Who Designed This Underworld Dungeon?

When Temude stepped out from the Initial Firestove, what appeared before him was a corridor of World Snakes lining both sides in welcome, stretching off into the distant darkness.

Though all these World Snakes looked more or less the same, he still recognized at a glance that the two at the very front were Kas and... Flament?

Since when did this thick-browed, earnest fellow defect as well? No—that’s not right. I’m on Kas’s side now; for Flament this ought to be called forsaking darkness for the light.

At the instant he crossed the threshold, he felt his body gradually slip out of his control. He could still feel every sensation rising from his flesh, yet he could not command it, as though a gulf had opened between spirit and body.

The music he had heard during his battle with Gwyn had vanished without a trace; what echoed in his ears now was boundless silence, and Kas’s voice breaking that silence.

The other’s tone was saturated with the satisfaction of a wish fulfilled.

"It is truly splendid to see you return in triumph, my king."

Temude watched himself walk forward into the endless darkness ahead. Behind him, the sight of the Initial Firestove spilling from the doorway turned into a blinding white radiance that could not be looked upon directly; as he advanced toward Kas, the sole light point in this world was steadily left behind.

"I, Kas, and Flament as well—we have gathered here for the sole purpose of serving you."

Kas and Flament lowered their heads, and immediately, the nameless World Snakes arrayed in a single line behind them also bowed, their number unknown.

This scene was no different from loyal subjects saluting their King.

As the Prince of the Warrior Country, Temude was accustomed to receiving the salutations of his people in his daily comings and goings; such things had long since become routine. Yet this time it impressed upon him a sense of difference unlike any before.

Flament, who styled himself Gwyn’s friend, Kas whose standing matched his, and even more World Snakes besides—beings such as these lowering their heads to him in submission gave Temude an especially... lingering, intoxicating feeling.

All the more so now, when his ambition had been magnified by the influence of the Sin Fire; no true ambitious soul could fail to be enthralled by the spectacle before his eyes.

To behold himself from a third-person vantage, watching the World Snakes bow and proclaim themselves his vassals, possessed a flavor all its own.

"Next..."

His steps carried him deeper into the darkness.

"True darkness shall spread across the entire world."

At the moment Kas spoke these words, the radiance spilling from the Initial Firestove was snuffed out in an instant; only the flame still flickering on the fire pillars flanking the great gate remained.

Yet even that fire, under the onslaught of the darkness, gradually lost the strength to endure.

In the end, the firelight was extinguished completely.

Temude’s vision fell into utter blackness. He could see nothing at all; even attempts to employ Magic or Combat Skills were of no avail.

At the same time, accompanying the darkness in his senses came a precipitous drop in temperature. The warmth brought by the firelight was dissipating at a terrifying pace; in a brief span the temperature plummeted, and a bone-piercing cold suddenly seized this world—and it continued to fall without pause.

Thick fog began to rise, spreading just as it had in the era before the Fire Era began, in the age when the Ancient Dragons held dominion, a time suffused with great mist.

So this—this is the transformation that befalls the world when one does not choose Fire Transmission?

Temude jolted as his field of vision suddenly detached from the Initial Firestove, and the entire world unfolded before his eyes: the Fire Transmission Ceremony, the Undead Town Outside the City, the Sick Village, Yanor Londo... the places he had once trod all appeared before him.

Then the darkness began to descend.

Mist spilling over its brim and darkness alike surged to engulf every place.

The darkness that no eye could pierce descended evenly upon every region of this world. The entire world, without warning, was plunged into pitch black, followed swiftly by the advent of dense fog and killing cold.

Even though only those regions he had visited flashed before his eyes, it still impressed upon Temude the sense that the entire world was undergoing such change. If the transformation of the scenery alone stirred little in him, then...

The agonized responses of the myriad living beings still lingering in those regions as they faced the onset of darkness were laid bare before him, one by one.

In the Undead Town Outside the City, those Soldiers already no different from Animated Corpses showed extreme terror when the darkness wrapped around them, screaming and fleeing, yet not knowing where they should run.

The warm yellow sky over Yanor Londo stilled utterly, and a wind more piercing than that of Yilushier rose and howled; the Giant Guards, in silence, had their Life Force stolen away by the cold.

The Giant Tomb, where silence had already long reigned, sank further into absolute death-stillness; skeletons and Corpse Warlocks alike found the coffins meant for them, lay down within, and none could say whether they would ever awaken again.

Wherever the darkness descended, all existing order was shattered; everything, everything fell into chaos and disarray!

Temude watched all of this. He ought to show some reaction, yet at this moment he found himself utterly incapable of responding.

Just then, as though born of auditory hallucination, Kas’s laughter rang in his ears—a hearty, triumphant laugh, rejoicing in the fulfillment of an ancient vow.

The Primordial Flame had been extinguished; the source that sustained the world’s light had vanished.

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