Chapter 19 The Traveler Who Stumbled into Hell

Once upon a time, there was a traveler who loved to travel and explore. Once, he stepped into an unknown area. The surroundings were dark and gloomy, giving people a very depressing feeling. The traveler was very tired at this time, but he had to cheer up and find a way out. He raised the torch, made a mark on the spot, and looked for the exit to the left first.

The traveler walked to the left with a firm step, but found that the road ahead was covered by a huge spider web. Above the web, a huge spider was crawling on the wall, as if waiting for its prey to fall into the trap it had woven. The traveler hesitated whether to light the spider web with a torch, but was afraid that the huge spider would suddenly attack him. In the end, he gave up this choice, returned to the original point he had marked, and turned to the right to look for a way out.

This time, the traveler kept walking to the right, but he saw many dried human bones on the ground. Some of the bones had teeth marks left by unknown animals, and it seemed that there was a beast that could eat people. The traveler had to become cautious again and thought about whether to continue forward. When he glanced at the gloomy skeleton on the ground again, he finally gave up the idea of ​​moving forward and returned to the original point where he had made a mark.

This time he turned upwards to look for a way out. As he walked, he saw only a bottomless pool in front of him. The traveler looked carefully at the water surface with the help of the firelight and saw a huge octopus in the pool. It was incredible. How could a creature that always lived in the sea suddenly appear here? If it was entangled by such a huge body, the result would be imaginable. He decisively gave up the idea of ​​diving into the water to find a way out and returned to the starting point again.

There was only one way left, and the only way was to look downwards. The traveler held a torch and kept looking downwards, but as he walked, he found that he had returned to the marked starting point.

“How can this be?”

The traveler screamed in disbelief and continued to move forward along the road below. However, just like last time, he returned to the starting point. The traveler calmed down and thought, and walked to the road to the left of the starting point again. Sure enough, he saw the huge spider web and the spider waiting for its prey to come.

“It really is back to square one.”

The traveler muttered to himself, and looked at the trap set by the spider again. It seemed that if he wanted to get out, he had to choose between the spider’s web, the unknown cannibal, and the octopus’s pool. The traveler sat on the ground, took out the stored food from his backpack, ate a delicious meal, recovered some strength, pulled out the sharp dagger he carried with him, held it in his hand, and slowly walked towards the spider web.

The traveler came to the spider web, slowly raised the torch in his hand, and set it on fire. The flames instantly spread out, burning along the veins of the spider web, illuminating the surroundings. The spider lying on the wall was awakened by the light and heat of the flames, and in an instant it jumped off the wall and onto the ground, landing right in front of the traveler.

The traveler bent his body, swallowed his saliva, stared at the guy in front of him, and held the dagger in his hand more tightly. The spider had already found its prey at this time, turned around and spit out many silk threads from its abdomen, aiming at the traveler’s position. The traveler keenly seized the opportunity when the spider turned around and ran towards it, and dodged the sticky silk threads sideways, and in a blink of an eye he had come to the side of the spider. The sharp dagger in his hand stabbed from the top of the spider’s head without hesitation. The spider’s body shook like an uncontrollable puppet, and then collapsed to the ground, motionless.

The traveler waited for a moment, making sure the spider was dead, then stepped forward and took back the dagger. After cleaning the sticky spider blood dripping from the dagger with a cloth, he resolutely walked forward.

With the joy of defeating the spider, the traveler’s steps became lighter and lighter, and he soon walked a long way. But when the traveler looked around with the torch, he felt something was wrong. Looking down at his feet…

“Ah! How could this happen?”

The traveler cried out in surprise again. The mark he had made in advance appeared under his feet again.

“Could it be that?”

The traveler once again muttered to himself and lowered his head, but he couldn’t figure it out no matter what. He ran towards the road to the right, and the scene in front of him made him stunned…

Those wind-dried bones and the skulls with teeth marks left by unknown creatures suddenly appeared before him.

The traveler angrily kicked over a pile of dry bones in front of him and shouted at the air: “What the hell is playing tricks here? Get out of here!”

There was silence all around, no response.

The traveler ran forward in anger, not caring about anything, until he found the two beasts still gnawing at the bodies of other travelers. What kind of creature was that? It was really hard to describe its appearance with the existing words in the world. All he saw was that they had extremely long and slender tongues, which were sticking into the bones of the corpses and sucking their marrow. This kind of creature seemed to never waste any nutrition from its prey. Should we say that it was an extremely greedy creature? Or an extremely frugal creature?
The two beasts were obviously unhappy that someone had disturbed them while they were eating. They turned their heads and stared at the traveler, their eyes flashing green light and making low roars. The traveler once again took a fighting stance with a dagger in his hand, closely watching the two beasts’ every move.

Soon, two beasts pounced on the traveler, one on the left and one on the right, and stretched out their long tongues at the same time, pointing directly at the traveler’s neck. The traveler slightly turned his body, grabbed the tongue of the beast on the left with one hand, and quickly swung the other hand holding the dagger to cut off the tongue of one of the beasts. The one with the cut tongue fell to the ground and struggled to scream, with dark liquid constantly flowing out of its mouth. The other one took this opportunity to get to the traveler’s side, and its sharp claws cut a deep cut on the traveler’s thigh. The traveler raised his other foot and kicked the vicious long-tongued beast far away, and then threw the dagger in his hand, which just pierced its body.

Soon, the two long-tongued beasts were silent. The traveler opened his backpack, bandaged his wounds, put away his dagger, and walked forward.

This time, the traveler did not have a victorious smile on his face. Instead, he frowned tightly and looked around.

“It’s here again! I know! I know! It must be that octopus that caused this. As long as we get rid of that octopus, we will be able to get out of here!”

After the traveler returned to the point he marked, he finally seemed to have found the key to the problem. Without any hesitation, he walked towards the road above with crazy laughter.

“You ugly bastard, I know it’s you who caused this! You’re the only one left here, right? It must be you, wait and see how I deal with you!”

The traveler cursed the octopus in the pool crazily, then jumped into the water with a splash, and stabbed the octopus’ body with a dagger. The octopus did not move, allowing the traveler’s dagger to leave marks on its body…

The traveler didn’t know how many times he stabbed the octopus before he stopped panting and looked at the octopus that was already covered with wounds. It turned out that the octopus had already died. It made sense. How could a creature living in the deep sea survive in this pool?
The traveler put away the dagger, smiled and said to himself: “The last one is solved, the exit must be behind this road.” The traveler took back the dagger and slowly put it on his waist. But the smile on his mouth suddenly stopped at this moment…

“No, this octopus has been dead for a long time. So it’s not it! It’s not it! But, who is it? The thing that always makes me go back to the starting point? Where is it?”

The traveler held his breath, dived into the depths of the pool, and swam forward along the only path under the water, trying to find the exit of this path. But when he poked his head out of the water, climbed up the shore impatiently and looked around…

The previous origin appeared in front of him again!
“impossible!”

The traveler shouted unwillingly, and ran towards each road again and again, up, down, left, and right. However, the result was still the same as before, without any change.

Uh…the traveler finally stopped because of exhaustion, holding his heart, as if he was in great pain!
What kind of pain is this?

Unlike the pain of a physical wound, this pain cannot be healed; once you begin to feel it, it will always be with you.

Unlike ordinary mental pain, this kind of pain will not slowly disappear with the changes in one’s own emotions. It is like it is rooted deep in the heart and cannot be erased.

This seems to be a kind of pain that cannot be eliminated or forgotten. This pain comes from being tired of the surrounding environment and being confused about finding a way out. For a traveler, this is probably the greatest pain! A warrior like him is not afraid of spiders that set traps to lure people, nor is he afraid of monsters that suck the marrow out of people, or the huge octopus. The only thing he fears is the fact that after bravely trying all the ways, he still cannot change his situation.

“There is no way out here! There is no way out here! No matter how hard I try, I can’t get out of here! I can’t get out of this place that I’m so tired of! This is… this is hell!”

The traveler knelt helplessly on the ground, holding his head in his hands, screaming madly, as if he was talking to himself, or as if he was talking to someone…

(End of this chapter)