"Ahgghh, that damn feeling of being sucked into a place." He still couldn't wrap his head around it. It was too complex, too inhuman. This must be crafted by powers of unknown gods, perhaps? Or was it that the ancient civilization that lived here before was more advanced than they were? Never mind that. He had to follow those rats for now.
So he went to the place where the rats probably would be. Indeed, there were about twenty or so, and their numbers seemed to have increased even further. Just what were they gathering here in the labyrinth? Well, it was indeed pretty hard to see once inside the labyrinth.
A dark, pitch-black, gloomy place that reeked of death.
After several hours, the rats began to move. "Oh, are they returning home now?" So he began trailing them toward the dimensional rift.
But this time around, the rats were using their speed as if they were being chased by something. There was something new, something out of order. They didn't behave like this before. But before he could even position himself on top of the huge boulder where he'd hidden previously, the last ones had already gone inside.
"Fuck, damn it," he could only curse. So he went down toward the entrance and put his hand on the invisible wall to see if he could truly no longer enter, at least for now when the rats weren't there.
As soon as he placed his hand on the invisible wall, a voice, mechanical as it seemed, echoed in his own mind.
[Would you like to enter the sub-space Rat Kingdom?
Yes/No]
It was a shocking assault on his consciousness, a shocking thing that spoke to him. He darted his eyes all over the labyrinth, but there was no one there. He even passed through the invisible wall and arrived at the back of the dimensional rift.
He must be losing his mind, right? With all of this that had happened.
"Maybe I should rest for now. I must be tired. Well, it's time I head back to the sanctuary for now." And so he returned, ate a meal, and slept. It felt like he was in a dream that somehow turned out to be reality.
After several hours of sleep, he finally woke up, refreshed and fully revitalized. Now what should he do today? Since he couldn't return without the rats, or could he? "Fuck, I don't know. I'll have to sort my mind out first." Clearly, even if he wanted to, he couldn't take care of every single rat in that nest or colony of theirs. If that was a city, then they surely had soldiers guarding it too, right?
He wasn't strong enough yet to attack that place on his own.
So he'd have to bide his time and grow. "I guess I'll have to return to the second floor for now and find the monsters' lair there. Let's see if there are indeed other magical bullshit like this one there too."
This time he brought his bag, taking out most of the clothing and other things he had inside. He was going to fill it with monster materials that he could bring up to this floor later.
As he began his journey down, the eerie quiet of the labyrinth was something that would sometimes get his cowardly nature to spring into action. His hair would stand up, and he would freeze, hyperventilating. He closed his eyes and sang himself a random tune, just to get his head out of the darkness of his thoughts.
It was a random occurrence but not entirely new to him. Ever since he'd been stuck down here, this had been a continuous yet unpredictable experience.
After calming himself down, he managed to take a step forward once more. He let out a big sigh of relief and shook his head.
"Come on, Benny, you can do this!"
A little later, he managed to arrive at the bridge between this floor and the second floor. He descended once more to the second floor of the labyrinth.
The mechanical voice had shaken him more than he wanted to admit. It wasn't just the strangeness of hearing something speak directly into his mind. It was the implications. Whatever force controlled this labyrinth was aware of him, was tracking his movements, maybe even his intentions.
And it was offering him choices.
The "Yes/No" prompt felt like something from the stories about ancient magical artifacts, the kind that granted wishes but always came with a price. Did he want to enter the rat kingdom? Part of him was curious as hell, but a bigger part of him knew he wasn't ready for whatever that choice might lead to.
His singing helped calm his nerves as he made his way down the spiraling stairs. It was an old tavern song he'd heard back in Tiamerith, something about a sailor who'd lost his way home. The irony wasn't lost on him.
The second floor felt different now that he knew what secrets the first floor held. If the rats had their own hidden civilization, what might the scorpions and rabbits be hiding? Were there more sub-spaces, more hidden kingdoms tucked away behind invisible barriers?
The thought was both terrifying and exciting. He was potentially the first human to discover these pocket dimensions, to learn that the monsters weren't just monsters but entire civilizations with their own societies and purposes.
But discovery and survival weren't the same thing. And right now, survival still came first.
Even if that mechanical voice kept echoing in the back of his mind, waiting for an answer he wasn't ready to give.