Is this really a Game?!



"It's there," Liara said as she looked down at the hole with Reign and the others.

They all glanced at each other before nodding at one another and going down.

The hole was about 15 meters wide and very deep, they actually couldn't see the bottom of it, so jumping down was out of the question.

Those that had the ability to control wind used their abilities to levitate, as well as to bring the others with them to slowly float down. Even then, about half of them were left, so Siggurd was the one that stepped up.

"Jump, don't worry about it," Siggurd said as everybody nodded as they already knew what his ability was.

As they jumped down, they started falling down before they suddenly slowed down.

[ Gravity Decrease ]

Siggurd's ability allowed him to control gravity, and by himself, he could easily help the others and slowly get to the bottom of the hole.

By using his skill, he created a domain around him that allowed them all to slowly fall down. He could have actually used the skill and helped everybody out, but the more people in the domain he created, the more mana he would need to spend.

Since they were expecting a battle to take place later on, he had to conserve as much mana as possible.

After about 2 minutes of falling down, everybody touched the bottom of the hole. The hole turned out to be even deeper than they previously thought it would be, and upon landing, Reign used his light manipulation to create multiple small balls of light that floated above the ground and lit their surroundings.

"This place, what is it?" One of the party members commented as they all stared around.

They were quite deep below the ground, and what they expected to find here was perhaps a small cave of sorts, but the place they were in right now was a massive cave with numerous tunnels present. 

They knew that there were tunnels because Basred used his ability, which allowed him to create sonic waves. Usually, the waves would be very powerful and could destroy anything in his path, but he used a very weak version so that the waves would spread out around them and bounce back to him upon hitting the walls so that he could get an estimate of how large the cave was.

What he found out was that the cave was not only gigantic but that there were many tunnels present in it as well.

"It's still below us," Liara said, which made Reign and the others glance in her direction.

"The artifact, it's deeper below the ground."

"Damn, this place is weird, the walls, the ground, it's all made out of rock, and it's very tough, we would need to use quite a lot of mana to dig deeper." Reign said as he clicked his tongue in annoyance.

The two that had the ability to manipulate soil and rocks tried using their ability, but it was for naught as they couldn't move anything at all. Their ability was worthless here as the rocks were not normal rocks and were highly resistant to their attempts to move them with their ability.

Reign had even punched the ground with some mana imbued in his fist, and the only thing he managed to do was create a tiny crack in it.

"I don't think we need to destroy anything, the tunnels, I think they will lead us to the artifact," Liara said as her eyes went hazy for a moment.

"Hey, you alright?" Reign asked as he knew that that was a sign of the fragments influence over her.

"Yes, it seems that they are trying to influence me, but in a good way, they are trying to help us locate the artifact," Liara said to Reign as she sensed that what she felt this time from the influence was different, it was as if somebody was speaking to her.

'I gave them some souls the last couple of days, but only a little bit so that they wouldn't grow stronger, but so that they wouldn't suspect me.' Reign thought as he glanced at Liara.

"It seems they lack the power to help us in any different way," Liara said, to which Reign sighed.

"Alright, stand still, I'll send some souls over to them, maybe that way they will be able to help us out more."

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Aethion asked Reign who nodded his head.

'This much won't make them a lot stronger, and I believe they will use most of the power they have to help us locate the artifact, it is something the one they worshipped used, so even if they have ulterior motives, I do think they will do whatever they can to help us out.'

"Well, it's your call anyway, just be careful, this place is too weird to be found here coincidentally."

'I know, the slight suppressive feeling that I can sense, the weird rocks that are almost impossible for a Tier IV being to break, that's not natural, no way that something like this was found on this planet naturally.'

"Powerful artifacts can influence the surroundings, if the artifact has been here for a long time, then it is highly possible that this place is the way it is because of it."

'If so, how do you reckon the demons managed to find out about its existence?' Reign asked Aethion who stayed silent.

"I honestly have no clue, perhaps it was a Transcendent demon that notified them for some reason, they might have coincidentally gotten a clue somewhere, hell, it could have even been the system that notified them, in order to create the challenge for you and Laura."

'The system, would it really do something like that, isn't it supposed to be more of an observer that helps you out?'

"Neither one of us is powerful enough to know kid, I'm afraid the answers to such questions are only known by those who stand at the very top of the universe."

Reign nodded his head before finishing the soul transfer. He had sent them the souls of a couple of Tier III and Tier IV demons, which should be enough to make them powerful enough to help out a bit more.

"How long do we need to wait?" Liara asked Reign who shrugged his shoulders.

"When I went there, it did feel like I needed a long time to get to them through the darkness, but who knows, there is a high chance that time moves differently inside the prison, not to mention that the way the soul perceives time can be different as well."

And just as Reign finished his sentence, Liara's eyes went blank as she stared at one direction.

She extended her hand and pointed in a direction, and Reign quickly used one of his balls of light and sent it flying there. It took the ball a couple of seconds to get to the wall, and there was a tunnel present there.

Liara's eyes returned to normal right after she had pointed forward, and she remembered everything, unlike before when her actions would make her lose consciousness during the time she was influenced.

She was able to see what she was doing, and she continued pointing her finger forward so that Reign and the others could see what was there.

"Let's go, it seems like giving them almost all of my souls was worth it," Reign told Liara as they all moved to the wall.

Of course, what he said was not true. He gave them a minuscule number of souls compared to the total number he had, but he believed that the souls could hear them, so he was doing his best to lie and give them fake information.

  They made it to the tunnel and entered. Everybody was tense and looked around as they walked through the tunnel. The balls of light were able to light up the way, but there was a weird feeling that everyone had during their walk.

They felt some slight danger.

The cave they were in was quite wide, enough to allow 6 people to walk side by side, and for there to still be a little bit of space left.

Siggurd was at the very front, and Basred was in the back, they were both there so that they could help out if anything happened.

Suddenly, both Basred and Liara stopped moving and shouted at the same time.

"There are monsters in this place!"

Their shout made everybody clench their weapons and tense up as they stopped moving as well.

Basred was able to sense monsters because of his ability. One sonic wave had returned, upon which he learned that there was something large walking toward them some 150 meters in front of them.

As for Liara, she was told by the voices that there were monsters here. It seemed as if the artifact was not going to be obtained easily as one needed to prove their worth by making it through the monsters in order to reach the artifact.