Selene…
Her body went rigid as her mind raced through all the possible outcomes to how Marcus might react when he learned about this.
Will he be happy about this?
Is he going to rush to figure this out so he could go back home?
Would he...would he leave me behind?
He fought so hard in the contest just so he could move on from his old life. When I tell him this...will he ignore all of that and cast me aside?
As she mulled over these thoughts, Sarah placed her hand on Selene’s shoulder and unintentionally caused her to flinch.
“Are you alright?” Sarah asked her.
Selene paused before answering as she said, “I’m...I’ll be fine. I just need to think this over later.”
Sarah pulled away as she felt satisfied with her answer and said, “Right. Well, I’ll need to tell you more about the Labyrinth, the potential dangers, and how we navigate it, so listen up.”
Selene nodded as she put her personal thoughts aside to pay attention.
“I told you before that the Labyrinth is more than just a complex maze, its like a living thing. However, the extent to how it can be described as a living thing is more disturbing than you might think. Its not just alive, because by definition, its a predator. Earlier I told you that it assimilates what it comes into contact with and then reconstructs itself, but that’s not entirely correct. In reality, it has an almost biological hunting mechanism called ‘Aggressive Mimicry’ in which it takes on the appearance and structure of what it senses around it to lure people into it. But something we learned as we went deeper and deeper into the Labyrinth is that it tries to copy that mimicry over and over and over again until the image it replicates becomes so distorted that its nothing like the original anymore. Ruvick described this as ‘approaching the endpoint of Entropy’, whatever that means,” Sarah explained thoroughly.
This brought up a new question in Selene’s mind as she asked, “If the Labyrinth is a predator, then what is its food source? You’re all able to traverse it just fine, yet it has to consume something, right?”
Sarah then met Selene’s eyes and an unusually disturbing expression came across her face as she said, “Its food source is information itself. It consumes information to grow and evolve, using the spiritual energy of Hell and Chaos to fuel it. As it spreads out across universes and latches onto worlds like this one, it burrows into the cultural epicenter of the universe like roots of an impossibly massive tree.”
“Are you saying that there is an even larger mass that this is connected to? An even higher structural point?” Selene asked.
“It’s possible. After the Mordrinite War, when we first started exploring the Labyrinth, the Elven Demigod Freiren arrived in Alken and acted as a consultant for us. This was before we talked to Ruvick about this as well, but she had a different name to describe the Labyrinth.”
“What was it?”
“She said that in ancient times, before the Dark or Light elves even arrived in Erebus, they described reality as something that was upheld by ‘The World Tree Yggdrasil’, and that the structure of the Labyrinth showed many similarities to the concept, but was clearly not the same thing,” Sarah said.
“Marcus told me a story about this a long time ago and said that Yggdrasil was once part of an Old Norse culture in his world dating back roughly thirteen hundred years ago. By comparison to this world, that culture is young, and yet somehow Freiren said her people have known about it since before they even appeared in this world?” Selene pondered.
“It seems that time is far more convoluted than any of us might have imagined,” Sarah said with an exasperated smile, as if trying to think about it too much was too ridiculous to imagine.
“Indeed. There have been several people who seem to have known who Marcus was prior to him arriving in this world, with some examples being centuries apart, yet Marcus is only twenty two years old. It almost feels as if time is like a snake eating its own tail,” she said.
“Right. Well, I think its time I addressed the main threats. As you already know, the deeper we dive into the Labyrinth, the closer we approach ‘The Endpoint of Entropy’, and more concentrated the energies from Hell and Chaos become. There are two main side effects of this, and one of them is that our magic becomes more and more distorted and difficult to control. Chaos is formless magic and it warps reality beyond the control of normal individuals. Those with weaker souls can’t go too deep or they become powerless down there. While you are still able to reinforce your body with spiritual energy, that alone will not be enough to face the Chaos Bringers that roam the Labyrinth. What’s worse is that ordinary monsters also roam down there too, and if we kill them and fail to destroy their bodies in time, they will come back to life as a Chaos Bringer, distorted by the spiritual energy from the Chaos Realm.”
“So these are the risks to do with the Chaos Realm, but what about Hell? What are the risks to do with the Realm of Hell?” Selene asked.
Sarah took in a deep breath as she looked away, almost as if remembering something unpleasant before she returned her attention to Selene and said, “The Realm of Hell is one of punishment, fire, and pain. We don’t know the rules of how Hell determines who suffers or how much they should suffer, but Ruvick informed us that anyone with a troubled past should avoid going too deep into the Labyrinth or risk their sins dragging them to their deaths. Hell will use any past crimes as a means of causing immense physical pain, but there are ways to mitigate it. We usually test people by having them interact with the crystal containing the power of Hell and see if they have any reaction. Given that you showed no such reaction, you should be fine.”
“And what about people who do have troubled pasts? Are innocent souls the only ones who can safely traverse the Labyrinth without being affected by Hell?” Selene asked, thinking of Marcus’s reaction to the power of Hell that emanated from Thalia’s body once before.
Sarah shook her head and said, “Oh no, that’s only if we’re really lucky. Its rare to find an innocent soul that’s strong enough to dive into the deepest layers. Those who are strong usually are like that because they had to do terrible things during their lives to survive. We can’t be too picky about things like that. After all, I myself am one of the Nøkkra, which means that I am far from innocent.”
“Then how do you deal with it?”
Sarah then raised her hand for Selene to see as red bolts of lightning sparked across her fingers, resembling Marcus’s power.
“The Blessing of our God of Wrath gives us the power to endure the pain we feel from Hell and turn it into strength. Those who have inherited the blessing of our lord can take advantage of Hell and turn its punishment into power, but those who cannot are severely limited on how far they can descend. The other issue that we face when we go down there is that Wardens from Hell tend to cross over and hunt us down because they can sense our sins and try to drag us into the realm. The Wardens are strong, frighteningly so, and they get even stronger after we kill them because we can’t figure out how to destroy their bodies, which leads to them becoming Chaos Bringers.”
“I have a question… What happens to humans or a god like me if we end up dead?”
Sarah blinked in surprised when Selene said that.
“You’re a god?”
Selene shrugged and answered, “Kind of, yeah.”
“Well…I don’t know about what will happen to a god that dies down there, but I doubt it would be much different to what happens to humans. We could end up turning into Chaos Bringers too if we die, but we do have a method to mitigate this,” Sarah explained, and Selene’s eyebrows rose in confusion.
“You do?”
“Of course,” she said as she turned around and called out, “Terrance dear, came here for a moment, will you?”
‘Terrance’? That name sounds familiar…
In response, a tall and pale man with black hair and black eyes turned at his name being called and walked towards them.
“Yes? What is it?” he asked.
Selene then recognized him as he got closer.
She knew that she had heard about his name from the tournament, but back then, she couldn’t remember where else she had heard that name.
Now she finally remembered.
“Terrance North…,” Selene blurted out with wide eyes as he approached them.
The former Mordrinite soldier nodded as she realized who he was.
“That is I. Is it a problem?” he asked in a non threatening manner.
“W-Well...no, not necessarily, but…my father told me stories about facing a Mordrinite warrior during the war that came close to killing my mother Artemis multiple times,” Selene told him bluntly.
Terrance tilted his head to the side and smiled warmly as he realized who Selene was.
“You’re Adrian and Artemis’s daughter then, aren’t you? I must say, if you’re the one joining our group then we are in good hands. Both of your parents were incredible enemies to face in battle. You should be proud,” he said in a kind manner that surprised Selene so much that she couldn’t help be blush slightly to hear praise about her mother and father.
“I...well, I’m not sure they would share that sentiment with you, but I appreciate it,” Selene replied with a smile.
Sarah watched the two of them talk and seemed irritated that they were able to converse so cheerfully as she wrapped one of Terrance’s arms in her own and glared playfully at Selene.
“Hey! He’s MY husband! Don’t go flirting with my man, harlot!” she joked in a humorously jealous manner which made Selene break into laughter.
Terrance then said, “Honestly, I’m surprised that you’re taking this so well. I figured that a woman from Duranell might find me a bit difficult to work with.”
After Selene calmed down, she replied, “I might have been angry to see you if I was a bit younger, but I once had a friend from Mordran a long time ago. I’ve moved on from any anger I might have felt for your people. The question I have though is how does Terrance help us avoid being turned into Chaos Bringers if we die?”
Terrance then took the moment to explain as he asked, “Do you remember when I faced off against Ranni and how I was able to come back to life repeatedly whenever she killed me?”
Selene nodded.
“Many years ago, I pledged my soul to the Goddess of Rebirth who was once worshiped on Mordran. Because of the blessing of rebirth that she granted me, I’m able to bring myself and others back to life by manifesting her within the Labyrinth. The Goddess of Rebirth’s method of resurrection can overpower the Chaos Realm’s energy that brings corpses back to life as Chaos Bringers, however it gets harder and harder to manifest the deeper I go because of Hell’s effects. Sarah is able to charge a talisman for me to help mitigate it and keep me in the fight longer, but at some point it will run out of energy,” Terrance explained.
“But...you’re only there in case of emergencies, right? People don’t die in the labyrinth often, do they?” Selene asked in a worried tone.
“Oh, no all the time!” Sarah and Terrance said at the same time.
Selene let out a deep breath as she was shocked at the level of danger that the Labyrinth presented.
“Let me see if I have this right...We have two people whose roles are providing resistance to Hell’s effects and manual resurrection, and with me joining, you have a powerful front line fighter whose unaffected by Hell. Are there other roles to this?”
“There are. We have navigators, trap sweepers, and designated anchors. The anchors help set up check points for us in the Labyrinth to fall back to in case we get ambushed. Terrance is in charge of maintaining the link between us and our anchors because he teleports us back to them through the rebirth process,” Sarah said.
Selene blinked as an idea came to mind, “Oh! I have an idea. I can be a back up for that role because I can use my magic to teleport us back with my flames.”
She then demonstrated for them that she can easily use the sunlight aspect of her power to teleport.
Sarah clapped with an impressed look on her face as she said, “Ooh! That IS helpful. Alright, you’ll be a backup Anchor Link then.”
Terrance looked at Sarah and said, “You found a powerful all rounder all right. She’ll be a big help down there.”
“So when do we head down there?” Selene asked.
Sarah looked at Terrance as if asking for his approval and he thought for a moment.
“Well...this is supposed to be just an orientation meeting to familiarize yourself with everything that we deal with down there...but considering the scope of what you’ve fought against in the past, I think that we can make a short expedition down there today so you can have some starting experience,” he said and Sarah nodded in agreement.
After several minutes of preparation for gathering their weapons and supplies, the three of them approached a large stone wall with strange letters carved into the rocky surface.
As Selene squinted, she realized that these were the same kind of Greek letters written on the Tower of Alken.
“Can you read the letters on the surface of the wall?” Selene asked them.
Sarah turned around and gave her a look as if she asked her something nonsensical.
“Of course not. These letters aren’t even from this world. Why would we be able to read them?” Sarah replied.
“Because its the same writing that’s on the tower of Alken. Maybe if we bring Marcus down here next time, we can see if he can translate this,” she said.
“Next time then,” Terrance said as he placed his hand on the surface of the stone wall and she could sense him feeding energy into it.
Before long, it started to open up as the Greek letters began to glow.
When the doors opened up completely, Sarah turned to her and said, “Shall we?”