The two walked over to the table and carefully examined the machine.
Its casing was plastic, held together with ordinary screws.
A power cord extended from the back of the machine and plugged into an outlet on the wall.
He crouched down and followed the cord to the outlet.
Beside the outlet was an extremely fine seam in the wall.
He reached out and felt it.
It was a door.
A hidden door disguised as part of the wall.
Odin stood up without unplugging the cord or pressing any buttons.
He walked straight to the seam, hooked his fingers into it, and pulled.
The hidden door slid open silently.
Behind it was a descending staircase.
He glanced back at the countdown.
71:41:52
Then he entered the stairwell, with Ponzu following behind.
Odin crouched and shone his flashlight to the left.
The stairs continued downward between rough stone walls. An explosion-proof lamp stood every ten meters, its dim yellow light reaching only a short distance.
Ponzu released two bees and sent them down first.
The bees buzzed out of sight around a bend in the stairs.
Ten seconds later, Ponzu said, "No danger pheromones. We can go."
Odin went down first.
The staircase was narrow, with room for only one person at a time.
He moved quickly but kept his steps light, making almost no sound.
Ponzu followed behind, noticeably slower.
She had to watch her footing while constantly monitoring feedback from her swarm.
After they descended three floors, another trap appeared.
The stairs suddenly gave way to a level stretch paved with neatly arranged square stone slabs, each fifty centimeters across.
Odin stopped.
"Weight sensors." Ponzu peered around him from behind. "Step on one with the wrong weight, and it'll trigger."
"How do you know?"
"I looked before coming down.
Look, the edges of the slabs are worn, but the ones in the middle are practically new.
Nobody's stepped on them."
Odin said nothing.
He took the small knife from his backpack's side pocket, held it in a reverse grip, and lightly tapped the first slab with its tip.
Nothing happened.
He pressed his whole palm against the slab and pushed harder.
Still nothing happened.
"It's fake," Odin said. "Probably meant to mess with your head."
He stepped straight onto it.
The slab didn't budge.
Ponzu breathed a sigh of relief and followed.
They crossed the level stretch, and the stairs continued downward.
Two floors farther down, a second trap appeared.
A corridor.
A long one.
It looked more than fifty meters long, with smooth stone walls on either side, evenly spaced strip lights overhead, and stone slabs underfoot.
There were no obstacles, just a straight corridor.
Odin didn't rush inside.
Standing at the entrance, he reached a hand in, then withdrew it.
"What is it?"
"Wind," Odin said. "There's wind inside, blowing from the other end."
Ponzu reached out to test it too.
There was indeed a breeze, faint and cool, carrying a slightly rank smell.
"A trap?" She frowned. "Or a vent?"
"I don't know."
Odin crouched, tied a thin cord to the knife, and slid it into the corridor along the floor.
The blade scraped softly across the stone.
Three meters.
Five meters.
Eight meters.
Suddenly, dozens of fist-sized round holes opened in the walls on both sides of the corridor.
Fine needles shot out of the holes.
They weren't individually launched darts, but dense sprays of fine needles fired from fixed positions, covering the entire middle section of the corridor.
The barrage lasted three seconds before stopping.
Three needles stuck out of the knife's blade, their tips tinged blue.
"Poisoned," Ponzu said.
Odin pulled the knife back, extracted the three needles, and held them up to the light.
They were about two centimeters long, as fine as hair, and appeared to be made of some kind of hard plastic.
He put the needles into a small plastic bag and tucked it into his waist pouch.
"Is there a way across?" Ponzu asked.
"Yes." Odin stood up. "Your bees can fly across, right?"
Ponzu blinked, then understood.
She released three bees and had them fly close to the ceiling.
There were no holes in the ceiling.
All three bees reached the other end safely and circled there.
"No other traps," Ponzu said. "As long as you stay high enough."
Odin nodded. He backed up a few steps and activated the Rabbit Talisman.
The world slowed down.
He didn't accelerate at full power, only enough to clearly follow how fast every hole in the walls opened.
Then he charged inside.
Right along the ceiling.
The soles of his shoes landed on the seams between the ceiling's steel plates. Each push was light, just enough to maintain his height and direction.
The round holes opened beneath him, spraying needles whose trajectories he could see clearly.
He dodged three volleys and reached the other end in less than two seconds.
He landed and turned around.
Ponzu watched him from the entrance.
"Come over," Odin said. "Stay close to the ceiling. You don't need to be fast, just steady."
Ponzu took a deep breath and climbed up to the ceiling.
She wasn't built for speed, but she was agile. Bracing her hands against the walls on either side, she hooked her toes into the ceiling seams and inched her way across.
Her swarm flew around her, some guiding her from ahead, others keeping watch below.
It took her four minutes to cross.
Her palms were slick with sweat when she landed.
"These traps... are such a pain," she said, panting.
"There are more ahead," Odin said. "Let's go."
They continued downward.
On the seventh level, they encountered a mirrored corridor.
Countless mirrors lined both sides from floor to ceiling, refracting the space into a maze.
Ponzu's bees flew inside. Three minutes later, they all returned, circling erratically in the air, completely disoriented.
"Visual misdirection." Ponzu recalled her swarm. "The mirrors break up the space. Even insects can't find their way."
Odin stood at the entrance, looking at himself in the mirrors.
Countless versions of him stood at different angles, all in the same pose.
He reached out and touched the nearest mirror.
Cold.
He pushed gently.
The mirror didn't budge. It was firmly fixed in place.
"We'll have to walk through," he said.
He activated the Rabbit Talisman but didn't increase his speed.
He entered the mirrored corridor at a normal walking pace.
Ponzu followed a meter behind, holding on to his backpack strap.
They had taken fewer than five steps when Ponzu noticed something was wrong.
"You veered left," she said. "You've already drifted fifteen degrees to the left."
Odin stopped.
He looked around. There were mirrors everywhere, all filled with his own face. He couldn't tell which direction was which.
He closed his eyes.
"You lead," he said.
Ponzu blinked. "I can't see the way."
"You don't need to," Odin said. "Your bees can sense direction. Tell me which way to turn, and shout stop if I'm about to hit a wall."
Ponzu fell silent for two seconds.
Then she released three bees and had them hover above her palm.
She sensed the angles of their flight, feeling how they responded to direction.
"Turn thirty degrees right."
Odin turned right.
"Ten steps forward."
He walked.
"Turn twenty degrees left."
He turned.
And so they made their way through the mirrored corridor, step by step, one with his eyes closed and the other watching her bees.
It took twenty minutes.
When they emerged from the mirrored corridor, Odin opened his eyes to find an ordinary stairwell ahead.
He glanced back at the mirrors, grateful he had brought Ponzu along.
Continuing downward, they reached the seventeenth level.
There were numerous pressure-sensitive plates here.
One wrong step would make the floor spring open, revealing a three-meter-deep pit with soft mud and spikes at the bottom.
Before you continue