavy spices, and the guilty pleasure of industrial-grade calories.
The menu board floating above the counter glowed with burning letters:
[Hellfire-Spiced Phoenix Wings (Mild/Medium/Abyssal)]
[Deep-Fried False Mandrake Roots (Screams Removed)]
[Golden Dodo Buckets (Family Size)]
"Fifty Solars," Victoria said.
She stood as far back from the counter as possible, her posture stiff. She tapped her black crystal card against the rune reader from a distance, using a tiny [Mage Hand] cantrip to avoid touching the greasy surface.
[Beep. Transaction Approved.]
"I need five of the [Golden Dodo Family Buckets]. Extra crispy. Abyssal spicy."
The clerk, a young Witch with a grease-stained apron, beamed. "Five Mega-Buckets! A woman of taste! Planning a party?"
"It is... a necessary transaction," Victoria replied stiffly.
Sizzle. Sizzle. Boom.
Five massive red buckets, each the size of a laundry basket, floated onto the counter. The heat radiating from them was intense enough to distort the air, carrying the scent of chili and high-grade magical poultry.
"Pleasure doing business! Would you like to add a gallon of [Slime-Jelly Cola] for only 3 Solars?"
"No," Victoria declined coldly.
She raised her wand. A thin, shimmering [Minor Aerokinetic Barrier] enveloped her body, isolating her pristine white uniform from the oily fumes.
Then, she looked at Hathaway.
She didn't speak. She just tilted her head slightly towards the counter.
The message was clear: I am a Wellington. I do not carry buckets of grease. You do it.
Hathaway twitched.
"Victoria," she protested, pointing at her own velvet military coat. "I am a Ludwig. My ancestors have portraits in the Hall of Glory. Do you expect me to look like a delivery girl?"
"You are a Ludwig," Victoria agreed, smoothing her white gloves with a distinct lack of sympathy. "But currently, you are a Ludwig with lower mana efficiency than me. Therefore, you are the Pack Mule."
With a flick of her wand, Victoria cast a [Floating Disk] spell. But she didn't use it to carry the food. She used it to carry her own handbag, ensuring her shoulders remained unburdened.
Then she shoved three massive buckets directly into Hathaway's arms.
"Oof!"
Hathaway staggered. The stack blocked her vision, and the heat threatened to roast her chest. "That's three," Hathaway grunted from behind the wall of chicken. "There are two more."
"Improvise," Victoria said, walking toward the door.
Hathaway sighed. Her eyes glowed faintly blue as she cast [Mage Hand]. Two spectral, translucent hands materialized in the air, grabbing the handles of the remaining two buckets and floating them alongside her ears like distinct, greasy satellites.
They stepped out into the street. And immediately, they were spotted.
"Nyao."
It wasn't a request. It was a coronation.
A ball of warm, orange light drifted down from the awning above. It was a Orange Tabby Lantern Cat—fat, fluffy, and glowing with the soft luminescence of a bedside lamp.
It landed directly on top of Hathaway's head.
It settled into her hair immediately, kneading its paws slightly to create a comfortable nest, treating the top of her skull like a premium heated cushion.
"Oh." Hathaway froze.
Her instinct as a human—and a hidden cat lover—kicked in instantly.
I have been Chosen.
The Apex Lifeform has descended upon me.
She immediately stopped moving her neck. She stiffened her spine, turning her upper body into the most stable, shock-absorbent platform possible. Her internal monologue was screaming “It’s so fluffy!”, but her face remained deadpan.
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"Victoria," Hathaway called out, her voice carefully steady so as not to disturb the orange blob. "I have been compromised. Hostile lifeform on sector... head."
"It's just a stray," Victoria glanced back, raising an eyebrow at the glowing orange 'hat' Hathaway was now wearing. "Shake it off."
"I can't," Hathaway said solemnly. "If I move, I might drop the chicken."
(This was a lie. She just didn't want the cat to leave.)
As if sensing her submission, the orange cat stretched out a stubby paw. It reached down into one of the Mage Hand buckets floating beside Hathaway's ear, hooked a spicy drumstick with expert precision, and dragged it up to the "Roof."
Crunch. Crunch. Purr.
Grease crumbs rained down onto Hathaway's shoulder. The cat was now happily eating dinner on her head, vibrating with a deep, engine-like purr that resonated right through Hathaway's skull.
"It is stealing our cargo," Hathaway reported, trying to sound annoyed, but failing to hide the slight smirk on her lips. "Look at this audacity. It thinks I'm a dining table."
"Let it eat," Victoria sighed, clearly seeing through Hathaway's act. "Consider it a toll fee."
"We are going to the Great Library," Hathaway grumbled, cross-eyed, trying to look up at the glowing whiskers twitching on her forehead. "The sanctuary of wisdom. And I look like a moving cafeteria with a parasite."
"We are not bringing takeout. We are bringing Bribes," Victoria corrected, checking the lids of the other buckets.
"Bribes?"
"The Great Library is a megastructure. Its internal surface area is roughly the size of a small moon. Magic flight is prohibited inside. Teleportation is blocked for undergraduates."
Victoria narrowed her eyes slightly, squinting at the distant spire of the library.
"Do you plan to walk to Sector Zero? It would take us three weeks. We would die of starvation before we reached the letter 'C'."
"So we are bribing a librarian?" Hathaway asked. The cat on her head shifted its weight, and Hathaway instinctively adjusted her stance to keep it comfortable.
"We are hiring a transport," Victoria corrected. "The library is the territory of the Mist Lantern Cats. They are the only ones who can navigate the non-linear space."
"Mist Lantern Cats?" Hathaway blinked. "Wait, you mean like this guy?" She pointed a finger up at the orange glutton. "Aren't they just... condensed laziness? Why would the Academy trust them to manage the Library?"
"Because the Mist variants possess a unique spatial ability called [Feline Fog Warp]," Victoria explained.
"Feline Fog Warp?"
"It is similar to the Eastern folklore concept of a 'Fairy Ring'," Victoria lectured, tapping her wand against her thigh as they walked.
"Normally, a spatial loop traps you. But the Mist Lantern Cats have inverted this concept. They swallow you into their mist, creating a folded loop. But instead of trapping you, they can 'spit' you out at any location the cat has previously visited."
"It is the only way to bypass the Library's non-linear physical distance."
She glanced at the buckets again.
"But, like all Lantern Cats, they operate on a simple principle."
Victoria pointed at the fried chicken with solemn gravity.
"No Calories, No Service."
[Time]: 10:50 AM
[Location]: The Approach to the Great Library
They left the noisy Commercial District behind.
Far ahead, the Great Library of Yggdrasil pierced the clouds.
From the outside, it looked deceptively modest—a sleek, ivory spear roughly the size of a standard cathedral. It sat politely within the campus skyline, obeying the laws of perspective.
But every senior student knew that the "building" was a lie.
It was merely the Doorframe.
The interior was a Folded Dimension, a spatial pocket roughly the size of a small moon, forcibly crammed into a physical anchor point.
And the path leading to it?
That was the true statement of power.
They stepped off the stone pavement and onto... Void.
The path wasn't a road. It was a Scar torn from the cosmos.
On both sides of the walkway, colorful nebulas swirled in a silent, suffocating vacuum. Distant stars flickered not above them, but around and below them.
The ground beneath their feet was a translucent ribbon of solidified starlight.
Hathaway’s breath hitched. She recognized the texture of reality here.
This wasn't a portal to the Astral Ruins.
This was the Astral Ruins.
She remembered the history of this place. Centuries ago, the Arch-Witches hadn't bothered to build a bridge across the void. That would have been too mundane.
Instead, they had simply reached into the shattered cosmos, ripped out a chunk of a galaxy, dragged it back to the academy, and nailed it down here to serve as a driveway.
It wasn't engineering. It was a breathtaking display of Architectural Arrogance.
It was the ultimate flex: We don't navigate the universe; we pave our sidewalks with it.
"Keep walking," Victoria said, her voice echoing strangely in the thin air. "Don't look down."
Hathaway couldn't help it. She looked down.
Through the translucent floor, she saw a spiral galaxy spinning slowly, millions of light-years beneath the soles of her boots.
A wave of Ontological Vertigo washed over her.
The sensation of being a speck of dust suspended over an infinite abyss made her knees weak.
The orange cat on her head seemed to sense the cosmic horror. It dug its claws tighter into her beret, shivering slightly, its purring stopped by the sheer scale of the nothingness.
And the contrast was absurd.
Around her was the absolute zero of the vacuum, the silent majesty of dead stars.
But in her arms, she held five buckets of spicy fried chicken that were radiating heat like a localized furnace.
This is surreal, Hathaway thought, clutching the greasy cardboard as her only anchor to reality. I am walking on a galaxy, holding fast food, wearing a terrified cat.
Finally, the path ended.
But not at the Library.
Right in the middle of this cosmic grandeur, suspended by massive, enchanting adamantine chains over a swirling purple vortex, was a structure that defied all logic.
It was a small, cozy Wooden Tea House.
It looked like it belonged in a quiet bamboo forest, not floating in the vacuum of space. A paper lantern hung by the door, swaying gently in a breeze that shouldn't exist.
On the wooden door, a small sign hung crookedly:
[Do Not Knock if You Are Boring.]
Victoria stopped. She adjusted her gloves, took a deep breath, and raised her hand.
Knock. Knock.
The sound was impossibly loud in the silence of space.
For a moment, nothing happened. The galaxy spun silently below them.
Then, from inside the wooden hut, a voice drifted out—slow, lazy, and terrifyingly clear.
"The door is unlocked. But wipe your feet. I just cleaned the stardust off the floor."