Blind Box World - SSS-Rank Eye of Truth

Ethan stood still, looking at the thin thread of energy running from Aldren to the mark beneath his feet.

The thread of energy was almost transparent, its oscillation very weak too. Laira and Ruo Yan were standing right beside him but hadn’t detected a thing. If the Eye of Truth hadn’t still been open after he passed through the False Wall, Ethan probably would have overlooked it too.

Aldren was still smiling, both hands hanging naturally at his sides as though he really were just waiting for an answer.

"You can see the true path of this labyrinth, can’t you?"

Nearly fifty creatures in the plaza were all looking toward Ethan. Some carried hope, others looked at him, Laira, and Ruo Yan’s three puppets with searching eyes.

Ethan didn’t answer right away. He slowly stepped to one side, pretending to adjust the cloak that had gone askew after his fall.

The mark beneath his feet immediately moved along with him.

’Just as I thought, it’s attached to me, not placed on the ground.’

Ethan bent down to brush the dust off his trouser legs. His left hand, covered by the Primordial Armor, lightly grazed his ankle, then he activated Disintegration at its lowest setting.

The thread of energy quivered faintly.

The mark beneath his feet immediately dissolved without producing any sound at all.

The blue stone on Aldren’s forehead suddenly flashed. The smile on his face was still intact, but the way he looked at Ethan had changed in the blink of an eye.

He knew the mark had been broken.

Ethan straightened up and calmly replied: "I just happened to notice an unusual spot on the wall."

Aldren tilted his head slightly. "Happened to?"

"That’s right." Ethan looked at the wall the three of them had just passed through. "Gravity pushed us toward it. I only chose the spot that looked different from the rest."

A few disappointed sighs rang out among the crowd.

A Beastkin nearly two and a half meters tall immediately stepped out. He had the head and mane of a lion, his whole body covered in dark brown fur, a colossal battle-axe strapped to his back. Each of his steps made the stone floor tremble very faintly.

The aura of Gold Tier 9 quickly spread out.

The Beastkin looked Ethan up and down, his heavy voice ringing across the plaza.

"You think we’re fools? Over the past three days, we’ve tried to break that wall more than ten times. Magic, strength, array-breaking items, none of it worked. You just arrived and passed through it. How could that possibly be mere coincidence?"

Laira narrowed her eyes, a few sparks of red fire immediately appearing around her hand.

Ethan raised a hand to bar Laira, then looked straight at the Beastkin.

"Who are you?"

The other slammed a hand against his chest, his expression full of arrogance. "Brakk, chieftain of the Red Fang war band."

Ethan nodded. "Then Brakk, if I really could see the path, what would you want me to do?"

Brakk answered at once: "Lead us out of this place."

"Is that all?"

Brakk frowned, his hand unconsciously coming to rest on the haft of his battle-axe.

Ethan looked at the people standing in the plaza. Many were wounded, a few had to lean on their weapons to stay upright, but there were still no small number of gazes lingering on the Primordial Armor, Laira’s dragon wings, and Ruo Yan’s puppets.

These people wanted to leave the labyrinth.

But if they came across treasure, they certainly wouldn’t give it up just because they’d cooperated for a while.

Aldren stepped forward, the smile on his face still gentle. "I understand your concern. In this situation, no one can easily trust a stranger. However, cooperation is still our best option."

He turned and pointed toward the three passages on the opposite side of the plaza.

"We’ve been trapped here for three days. Every six hours, the structure and rules inside the labyrinth change once. A path that was once safe can become a trap, and a passage that was blocked can suddenly open. Twenty-three people have died, seven have gone missing. If we stay any longer, the number of survivors will only shrink."

A creature of stone and metal standing nearby also stepped out. His body was nearly three meters tall, and on his chest was a round energy core giving off a pale yellow light.

"I am Korr, core-keeper of the Stone Heart tribe." His voice was dry as stone grinding against stone. "Aldren isn’t wrong. Our energy can’t fully recover inside the labyrinth. If we’re held here another three days, at least half the people here will die."

Ethan looked at the three passages then asked: "Can’t you go back through the gate that brought you here?"

Aldren shook his head. "All the gates go only one way. After we entered, the way back immediately vanished."

Ruo Yan directed a puppet to advance two steps, her black eyes looking at the three passages ahead.

"Which paths have you tried?"

Aldren pointed to the left. "Twelve people once went in there. About ten minutes later, they came back out of the right passage, but no longer remembered anything they’d seen inside."

He shifted his hand to the center passage. "This one is full of spatial wind. We advanced less than a hundred meters before we had to withdraw. Four people were cut into many pieces."

Finally, Aldren looked at the right passage.

"The last path has no obvious traps, but no matter how long you walk, you always end up back in this plaza."

Ethan asked on: "In three days, how many times has the labyrinth changed?"

"Eleven times."

"After each change, does the shape of the three paths stay the same?"

Aldren nodded. "That’s right, only the rules inside change."

Ethan said nothing more.

Aldren answered too fast and too fully. Like he had prepared this information beforehand, just waiting for someone with the ability to see the rules to appear.

’He doesn’t know about the Eye of Truth, but he definitely saw me identify the False Wall.’

Aldren didn’t just want to leave the labyrinth.

He wanted to keep Ethan, at least until he found what he needed.

Ethan didn’t reject cooperation, but he wouldn’t let these people order him around as they pleased.

"I have three conditions."

Brakk immediately frowned, his voice carrying a note of displeasure. "You still want to lay out conditions?"

Ethan glanced at him. "You can find the way yourself."

Brakk gripped the haft of his battle-axe, his gaze turning fierce, but in the end he said nothing more.

Aldren smiled. "Go ahead and say them."

"First, no one is permitted to touch Laira, Ruo Yan, or her puppets without permission."

Aldren’s gaze swept over Laira for a fleeting moment, then he nodded.

"Of course."

"Second, while we’re moving, everyone must follow my directions. No one may leave the formation on their own, step onto a different path, or touch an item that hasn’t been checked."

Brakk asked coldly: "And if your orders are wrong?"

Ethan replied calmly: "Then you can choose not to follow."

Brakk’s expression turned ugly, but Korr spoke up first.

"The Stone Heart tribe accepts. What’s the third condition?"

Ethan looked at Aldren. "Resources and items discovered along the way will be distributed based on contribution. Whoever sees something first doesn’t mean they own it. If we can’t reach agreement, no one is permitted to touch it."

The corner of Aldren’s mouth curved up slightly. "Very fair."

Ethan asked: "Can you speak for everyone here?"

"I can’t." Aldren shook his head frankly. "But I can speak for the Elf group. Brakk speaks for the Red Fang, and Korr speaks for the Stone Heart tribe. The other small groups can choose to follow or to stay behind."

Brakk said in a low voice: "The Red Fang accepts."

Korr nodded too. "The Stone Heart accepts."

The remaining small groups began to confer among themselves. Not long after, all of them agreed to join.

No one truly trusted Ethan.

But they had no better option.

Ethan turned to look at Laira and Ruo Yan. Laira crossed her arms over her chest, her expression clearly unhappy at having to travel with so many people.

She leaned close to Ethan and lowered her voice: "Do you really want to bring this lot of people along?"

"At least until we understand the labyrinth."

Ruo Yan pretended to inspect the damaged arm of her puppet, but her gaze flicked toward Aldren.

"That Elf has a problem. He smiles too much, looks very fake."

Laira immediately nodded. "I don’t like his face either."

Ethan looked at the two of them and said calmly: "Then don’t turn your backs on him."

Ruo Yan lifted her head to look at Ethan. Laira’s lips curved slightly too. Both of them understood he had noticed something, but this wasn’t the place to say it plainly.

Ethan stepped up before the three passages, a faint white light slowly appearing in both his pupils.

[Eye of Truth.]

The three passages before him immediately changed.

The left path didn’t truly exist. It was formed from many layers of space stacked on top of one another. Each time the people inside completed a full circuit, their memories would be erased, then they would step into the next circuit again.

The right path was also a loop, but it didn’t erase memory. Those who entered would realize they were trapped, then keep walking until their energy ran out and they died.

The center passage was the most dangerous.

Countless blades of spatial wind continuously cut across the corridor. However, they didn’t appear chaotically as the others thought. After every thirteen beats, all the wind blades would vanish for a very short span of time.

The true path lay behind those wind blades.

Ethan closed the Eye of Truth. A dull pain appeared behind both his eyes, but his expression didn’t change.

"Take the center path."

Brakk immediately said: "That’s the most dangerous path."

Ethan looked at him. "Then do you want to take the left path?"

Brakk fell silent.

Aldren looked at the pitch-black corridor ahead then asked: "You’ve found a way to get past the spatial wind?"

"It appears in cycles." Ethan stepped into the center path then turned his head to look at the crowd behind him. "Step exactly in my footprints. When I stop, everyone stops. When I run, no one may fall behind. Anyone who doesn’t listen bears the consequences themselves."

Laira immediately walked close to Ethan’s right. Ruo Yan directed her three puppets to guard behind him.

The others quickly formed up into a formation too. Brakk and the Beastkin group stood in the middle, Korr and the Stone Heart tribe took charge of the rear. Aldren led the Elf group nearest to Ethan.

The corridor ahead was very dark. On the two walls were countless deep gashes, a few spots still stained with dried blood and fragments of hacked-apart armor.

Ethan walked about thirty meters then suddenly stopped.

"Stop."

The crowd behind immediately stood still, but a few people still looked around in confusion.

Two breaths later, the air ahead suddenly quivered.

Fwsh!

Hundreds of nearly transparent wind blades appeared, cutting across the entire corridor. Each wind blade left a deep line on the rock wall. If anyone had taken even one more step, their body would surely have been divided into many parts.

A few people immediately went pale.

Ethan didn’t look at them, only counting silently in his head.

’Eleven, twelve, thirteen.’

The moment the wind blades vanished, he immediately shouted:

"Run!"