POV: Adam

Our footsteps seemed to be in sync as we walked forward towards the next ruin. My black and red kusarigama was gripped tightly by my right hand, as I felt unusual unease.

Things had gone well. Very well. Almost too well. I could feel something bad coming my way. Just like on that one night that I came home. The eerie feeling made me want to stop in my tracks, but I kept walking because there were people behind me who I had to lead.

There were only two of them left. Every ruin had taken some of my group members away from me, except for the last one. I could have credited our improved strength and felt more confident, however, I didn't feel that way. It felt like the ruin had let us survive.

I started focusing again once they came upon a large door. I didn't bother to look at what was on the door, and just walked up to it and pushed it open.

Behind the door, we discovered a filthy, stone hall that had multiple passageways leading to who knows where.

After turning around to see two expressionless men behind me, I nodded, after which they nodded back.

Then we headed into the ruin.

There were blood stains and cobweb all over the place, but I wasn't bothered by trivial things like that. I observed all the passage ways that were abnormally tall and wide. I could only think of one reason for them to be that way.

"Expect to see some large monsters," I said to the two men behind me, while keeping my gaze forward.

I could sense the nervousness from them. I was nervous too. Even with all the ruins we had gone through and survived, the next ruin was always terrifying. There was no way around that. Accepting the nervousness and getting used to it was the best option.

"Any ideas on which way we should go?" I asked.

"They're all the same, aren't they?" asked Liran.

"I think so."

"I think it's a maze, so we should try doing that thing where we walk through all of them with our hands on the wall," suggested Mark.

"Yeah, let's do that, starting from there," I said, pointing to a passageway on my left that had a large bloodstain on the wall next to it.

The two men nodded, and we proceeded to go down that pathway with all of our left hands trailing along the wall. We walked expecting to quickly discover a dead end, but even after a few minutes of walking the path just kept on going, doing all sorts of turns along the way.

Finally, after ten minutes or so, we reached the end of the passageway. While keeping our hands on the wall, we turned back.

We walked for another ten minutes until arrived back in the hall. However, I couldn't help but notice that something was different. The passageways weren't the same. No, they were the same. It was just that they had moved since we left.

As I was thinking, I suddenly realized something, and looked at the wall to my right. My brows furrowed after I noticed that there was no bloodstain on it.

I looked around me and realized that there was no door with a bloodstain like the one I saw on the wall next to the passageway we walked into.

"The passageways changed," I said.

"Huh? What do you mean?" asked Liran in a confused manner with a little panic in his voice.

"I looked for signs I could separate the passageways when we came here, but now I can't see those signs I memorized," I explained.

"You're sure you remember correctly?" asked Mark calmly.

"Positive."

"Then this strategy won't work," Mark said and removed his hand from the wall.

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"Shit," Liran said and removed his hand as well.

Mark looked me in the eyes, expecting me to share some kind of discovery that I had made, like I had done in the previous ruins, but this time I had nothing to offer.

I shook my head, disappointed in myself. I then directed my gaze away from Mark, and hoped to have an epiphany, but I couldn't come up with a plan that seemed like it would work.

Interrupting my thoughts was Mark, who seemed to have come up with something.

"How about we just go down other passageways and observe the changes each time we come back. There's probably some kind of pattern."

Liran looked at me after hearing Mark's proposal, and I nodded with closed eyes.

Seeing that I approved of the plan, Mark turned to look at the passageways, "So which one should we try?"

"It's irrelevant which one we choose. Just pick one at random," I responded monotonously.

"Let's take that one," Mark said and pointed diagonally to the left.

We then headed into the passageway in a fairly relaxed manner. Something was bothering me. It felt like I had forgotten something. It was only after walking for a few minutes that I realized what I had forgotten.

'Right, the monsters. There haven't been any monsters anywhere. Was I mistaken? Maybe the passageways are large just for the sake of it,' I thought.

Then, I noticed Mark, who was far ahead of me and Liran, walking around without a care in the world. He was just about to turn to the left.

Knowing just how dangerous it was, I quickly called out to him, "Mark, wait!"

"Huh?" Mark said as he looked backwards, but it was too late.

He was already susceptible to any attacks that came from around the corner. However, nothing happened.

I stood frozen for a second or two, having expected the worst, and thus being shocked when nothing happened. "Uh, nothing, just be careful when turning and stay close to us."

After giving me a slightly confused look, Mark said, "Sure. I don't think there are any monsters here, though. If there were, I think we would have seen one by now."

I pressed my lips together in thought and after a while said, "Just be careful. You know how unpredictable these ruins can be."

Mark nodded and waited for me and Liran before beginning to move forwards again. We walled for a bit before the next corner came up and we stopped.

"How do you want us to check if there is anything waiting for us?" Mark asked me.

"Just put get close to the corner slowly and peek if there's anything there."

"Okay," Mark said and sneaked close to the corner.

Then he peeked over his shoulder. However, he did it in a way that didn't seem. It was like he wasn't nervous. Maybe he had been facing all kinds of monsters in these ruins for too long. He had grown used to it. What a fatal mistake.

"All cle—" Mark was saying but suddenly stopped.

He had been cautious because I had told him to do so, but he hadn't actually expected anything to be there.

Just as Mark peeked over the corner, however, a creature with the body of a man but the head of a bull showed itself. The creature was 4 meters tall, it had an enormous rusty battleaxe in hand, and its body was in peak physical condition. It was a sight you wanted to look away from, but was too terrified to do so.

Mark hadn't even summoned his weapon and didn't have the chance to do so, as his upper body was separated from his lower body in an instant by the swing of the minotaur's battleaxe. I could only observe as one of the last friends I had was bisected in front of me.