Mystery: When the Fool Meets the Masked Fool

Chapter 576 The Self-Destroyer

As Klein continued to traverse the distance, he finally saw the bottom of the pit.

It was a huge, dark palace that blocked the way down.

The palace was supported by massive pillars, inlaid with all sorts of bones and different parts of corpses, and in some places even covered with bloody skin belonging to different races.

"Ah, we've arrived at the royal city's sewers." Klein produced a lantern in his hand. "I hope we don't encounter any incarnations of Hidetaka Miyazaki."

"If we were to run into a whole bunch of Miyazaki Hidetakas here, that would definitely be a bit troublesome."

Klein recalled his past experiences playing Elden Ring.

"Huh? That's strange. I can't remember seeing anything while playing games before." Klein shook his head. "Looks like it triggered my brain's automatic protection mechanism."

He had no intention of digging out the memories from the depths of his brain to examine them, and strode forward.

We entered the palace through the open gates.

On both sides of the hall were coffins of different shapes and colors, placed there quietly, as if even their existence had been weathered away by death.

As Klein entered, some sounds suddenly emanated from inside these coffins, as if rusty joints were opening one by one.

Klein raised his eyes, which had been slightly lowered, and swept them over, causing all the coffins to fall silent instantly.

Ignoring these things, Klein stepped into the depths of the hall, where there was a downward gray-white stone staircase, and a huge stone tablet stood at the entrance.

At the top of the stone tablet stands a slender bird statue, seemingly made of bronze, with various pale symbols on its wings.

Beneath the bird-shaped bronze statue, on the surface of the stone tablet, characters originating from the "words of the dead" resemble simplified birds of different shapes or snakes coiled in various forms, forming two ambiguous phrases:
"Even the gods cannot escape it."

"Even in death, they will be imprisoned."

This time, Klein stopped and stood in front of those two sentences for a long time.

His intuition told him that the River of Eternal Darkness lay below.

Yet a strange intuition reminded him that there seemed to be something even more troublesome than the River of Eternal Darkness within this place.

"Looks like we've arrived at the boss's room."

Klein subconsciously reached into the mists of history, trying to pull out the "Aha" he had seen in the simulated universe.

Unfortunately it failed.

After hesitating for a moment, Klein started walking again, bypassing the stone tablet topped with a bronze statue, and descending the gray steps one by one.

After descending for an unknown period of time, the aura of the "Source Castle" around him reflexively expanded, becoming extremely dense, resembling a grayish-white silkworm cocoon.

At the same time, Klein tilted his head slightly and heard a faint, ethereal rustling sound.

This seems to indicate that deep underground, not far from our current location, there is an underground river flowing slowly.

The further they went, the stronger the feeling of death looming over them became, causing Klein's pupils to shrink.

Klein looked down at his feet.

There, a dark, unreal stream of water suddenly appeared.

Its surface is so dense that even light cannot exist.

Klein tried to teleport there directly, but found the space itself to be completely silent.

With no other option, Klein had to fly there.

A pair of wings appeared on Klein's back, flapped twice, and he took off.

These are not ordinary wings; they are mechanical wings created by Klein based on the wings of the Doomsday Beast. Ahead, beyond the horizon, lies nothingness, within which flows a straight, wide, illusory, colorless, and dark river.

The river was so blurry and difficult to see because it was shrouded in a thin, grayish-white mist, like a barrier.

It flapped its wings and descended to a distance close to the river.

Klein placed his palms together in front of his chest.

The doors took shape in Klein's hands, one ring inside another, one layer inside another.

Klein plans to use part of the Gate's authority to create a sealing device to carry away the waters of the River of Eternal Darkness.

But at that moment, Klein had a sudden thought, frowned, and straightened up a little.

He inexplicably felt the threat of death.

But Klein couldn't pinpoint where the threat came from.

I can't quite explain it, but I just feel a sense of danger.

Sensing danger, Klein began to hover above the river.

But the water below remained calm and still.

Soon, Klein found the source of the threat.

It was a tributary, where huge, pale stone pillars stood, as if supporting something and preventing it from collapsing.

At this moment, among these stone pillars and along the edge of the tributary, countless slightly blurry, translucent figures moved back and forth, lingering slowly but tirelessly. Sometimes they ventured into the depths of the tributary, sometimes they turned back, but they could never escape the river's bewildering presence.

One area is particularly special.

A human figure sits in its center, almost as large as the surrounding stone pillars.

It was draped in a dark robe, and its profile showed signs of age.

Its face had obvious features of the Southern Continent, but it had rotted away, leaving behind patches of decay and growing feathers stained with colorless ash.

Klein knew him; he was Mr. Azik's father, the "Grim Reaper" and "Emperor of the Underworld" Salinger of the Fourth Age.

At this moment, the Underworld Emperor was sitting in the river with his head drooping, looking out of place among the surrounding figures, as if he had been caught in a whirlpool of "meaninglessness".

What distinguishes it from the other figures further away is that it has no color at all.

Other figures retain the most basic black and white distinction that distinguishes them from the shadows themselves, but Salinger lacks even the most basic black and white.

It's like being stripped of all color.

Not only it, but the river beneath it, along with the surrounding area, was colorless, extending into a large region.

It has no color and no meaning.

Only "nothing".

The source material... has been contaminated?
Are you kidding me?
What can contaminate the source material?
Klein's brow furrowed deeper as he looked at Salinger.

Suddenly, a word popped into Klein's mind.

Self-destructor.

The "Emperor of the Underworld," Salinger, whose death mark had somehow become a self-destructive being, stood before him.

As a result, even the tributaries of this River of Eternal Darkness were polluted.

(End of this chapter)