Chereads / An Intoxicating Reality / Chapter 7 - Ouroboros Nightmare

Chapter 7 - Ouroboros Nightmare

Flores looks down and saw a large instrument created out of nowhere. She was flabbergasted at the sight.

Roan positions the grand piano against the bumpy and stony crevice walls to both reduce the speed of both Flores' and Roan's speed of falling, and be used as a stepping stone to jump towards the nearby flat surface sticking out of the walls.

"Jump right now and hold onto that flat surface's ledge!" As they both jumped up and lifted themselves onto the ledge.

"PuH- huh... huh... huh... that was a close one-" Roan said while gasping for air. 

As they were observing their surroundings, Flores picks up on a peculiar image.

"Yeah, but have you noticed something strange on this ledge?" Flores softly points out towards a strange symbol sticking on the wall next to them.

The symbol resembles that of a snake. The snake appears to reveal its mouth, its fangs were nowhere to be seen.

"Now that we can catch a break, I just realised that there are human skeletons around us." Roan concernly points out.

While Roan was mentioning the after thought, Flores was scavenging through the corpses and found a diary named, 'Ouroboros Nightmare'.

It reads,

---

[7th Calendar of Judom]

Day 1: We finally got to this ledge, took us a long travel across a span of 2 months. My pals and I are researchers from the Researching Department of Draga. Oh, I forgot about my name; my name is Dersia Montina, the head researcher of sector 77. I am with only Jodah Milli and Marley Milli. Sadly, the other 4 individuals were swept up from the mana creatures of the Forest of Agrave. But, it is our duty to explore and expand our knowledge about this world. Unfortunate sacrifices are apart of life.

Day 2: Feels like a second just past, this snake like symbol is so fascinating. Apparently this snake symbol releases an indefinite amount of venom. Extracting the venom is quite a difficult process because the venom keeps moving on its own. From what we can observe, the venom can be calculated to be 8 times more potent than the most dangerous and poisonous frog in the world, Poifrog. The internal facial structure of this peculiar snake-like creature appears to be quite ancient. I believe solving this problem can potentially get us a dungeon filled with treasures or perhaps a successor/legacy awaits somewhere after we manage to solve this strange riddle.

Day 3: Weird, our bodies started to corrode bit by bit, I checked my face, it was dripping. This can't be, the venom is so strange that it bypassed our special suit made of Antonium which can sustain both environmental and elemental damage. The antidote we have in our backpack couldn't stop the venom from destroying the cells in our body. 

Day 4: We stopped panicking after realising that we might be potentially in an illusion of some sorts because we couldn't feel any pain. In the afternoon, my friend Marley has just activated some sort of mechanism behind this mysterious snake symbol. She pressed her palms on some hidden door causing a bright purple light to lit up from the cracks. Nothing really changed besides the dripping of venom coming out of its fangs has stopped.  After an hour of observing changes from activating the hidden mechanism, we only discovered that there was a tunnel leading to a lake. This lake looked really deadly, fumes of poison fogged our vision, purple liquid bubbling like magma spews and a strangely placed wooden door on the other side of the lake which seems to not be affected by its surroundings considering its optimal quality. From the rocky platform to the other platform has roughly a 50 metre distance. Unfortunately, we don't have anyone who can help us teleport there or perhaps give us the ability to get there in the first place.

Day 5: Its hard to breathe now. We tried to use the rope we bought for 30 silvers due to its quality. The rope was thick and had a slime-like texture/feel so it could stretch and could potentially get us over the other side. The second the rope hovered over the intimidating purple lake, it disintegrated into nothingness; it was as if the rope itself didn't even exist. This was not looking good at all for our end. 

Day 6: Jodah died in his sleep, HE WAS REDUCED TO A SKELETON! Oh my researching days, half of my body is rid of its flesh. MARLEY!!! 

---

Both Flores and Roan had a ghastly face, she vomited while Roan was contemplating what was written in the diary.

"Roan-" Flores looked at the back of Roan who was gazing above.

He turns around and tries to press his palms against the walls in searching for the hidden mechanism while saying, "lets find out what's behind that door, and I just looked at my status just now."

"What does it say?" She solemnly questions.

[Passive: Poison Immunity]--[Rank E]--[Immunity: 36%]

"My poison immunity keeps on increasing, I feel strange-" As he points out and then ponders to himself.

"Perhaps this is a legacy or some sorts-" As Flores continues to scavenge for other items that weren't affected by this mysterious liquid.

'Perhaps it wasn't just poison.' Roan thought.

Suddenly, a bright purple light lit around a pressure point hidden within the walls. 

"Flores, I believe this might have something to do with my poison style." Roan sternly mentions.

"I believe so. I will watch out from here so don't worry and do your thing sweetie~" Flores frolicking said.

---

*Clomp*

*Clomp*

*Clomp*

...

The dark and spooky cave surrounds the vision of Roan, the sounds of the eerie reverberation of his footsteps sends echoes across the rugged passage, he walks quietly but yet swiftly, and he then treads upon a lake.

The lake was calm, the descriptions of the bubbling and rampart spews of purple liquid was overly exaggerated. 

'Doesn't this looks like a normal lake for some reason.' He internally questions to himself as he remembers the characteristics of the lake. 

He stretches his arm towards the purple liquid of the lake. 

'Feels cold on touch, it is as if my arm is wrapped around ice cubes.' He continues to ponder to himself. 

Unexpectedly, a glob of purple goo attacked him from behind. It hit him on his neck causing his consciousness to slowly fade away and fall into the depths of the purple lake.