Victor had done drugs once.

It had been a surreal experience, which broke a friendship, made him a hero of Happyland, and allowed a mortal to access the realm of gods. Higher understanding of the universe through mushrooms.

It didn’t prepare him for his current trip.

Victor felt his soul separated from his body, his flesh taken over by alien sensations as the universe twisted and folded. The black hole which swallowed him, Vainqueur, and Crom Cruach transformed into a corridor of swirling light. Victor’s spirit moved inside a chaotic rainbow, his mind bombarded with information.

Images flashed inside this strange, spatial hallway. Visions of Happyland, of Heaven and Earth; pictures of nine realms linked together by a giant tree, of an ancient city ruled by an undead abomination; the vague, incomplete design of a colossal machine constantly rebooted; the sight of a crew of men, harpies, and minotaurs navigating an endless ocean, of martial artists meditating around a black lotus, of an alternate earth where potions could grant the power to rule the world.

Victor had heard many people call Outremonde a crossroads between realities. Now he understood why. The visions continued, from pictures of worlds straight out of the wildest works of science-fiction, to phantasmagorical dimensions which made absolutely no sense to his human mind.

These visions were but a mere glimpse of the endless multiverse, of which Outremonde was only a small corner.

The journey seemed to stretch for eons condensed in the span of seconds, only to end as abruptly as it began.

Victor’s soul and body suddenly resynchronized without warning, granting him back his five senses and motion controls. The lights of the infinite corridor were replaced with a starry sky, and the back of Vainqueur for some kind of marble platform.

Owing to his luck, the Vizier crashed against it face-first.

“Ugh…” Victor heard Vainqueur complain next to him, the dragon had landed next to his rider. Whatever space-time mojo they went through had removed some of their buffs, returning the duo to their original mortal forms. Perhaps their spells had simply run out of duration inside the time corridor.

“Your Majesty, are you alright?” Victor asked his friend, rising back to his feet.

“I am,” the dragon replied, shaking his neck and leg as he rose back up too. Having recovered from the emergency landing, Vainqueur looked at the skies. “Where are we, Friend Victor?”

The Vizier had no idea. He glanced around, and the more he saw, the more impressed he grew.

The duo had crash-landed on a large, circular marble platform the size of a football stadium, floating aimlessly in the void of space. Or at least a dimension that looked like space; the stars in the heavens glowed with weird and lurid colors, from green to purple. Crimson nebulae swirled in the shape of storms and hurricanes, while constellations rearranged themselves in an incredibly complex dance. Suns fell down like meteor showers on the horizon, while wonderful cosmic auroras provided light.

Beautiful. Simply beautiful.

Victor turned away from the alien skies and examined the platform, the ground covered in ancient pictures carved in stone. Most represented scenes of dragons and fomors, or of ancient creatures which the Vizier didn’t always recognize. One carving represented the Dread Three, facing down an army of angels; another represented Mithras radiant, defeating a fomor as mighty as Mell Odieuse. Each god had a scene consecrated to their success, showcasing an epic feat.

Immense gates thirty-meters tall, made of an alien black metal, stood in the middle of the platform, closed, and locked.

What was this place?

A System notification answered him.

You have entered [Valhalla].