After a short grilling torture session, Katherine had finally finished cleaning Alex's entire body.
"You need to wash your underneath that skin more often, okay? No girls are going to like you if they see it."
Alex could only slowly nod in the face of Katherine, who was lecturing him on basic hygiene.
He couldn't really argue back directly, knowing all the things she was saying were true.
"And don't forget your girl's part too. How often do you wipe after going to the bathroom?"
"N-Not often."
"You have to wipe every time you use your female part to pee, okay? It's not the same as the men's one."
Alex silently nodded again.
"I'm going to check it again in the future. I better see you fully clean next time."
Seeing her not planning to give him an exact date for the checkup, Alex felt a chill travel down his spine.
"Mom... I can't really peel back myself."
Alex finally raised his concern, making Katherine blush a little as she removed his pad from his dirty panties.
"You'll get used to it... Just practice it more often."
After grabbing a fresh pair of panties and clothes for Alex, she quickly put them onto him.
"There you go... Now go to sleep for the night, okay?"
As Katherine gently carried Alex over to the bed, his stomach suddenly started growling.
"You hungry?"
Alex nodded a little.
"Let me go get you some food."
With Katherine gone from the room, Alex immediately started to attempt to sit back up.
However, the soreness quickly made him regret that idea, forcing him to lean back down on the bed.
Yet, the soreness itself also made it extremely uncomfortable to sleep, as every muscle on his body was aching.
"I'm never wearing that armor again, no matter what," Alex murmured as he tried to roll over.
But even rolling over was a little difficult, taking him way too much effort as he felt more awake than before.
Closing his eyes, all he wanted to do now was just to have the day to be over with.
"Alex, I got you something."
Katherine quickly supported Alex back up from the bed before she put a cup of milk against his mouth.
Within seconds, Alex could already tell what it was from the warm, buttery taste.
He didn't reject it as he drank it all down before she threw the cup into her pocket dimension.
"You feeling full now?"
Alex slowly nodded. He let out a small burp before she helped him lean back down onto the bed.
"Goodnight Alex... You're going to feel better tomorrow, okay?"
With the lights turned off, all Alex could do for the night was to close his eyes.
---
The next day...
When Alex woke up, he could feel his body completely normal.
As the three of them walked in the dark hallway, Sophia's light spell was the only thing illuminating them.
"When is this walk going to end?" Mary complained as the hallway seemed to be just a super long straight line.
"I don't know. My mana can't even detect the end of the hallway at all. Probably just a few more minutes."
Hearing Sophia's answer only made Mary sigh, but she continued forward along with Alex in the front.
"Huh... It's not an endless loop either."
Alex murmured as he had been making markings on the floor, yet he hadn't run to a similar one at all.
"How about we stop for a bit first?" Sophia suddenly suggested.
"Sure."
The three of them quickly started examining their surroundings, trying to find a clue about the hallway they were walking on.
However, all four sides are just stone walls, with nothing particular that made it stand out.
Looking back, they could still see a dotted light on the horizon, the same place where they had come from.
"I think it really is just a long hallway," Sophia suggested.
"I guess you're right."
As the three of them resumed walking forward, the dotted light became smaller and smaller until it was completely gone.
At the same time, Alex quickly noticed that the path they were walking on had a slight downward decline.
"How long have we been walking for?" Alex curiously asked.
"No clue."
"I don't know."
Seeing both of them already losing track of time, Alex began counting inside his head as the three of them continued forward.
After counting almost over 1000 seconds, Alex suddenly stopped again.
"Wait, we have been walking at least for thirty minutes from beginning to end... Something is wrong."
"What is it, though? Should we start heading back then?" Mary asked, starting to look a little nervous.
"We can't go back. We'll just waste all our time walking this far." Sophia argued.
Seeing two conflicting arguments, the two of them turned over to Alex for a decision.
"Wait, let me test something first."
A small fireball suddenly appeared in Alex's hand, rapidly increasing in size before he threw it down the path.
Quickly, the entire hallway started to light up, traveling further down and down until it disappeared completely.
"Shit, I lost connect to it..."
Sophia immediately understood what Alex was trying to do, as she quickly cast a light spell and threw it down the hall.
Just like Alex, the spell flew down until it disappeared into the distance.
"That was like at least several miles... We're going to take forever walking this path."
Hearing Sophia's answer, Mary immediately started dragging both of their hands.
"We're going to go back! I'm not going to walk here for two hours in the dark."
The two of them looked at each other for a second but eventually agreed to Mary's argument.
They had no other answers for now other than to head back to where they came from and look for more clues.