Benny, Gustav, and Meredith now headed toward the place Benny had mentioned before. The place where the distorted magical space connected to the sub-space where the monsters lived. But first, they made sure not to make any noise and waited for the mutated rats to return home after their outings in the labyrinth. Benny took them to that high ground he'd mentioned before, where he'd jumped on the rat's back.
So far, Benny's story has been consistent. This high place indeed existed. Now they just waited. After about twenty minutes had passed, the rats returned, and indeed, as their eyes confirmed, the mutated rats vanished into thin air. As if they jumped into the air and were gone. They made sure to watch the back of the space, and no, the rats didn't pass through. They were gone. Poof! Like a magician's trick.
"So I wasn't hallucinating or delusional at that time," Benny smiled. His grin was wide, and almost the chuckle of an insane man escaped him.
"So it is indeed true. I believe you now, Benny, more than ever. It may have just driven me crazy if it wasn't true. I guess the question now is, could we also enter that space? And would that voice that spoke to you appear once more?"
Benny looked at the two of them. "Well, there's only one way to find out, right?"
They all went down, but first the two new people with him went a little closer. They inspected the distortion. It was indeed not visible to the naked eye, and with the darkness around them, it really wasn't visible.
They also went around it and saw that there was indeed nothing at the back but a wall of earth and rocks.
Then Gustav and Meredith placed their own hands on the distortion at the same time. They closed their eyes and waited for several seconds to pass. But there was no voice. It seemed that Benny was right. There must be a condition for them to be able to enter. So it meant just knowing that there was this distortion wouldn't count for anything, even if you saw the monsters enter it. Taking into account what Benny had told them before, should they also do what he did and jump on the back of a mutated rat so they could enter?
"Benny, it seems that the voice you told us about didn't speak to us. I guess we really need to jump on the rats' backs, right?"
Benny gave it thought. "I guess you should? I don't know, man. But let me try it again. Let's see if that voice is still here and that option to travel to the sub-space."
Benny gulped, sweat visible on him, though they only had his two light crystals for now. They wanted to remain hidden, and torches seemed to attract the monsters. They didn't camouflage them like the light crystals.
Later, they too would be getting their own light crystals to use as light.
Benny placed his hands on the distortion. Then the words came and assaulted his mind, and a holographic screen appeared in front of him. Benny screamed as if shocked, though it was his second time experiencing it.
[Would you like to enter the sub-space Rat Kingdom?
Yes/No]
What was different right now was that it had this floating hologram in front of him. The voice was still mechanical and cold, but now it was showing something in front of him. The words he could read, the choices were still the same.
"Do you see it? Do you see what I see? Did you also hear that... that voice?" Benny said as he shook the other two.
They looked at each other, then at Benny, who was pointing at something in front of him. But sadly, they couldn't see it. Only he could. So maybe it was only after you had entered the place that you could do so?
They shook their heads, and Benny had just lost it. He groaned in disappointment, then mumbled, "I guess I'm really losing it up here."
But the other two didn't agree with his statement. They'd seen the rats go into the magical distorted wall or space and vanish. So either they were also losing it with the same delirium as him, or this was all true.
"I guess we should return for now. At least we now know that what you said was true. Next time, let's actually do what you did. Maybe we could also enter that space if that was indeed the condition."
Benny slowly raised his head to look at them. His eyes were tired, and so was he, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically.
"Okay, let's head back for now. I need to clear my head. And we also need some sort of plan. We can't just enter that place without anything specific, like what should we do when we get there and such," Benny said.
"Yes, let's discuss this more later, and let's save our findings from the others until it gets more concrete," Gustav said.
They now moved back toward the first floor sanctuary.
The walk back was filled with a different kind of tension than before. Now they all knew Benny wasn't delusional, but that somehow made things more complicated rather than simpler. If there really were entire civilizations hidden behind these dimensional barriers, what did that mean for their survival? For their plans to escape?
"You know," Meredith said quietly as they navigated the familiar corridors, "seeing those rats disappear like that... it's almost scarier than thinking you were crazy, Benny."
Gustav nodded grimly. "Because if there are organized societies down here, with their own territories and purposes, then we're not just trapped in a monster-filled maze. We're potentially in the middle of someone else's world, and we don't understand the rules."
Benny remained silent, but his mind was racing. The holographic interface, the mechanical voice, the structured choice system. It all felt too organized, too purposeful to be natural. Someone or something had designed this labyrinth with specific intentions, and they were just beginning to scratch the surface of what those might be.
As they approached the sanctuary, they could hear the quiet murmur of voices from the other survivors. People who still thought their biggest problem was being trapped with monsters, not knowing they might actually be refugees in someone else's domain.
"When we tell them," Gustav said softly, "and we will have to eventually, it's going to change everything. Their whole understanding of what this place is, what we're dealing with."
"Maybe that's not a bad thing," Benny replied. "Maybe it's time they knew the truth about what we're really up against."
But as they entered the sanctuary and saw the faces of people still struggling to accept their current reality, he wondered if they were ready for a truth that was so much larger and stranger than anything they'd imagined.