'How? How is it here?'
No words could describe how surprised and terrified he was when Alex saw the huge robot-like creature down the cliff. Various memories got triggered inside his brain as he stared blankly at the war machine that laid unmovingly against the colossal tree.
He recalled the hellish moments he had in the Dark Palace, the tortures from the dark mages, and the deaths of his fellow captives. The memories were so dark that he sweated hard and felt cold all over just from thinking of them.
Were the people of the Dark Palace here? How did they get into the abyss? Were they after him?
Alexei silently inhaled deeply to cover up his nervousness, then immediately squatted down to hide in the lush bushes. He held his breath and even covered his mouth with his two hands. Now that his Gift was almost unusable and his body was not really in a good shape, he could hardly muster the courage to even look at the thing below.
If his worst fear turned out correct, there were Dark Palace subordinates nearby. The last thing that he wanted was to be discovered and dragged back to that place so of course, he must hide!
"The frontier is dangerous because the guilds have become active lately. We take this area as our base for now."
"I don't have any objection."
The more Alexei held his breath, the sharper his hearing was. Despite the distance, he managed to hear the two voices that rang from below. Both from male, one an old man, the other somebody in his twenties or thirties. Because he turned his back on their direction, he could not see their appearances. However, he knew that they were indeed mages from the Dark Palace. Those voices were too familiar. Because he recognized them, the beating of Alexei's heart became so loud it nearly deafened him.
'Why now? Why do they have to even appear here?'
Large beads of sweat unknowingly formed across his face. He became dizzy from the influx of memories that reminded him of the darkest moment of his life. When he began to walk away with hunched back, his gait was steady yet his vision was not. Alexei's eyes busily darted around him in fear that there were more enemies nearby.
At that moment, Alexei felt as tense as when he first attempted to surf across a tsunami. The youth who usually could stay calm amidst a pack of monsters was nervous. This feeling was brought about by the knowledge of the mages' fighting power and their ruthlessness. Every single cell of his was telling him to run away.
'I don't know if this tower also has 48 floors, but I'm sure those guys down there are equivalent to floor 10 bosses.'
'I'm insane if I choose to confront them!' He thought as he slowly retreated.
"Surprisingly, fifteen miles southwest from here, I found a safe zone built by people who chose to descend from higher floors."
The voices resumed their talk. Alexei was alert since their continued dialogue meant that they were focused on their discussion.
"Ah, they must be a gathering of the bunch of cowards who lost their ambition along the way."
"Thought so too."
"Sir, shall we check it out? Or should we just send this thing over?'
Alexei never looked back. He quickened his pace upon hearing clanking noises from metal gears as he knew, even without seeing it personally, that those sounds came from the automaton that had awakened.
"Marlon." Then the dark mage with an older-sounding voice finally spoke the name of the other mage. Alexei instinctively paused then hid behind a rock, recognizing the name was that of the lunatic dark mage responsible for everything that he experienced, the person who organized the kidnapping several months ago.
"Yes, Master Oliver," Marlon replied, the expression on his face hidden by the ever-present skull mask that he wore. If Alexei only dared to take a glimpse, he would see the skull-faced robed man bowing his head to show subservience to the older guy.
The one called Master Oliver unhurriedly said,
"The Abyss World is as boundless as the Middle Lands. No reliable records have been made to map out the entire abyss. If Lich Abel did not employ his secret technique to locate the rat who is in this Tower right now, we would have wasted a lot of time searching outside. However, Marlon, the Leader gave us only until the end of the current cycle to finish our mission."
"I believe it's enough time, Sir." Marlon kept his head slightly lowered.
"We can't be complacent, Marlon. We don't know if the relic won't help that rat teleport out again."
Hearing that, the youth gritted his teeth.
The look on Alexei's face turned worse as he processed the information in his head.
Every month the door to the first floor would open, but the lineup of monsters and layout of the floors would remain the same aside from the top floors for about six months.
He lifted up his collar to cover his mouth, then began to move again while making sure that his steps were as silent as a cat's. Of course, that was not really possible. Thankfully, forests in the abyss were never quiet as various unidentified creatures create noises from time to time.
Still, his heart was heavy as he worried about his current and future situation.
'An entire abyss cycle. I need to hide away for that long... Just f*cking... sh*t!'
The fake stars appeared in batches in the fake sky above. Unsurprisingly, unlike the actual ones outside the Tower, the stars inside had no effect on the people residing on the various floors so, with each passing day, many become corrupted and prone to committing nefarious things.
The scant light provided by the fake stars was enough to help Alex navigate in the dark though. Yet, it could do nothing to stop the abyss from amplifying the fear, worries, and insecurity that finally managed to worm into his heart. The only good thing was that he was still far from madness.
However, Alexei felt despair when he realized that the automaton that Dark Mage Marlon awakened did not head southwest where the subject of the two's conversation was.
What did this mean? Those two were playing with him!
They long detected his presence above the cliff but pretended that they did not! They were too confident that they could immediately kill him so they did not bother lowering their volumes!
Realizing this, more curses appeared in his mind.
Alexei began to sprint with all his might, making it his goal to just arrive by the newly formed river. Behind him, the ten-meter high battle automaton finally appeared, having climbed the cliffside in just three seconds. Its walking speed was not fast. Nevertheless, because of its longer legs, it was quickly catching up to its target.
The two black-robed men who stayed at the foot of the mountain did not stop their conversation. Regardless, from the start, their eyes never left the direction where Alex was, which proved that Alexei's guess was correct.
"Sir, will the black dragon riders join this operation? Wait, that rat..." Marlon crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes as he focused on the images shared by the automaton. "He shares resemblance with the one who took the relic away."
If Alex was still nearby to eavesdrop on them, he would have been scared witless.
Thankfully, the other robed guy spoke while shaking his head, "You're too nervous and eager to complete this task so your eyes are playing you. I can't feel the relic on him. He's probably just a rat from that settlement who happened to be hunting nearby. Anyway, make sure to kill him."
"My apologies, Sir. Please leave it to me, Sir."
After nodding, the older Dark Mage, Oliver, turned around and headed southwest. Marlon maintained his bow until the old man disappeared from sight. Moments later, the skull-masked mage lifted his head and then moved about to survey the area. When the slaves brought from the Dark Palace arrived, he ordered them to clear the surroundings and build a camp.
Marlon cut off the vision-sharing connection with the automaton after leaving some commands to it. Primarily to kill the eavesdropper and every other creature within a mile radius. He then immersed himself in experiments and the reviews of the Palace's information about the current cycle. The 'rat' that slipped away was completely forgotten as Marlon did not believe that anything on this floor can escape alive from a battle automaton of the Dark Palace.
...
...
...
'... The mages did not follow.'
Ten minutes swiftly passed and it was only because he took advantage of the trees and the rugged paths that Alexei managed to escape getting flattened to death a few times.
His expression was back to normal, that was, calm and expressionless. Calculations and plans span around in his mind. Now that the perceptive mages were out of range, Alexei tightly gripped his necklace, sending a bit of mana to the precious gem in it. He had no more reasons to let the abyss amplify his emotions.
Almost instantly, he felt his mind become clear.
Right, the environment in the abyss was so mysterious and insidious that it could pollute one's thoughts and feelings. Most of his reactions and thoughts when he was still at the ridge were induced by the 'abyss effect'.
But the stronger the ambition was, or the more determined a person was in pursuing something, the stronger the resistance to this 'corruption' was.
This was why not many local survivors who came from the towns outside the Tower had gone mad. It was because they knew what they wanted - strength and freedom. The goals kept in their hearts and minds helped them maintain a clear mind.
Meanwhile, the outsiders called by the Tower knew nothing about the place when they first set foot on it. In the first place, none of them expected to suddenly get summoned from Mavria. Although the rate of a Fallen Blessed appearing amongst the outsiders was higher, the rate of casualties and people succumbing to madness and corruption was also higher. Those with Gifts could have easily combated the 'abyss effect' using their Gift. But the prerequisite was that Gift users could be summoned. However, ever since time immemorial, the Tower had never summoned a Gift user, or rather, it was purposely avoiding to summon people who were blessed by the Sovereigns.
As Alexei technically belonged to the local group from having entered through one of the eight towns, he lacked no craving for freedom and strength- the same things that the locals wanted. He was also a Gift user.
In other words, the ravings and miasma ever-present in the abyss could hardly influence him unless he intentionally let himself be affected.
'Those Dark Mages... they have not changed one bit.' He sighed.
'They can easily perceive people's dark emotions and eventually came to love hearing pained moans and screams of despair. But only the expressions of despair and fear on the faces of the strong could satisfy them. They are weird, perverted, and evil. The feeling and expression of fear and suffering from those they deemed weak can't arouse their interest.'
Alexei was indeed disoriented when he saw the automatons and the mages. However, his strong desire for survival immediately kicked in. When he remembered the weird quirks of those mages, a rough plan formed in his mind, and several minutes later, the result presented itself to him.
He was weak and acted like a coward. The 'abyss effect' helped made it look convincing. So the Dark Mages who thought too highly of themselves did not deem him worthy of being personally killed by them.
Alexei saw it as his win because as long as Oliver or Marlon himself did not go after him, Alexei was confident to escape alive.
But after going through all the stress and tension, would he be satisfied with just being able to escape alive?
Alexei dodged the incoming giant robot fist that came his way by jumping on a high branch of a tree. The automaton unhurriedly turned around. A moment later, its red eye quickly locked onto him, and then it fired missile-like magic projectiles from its back.
The youth simply dropped down the tree to evade.
"You think I was running away from you because I'm scared of you?"
A laugh escaped from Alexei's mouth. But the smile he donned was cold and mirthless. He was afraid of the Dark Mages because they were too strong for the current him. With just a wave of a hand of those two, he would definitely end up as a charred corpse or a heap of ashes that nobody would be able to recognize.
However, the automaton was a different matter - especially now that its owner was far away.
Before he became the guinea pig of the Dark Palace, he was a former speedrunner of the game version's abyss. If there was a college course for battle mechanics and game monster patterns, he would have a Ph.D. in it already. Like every other pro player of the game Mavria, he knew that the automaton's weakness was the core which only exposes itself when performing magical attacks!
Hence, Alexei poured every ounce of mana left in his body into his Gift to materialize a short dagger. Then he jumped up and stabbed the glowing eye of the ten-meter giant automaton.
"You're mine!" He declared.
He did not notice the hint of madness that flickered across his grey eyes when the sounds of breaking glass echoed after.