When I woke up, I felt worse than sick, I had some spasms and some fever. But fortunately I could feel my skin again. Mind you, I was in a lot of pain.

Apparently I had earned some painful scrapes on my knees and elbows, my fingertips hurt like I had burns even though they didn't look damaged in any way. And I still had little spasms in random places on my body. I checked my toolbox and it was a little scorched, I didn't notice it before, but there were some black marks on the lid, apparently some lightning struck it.

Maybe I should have left the box in the tunnel, it slowed me down during the ride and I only needed a piece of wire. On the other hand, maybe if I didn't have the box, lightning could have struck me?

It was better not to think about such things.

I slowly got up, picked up the gloves I took off earlier, the protective glasses I had dropped during my unconsciousness and put them in my toolbox.

I took out my phone and tried to look at the time, but it didn't work, I didn't know if it was because of the lightning that broke it or that the battery died while I was sleeping, I hoped it was the latter because I doubted there was any phone technician in this place.

And so I started back down the road towards the room where I got the marble.

The Marble, I remembered, quickly pulled it out and noticed that it was no longer vibrating like before. Nor was there any image or glint of anything on it. It was simply a translucent crystal sphere. I went back to the entrance of the spherical room and I could see from the opening the same cube with the same arms circling in the same place as before, I could not notice any difference before the "repair" I made.

Anyway, I would not return to that place, so I simply turned around and went back through the tunnel. On my way back I got lost, I didn't remember the path I took to that place and I didn't have the foresight to mark the route, silly me, now I was going through unfamiliar tunnels and random intersections from one place to another without knowing where I really was, maybe I should start making a map.

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The tunnels were silent but you could casually hear noises through the wall, floor and ceiling, footsteps, voices, screams, things falling or banging, roaring, and other sounds I didn't recognize.

Then I came to a room, it was a large room, truly large, no less than eighty meters in diameter, completely circular and with the ceiling at about twenty meters, measurements worthy of a large warehouse. In the center was a rock dome about fifteen meters high that spanned most of the center of the room and left only a corridor between the sphere and the wall, and I can see a light at the top of the dome.

I walked around the sphere near the wall until I found some metal pipes nailed to the side of the sphere like steps. I saw the light at the top and thought I might as well look.

I cut a meter of wire and tied two wire rings to the handle of the box. Then I hooked each ring to one of my shoulders and turned my toolbox into a makeshift backpack. A little awkward but it left my hands free so I could climb the ladder.

Climbing was a little difficult because my fingers were sore and I was a little weak, but as I climbed, the ladder leaned further forward due to the contour of the sphere and it became easier. After a stretch it became flat steps to rest my feet on with a handrail, I kept going up and made it to the almost flat top. As I walked towards the center, I saw a hole about a meter in diameter all the way through the center of the dome. I lay down next to the edge and peered down.

A cable descended from the ceiling through the hole and further down held a huge crystalline structure shaped like a chandelier, which had hundreds of lights on the tips, it was a chandelier that illuminated the space below. Although the chandelier was very bright, all the light was focused downward, so it didn't bother my eyes. I hung my head and peered around the glass into the room below. More than a room, it was a large hall.

I could see people, hundreds of people gathered in some sort of elegant party, all dressed in elaborate costumes. From heavy, bulky robes to simple loincloths, all made of materials I had never seen before. There were women and men, old and young, tall and thin, but they all had one thing in common. They looked very good.

All of them, absolutely all of them, despite the distance from which I saw them, I could tell they looked incredible. Not like simple TV performers, those were ugly in comparison. No, these were so attractive that it was unnatural, like looking at a sculpture or a painting, something that you recognize is gorgeous but you also know doesn't exist. That it can't exist.

And there they were, hundreds of... beings, I didn't dare call them human, they couldn't be, some didn't even try to look like humans, no... one word came to mind.

They were monsters.