The Road That Came to a Stop
Narrow, airless, muddy.
The sewer comparison from earlier had clearly been apt. This passage led ever deeper, but it never opened up as they went.
Quite the opposite: in many places it grew even narrower, barely wide enough for one person to pass. Apart from its age and disrepair, the passage itself showed no other remarkable features.
In this harsh struggle for survival, the group had been forced into a genuine single-file line, trudging onward in silence.
The only consolation, perhaps, was that although this passage seemed to lead straight to hell and wound its way back and forth, there were no forks.
With the difficult choice of which way to go spared them, they could keep walking on in a daze.
And Fu Qian, naturally, was still at the rear.
Of course he wouldn't turn down Sha Ming's invitation.
He wasn't so sure about Sha Ming's claims regarding Huang Zhixun, but this unpleasant place deep below seemed much closer to the source of everything.
The triumph of the expedition was right before him. How could he let it slip by so easily?
Even now, as they pressed onward, Fu Qian was making faint discoveries in a passage that seemed utterly oppressive to everyone else.
At first glance, the layout of the passage was undeniably bizarre.
It had all the trappings of ancient ruins newly brought to light, but it was hard to imagine any passage—or sewer—being built with so many twists and turns.
By contrast, as he walked through it, Fu Qian was reminded of the unusual spatial entrances he'd encountered more than once.
The merfolk's hideout, for example. Or the workshop.
The passage before him gave off a similar feeling, as if its course somehow represented the very nature of the