THUD!
I hit the bottom of the pit at last.
Or at least, what felt like the bottom. Instead of answers, though, I got even more questions. The platforms I’d been jumping down from had vanished ages ago. Down here, the rock was untouched—natural, not carved or reinforced.
No supports and machinery. Nothing that could’ve dug this deep.
Unless the mining company had used mages to drill further than where the platforms ended.
That should have been impossible.
For now, though, nothing seed imdiately wrong.
Nothing except the blaring system notification that wouldn’t leave my vision.
[Nyx’s Presence Warns You]
I forced myself to ignore it for a mont and studied the walls around . The shaft was perfectly circular, the stone cut clean—too clean. If this really was a mage’s work, then their control over magic made mine look like a child’s scribble.
It was almost... atomically precise, if I had to put it into words.
The surface glead like polished marble.
That should not exist in an abandoned mine shaft.
[Warning!]
"What?"
BADUMP!
That feeling again.
I moved to the right without thinking, just in ti to dodge sothing I couldn’t see. My eyes caught nothing, but every instinct I had scread that I’d just avoided sothing lethal.
BADUMP!
Again. This ti I stepped left, slipping past what felt like a ghost brushing by.
[Black Sun]
[Echo (On)]
If I couldn’t see it, I’d burn everything until I hit it.
Flas roared out of , flooding the shaft from bottom to top. The platforms I’d passed on the way down lted and collapsed in the blast.
When the fire died...
My instincts shrieked again.
BADUMP!
"Shit...!"
I dropped, barely dodging another invisible strike. It felt like I was losing my mind. Was I actually fighting sothing, or were my nerves just misfiring, sending danger signals at random?
I didn’t want to find out the hard way.
I had to get out. Now—
Sothing brushed my hand.
It was as light as a feather. No—a blade? A tentacle? I couldn’t tell. The texture slipped away before I could make sense of it.
And then—
FWOOSH!
Black fire erupted from my hands the instant that touch registered.
[Black Flas Counteracting Unknown Presence]
[Advice: Leave]
FWOOSH!
This ti my cheek ignited, a burst of black fla tearing across my face. It was getting faster—so fast my instincts couldn’t even keep up.
FWOOSH!
Then my legs.
"Shit!"
[Dark Step]
I teleported back to the point where I’d first jumped, dodging another unseen touch by a hair.
For a split second, the world snapped into pure black.
Cold. Suffocating. Like sothing vast and ancient had just turned its head toward .
Then I slamd back into reality, stumbling onto the familiar ledge as I tripped on a stray rock, lungs burning as if I’d run a marathon.
THUD!
"Was it a ghost...?"
I still had no idea what I was dealing with. I didn’t even know if it could actually kill .
I knew it was dangerous—but how? My body reacted with flas every ti it touched , yet I felt no real pain. No lasting wounds.
Part of wanted to disable my spells, just to see what would happen.
But I liked being alive more.
"So, looks like I’ve got my answer to everything weird that’s going on in this town."
The question now was: what in the world was it, and what did it even do? I definitely didn’t want to turn myself into a test dummy.
Luckily, I had the perfect alternative. I should at least get one more answer before I return to Evelina.
[Dark Step]
I teleported outside and grabbed the closest living animal I could find.
A squirrel.
Should be good enough.
[Dark Step]
Then I returned to the ledge. My plan was simple: see if it attacked the squirrel, and find out what in the world it would do to sothing that didn’t have black flas like mine.
The thought of going back down there myself, though...
I really didn’t want that.
"I’ll play it safe."
[Holy Fla Manipulation]
I coated the squirrel in holy flas—just enough to protect it from the worst of the damage when it landed below.
"Nothing personal."
I hurled the squirrel over the edge and squatted down, waiting for the impact, enhancing my hearing with magic.
After a minute or so...
THUD!
It landed.
As for the next step...?
[The Serpent’s Amulet Resisted mory Erasure]
"H-Huh...?"
For a second, I just blinked, crouched at the edge of the shaft, staring into the darkness and waiting for sothing to happen.
Waiting for... sothing.
"...What was I doing again?" I frowned.
That wasn’t right.
I knew I had just done sothing—sothing important, sothing that mattered enough to leave my nerves humming.
My hand tightened slightly.
There was a faint warmth lingering on my fingers, a thin residue of holy fla clinging to my skin like dust.
"...Did I drop sothing?"
No.
No, that wasn’t it.
[The Serpent’s Amulet Counteracted mory Erasure]
The notification pulsed again, sharper this ti, cutting through the fog in my head.
And then—
It hit .
"Squirrel."
My head snapped up.
"I dropped a squirrel."
Why would I—?
Right.
A test. My test. The invisible thing waiting below.
My thoughts slamd back into place all at once, like puzzle pieces violently snapping together.
"...Right."
My breathing slowed.
"Sothing’s down there. Sothing that sses with mory."
I exhaled through my nose, forcing myself to stay calm.
"Great. Just great."
Of all the things it could’ve been...
A monster, a cursed artifact, or so underground faction just as big as the Shadow Society.
No, of course not.
Of course, it had to be sothing weird.
Sothing I couldn’t punch, touch, or even see—sothing I still didn’t know enough about.
Still, I probably had enough to form a hypothesis. Maybe... just one more squirrel would be enough for to finally co up with a full answer before I report to Evelina about what’s going on.
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