Chapter 22: Finally Learning What Needed to be Learned

The one thing that had immediately assaulted me once I made it to the bottom of the stairs was the intense heat. I hadn't grown up in the warmest of climates, but I knew this was probably around forty degrees Celsius. My eyes were struggling to adjust to the insanely bright light that was being forcefully shoved into them.

Once my eyes had finally adjusted, I was amazed. In front of me was a desert covered in white sand. The sky was a light blue color and all I could see was rolling hills covered in sand. I didn't dare to step out of the stairwell, my resources were too low to attempt a walk through a desert where I could feel this amount of heat when I was in the shade.

I have to go back up a floor to find an elevator. I have enough for around six days of rationing. Rationing in a desert is not an option, it will get me killed. I was tempted to leave immediately, but I wanted to see what I could learn if I just stuck around for a single day. I will not leave the stairwell though, as if it disappears and I struggle to find it again, death is certain.

While I watched the sand shift in the wind, I thought of what resources I needed to get through this floor. Obviously, I was going to need some sort of protection from the sun. I had yet to find any sunscreen so I was going to have to wear a layer of clothing to prevent the sun from melting my skin directly.

I was going to need to bring as much water as I possibly could carry. Limit the amount of extras I brought to minimize weight and maximize usefulness. The air was super dry, so any exposed skin I had would crack and burn in probably less than an hour.

My weapon, lots of water and food, a map of The Hub, and three acetaminophen. I would carry only a single backup set of clothes and no extra shoes or boots. The Hub map was important, as without it, I was probably going to get very lost.

I was curious what night was going to do to this desert, if it even had a day and night cycle. There wasn't anything I could see other than hills of sand, not a single plant or animal. I checked my watch and saw that it was approaching late evening, so I just sat in the corner of the stairwell.

There wasn't too much to do while I scouted this floor. I had plenty of time to waste so I started to think of my plans once I got back to The Hub. Find and talk to Kacey, then gather what I need, see if maybe anyone has any sunscreen I can trade for. If not, trade for long sleeved clothing, and if that falls through too, a trip to floor three.

I had a lot of questions to ask Kacey. I wanted to ask about a lot of things, but I'm scared he won't answer. It felt almost rude to ask someone if they had nowhere to return because their world had died, and what a dead world even was.

I was going to ask anyway, as I wanted to know. No, I needed to know. I have made it to floor twenty-two, I deserved to know a little bit about what was happening down here. If I knew that little bit more, I could predict what was coming and save myself.

I had theories, but nothing I could confirm. A topic as sensitive as this couldn't be partially correct. There was a definitive answer, and I was going to figure it out. I wonder if a trip back to floor eighteen would be a good idea. Maybe head to that wooden building at the top of the stairs.

That awful feeling I felt being near 'her' was going to be hard to overcome, but if I could ask 'her' a few questions, it might be worth the side trip. I would probably travel to eighteen through seventeen though, so I didn't have to walk up all those stairs. Dealing with the nightmares floor seventeen had would be good training anyways.

The sun had gone down beneath the horizon after waiting for a while. The day felt like it lasted forever, even though I knew not much time had passed. Without my watch, I would have said this was a longer than normal time for the sun to be out.

The wind was getting colder and colder. Roughly one hour after the sun had set, it was getting too cold for me to stick around without layering up. So I put on every layer of clothing I had, and kept waiting. Roughly three hours after the sun had set, it hit what I felt like was as cold as it was going to get.

I was chilled to the bone. I had started exercising at some point just to try and stay warm. I had also moved a decent amount up the steps to avoid the strong winds howling through the stairwell. The temperature required full winter gear. A rough guess told me that it most likely was around negative forty in the wind.

Forty in the day, negative forty at night. A temperature difference of eighty degrees, what the hell was wrong with this floor. Well, as long as those were the only issues, I could prepare for them. It was time for me to go back and find an elevator.

…

It took forever to find the elevator on floor twenty-one. There was a trick to it, but I would have thought it would have led to the beginning, not an elevator. The trick was to misalign everything as much as possible before moving on.

First stop was going to be the entrance of The Hub. While I was riding up the elevator, I got out my map. Supplies were everywhere in The Hub, so I didn't have to make a stop at my base first to resupply. I would have to go to my base once I wanted to start trading, but that was easy enough.

The doors to the elevator open, and I find myself easily able to locate myself on the map. I was oddly close to the entrance already, no more than a ten minute walk. I wonder if each of these elevator's locations correlated to a different floor, but that would be pointless. It was most likely just random.

I spot the familiar table with the welcome notes on it. I decided to wait for a minute or two and see if there was an ongoing conversation again. I tossed my useless Bestiary on the table. I hadn't bothered to update it with the creatures I had seen, as there really just wasn't a point.

'This is a dangerous place to put an item as valuable as this.' Paper quickly makes its way onto the table along with a pen.

'That's because it's useless anyways. Wrong and incorrect past this floor. This is Logan, do you remember me, Kacey?'

'Of course! I'm terribly sorry that the information we collected from people who claimed to travel down was wrong. Do you have proof you've traveled down past this floor, it's only been a few weeks.'

'The castle halls are filled to the brim with traps and can't be randomized, there is a creature on floor seventeen that will talk with you if you do not attack it after it forces nightmares on you, and something on floor eighteen that was so impossible to describe even now I struggle to find words to explain what I had seen.'

'You… There's so many questions I have to ask you, and I'm sure you have a similar amount. Let's go somewhere a bit more private. I will place a marked map and we can continue our conversation there.'

…

'Logan, have you arrived.'

'Yes.' I place a piece of paper on the table. I was nervous, I was finally going to learn something, it may not be useful to me immediately, but I already knew that this information was going to help me in the distant future.

'Good. To begin, how far down have you traveled?'

'I made it to floor twenty-two, but had to turn back immediately due to lack of preparedness.'

'How much do you want for this information?'

'Nothing, other than you to be completely honest with me from this point. How far down have you gone?'

'I have made it to floor nineteen, and turned around at twenty, as I was too scared of the floor to continue any deeper. How can I trust the legitimacy of your claims though, you could have traded for that information.'

'I know of your dead worlds.'

'How? No one would trade for that information… unless…'

'You're right, the creature on floor seventeen. The one that gives nightmares, around halfway through the floor, if you can hold your anger and fear, it will talk with you for a short time. In that short time it told me that nearly everyone who comes to this place is from dead worlds.'

'I've not heard of anyone trying a pacifist approach to that floor. What made you do it?'

'Curiosity. And the fact that it never actually hurt me. You should know that it told me, whether it is the truth or not I can't say, that it doesn't want to actually do what it is doing. It is being forced to do it by someone or something.'

'Someone.' Kacey sets the note down quickly. The harshness of the writing made me concerned. They knew things that I don't, it is time to fix that.

'Who?'

'You should know. You've probably put it all together, if you've learned all this.'

'What kind of person would do this?'

'You're thinking too narrowly. Do you think any normal person like you or I could make something this elaborate? Even with all of the technology in the known multiverse, this would be a pointless creation.'

'You can't be implying the existence of gods here, that's simply absurd.' I write down, not wanting to believe. I wouldn't call myself an atheist, but I have yet to see compelling proof to counter the point… until now.

'I wouldn't call these things gods. They rule over us like they are, but they have no control over us, nor the omnipotence that a classical god would possess. These are demons. Beings that live to torture and destroy.'

'Demons? They created this place to torture us, for what reason?'

'Created is an interesting term, but it doesn't quite fit. You have all of the pieces now. Just put them together, Logan.'

My head was spinning. There were so many puzzle pieces, and they didn't seem to fit anywhere. I was still missing something. I was missing the connection, the final question which almost happened to be my first.

'What is a dead world?' For a while, there wasn't a reply to my question. The paper had disappeared almost immediately, but it was minutes before I even saw any indication that there was a reply in the works, a pen falling on the table. Finally, after ten minutes, the reply came.

'A dead world can be many things. The most common way to spot them is how they've warped. A dead world will warp into its most primal nature, and as such will kill anyone that managed to survive the event which killed the world.

Let us take this floor as an example. Who knows how this society was before their untimely collapse, but their world warped into what it saw it had become, a center for communication and shopping. Nothing more, nothing less.

Now for the information you were probably asking for; how a world dies.

A world can die one of two ways. Naturally, or on purpose. Natural death includes everything from the inhabitants nuking each other into oblivion to their host star exploding. The other category cannot be caused by natural inhabitants of the world. It is a malicious process that is painful for everyone and everything involved.

This is a process that seems to be started by demons, and their hatred for the living. They will forcefully warp the word to their own twisted ideas. While that rarely lasts, if a demon is persistent, it can control said world for as long as it wishes.

Before you even ask, no one has any idea how it is done.'

A harrowing final piece to learn, but it didn't quite feel like everything was here. I don't think Kacey was lying, or misleading me. They had no reason too at this point, and it matched almost every piece of information I've collected on my own.

Demons.

Not only are they real, they are hellbent on complete and total destruction. Then the entity that controls all these floors is a demon. A demon powerful enough to converge already dead worlds into a horrific twisted hellscape that it forces creatures to live in.

It all started to finally click together, the pieces started to fit. The Rotting Angels were just husks of their former selves. Everything used to belong to its own world, and was maybe less violent before being corrupted or killed. The warping effect caused by death.

My head was in my hands as I sorted through all of my thoughts. The creature on floor seventeen was clearly not an inhabitant of that world, it was forced there by someone, a demon. What world did it belong to, and why was it suddenly on floor seventeen.

Floor eighteen, 'her'. 'She' probably wasn't an inhabitant of any world. The sense of wrongness that I had felt only a handful of times. When I fell into the first floor, when the creature on floor fourteen appeared, and 'her' on floor eighteen. There was a connection between them.

'Her'. 'She'... was a demon.

I had met a demon and lived to tell the tale. An encounter that shouldn't have been. Unless she was the one who controlled everything, 'she' was the force behind it all. I had to go back and try to talk to 'her'. 'She' might be what brought me to this place, and very well might be my ticket out.

'Kacey, are you still there?'

'Yes.' A reply comes immediately.

'I'm going back to floor eighteen to meet with what I now suspect might be a demon.'

'That is perhaps the stupidest thing I have ever heard. For me, floor eighteen was a wasteland with worn down wooden gates covering the path. What did you see there that has you wanting to go back?'

'The floor I saw was vibrant red gates with a wooden building at the top of the stairs. Inside was what is most likely a demon. On my way down, 'she' asked me a question of what it looked like to me. There were trees and oddly proportioned animals that watched me with nothing but curiosity in their eyes, almost fear.'

'You are perhaps the stupidest person I have ever met. Logan, demons may not be gods, but to normal people like you and me, they may as well be. You said it was so impossible to describe, I thought you were talking about the landscapes of absolute desolation.'

'I have to know, Kacey. I have to.'

'I won't try and stop you, but I just want to know one last thing. What drives you to know about something you can't control, do you not fear the answer you seek will be unsatisfying?'

'I don't care at this point. I'm going to learn who is keeping me here, and why. Then leave. My world is alive still, and I want to return to it.'

'Then I wish you luck in your travels, Logan. You'll get more use out of this than I ever will.' with this note came a small glass bead. There was a wonderfully crafted world of color inside of the clear glass bead. I noticed another note fall onto the table after inspecting the bead for a while.

'Where I came from, this bead was said to grant luck and good fortune. Please make sure to get some use out of it. I'm much too old to try and push deeper into this place.'

'Thank you, Kacey, I mean it. I'll come see you again, I don't know how long this trip will be, but before I leave, I'll come visit again.'

There was no reply, just a silent understanding. There was nothing rude about them not replying, we walked different paths, and mine now led back to floor eighteen to try and figure out this mess.

I gathered the supplies I would need for at least a week and made my way towards the nearest elevator. I would prepare myself for floor twenty-two when I got back, for now, it was time to visit 'her' again. To say I was scared would be an understatement. If I knew 'she' was a demon, I really should just go on with my life, but I couldn't resist. Not when such important information is on the line.

…

I ended up going to floor seventeen, and meeting the fox masked creature again. I never found another break room where the creature stopped to talk to me, but it did give me the strangest look when it saw me again. It recognized me, and was confused why I came back. I waved at it, but my destination lay one floor further.

…

I exited the stairwell while my nerves were at their peak. I figured that my anxiety would probably be stronger than my fear of whoever this was, so I didn't even try to calm my racing mind. There was no point if another emotion was just going to cloud it anyways.

The floor itself looked almost identical to when I had left it previously. The trees were the same, as well as the vista peeking through the trees. I was a bit worried that I would see the desolate wasteland that Kacey saw, but it seemed everything was in order.

I turned around and saw the wooden building, immediately feeling that sense of wrongness that I was hoping wasn't a bad thing. I walked towards the building this time, and the curtain on the front of it only showed me the silhouette. Despite that, I swear I could see 'her' smile.

As I stepped onto the raised platform of the wooden building, 'she' spoke.

"You came back." There was a hint of playfulness, yet also curiosity in 'her' voice.

"I did. I know you said I will never see you again…" I started to choke on my words as I tried to step through the curtain, the feeling of wrongness had turned into pain. I ignored it. The pain was intense, but I needed to know.

"That you spoke at all was impressive. Logan, what is it you seek to know from me?" 'She' asked me as I forced my way through the thin curtain that felt heavier than metal.

"Are… you a demon?" I choke out painfully.

"You don't need to force yourself to speak, Logan. I can read the thoughts in your mind. Let's ask another question to answer yours, do I look like one?" 'She' asked, and 'she' looked the same as when I last managed to see 'her'.

"You… look." I take heavy breaths and manage to straighten my posture. "Near human, but the feeling of wrongness I get from looking at you is causing me pain. The same as before."

"Some cultures call me a demon, but I prefer the title of 'God'. Your thoughts show a recent conversation with a being also trapped in this place. Someone more trapped than you I suppose. Instead of just answering your next question. I suppose I shall let you ask."

"Do you control the floors? Why bring me here?"

"I dare not even jest at my control here. No, I may have the power to end worlds, but leaving this place is impossible for me. I am also trapped."

"Wait… you're trapped here too? Then what is controlling this place?" I ask, the pure shock from the revelation caused me to completely forget the pain I was feeling from being near 'her'.

"I dare not say." 'She' replies quickly, a hint of fear and hesitance in 'her' voice. "You will encounter it eventually, if you are strong enough to talk to me here. I lied in our first meeting, saying we will never meet again."

"Clearly, I am here now."

"Not the point. We would have met again even if you hadn't come back to this floor. Had you been any unluckier, I would already be gone, you'd have never seen me, and never gotten your closure."

"So, what floor will I see you on again then? Since this is clearly what you want to say."

"The ruler of this place has placed many restrictions on me, but with my power I am given a certain amount of leeway within those rules. I was told to never say what floor I came from if I wanted to roam wherever I pleased."

"Honestly, it seems fair considering some of the things I have seen in this place."

"I am the boss of floor thirty-four."

My jaw nearly hits the floor as my mind halts. T-t-t-t-thirty-four!? Boss!? What?

"What?"

"While it seems shocking, I want you to know I just lost my freedom for who knows how long by telling you this. As soon as the ruler of this place finds out, I'll be trapped on my proper floor."

"Why me? What do you have to gain?"

"Logan, you're thinking too small a scale. I'm immortal, I cannot die no matter how long I exist. You're interesting to me, a plaything if you will. You will die, the odds of you making it to my floor and still being sane are slim to none. Yet, if you somehow manage it, you will have entertained me for a short time. This is meaningless to me.

In fact, I have done this before, long before you can even begin to comprehend, and I have been allowed to roam once more. I will be punished, but only temporarily. I am truly immortal. No matter how powerful the ruler of this place is, I cannot die. That is true immortality.

You are insignificant. I gain entertainment, and you gain the knowledge of your imminent doom. No matter how you fight against fate, this place is designed specifically to break you. I tell you this, not so you can prepare yourself or despair, but so you understand the brevity of the situation you've found yourself in.

You gain the knowledge that you're fighting a losing battle, and I gain a plaything for a few months or years of your time. That is what is happening."

"I see."

I didn't know what to think, honestly. How deep did this place go, that something like 'her' was the boss of floor thirty-four. 'She' can't, and won't help me escape this place, and has even tried to mess with my mental state by telling me how insignificant I was.

Well, dumb bitch, I know I'm insignificant. You're immortal and last forever, my life is a short speed bump in your life. Just know I'm going to be the least cooperative and nastiest speed bump you'll ever have the displeasure of hitting.

I could see shock on her face. Her dumb face was filled with rage and shock, but she couldn't harm me. Not here, and by the time I get to her floor, not ever. I turned and left. There was nothing more I needed to know, and anything else I could piece together with what I had.

I wasn't going to give her the reaction she wanted. I will leave this floor, return to The Hub, get ready for floor twenty-two, and make my first attempt at it. I got the answers I wanted. They didn't make me any happier, but it cleared things up.

…

I didn't go back to Kacey. They didn't need to know, not yet. So here I was, sitting in front of the desert, ready to finally start my proper adventure. I took a long rest after leaving floor eighteen. There had been a lot on my mind, but after giving it time, everything kind of just sorted itself out.

I just focused on what was in front of me, and that was an insanely hot desert. I had caught the early morning sun by the time I made it all the way down the stairs with my heavy gear. I was ready to survive for two weeks in high heat and insane cold. I had winter gear in my second bag.

That's right, I am carrying two bags. I have a second, slightly smaller bag carrying lighter things like jackets and winter rated gear. I had a small tent to help break the wind at night, and some guy actually had some half decent sunscreen he was willing to trade when I told him about some of the floors past The Hub.

Ready as I could be, I stepped into the sand with my boots. I barely sunk in, the sand was hard and packed down. The sand I saw blowing in the wind was only the top layer, but that was fine, that just meant I would waste less energy.

The hot and dry air was killer. Cold water was only an option for around two hours, before everything in my bag had heated up with the hot sun beating down on it. I was wearing a black long sleeve shirt that was supposedly UV resistant according to its label, but I didn't trust this stuff even when it wasn't my life on the line.

Day one was coming to a close as the sun began to set below the sandy horizon. I waited until the sky had gone completely dark. I set up an LED lantern I had traded for and began to set up my tent for the night when I saw something reflected the strong light of my lantern.

Eight big eyes were staring straight at me in the distance, the light easily reflecting off them. I didn't want to make fires because I was scared of it attracting things that might lurk on this floor, but it seems my bright light had the same effect. I was going to need to set up during the day from now on, if I didn't find the exit before next sundown anyways.

I entered my tent, held perfectly still and turned off every single source of light. I was hoping that would be enough, but just in case, my ax stayed beside me at all times in case I needed to fight anything.

I could hear it as it searched for me. It had eight legs and was bigger than a big car, as descriptive as that is. A giant spider if I had ever heard one. I wasn't interested in moving to look at it, in case it could somehow sense my movement. In fact, I even stopped breathing while it passed by.

Two minutes later, I felt it was safe to breathe again. It was probably safe to breathe while it was passing me, but I wasn't going to test that when it was so close already. I decided to try and get a little bit of rest seeing as turning off my lights made it miss my position by a few meters, odds were low another creature would pass by me through sheer luck.

Waking up once the sun had risen really made me appreciate campers a lot more. The warm sunlight with the cold morning air was harsh. The temperature difference from night to day was astounding, and painful. What it did to the air pressure made my head pulsate with pain.

How an ecosystem like this can survive is a miracle. My best guess is that the spiders burrow under the ground during the day and come out at night to look for food, or just wander. Giant spider things I will never understand.

Well, I guess this ecosystem doesn't have to survive. I laughed a little thinking how this world warped itself into a massive desert with giant spiders. Imagine your world being known for the largest spiders anyone had ever seen. It was really funny to me.

This floor was a lot of just the same.

Walk a lot during the day while staying hydrated. Try not to get eaten by giant spiders or freeze to death at night. Kind of challenging, but not too bad with how much I prepared for the floor. I wasn't going to stick around though. I could just drop all my gear and trade for it again on another floor if I didn't need it immediately.

Eventually, I came across a small stone structure. It didn't quite fit here, as the stone of the building was yellow while the sand and, as I had found out earlier, the stone beneath were white, so what this building is made of, I had no clue.

What I did see was a green exit sign. The door was what appeared to be a bedroom door from a very old house. I was a bit curious about what the next floor was going to be, but nothing could stop me now. My descent was inevitable, they better watch out.