Seoul Object Story

The adventure came to an end as everything was scattered into sand.

The moment when even the sky turned into sand and collapsed, I realized.

Ah, it was a trial inside an illusion.

Moreover, I began to understand the killing conditions that I saw through my ‘eyes’.

They were not killing conditions for the labyrinth Object, but killing conditions for destroying the illusion. The <Die in this world.> must have meant that I could escape the illusion by dying.

With that realization, the consciousness buried in the illusion began to surface, and I was able to escape the illusion.

When I woke up, I saw a vortex that surrounded me and towered as if it would reach the end of the sky. In the centre of the vortex, there’s remains of a building that looked like it would turn into sand at any moment.

Naturally, I thought I would be in a space filled with flowing sand as that was the place where the cracks opened, or in the insides of the labyrinth’s cubic rooms. However, what greeted me were vortex, ruins, and Black Reapers.

The Black Reapers were fast asleep, clinging to my stomach. They must have come through the vortex to help me snap out of the illusion. Judging from how the light from their firewood had become very weak and their shapes had slightly melted, It must have been quite difficult for them to intervene with the illusion.

It must have been hard.

I lifted the tattered Black Reapers one by one, stuffed them with a lot of firewood. However, as I patted them, a different idea suddenly occurred to me.

If the black reapers hadn’t come, wouldn’t I have died in the illusion a long time ago and been at peace?

It was a very smart and logical thought, as expected of a cool-headed person like me.

Hmm…

I lifted the Black Reapers one by one, who had become bloated from being fed too much firewood, and started burying them in the sand.

Hihihihi!

It was a little funny to see the Black Reapers’ heads sprouting out of the sand, as if they were sprouting plants. Seeing them, I felt like all the stress from passing the trial was washed clean.

Moreover, the Black Reapers would surely show even more interesting reactions when they wake up.

I left the fun for later and started to look inside the ruins. The harsh sound of the wind constantly rang in my ears, making it hard to hear anything else. The darkness was also challenging, as it was a level of darkness that would make ordinary people have a hard time distinguishing between heaven and earth.

Even though it was an environment where it would be difficult for a human to move around properly, it was not a big problem for me, who had light shining from my eyes. The ruins were quite large, but they were completely weathered and collapsed, so there were almost no structures left.

I don’t know much about architecture, but considering the scale, wasn’t it a huge building like a royal palace?

There was only one place in the weathered ruins that had maintained its shape. It was the throne. Even though it had already weathered and eroded, and all of its splendor had disappeared, the shape of the huge chair was still there.

The floor had yellowed, cracked, and crumbled, and they looked like they would turn to sand at any moment, but it was the only solid stone in the ruins full of sand.

And as if decorating the space, there were huge pillars around the path leading to the throne.

The place felt like a king’s audience chamber.

On the throne, a skeleton wearing completely tattered clothes was fixed with large rock nails into it. Each and every bone joint was nailed to the throne so tightly that it would be hard to move.

Even though I wasn’t the one being nailed, it was such a horrible sight that I couldn’t help but frown.

And on top of the skeleton’s hand was a ring of light that was emitting white light. This skeleton looked like the old man who had created the labyrinth and trials using the ring of light.

I don’t know exactly why he did that, but he must have his own reason. It must have been something necessary enough to nail himself to the throne..

Well, I wished that I had achieved what I wanted by passing the trials.