Chapter 42: The Serpent’s Labyrinth Entering the Third Floor, Nightingale swung his head around to examine the foreign environment.
He and Flaming Rose were standing inside a vast expanse composed of fractured stone and obsidian walls. The air carried a faint metallic tang, sharp and bitter on the tongue, as if soaked in the remnants of blood long since dried.
A thin mist rolled across the ground, moist, drifting between scattered ruins and cracked pillars that jutted upward like the remnants of some ancient cathedral. The further his gaze wandered, the less the horizon made sense. Structures curved upward, twisting into themselves, defying gravity as though the worldscape had forgotten the laws that governed it.
Well, to begin with, the floors of the Black Spire were regarded as augmented realities, or perhaps "artificial worlds" would be the more fitting term.
It wasn’t mere simulation, nor was it truly physical.
It was both.
𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶 Think of it like a virtual reality, except far more advanced and terrifyingly real. In a VR environment, the user’s senses are tricked by digital feedback like visuals, sounds, and sensations that mimic the real world.
But the Black Spire could hardly be called a cheap imitation of reality, could it?
Compared to a virtual reality, it wasn’t a mere illusion or simulation made using programs and digital circuits but a vast myriad of star-like connections that existed within physical reality. Most even say the Towers located on Earth were merely gateway terminals that allowed awakened humans to enter the true body of the Black Spire, which exists in another dimension. This theory became more evident considering the fact that people from other countries could challenge the Tower and see one another upon clearing the Tenth Floor.
The more intriguing question, however, was why Espers from different parts of the world couldn’t interact with one another at the levels below the Eleventh Floor. If the towering structures on Earth were merely gateways leading to the same place, then why did such isolation exist? Lu Song had been mulling over this puzzle even before he became an Esper.
Was there a fundamental difference between the Chinese Tower and the Japanese one, for instance? Or was it a Law deliberately imposed by the mysterious creator of the Black Spire?
Based on the information he had gathered, the former seemed unlikely, leaving the latter as the more probable explanation.
’Hold on... does this mean that the mechanism of the Tower is completely artificial?’
Nightingale’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.
On the remote islands of the South Pacific like Fiji and Melanesia, it was said that in order to lead, one had to predict the weather of tomorrow with a mere glance at the sky.
What seemed like a supernatural gift was, in reality, nothing more than instinctive calculation: reading wind currents, cloud formations, temperature, and humidity patterns in the brain. The island leaders never realized their minds were performing these complex computations. To them, it wasn’t analysis but "listening to the voice of the wind."
Of course, this was nothing but delusion. It was true that the leaders of Fiji and Melanesia had simulated the next day’s weather in their minds but even the slightest error in their supposedly perfect calculations would have sent their imagined world careening far from reality.
But... what if it were possible to pull something from that "Imaginary World" and bring it into reality?
In that case, they wouldn’t need to "listen to the voice of the wind" to predict the weather, they would bend the world instead to match their vision. With such power, they could reshape reality, rewrite its laws, and replace those unbendable laws with new ones. Even celestial beings and devils would bow before them.
Or let’s use another example. The creators of a virtual reality built artificial worlds by sending command codes and instructions into a computer. Through those codes, they determined what could or couldn’t exist within that space.
For instance, they could define gravity, the color of the sky, the limits of a landscape, or even the lifespan and actions of an entity within it. Everything was bound by parameters, and these parameters obeyed the intent of the creator.
Everything within such a world was calculated, recorded, and governed entirely by data.
The unknown creator of the Black Spire had likely done something similar, and the "Mire" was merely the byproduct.
"..."
Nightingale’s body trembled.
He couldn’t even begin to fathom the kind of entity capable of such a feat.
Isn’t that... what humanity called a God?
’Don’t think about it! Don’t think about it at all!’
Nightingale shook his head, forcing the dark thoughts away and trying to focus on something else. It was as if some unseen presence might hear them if he lingered too long on them.
"...Is the 3rd Floor... a maze?" he murmured, frowning as he surveyed the twisting corridors. From the looks of it, that seemed to be the case.
Frowning, he turned to Ms. Rose and asked impatiently:
"You said you’ve been here before, right? So... what exactly is this Floor?"
She studied the twisting corridors for a moment. Then, the pristine mask turned toward him and spoke.
"As you can see, this is the Third Floor. Or, more precisely... the Serpent’s Labyrinth."
He raised an eyebrow.
"The Serpent’s Labyrinth? So it’s a maze?"
She nodded.
"Yes. That’s correct."
Lu Song looked ahead, scratching the back of his head with a wry smile.
"How lovely. Mazes aren’t exactly my cup of tea. But then again... would something as magnificent as the Tower even care about an old man like me? I take it you don’t happen to have a map?"
Tilting her head, Flaming Rose replied like it was obvious,
"Of course I have a map. Do you think I’d come here otherwise?"
Nightingale blinked in surprise and muttered,
"Ah."
Rose sighed.
"The layout for each floor can be obtained from the Awakened Association. Of course, there’s a price to pay. Since you haven’t been here before, I assume you don’t have a map. In that case... consider yourself lucky to have met me."
Nightingale’s eyes brightened with understanding.
"Ah... I see now. So that’s why you needed a partner. You couldn’t have made it through here on your own."
His words seemed to strike a nerve. Flaming Rose remained silent, her expression hidden behind the pristine mask. Perhaps there was a frown on her face, but he would never know.
After a moment, she nodded reluctantly.
"That’s the gist of it. My ability lets me generate Azure Fire, but the more powerful the attack, the longer it takes to charge and during that brief window, I’d be completely exposed. Exploring the labyrinth with a flaw like that would be a nightmare, wouldn’t it? That’s why I need someone to cover my back."
Nightingale frowned.
"If that’s the case, then why not join a cohort or a temporal party? Wouldn’t that be more effective than teaming up with just one person?"
Flaming Rose looked at him. She looked at him, really looked at him, and continued to study his unremarkable face without uttering a single word.
Just what’s she thinking? he wondered but didn’t voice his thoughts.
Finally, she lowered her gaze slightly and said in a strange voice.
"It’s... complicated."
’It’s... complicated?’ Nightingale thought to himself, trying to understand what she meant.
Of course, he couldn’t see through the pristine mask, so he had no clue what she was trying to convey.
Perhaps something had happened in her past, and judging by the tone of her voice, that seemed the most likely explanation.
He couldn’t ask her about it either as she might deflect the question or simply refuse to answer. Either way, it would plunge the already tense atmosphere into awkward silence.
In the end, everyone had their story.
’How curious indeed.’