Midgame Maps Are Meant to Be Torturous

A grand temple, far larger than any of the other buildings and filled with an air of solemn majesty, stood in the deepest part of the city.

The sky above the Eternal City had originally been blanketed by stars. No matter where one went, looking up revealed a sky full of dazzling starlight.

Yet around that temple, the stars had grown dim.

Or rather, the closer one got to the temple, the dimmer the starlight became. By the end, there was no trace of starlight left around it.

Only an endless, deathly silent night remained.

That place looked like the Demon King's castle that Brave Heroes would challenge at the very end.

A single glance was enough to make one feel the pressure contained within. Leon would not have found it strange if something suddenly burst out from behind those tightly shut doors.

He had leaped out through an inconspicuous flaw in the mountainside, only to witness scenery he had never seen before.

This was one of Sain Underground City's common map-design techniques, giving explorers more positive feedback.

Even though he had encountered this kind of scene design many times before—for example, crawling out of a cave after defeating High Lord Wolnir and overlooking Irithyll of the Boreal Valley—Leon never held back his praise whenever he came across a map like this.

"Beautiful! Sain!"

But there was one thing about this place that was not so beautiful—

With his current jumping trajectory, he would fall straight into the bottomless abyss.

The inverted building beside him that could serve as a foothold was more than two or three arm-lengths away!

Leon instantly snapped out of his admiration for the scenery. Without hesitation, he prepared to pull back the grappling hook he had thrown toward the cliff edge and hurl it again