Aeon felt a weird sensation in his ears as his head was being swallowed by the wall. It made him feel like he was being submerged underwater. His chest was rising and falling rapidly in panic. Though when he realized that he did not experience any problems with breathing, he immediately started to calm down.
Aeon's entire body soon entered the wall and he fell to the ground face first, his huge sack squashing him. Just beside him was the missing fruit. He immediately heaved a breath of relief as he recovered it. Then, he stood up.
Silence…
Without even bothering to clean it, Aeon took a big bite out of the fruit. Then, he whistled in disbelief.
In all honesty, he was really excited. He discovered something that was surely a huge puzzle piece. But he was still too overwhelmed to react. He was still too overwhelmed to celebrate.
He wanted to scream triumphantly, but he was too bothered to do so.
In that underground cave, reality could actually be an illusion.
Looking back, was he supposed to touch each and every inch of the walls to determine which one he could phase through?
No… Not a single sane person would think like that.
Aeon touched quite a lot of walls. He even attacked some too. Those being solid and concrete meant that the ones which are passable are few in numbers.
His encounter with one was actually rather fruitful.
….
The inside of the walls looked identical to the outside. Behind him, where he just entered, was the generic wall that filled the maze. He basically entered a wall then exited in another. It appeared as though the walls and passages just flipped; the walls became the passages and the passages became the walls.
The only thing different about the current setting is that there was no fog that obscured his vision. It was still quite dim, but at least he could see a lot better.
Curious, Aeon slightly touched the wall behind him.
In response, the wall started sucking him in again. However, because only a teeny tiny portion of Aeon's body was exposed to it, it couldn't exert too much force. In the end, Aeon was able to pull his finger out with no problem.
Aeon cringed from the feeling. He didn't want to experience that again.
As he faced forward, he started wondering what he was supposed to do. Was he supposed to search again? Back to square one? Was the maze outside the walls irrelevant to begin with? Was the exit hidden inside the walls?
So many questions; none he could answer.
He'll just figure it out himself.
Aeon was about to take his first step in the new world when he suddenly heard tapping noises. It sounded like multiple daggers hitting the metallic floor in a fixed rhythm. Moreover, it was gradually becoming louder and louder.
Something's coming!
Aeon's eyebrows furrowed. A few dozen meters in front of him was a path that split left and right. After a few moments, he'll come face to face with what he's up against. He immediately stored the half-eaten fruit and dropped his sack.
The twin swords were unsheathed.
Small tendrils of lightning started appearing from Aeon's hands.
A foot with sharp claws emerged from the right path.
Aeon burst forth, his swords shining brightly.
Enchantment: Lightning!
A creature's scaly head popped up about three meters from the ground. It looked like that of a lizard's. Though it seemed like it was standing.
Aeon's right eyebrow twitched. The appearance of the creature was not something he was expecting. It was completely foreign to him. It looked like a hybrid between a lizard and a human.
But that didn't mean he was scared.
Aeon kicked hard on the ground to adjust his direction. His target: the head!
Verdure and Zephyr crossed in front of him leaving a white, crackling trail.
Die!
The pupils of the lizard's eyes immediately shrank due to the bright light cast by Aeon's swords. However, it was not blinded. It even reacted extremely quickly and lifted two scaly hands with scythes as claws.
Aeon clearly saw everything that happened.
Bzzt!
Lightning clad swords collided with the scythe-like claws producing a loud ringing noise.
Bang!
Though the lizard was pushed backward and crashed against the wall, Aeon's weapons could not proceed with the kill. His swords were burning hot due to his enchantment, but they barely even affected the monster's claws. It couldn't melt it.
Aeon's body hung mid-air as the forward momentum was being released. Then, the muscles in his arms bulged as he pushed. The lizard's claws banged against its own head.
Aeon slid back.
Immediately after, more tapping noises echoed throughout the narrow passage, forcing Aeon to retreat a few more steps.
"Fuck, so this is where you guys were hiding," Aeon grumbled. For him, the floor being too peaceful was truly unusual. He knew there'd be a catch soon. And here it was.
Although there were probably a few dozen more standing lizards, or lizardmen as Aeon coined on the spot, he wasn't too worried. It wasn't too hard to tell which kind of magic was more effective against beasts with such features.
If his weapons couldn't get past the monster's claws, something intangible like his lightning should, no?
Enchantment: Discharge!
His spell, Discharge, allowed him to release condensed lightning, its shape based on how it was used. It was basically a spell that Aeon came up with as a replacement for his sword intents or wind blades.
Hooo… Aeon exhaled as he pulled back his swords.
The lizardman that Aeon fought just a few moments ago finally recovered. At the same time, its buddies started pouring in as well.
The metallic tapping noise, at that point, was already deafening, but it couldn't break Aeon's focus.
When the monsters were almost already upon him, his swords swung horizontally.
Dance of the Celestial Swords: Half Moon Blade!
The monsters in the front saw this and put up their guard as fast as they could.
True, they were quick to respond.
They could even capture Aeon's swift movements. However…
"It's useless."
There was a low humming sound as the lightning in Aeon's swords left their vessel. They created two streaks of white line as they moved with unstoppable momentum towards the gang of lizardmen.
The monsters' scythe-like claws? They weren't affected in the slightest. The lightning passed by without harming them. But it was a different case for their bodies…
Sizzle! Zeng!
The lizardmen's torsos shot through the air as their lower bodies stumbled and fell.
Every creature in front of Aeon was sliced in half, their burnt flesh giving off a disgusting stench.
Aeon casually dodged the mutilated bodies that flew towards him. Then, he pressed forward.
Naturally, he didn't get every single lizardman approaching him in a single strike. There were still those who hadn't even made the turn yet, completely safe from his destructive attack. He had to take those down too.
The area was immediately filled with the sounds of metal clashing against metal.
….
Aeon sheathed his swords. The lizardmen were really quite something. If it were him without his lightning, he would've died a hundred times already. The lizardmen were far tougher than average-sized magical beasts despite their small size. Their combat sense wasn't something to scoff at too.
The fight lasted for more than 10 minutes, but Aeon wasn't tired at all. If there was something that he lacked, it was surely not endurance. He trained for more than 10 hours per day, how in the world would he fall short in such an area?
He chose the right path, took his sack, and started running.
As he progressed, he encountered more lizardmen and were slowing him down quite a lot. However, this time, Aeon was much more optimistic about his situation. He found out that there were symbols engraved on each path. He didn't know what they meant or symbolized just yet, but it was better than nothing.
Continue!
Aeon's body was slowly being filled with bruises, but he still pressed onward.
….
Two hours passed.
Then three.
Then seven.
Then ten.
Slash… Kick!
Aeon cleared the path in front of him.
He had been moving around for 10 hours now, and he was fighting in approximately half of it.
Aeon was starting to get troubled. He realized that the maze was not as easy as he initially thought. There were too many enemies. Where was he supposed to rest?
Cocky! He had been too cocky.
If he knew that the monsters there were in the thousands, he would've stayed close to the exit that he knew of! True, he had improved. Rapidly, nonetheless. But in front of overwhelming numbers, he found it hard to keep up.
Truth be told, Aeon was already confident in fighting toe to toe against colossal beasts. Those that he encountered in Gray Forest, at least. That's how much confidence he had in himself after those weeks of training. He set himself up for a hellish routine, but he didn't regret it one bit, because he could clearly see the results.
He wasn't as strong as Dan yet, but he knew that he greatly improved.
But fuck… these lizardmen. There's just no end to them.
I need to find another exit!
Aeon had to cross the walls one more time. Outside, he should be safe.
He had been looking for a wall he could cross over for four hours already. But he was too unlucky! He couldn't focus on a certain area either because, after a few moments, a bunch of lizardmen would arrive.
So, four hours into the task and he still had nothing!
Aeon's body was starting to get tired. His dilemma escalated slowly, but painfully consistent.
Stress started building up. Another five hours of fighting and he was quite sure that he won't be able to cast magic anymore.
Aeon ran into the clear path ahead of him, the two-meter tall lizardmen pursuing closely behind.
On the bright side, Aeon discovered what the symbols on the ground meant.
As far as he knew, they were numbers. After countless twists and turns that provided him with a bunch of data, Aeon was able to extract their individual values. It followed the pattern of the decimal numeral system, so after identifying the values of the first 10 digits, figuring out the rest was a piece of cake.
He hoped that, if he followed them in order, it'll lead him to the exit.
It was a simple game, to be honest. After he locates the number in the path he was currently passing through, he'll search for a fork or a crossing. There, he'll randomly select a path and search for its number. If the selected path's number was not the one that came after the previous number, then he'll simply go back, and choose another path.
Repeating those steps again and again, Aeon was able to get to where he was now after 10 hours.
He didn't know what number represented the exit, but now he was on path number 172.
Silently, Aeon hoped that the exit was somewhere in the 200's because he was too beat. The monsters chasing behind him weren't giving up either.
Fuck!
Aeon stopped and turned to attack. He had gathered up a bit too much and might be a problem when some more came from in front of him.
But, strangely, after pulling his swords out, a loud and ominous dinging sound reverberated through the air.
The lizardmen pursuing Aeon stopped moving almost instantly, responding to the sound. Then, they just stood there with empty gazes.
Chance!
Aeon's eyes were filled with excitement. After fighting more than half a thousand of those monsters, he found out that they didn't have tough skins. In fact, if he could get past their scythe-like claws, he could kill them with a single slash to the neck.
He had to kill as many as he could while they were still dazed.
Aeon prepared himself to attack. But then, he noticed that no matter how hard he pulled his legs up, they wouldn't move.
He couldn't take a single step...
The lizardmen couldn't attack Aeon because they were somehow distracted.
Aeon couldn't attack the lizardmen because he couldn't step forward.
Common sense told Aeon that he just needed to attack from where he stood using magic. But, for now, there was something much, much more important than killing the lizardmen.
He had to know why he wasn't able to move!
Looking down told Aeon everything he needed to know. But finding out the answer nauseated him.
He couldn't move because his feet were buried ankle-deep into the floor.
Moreover, he was sinking!
"Oh for fuck's sake!" Aeon cursed out loud.
The lizardmen did not give chase and attack anymore.
Aeon sank until his whole body was swallowed by the floor.
He fell one level down.
….