Leaving the circular hall where the well of the Underworld was, Konrad walked through the main tunnel of the ancient mine.
The tunnel leading out of the mine was wide and spacious. Despite the ruthless flow of time, it had remained in perfect condition — just like the ancient wall that surrounded the Dark City. The floor was inclined and led down, deep into the belly of the mountain.
On the tunnel walls were depicted many ancient murals. This murals were about the destroyed civilization of the Forgotten Shore. He looked at them with detached amusement.
Some time later, Konrad reached the mouth of the tunnel and saw the swirling white mist at entrance. He sat down waited for for hours.
Eventually the white fog of forgetfulness receded from the valley, back to the hollow mountains. Konrad walked out of the tunnel and looked around. At the bottom of the quarry, there was a giant Nightmare Creature.
The abomination was enormous, easily twice the size of the Carapace Demon… who had already been as tall as a house. It looked like a strange insect, somewhat resembling a weird mix of a rhinoceros beetle and a praying mantis, with a smooth carapace, massive horn, and deadly blades attached to the joints of its limbs.
The whole creature seemed to be made out of stone and was the same color as the floor of the quarry.
…That flesh, however, was broken and shattered, lying in piles on the ground.
The giant stone demon was dead.
Soon, Konrad was out of the stone quarry. He started climbing down to the foothills of the hollow mountains. The path became less rocky and he even started to see green grass. He could even the see the dreadful crimson labyrinth in the horizon the and sun was also setting.
To be honest, it was a very beautiful view. Konrad felt novel seeing this fantasy like scene.
"Sometimes, I truly forget this is a fantasy world. Even this doomed world can have some breathtaking moment." Konrad muttered.
...
Konrad reached the foothill of the Hollow Mountain and edge of the Forgotten Shore.
"Ah! Forgotten Shore! I am here!"
By that time the sun has set and the tides of the dark sea had drowned the crimson labyrinth.
Konrad made his camp a distance away from the edge of the foothill. Now his wait begins. He is going to wait for the headless statue of the builder. No way in hell, he is going to alone walk all the two thousand kilometers of monster infested crimson labyrinth to the Dark City. He wouldn't make it...
....
A month later, Konrad boarded the only ship on this cursed sea, the headless statue of the Builder. Through out the last month Konrad had been nightmare creatures near the boundary of the Forgotten Shore. He goes down to the crimson labyrinth at down and spends the day hunting nightmare creatures in the labyrinth. He climbs up to the foothill at dusk and spend the night sleeping and eating.
Somedays, the white fog comes all the way down to the edge. He stays in the Forgotten Shore that day. The health of his soul core has also recovered.
[Soul Fragments:(624/1000)]
....
Konrad stood on the back of the headless statue as it lumbered forward, its massive stone feet crushing the salt-burned soil beneath. Behind him, the Hollow Mountains sank into the distance, swallowed by mists too thick and alive to be mere weather.
Ahead lay the Forgotten Shore's crimson labyrinth, a cursed stretch of wasteland stretching farther than any map dared mark. No birds flew here. No wind howled. For now at least. Just silence, and the rhythmic stomp of the Builder's ancient feet echoing like war drums in a dead land.
The statue walked a path only it remembered. Carved of marble and granite, mottled with age, the headless Builder bore Konrad like a pilgrim-borne god. It crossed valleys choked with bones, passed over bridges made from the ribs of titanic sea beasts, and waded through shallows where the water didn't reflect the sky. Konrad stood still, his [Red Mane] snapping behind him, blades strapped to his armor and blood still fresh on the hilt. He had survived the Hollow Mountains, but survival was a curse in this place. It meant more to endure.
The first horror revealed itself in the first night on top of the headless statue.
The sea turned red. Not blood—not truly—but thick, scabbed brine, congealing in long swells. Dead trees drifted there, nailed together by barnacles and ghost hands. From the water rose a creature with no eyes and too many teeth, slithering up the Builder's leg like a leech with ambition. Konrad didn't speak. He silently changed his [Blue Mercury] to a zweihander. He dropped onto the thing's back, drove his zweihander down its spine, and held on as it bucked and screamed in tongues that no sane man remembered. It bit at him with sideways mouths, but he was quick and colder than fear. In the end, it fell back into the sea, dragging pieces of itself with it.
He didn't ask what it was. The spell also didn't announced a kill.
**
By the time the Builder reached the deep into the Crimson Labyrinth, Konrad hadn't slept in two days. He felt like he would fall asleep anytime. Seeing there was still a few hours of daytime left, he closed his eyes.
...
Konrad climbed down from the statue, boots landing in wet ash. The labyrinth rose before him, jagged crimson spires forming a maze that shimmered like glass when touched by moonlight. He heard voices in there—mocking, coaxing, screaming.
They weren't his.
He stepped inside anyway.
The air changed. He no longer heard the Builder walking. The wind didn't move. The sky was red, as if the sun bled but never fell. The crimson labyrinth pulsed, subtly, as if they breathed. He marked his way with scratches on the floor, but the scratches disappeared when he blinked. Time didn't move correctly here. He started moving around frantically.
He encountered the Carrion Choir on the third turn. Corpses sewn together, draped in veils, humming in harmony. Their heads turned in unison, rotten mouths smiling. Konrad didn't draw his blade. He backed away, slow. They followed but did not touch. They wanted him to listen. That was how they killed: not with claws, but with songs. They screamed behind him, the song breaking like glass inside his skull despite the protection of his armor.
He escaped them—but not the next thing.
Further in the maze, he found a knight made of glass. Hollow. Empty. It mirrored him perfectly, mimicked every move. At first he thought it was just a reflection, until it moved when he didn't. When it lunged.
Their blades clashed. His sword cracked its shoulder. Its blade pierced his side. He bled. It didn't. They fought for an hour or a second—it didn't matter. In the end, he let it stab him, let the sword slide deep into his ribs, and used the moment to drive his own blade through its core. The mirror shattered.
He screamed as a thousand memories not his own flooded his mind: lives it had stolen, faces it had worn.
He lay in the dust for a while, his eyes empty, distant...
"Found you!"
Suddenly, he grabbed something unseen and drove his [Stygian Talons] through them and activating his [Thunderheart] to electrocute it.
Something screamed as the world around him shattered.
...
Konrad opened his eyes and heard the spell wishpered,
[You have slain a Fallen Devil, Lost Minstrel.]
He saw he was holding some kind of jellyfish thing that had wrapped itself around him. And it was already night.
***
After a week. Time was loose on the Forgotten Shore. He hid from a swarm of skyfish that shrieked like children and burst into flame when they came close. Lets not mention the normal Awakened beast he had to fend off.
He killed a godlet made of dead childrens, severing its worm-thin limbs as it tried to feed on his guilt. He didn't stop to bury it. Nothing deserved a grave here. It was an Awakened Devil.
Food was scarce. He fed on foods he had rationed in his storage memory and the warmth of fireless nights. He barely slept. When he did, he dreamed of a cavern beneath the sea that whispered his name.
At every night, the Builder enters the Dark Sea.
It wasn't water.
It moved like smoke but dragged like tar. No stars. No sky. Only the Builder and the black. Konrad stood atop its shoulder, watching the sea ripple with shapes too big for thought. He heard singing sometimes. Not sirens—no, sirens were kinder. These voices sang in reversed time, backward lullabies that made his bones itch.
On fourth night, a whale passed beneath them—except it wasn't a whale. It had no mouth. Only eyes. Hundreds of them. All open. All staring.
It didn't attack.
Most horrors didn't. They watched. Waiting. Measuring.
He didn't look back. He saw nothing, he heard nothing. Only his [Clairvoyance] kept him alive.
**
Eventually, the Builder slowed.
In the distance, a white marble arch stood on the shore of something that was not quite land, not quite anything. Konrad's destination was here.
His journey ended. He climbed down slowly, and dismounted, boots scraping against the stone.
The statue did not froze
It carried on it's merry way, continuing it's endless hunt around the forgotten shore.
He touched the cold, stable marble floor beneath his foot, said nothing, and turned toward the disappearing silhouette of headless statue in the distance.
Konrad's wounds burned. His body ached. He laid down on the marble floor to rest. He will move later. Scout the area and collect supplies for the last part of the journey.
The vast expanse of Forgotten Shore wasn mostly behind him.
The dark city was ahead.
And whatever came next… he would face it.
With silence, fear and murder.