/
The Missiontakers leave the cramped hidden room and continue heading east.
Along the way, they swear their eyes are going to go blind.
On the left, the right, on the ground they’re standing on, are all large bright blobs that keep switching colours.
Perhaps some people might find the colourful and jumpy environment lively and interesting for a few moments.
But being inside for some time, plus the persistence of vision, means they only feel their vision dimming and depressing. They are barely stopping themselves from fainting.
But stop they still do, and look up at the ceiling, but the ceiling has something subtly wrong with it.
It’s black, for sure, but it’s also mirror-like. It’s almost like a brilliantly colourful kind of black, with an almost mist-like, fantastical quality to it.
The Missiontakers swear they’d develop delusions if they stay inside any longer, like their forms would just sink into that deep darkness, being reflected on a pure mirror.
He ShujĂŒn is rubbing her eyes, sighing, “why would this bloody place even exist
”
She is complaining, and the other Missiontakers silently agree. This is a terrible place to be, especially painful for their brains and eyes.
They stop for a short rest and continue forward. With A-One leading them, they aren’t getting lost, at least.
But because they’re heading forward, Mu Jiashi and the others who are hurrying their way end up missing them.
Mu Jiashi, Fei, Wu Jian and Mystic are also inside of this room hidden away behind many left turns now.
Mu Jiashi sighs upon seeing the hidden room, empty save for the person on the ground.
So he says, “maybe we can try talking to him first?”
His hair colour is still grue; the utility card is still active.
The Missiontakers agree, and so Mu Jiashi walks forward and kneels by the person’s side.
Possibly thanks to the utility card, or if it’s because Mu Jiashi already has the information from the other person, so this one speaks up after just a few questions.
What he says is similar to the other person. ‘They’ are coming, and so they built this labyrinth to trap ‘them.’
But it was a complete failure.
This person looks equally dejected and hopeless when talking about this part.
He is also part of the team who built this labyrinth, and also participated in its quality assurance. For them, this labyrinth was the entire embodiment of their hope.
Perhaps, it is the same for all of humanity as well.
However, they failed.
Mu Jiashi’s thoughts are digressing, though——Really? Did they really fail? Was that what happened?
His mind answers, yes, they failed.
Defeat. The word makes Mu Jiashi feel distinctly complicated. Once, he also felt trapped, enervated, and unable to escape from something similar.
That was a personal failure of his. But here, they are facing the failure of the whole of humanity.
An individual who is wrapped up in something as terrible as this would appear to be entirely useless.
Just like the builders of this labyrinth says, ‘they’ appear to be creatures magnitudes more superior to humanity.
In the blink of an eye, they can destroy what they have achieved in an entire month, their hope that has been built up for an entire month.
The person continues talking about this in a whisper and keeps repeating himself. It’s like he is also trapped in a labyrinth in his mind – he is trapped here, by himself.
This should be quite obvious. He is a succumbed Tower resident. A loser who remains succumbed in this Nightmare, without even his sense of self.
After the largely fruitless conversation, though, the person mentions something the other person didn’t talk about – he talks of a traitor among humanity.
Traitor?
Mu Jiashi can’t help but fall silent.
The strange feeling ends up vindicated, it seems.
When the person says, all of humanity united to build this Seven Wonders-level of labyrinth, Mu Jiashi was already feeling that something was off.
Working together? Even in the times of their memories, when the world was largely at peace, unity was a far less commonly employed word than divisive when used to describe humanity. Everyone knows, humans are like that.
Even when a common enemy has surfaced, some might stride forward, but others will just end up weak in their knees.
Was this really a product of humanity’s unity? Or just one desperate struggle?
Also, Mu Jiashi also finds himself unwilling to admit that, humans, in the face of that intelligent lifeform, would be so utterly useless.
One month, and the blink of an eye
 is such a stark, utter contrast that makes Mu Jiashi feel dazed and in disbelief.
So to him, the existence of a traitor would be a welcome excuse.
That said, the person from earlier didn’t mention the traitor at all. Instead, it’s this person who lies alone in this cramped, hidden room that says, ‘traitor.’
Mu Jiashi is eyeing the person rather suspiciously. This person still has his arms and legs intact. While his mind is clearly muddled, and it can certainly be argued that he isn’t far from death’s kneel either, but he’s still in a far better state than the person before. When the victors weren’t humans.
So who was the traitor?
Mu Jiashi has an answer already.
And he has already lost interest in further communication with this person.
The person who continues to murmur, “traitors
 traitors
 ‘they’ didn’t value or need a traitor. They were always, the superior species.”
He says with a tone that could even be said to be melancholic.
Mu Jiashi stays like that for a moment, then stands up and leaves this place without another word, not even parting with the person. The other Missiontakers follow closely.
On the long hallway decorated with confusing streaks of light, Mu Jiashi deeply inhales and exhales, then says, “let’s go. We’ll try the middle path.”
Wu Jian says, “when A-One and A-Two were exploring, they said they didn’t encounter anyone else on that path, I think?”
Fei nods and says, “yes, but
 what if there’s someone who knows this scene better than the two of them here?”
She doesn’t name names, but everyone knows she is referring to XĂŒ Beijin.
And just as she suggested, XĂŒ Beijin and his companions have found someone.