Animated Plane?

Time rewound to two days earlier.

Benjamin and Viola followed behind Clark, passing through the side door of the command room and heading deeper down the corridor.

When he reached the end of the corridor, Clark stopped before an ordinary-looking metal wall.

He raised a hand and lightly pressed a spot on its surface.

As though some illusion spell had been dispelled, the wall silently split open, revealing a hidden door just wide enough for one person to pass through.

Beyond the door stood an extremely rudimentary device that looked like an elevator.

But calling it an "elevator" was generous—it was little more than a metal platform, surrounded by a bottomless vertical shaft, with endless darkness above and below.

Clark stepped onto it first.

Viola followed close behind, not forgetting to shoot Benjamin a look that said, "Don't just stand there."

Benjamin took a deep breath and stepped onto the platform.

After Clark confirmed authorization with the magic array on the platform, it began to descend.

Benjamin could clearly feel their group being drawn by some steady force as they descended at a uniform speed toward the depths of the earth.

The rock walls around the shaft swept upward at high speed. Occasionally, he could see faintly glowing runes embedded in the strata—the traces of reinforcement spells.

One minute.

Five minutes.

Ten minutes.

Benjamin silently counted the time, and the surprise in his heart grew stronger and stronger.

At the speed of this lift, after descending for ten minutes—they had likely gone more than fifty kilometers underground.

Beside him, Viola had also lost her usual lazy expression, her silver-gray eyes gleaming with thought.

Finally, after nearly another ten minutes of descent, the platform gave a slight shudder and came to a stop.

The rock wall ahead automatically split open to