Chapter 5: The Gatekeeper - 1
The passage was now almost collapsing on Fade. As they progressed, the inside of the cave had narrowed even more, and strange-colored mosses and bluish mushrooms had started to sprout from the damp stone walls. In some corners, small, sphere-shaped plants with a yellowish glow were hanging down; a vibration seemed to emanate from them as if they were breathing. Fade couldn’t take his eyes off them.
"This place... feels like a living thing..." he murmured.
With every step, strange crackling sounds came from the stones beneath his feet. On the left side, in a hollowed-out section of the wall, a plant emitting a flickering purple light caught Fade’s attention. For a moment, he thought about approaching and touching it, but a voice inside him told him not to.
And at that moment...
The bridge suddenly shook.
Fade involuntarily took a step back. The passage in front of him was no longer straight. There was a wide gap in front of him, and the ceiling height had multiplied.
And there he was, standing.
The Gatekeeper.
In the middle of a giant silhouette about three meters tall, there was an armor that seemed to be covered in tar. It had no face, or at least it seemed that way. There was only a pitch-black, foggy void... There was a spiny, bony structure extending from its back to the ground, and the ground trembled with each step. In his hand, he was carrying a mace that looked almost as tall as Fade, seemingly made of black steel.
Fade’s eyes involuntarily called for the stat window. The system had recognized the monster. But...
**[GATEKEEPER(Weakened)]**