According to Mesopotamian myth, when the Lady of Heaven, Ishtar, forced her way into the underworld, the first gate stripped her of the crown that symbolized her authority and pride.
But when it came to Shane, it turned into the direct suppression of the Heroic Spirit power he had obtained through the Class Card.
"So because I don't actually hold any real authority in the living world, and the awe others feel toward me all comes from my strength, the judgment changed in this way?" Shane staggered in the darkness, silently making the guess to himself.
But before he could fully sort out the logic behind it, that irresistible pull seized him again and dragged him forward.
The second gate had already opened soundlessly in the dark.
"Remove the beads from her neck."
That emotionless declaration rang out once more.
Shane felt a sudden heaviness in his chest. The magic that had been boiling inside him like hot water was drained away in an instant, falling into total stillness.
Then came the third gate.
"Take the measuring cord from her hand."
This time, what he lost was the vitality of the flesh itself.
The warmth of the living began pouring out of him at a terrifying speed, while the underworld's bitter cold—cold enough to freeze the soul—invaded his limbs and bones without restraint.
Shane's lips immediately turned blue-purple, and every breath he exhaled became white frost.
The fourth gate. The fifth. The sixth…
"Unfasten the breastplate from her body!"
"Remove the gold rings from her wrists!"
"Take the clasps from her feet!"
Each time he passed through another gate, that hollow voice of judgment sounded right on cue.
Shane could feel it clearly: the stamina he relied on, his five senses, even the very weight that marked him as one of the living, were being mercilessly stripped away layer by layer between those gates.
And when, dragging legs that were nearly numb, he finally reached the last one—
"Remove the pala from her body."
With that came the judgment that, in legend, had stripped Ishtar of her final shred of dignity.
The clothing on Shane's body instantly came apart and disintegrated like burned ash, scattering into nothing.
Now, in the naked state of a mortal newly born into the world, he stumbled across the final boundary between life and death.
"I'm a grown man. What breastplate and jewelry was I even supposed to have…" Shane muttered inwardly, half helplessly.
And what surprised him even more was this—
In the legends, the gates of the underworld were a place of judgment, where the soul's good and evil were questioned. They were said to be absolutely fair and rational, and anyone passing through had to answer the gatekeeper's interrogation.
But all the way here, other than being mercilessly stripped piece by piece, he hadn't even gone through a single round of questioning.
For Shane, who had steeled himself for all of that, it was honestly a little disappointing.
Unable to make sense of the underworld queen's thinking, he could only endure the bone-deep cold and continue forward with his bare body exposed to the chill.
He had not gone much farther when the scenery around him finally began to change.
Standing at the edge of the elevated passage, Shane looked down.
"That should be the temple where she resides… right?"
But contrary to what he expected, beyond the seven gates there was no magnificent subterranean palace, no gloomy yet still splendid divine hall.
What spread out before him was a barren wasteland of absolute silence.
In that vast emptiness, only two enormous, rough black pillars stood alone at the center, like the last bones holding up the dark vault of heaven.
"It really does suit her…"
Shane had already lost count of how many times he had murmured something like that.
Everything here matched the underworld perfectly—a realm of absolute death and desolation, with nothing remotely beautiful or alive anywhere within it.
So then, where was the queen who governed growth and decay, who commanded serpents and dragons, who ruled over the galla spirits?
Just as that question rose in Shane's mind—
A frigid current a hundred times colder than the chill between the gates suddenly poured in from every direction like something physical.
Without magic to protect him, and with a body now weaker than that of an ordinary person, more than half of Shane's body was instantly seized by a layer of pale frost. Even his teeth began chattering uncontrollably.
And together with that extreme cold, the two great pillars in the middle of the wasteland suddenly lit up with ghostly blue light.
It was the pure color of souls.
Then countless tiny blue lights, as though called by something, began gathering from all directions between the two pillars.
They compressed and condensed in midair, forming a dark red sphere as thick and heavy as blood.
Then, amid a scalp-prickling sound of grinding bone, an enormous pale, bloodshot skeleton slowly cracked its way out of that sphere.
"O living one who has crossed the boundary of life and death…"
The skeleton, draped in tattered white gauze, did not open its mouth, yet an ethereal and indifferent chant resounded directly inside Shane's mind:
"You not only called my true name, you even dared to step into this land of no return wearing that utterly fearless composure."
"Are you not afraid of annihilation?"
The "annihilation" she spoke of was obviously not simple bodily death, but the soul falling forever into the deepest reaches of the underworld, imprisoned by her for all eternity, beyond even reincarnation.
Faced with that dreadful gaze, cold enough to freeze the soul itself, Shane did not collapse under the pressure.
He raised his head slightly and met that divine presence head-on.
For some reason, he felt that this Ereshkigal before him was a little different from the mistress of the underworld he had imagined.
She was majestic, overwhelming, and instinctively terrifying—worthy of awe—but somehow… she lacked the softness he had associated with a goddess.
"Well, she is a god who governs death. Maybe she has no need to rely on outward beauty to sustain her presence," Shane thought to himself.
Even so, standing naked before a goddess was still undeniably awkward.
His first instinct was to cover himself, but the thought immediately felt ridiculous. Before a goddess who ruled over death and decay, that would be as pointless as covering one's ears while stealing a bell.
Since her laws had already stripped him back to this original state, she obviously would not judge it by human ideas of shame or desecration.
Shane let out an awkward little laugh.
Then, enduring the frost clinging to his body and the bitter cold, he slowly stepped forward, bowed slightly, and offered a flawless, elegant formal salute.
"Annihilation is indeed something to be revered."
Staring into the darkness ahead, Shane's voice was weak, yet unwaveringly firm.
"But the wish in my heart is one I had to bring before you, no matter the cost."
Then he slowly lifted his head, a trace of apology in his eyes.
"Still… I owe you my deepest apology, my lady."
"The offerings you had hoped for—the vivid bougainvillea and carnations blooming in the living world…"
Shane let out a quiet sigh.
"They were destroyed on the way here, caught in the aftermath of battle."