When Russell "opened" his eyes again, he had transformed into a dune cat.
He was in a black, starless void.
Turning into a prone-spiritual version of oneself within the Matrix space—this was a common infiltration form for Spiritual Energy hackers.
Without adopting this method, it was easy to get lost or confuse reality with the Matrix space… after all, memory attacks are the most common form of counterattack; and if one assumed a form too unrelated to oneself, it would be all too easy to suffer from Self-Damage under the Offensive Defense Wall, leading to the disintegration of consciousness.
The cat was in the midst of a pure black maze, spinning around to inspect everything in front of it.
The material of the maze walls brought to mind obsidian, as their surfaces lacked a metallic luster and had some unevenness and defects.
Each defect was a leak, large or small.
