Royal Saint Crown University, King's Campus, deep within the ruins.
On the dark corridor, rhythmic footsteps echoed, treading on the cracked stone floor. Dorothy cautiously advanced. A Corpse Puppet beside her held a lantern, providing limited illumination.
In the faint lantern light, Dorothy surveyed the surroundings. The spacious corridor held nothing but scattered rubble. The stone walls beside were rough and pitted, as if someone had chiseled away the original plaster. Every few steps along the corridor, she would encounter rooms without doors, but a brief light revealed they were empty.
After descending the stairs from the altar room, Dorothy had reached the depths of the ruins. She then discovered the ruins were becoming complex, with not only stairs but also branching paths, rooms, and corridors. Navigating through them, Dorothy could only mark her path and rely on her intuition to choose the way forward.
The complexity of the deep ruins exceeded Dorothy's imagination. Stairs going up and down, intersections, scattered rooms... and poor visibility. This could truly be described as a labyrinthine environment. Dorothy had been searching this maze for a considerable time but had found nothing. Whether it was a passage or a corridor, every place was completely empty, devoid of anything.
'Damn... this ruin isn't just a maze... it's also completely empty except for rocks and dust! Just as Beverly said, this place has been looted by several societies, and there's nothing left.'
Wandering in the depths of the ruins, Dorothy thought this. Clearly, the Eight Point Nest only utilized the first and second levels of these ruins. Their main objective was the altar on the second level. The remaining labyrinthine area was simply ignored; after all, there was nothing inside.
'Fortunately, I prepared beforehand. The Captain had prepared water, dry rations, and lamp oil in the magic box, allowing me to stay down here for a while. Otherwise, I would have had to turn back.'
Thinking this in the darkness, Dorothy continued forward. Before long, the corridor she was currently traversing reached its end. Appearing before her was yet another downward staircase.
'Another downward staircase. Starting from the torture chamber on the first level, is this the fifth one already? Just how deep are these ruins?'
Looking at yet another staircase before her, Dorothy grumbled in her heart. Then, she sensed the Corpse Puppet left on the first level for monitoring, confirming that the connection between herself and the Corpse Puppet was fine.
'Good, it's not too deep. I estimate I've only descended less than a hundred meters so far. I've explored most of this level, and since I haven't found anything yet, I'll continue downwards.'
Thinking this, Dorothy began to step down the stairs.
Just as Dorothy had descended to the new level and hadn't gone far, she suddenly froze, her expression turning serious.
"Upstairs... someone's coming? Did those guys actually escape back?" Frowning, Dorothy looked upwards. The small Corpse Puppet she had placed on the first level could now hear gradually louder footsteps coming from the entrance corridor.
...
Ci Rong quickened his pace along the corridor. Before long, he exited the corridor and arrived in the torture chamber located on the first level of the ruins. Immediately, he was stunned by the scene before him.
"Wha- what's going on! Where are they? Where did everyone go!"
Standing at the entrance of the torture chamber, Ci Rong exclaimed loudly in a surprised tone. Before him was a torture chamber devoid of any people. Not only were the penal slaves and prisoners from the original cages gone, but even the guards he had specifically ordered to stay behind were nowhere to be seen. The scene was completely silent.
Initially, Ci Rong started worrying when he heard two students from the Secret Knowledge Society gathering point say that a group of ragged people had suddenly run out from the inner area. Seeing this scene, his fears were finally realized.
"It seems I was right. We've been tricked."
Just then, a cold voice came from behind Ci Rong. The pale-faced, hairless Claudius, with his hands behind his back, slowly stood beside Ci Rong, gazing at the scene before them.
"Tricked... Is this Black Dog's trap? Did they not only lure us into an ambush but also seize the opportunity to raid our stronghold?"
Looking at the scene before him, Ci Rong said in disbelief. Meanwhile, Claudius, after a brief glance around, slowly walked into the torture chamber. Seeing this, Ci Rong quickly followed.
"The smell of blood is strong, there are bloodstains on the ground. There was a fight, but it wasn't intense. The guards left behind were taken care of with almost no resistance..."
Observing the surrounding scene, Claudius murmured. Ci Rong, standing beside him, also spoke with concern.
"Everyone's gone... Could they have all been captured by those Black Dogs?"
"Whether this was done by Black Dog is still unclear..."
Just then, his expression suddenly stiffened, as if he had sensed something, and he looked upwards.
Claudius focused his gaze, staring towards a direction on the ceiling. There, he saw a gecko watching them.
With a wave of his hand, a bat flew out from Claudius's sleeve and rapidly soared towards the gecko on the roof. Seeing this, the gecko tried to escape, but after only a few steps, it was caught by the bat's claws. The bat then flew back and placed the captured gecko into Claudius's hand.
"This gecko is..." Seeing the struggling animal in Claudius's hand, Ci Rong recalled the gecko that had once attempted to peek at him across the spider silk corridor.
"This is a flesh puppet created and sustained by the power of the "Cup"."
Claudius said coldly. He then threw the gecko in his hand aside, where it splattered into bloody foam. Next, he quickly walked to the end of the torture chamber and took the stairs there to the second level. Ci Rong also hurried to follow.
On the second level, where the altar stood, Claudius looked around. He then saw a pile of bricks on the floor in front of a wall covered with black cloth. Seeing these bricks that hadn't been there before, Ci Rong immediately spoke.
"That wall of text has been dismantled. Those guys did it!"
Without responding to Ci Rong's words, Claudius turned his head and looked towards the downward entrance beside them, speaking coldly.
"They went down, and they should still be down there now."
After speaking, Claudius's figure was enveloped by a layer of Shadow. This Shadow then dispersed, transforming into black bats flying in the air.
Amidst chirping sounds, dozens of bats swarmed towards the staircase leading down into the ruins. Upon entering the ground and the deep labyrinth, these bats began to split up and search, leaving no path or room untouched.
In an instant, Claudius searched the ruins at an extremely high speed, searching for the enemies hidden within.
...
"Huff... huff... Damn... How, how did someone like this suddenly appear again!"
On the bottom level of the ruins, in the dark corridor, Dorothy ran forward, panting. Beside her was the Corpse Puppet, holding the lantern and running with her, lighting the way.
At this moment, Dorothy was extremely nervous internally, as she had never expected such an unplanned element to suddenly emerge.
'Where did such a perverted guy come from? Not only can he detect the small Corpse Puppet I used for monitoring, but he can also transform into such a large swarm of bats, and now they're all coming down to find me...'
While running, Dorothy anxiously thought to herself. The reason she knew the other party had transformed into a swarm of bats to find her was because, to prevent getting lost, she had placed several humanoid Corpse Puppets at key locations on the upper levels of the ruins. Relying on the vision of these Corpse Puppets, she saw the swarms of bats rushing in. Her placed Corpse Puppets were then surrounded, drained of blood, and torn apart by these bats until they were completely non-functional.
Now, Dorothy was well aware that there was a large swarm of bats searching for her level by level in the ruins above. With that intensity of search, she would be found no matter where she hid.
Facing this swarm of bats, hiding was useless for Dorothy. She could only run towards the deeper parts of the ruins; that was the only direction to escape.