A chill suddenly ran up his spine.
Hao Ren shivered. He thought he was being attacked, but he soon discovered that it was just a chill, and this chill was not real. It was a vast, indescribable force peeping at him. The hostility and pressure of this force had given him the illusion of falling into an ice cave.
"It's a goddamn place," Hao Ren mumbled to himself as he tried to calm himself from the uneasy feeling. He looked around and saw that he was standing in a passageway. He could not see the end of the passageway, which had a tall and sloping roof with grooves ragged fabric hanging down from the above. The fabric was swinging in the air even though there was no wind. The entire passageway was made up of huge black stones, void of any decoration and bright colors. All he saw was a whole piece of depressive darkness as if colors had been erased from this space.
The passageway was not wholly dark though as there was faint light that came from nowhere defused in the air. Hao Ren could see the surroundings. He had noticed that fog filled the passageway. The nature of this fog was similar to the mist that he saw when he first entered the mysterious realm of Ancattero.
He heard footsteps behind him. Y'zaks and others had crossed the portal into this space. Just like Hao Ren, Hasse had also sensed the unusual atmosphere here. He held a crossbow in one hand and a rune card in another, his voice grave. "Do you feel it?"
Y'zaks replied with a bassy voice, "Well, a powerful force is holding up here, and is peeping at us. I couldn't tell its position as it is like everywhere. I'm afraid that it's the mother of all Shades of Chaos if they have a mother."
Vivian was the last came in. Her brows pulled together, and she felt it inexplicable when she heard the conversation. "A powerful force? Where? I can't feel it."
"You can't feel it?" Hao Ren glanced at Vivian with amazement. "I feel it, and goosebumps are all over me."
"I just feel that the atmosphere here is terrible," Vivian said, tilting her neck uncomfortably. 'It's not just the dark surroundings, but the feeling of something lurking around in all directions in the background. Apart from that, nothing else."
Hao Ren and Y'zaks exchanged a look. Both of them could feel that there was something that was powerful. Though indescribable, the feeling of being stared at by that thing was unmistakable real as it sent a chill down their spines. It was weird that Vivian had not been able to sense it.
"I don't know what's going on," Vivian said, knowing that Hao Ren would not lie. Her face turned serious. "It seems that my perceptibility has become slightly different from yours. There are only two possibilities for this: this space is unique where different people will have sensed things differently, or the problem lies with me."
Vivian did not elaborate on the latter, because she knew that there had been so many strange things that she could not explain happening to her. She, however, suspected that the problem might have something to do with her successful sealing of the Shades of Chaos thousands of years ago. The shadow of the seal is related to: If the strange atmosphere in this space did not affect her, she might have the opportunity to recapture and re-seal the shadows.
There was only one way forward. Vogus was right; the shadowy maze was used to trap those irrational things, people with a normal state of mind would not see the branching-paths and traps in the maze. Focusing their mind, Y'zaks and Hao Ren took the lead and strode further into the endless passageway.
The fog and dim light began to prevent them from seeing clearly but not Hao Ren. He was not usual in that he had supervision. Despite the poor visibility, they dared not use any light. Light would create shadow, the shadow would attract the Shades of Chaos, and that would only become more dangerous.
The uniqueness of the Shade of Chaos was that they did not merely lurk in the darkness, but in the gray zone where light and shadow overlapped. So the dimness in the passageway was safer instead. When there was no light, there would be no shadows.
It was probably one of the sealing mechanism of the shadowy maze.
The Calamity Cloister was long and winding with alternate straight paths and corners. Due to the poor visibility, Hao Ren could only roughly tell that he was moving in a maze judging from the twists and turns through which he was traveling. He began to imagine the countless branching-paths and hidden openings along the smooth walls that he had passed. He could not see them only because he was sober.
Perhaps he needed to be possessed by the Shades of Chaos to see the hidden paths, he thought.
He quickly shook this dangerous thought off his mind.
The strange space felt so depressed that it had caused him to have strange thoughts.
Y'zaks was walking beside Hao Ren. Running his hand across the black stones on the wall, he said, "This space is completely heterogenized. These stones were originally stone, but now they feel greasy like some creature although the underlying material has not changed. Nothing is covering the surface; it is the realm that changes and distorts the nature of these stones."
"How long have we been going" Hasse suddenly asked.
Hao Ren took the MDT out of his pocket and checked the time. "Almost two hours. This goddamn place is vast!"
The MDT scrambled to dial down its brightness. "Damn it! You should have given me a heads-up before taking me out," the MDT snapped.
Hasse was startled. Pointing at the MDT, he asked, "You bring this with you? Didn't you say there were only four of us?"
"I think it shouldn't be a problem," Hao Ren said, scratching his hair. "The Shade of Chaos does not affect it though it is bitchy like a human. We don't have to see it as a human; it's just an AI," he said.
The MDT knocked on Hao Ren's head. "You're the one non-human!"
Hao Ren grabbed the MDT in his hand. "Are you a human?"
"I'm not a human."
"Then why are you complaining?"
"Oops!"
Hasse looked on with his jaw dropping on the ground.
"So my advice to you: stop being curious at the strange gadgets that Hao Ren carries," Vivian said, looking at Hasse. "You can treat it as a robot cat, and acknowledge that it is an amazing gadget but don't delve into its rationality."
Hao Ren was speechless.
Anyway, despite the hoo-ha, the appearance of the MDT had somewhat calmed the depressive atmosphere. Hao Ren tucked the metal brick back into his pocket and then glanced into the long passageway. He could still feel the menacing force lurking around but was unable to gauge how close he was from the source of that force.
The place felt like an infinite dimension.
But this seemingly endless passageway had an ending point. After hours of exploration in the passageway, Hao Ren began to notice changes in the surroundings. The path started to open up, and there were fewer corners in the passageway. It seemed like they were closer to the heart of the maze.
Suddenly, a door appeared ahead. They could feel from here that there was some depression, chaos, horror, and forces of hatred and hostility that came from behind the door. They instinctively exchanged a look before running towards the door.
"Hey, there are some words here!" Completely unaffected by the atmosphere and unlike the others who had tensed up, Vivian enthusiastically examined the stone door and found some words engraved on the lower part of the door. Unexpectedly, those texts were not Tannaean but ancient Letta text.
"An eternal curse is upon us. We who exiled from the otherworld carry sins with us. We are destined to fall into an endless violent quagmire, controlled by a hatred without root and reason. Behind this door is the source of all sins and curses, but no one could dispel it or appease it, because the perpetrators and victims of this sin are dead, no one can forgive anything."
The author of the passage is a stranger named Kasandzor, the awakened.