The Unstable Space
This was Xu Huo's third time in the Underground Round Tower.
This time, the Spiral Staircase hadn't returned to the shape it had been in during his first two visits. Instead, it remained as he'd left it, descending along white steps to the bottom of the Round Tower. The round table was now in the center, with three black shadows seated in their usual places. He walked over and sat in his own seat.
After a brief silence, all four of them reached out at once. Xu Huo opened the White-Covered Book before him, while the other three shadows turned over their playing cards, gripped their daggers, and pressed down on the Black Sliver.
White, orange, red, and black spread across the table, quickly covering it before flowing down the legs and onto the floor. After swallowing the floor, they spiraled upward through the Round Tower. The colors sometimes mingled and sometimes separated, each striving to claim as much of the tower as possible.
Soon, black and white gained the upper hand. The orange and red were forced back and stopped where they were. Only black and white remained to fight for territory. After swallowing the entire Round Tower, black turned to cover white.
As the white area shrank, it was suppressed by black alongside the orange and red. All three colors were pushed back to the bottom of the tower. At the same time, the inside of the Round Tower began to change.
The round table came apart, splitting into four pieces. But the section occupied by the Black Sliver kept growing and spreading, soon exceeding the table's total area. The Spiral Staircase slowly turned from white to black. Thorns sprouted from its steps and stretched toward the surrounding walls, while countless black stone spikes grew