The two of them dashed into the narrow path behind the stone wall, where the last trace of light behind them vanished, like a candle snuffed out by a sudden gust.
Their footsteps echoed against the cold stone floor, each disjointed beat bouncing off the closed-in walls, creating a distorted rhythm, as if not just two, but dozens, maybe hundreds of invisible shadows were following, running alongside… or stalking them.
The air grew thick. Every breath Ren took felt like swallowing something heavy and damp, like mist saturated with moss, mold, and dried blood that had clung to these halls for centuries.
The hallway kept tightening, the stone walls not only closing in but also seeming to tilt inward, as if space itself was trying to swallow them whole.
Magical lamps along the walls still flickered faintly, but their glow was smudged, as if someone had smeared across their surface, leaving hazy trails of dirty light.
And then, one by one, the lights went out.
Ren didn't stop moving, but a chill began to crawl through his veins. Something was wrong, off..waiting ahead.
"Where are we going?" he asked, his voice dry, almost devoured by the dense air.
No answer.
Copper simply pulled a glowing stone from his inventory, a rare luminescent crystal used for navigating through areas of light interference. Its pale light reached the wall ahead…
...and revealed three paths.
Each split evenly, side by side, waiting for someone to choose.
"No way," Copper muttered through clenched teeth. "I remember, this place only had one corridor…"
They turned left, by instinct.
But before long, another fork appeared.
Then a crossroad.
Then a long, winding hallway that finally opened into a circular room with five pitch-black doors, each like a gaping maw, waiting to swallow whatever dared step through.
Ren clenched his sword's hilt. Sweat slid down his spine.
"We're… being led into a labyrinth."
Copper didn't deny it. He stopped, the crystal's glow flickering in his eyes, sharpening his face with harsh shadows.
"Not an ordinary one," he murmured. "This is..."
He didn't finish.
The wall behind them, the one they had just passed through, vanished.
No sound. No animation. No system warning.
It was simply… gone. A perfectly smooth slab of stone, as if no passage had ever existed there.
Ren froze.
His heart thundered like war drums, each pulse echoing in his ears, drowning out all other sound. That solitary rhythm filled the space, heavy, foreboding, and final.
Then, in the tightening dark, Copper's voice broke through, low and gritted between clenched teeth:
"Shit..."
Ren flinched, not because of the curse itself, but because of who had said it.
For the first time since meeting Copper, he had heard him truly swear.
Not sarcastically. Not with half a smirk. But raw, guttural...real fear.
And that made everything feel… worse.
"I… I think I know where the hell we are…" Copper whispered, eyes locked on the darkness ahead, as if hoping memory would claw its way back from wherever he'd buried it.
Ren held his breath, slowing his steps to match. Before he could ask, Copper spoke again, already anticipating the question:
"We're in the lowest level… of the dungeon…"
His voice was rough. The crystal's light played across his face, tight with pressure.
"A massive underground labyrinth… right beneath the Town of Beginnings."
Ren's eyes widened. Beneath the Town of Beginnings?
The idea that there was a dungeon below it was outrageous enough.
This place, the supposed safe zone. The place everyone thought was untouchable. A haven. A home. The only place believed to be free from death.
And underneath all that… deeper than the known floors… this?
Copper hissed through his teeth. "Since when…? Damn it. Damn it all…"
He began to repeat himself. His steps grew hurried, like he feared the labyrinth would devour them whole if they stayed still even one more second.
Ren gripped his sword tighter, instinctively. A coldness crept from the nape of his neck down his spine.
And in that moment, he understood...
They weren't just lost.
"Let's go. We don't have time to explain."
Copper's voice dropped, sharp as a blade across the throat. Without waiting for a response, he picked a path at random and strode forward. His silhouette quickly melted into the faint mist that clung to the stone corridor.
"You have any stealth skills?" Copper's voice floated back, barely more than a whisper. "If so, use them. If not… stay absolutely silent. And turn off the crystal."
Ren said nothing.
He only lowered his head, drew a deep breath...
And let himself vanish into the dark.
No footsteps. No breath. No presence.
A brief crease of concern passed over Copper's brow as he glanced behind, and saw nothing but black.
Even with a fully leveled Search skill, he couldn't easily pinpoint Ren's location anymore.
'Better than I expected...' Copper silently noted.
But then, he too let out a faint sigh. A breath as thin as mist.
Because he knew well, compared to the things wandering beneath this labyrinth, even the most refined stealth skill was nothing more than a child playing hide and seek before ancient monsters.
'Let's pray they haven't noticed us yet…'
Even though he no longer believed that himself.
.....
"I'll explain... more clearly, about where we are and the current situation."
Copper's voice cut through the silence, not loud, but in this quiet, it sounded like a solemn funeral drum. He didn't turn back, kept walking steadily through the cold darkness, his footsteps echoing like a countdown.
"There aren't many words to describe it, but you need to understand one thing: this place is very, very, very dangerous for people like us."
Ren didn't respond. He simply followed, silently.
"The average level of monsters down here… is around 50."
He paused, letting the words sink into their blood.
"Just encountering one… is enough to turn both of us into a line of data on the system interface."
The darkness felt like it tightened. Ren swallowed hard.
"Stealth doesn't help if we get too close. They can sense heat, movement, even your breathing when you think you're completely silent."
For the first time, Copper's voice dropped, no sarcasm, no jokes, no deception. Just the truth. Raw and undiluted.
"We're not running anymore, Ren."
He came to a full stop and turned to look at Ren. The pale glow from the luminous stone reflected in his eyes, eyes colored in something between ash and blood.
"We're just seeing how long… we can stay alive."
"When I accidentally stumbled into this place... during the Beta test," Copper whispered, his voice heavy with the weight of memory. "Don't ask me why I dared come down here despite how strong the monsters were, Beta testers could revive after dying back then."
"I didn't pay much attention to details in this maze. Everything was still a mess. Nothing fixed. Bugs everywhere… I thought maybe the devs hadn't finished this place yet, that they'd complete it in the full release..."
He let out a dry chuckle...void of humor.
"But looking back now... maybe… it wasn't a bug."
Ren didn't get the chance to ask.
Copper suddenly froze.
His eyes widened in the dark.
"Shit."
He spun around, bolting back the way they came like a shadow. Without a word of explanation, Ren turned instinctively, chasing after him, his footsteps pounding the stone like war drums.
From the hallway they had almost stepped into, a faint red glow flickered in the pitch-black like ink.
Then vanished.
Ren recognized it. That pale red light, the eerie shimmer like a flame flaring then dying, it was a spawn effect.
A monster had appeared.
Though its form remained hidden, he felt it.
Something was wrong.
The air held its breath. No footsteps. No wind. Only the heartbeat inside his chest.
Something stood in the dark.
And luckily, it hadn't noticed them yet.
Yet.
They pressed onward, quiet as drifting shadows in the earth. Not a single word. Not a single breath more than necessary.
Every step was laced not only with caution, but with a creeping helplessness, seeping deep into their lungs.
Everything… seemed to be turning against them.
Dead ends appeared without warning, like traps laid in advance. Long corridors led to chambers where monsters lingered.
There were moments, just a step too slow, and they would've been seen. More than once, they had to flatten themselves against the walls, holding their breath as some massive silhouette glided past.
Ren felt like he was walking a tightrope between life and death.
The map didn't work. The mini-map interface wouldn't open. No markers. No direction.
The teleport crystals...useless.
Not "disabled," like the system normally warned. They just… didn't respond. The activation effects would appear, but then vanish...
As if this world rejected that miracle.
Ren no longer knew how much time had passed.
Maybe hours.
Maybe just twenty, thirty minutes.
Time stretched here, distorted and blurred by the weight of the darkness.
Each time he looked back, he felt as if he were leaving behind a dream. A dream where the only things were lonely footsteps, dim light, and the sensation of something… watching.
"We can't keep going like this," Ren muttered, voice dry and worn as if the air itself had wrung him out.
Copper didn't look back. He only murmured a reply, nearly swallowed by the wind:
"...I know."
But that was all.
That was all they could do now...
Wandering forward in a nightmare that refused to end.