Now that we were right at the foot of the palace, I was able to see it in much more detail. The manor was built with stone bricks just like many of the other buildings, but this building was much better maintained. There were many cracks in the walls, but at least none of the walls were completely collapsed. There were probably at least ten floors, assuming each floor was the height I was used to at home (in my original time period?). And that wasn’t including the towers rising from some of the corners of the complex geometry of the palace. From the top, you could definitely see into the distance for many miles if there wasn’t any fog.

The front doors were even larger than the gates of the city, and there were two guards here instead of just one. But again, they didn’t move an inch to even greet us.

Xiang gave the huge heavy metal doors a small push, which surprisingly pushed them wide open. A creak echoed through the inside of the open space of the inside, escaping from the new opening in front of us. I wondered if Xiang had some sort of supernatural strength. Well, it wouldn’t be too extraordinary considering all this time travel stuff.

The darkness through the doors gave out an ominous aura, but we walked straight in, our footsteps sounding loud in the closed but large space. I tried not to look into the dark unknowns and kept my eyes on the ground.

Just a few meters in, the doors slammed shut, making a sound so loud I raised my hands to cover my ears. That didn’t go so well with my hands tied, and a ring continued to hum after the echoes died down.

Now we were in the middle of darkness. There were no windows anywhere, putting the entire room into a completely unknown abyss. This was probably the only time in my entire journey that I felt comforted by Diane’s hand gripping my arms tightly. At least I knew I was still with some people, even if they want to torture me.

Then there was a small buzz, like a spark of electricity turning on a light bulb behind me. I turned around, putting my back against the darkness, and sure enough, there was a small light in the distance, at the end of a long hallway. The enormous doors we just went through were gone, but what was even unusual anymore?

We left the dark chamber and went through the hallway. I still couldn’t see anything very well, but I could tell from the atmosphere that we were underground. Then how far underground? Well, even if it was miles down, I still wouldn’t be surprised.

Just as we reached the end, my eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and I could make out the walls from the flickering light bulb. The hallway was paved with stone bricks, just like the outside of all the buildings on the surface. The bricks were damp, and some gaps even had water trickling out, then disappearing back through the gaps between the bricks laid on the ground.

Along with the damp walls came a mossy, earthy odor mixed with the stench of a wet towel left in a damp room overnight. I had never enjoyed the smell of nature, preferring the comforts of my own room. But now, my captor’s firm grip prevented me from pinching my nose, and I could only resort to breathing through my mouth.

At the end of the hallway was the wall holding the light, but two more corridors extended to the left and right. The tunnels had the same light bulbs protruding from the walls, but they were so sparsely distributed that it was still hard to see anything. I looked through both sides, and the hallways seemed to go on forever, with the same pattern of lights lining until a distance my eyes couldn’t see.

“Welcome to the labyrinth!” Exclaimed Ben amusingly as we turned right.

And sure enough, after we walked for a short while, we came upon another split. We continued on, going through more twists and turns. But only after a few intersections, I was left confused, convinced that we had just gone in a circle two times.

Throughout the entire walk, Ben started talking again, this time about how this maze prevents people from escaping and how it’s designed to regularly change, so we shouldn’t bother memorizing the path and so on. I ignored him, but at least I was thankful to have his company back. It gave me something else to think about in a dark, damp place like this.

“And here we are,” Ben said aloud suddenly, “the end.”

I looked up, and it took me a while to realize that we had finished that labyrinth. Now we were in some sort of a lobby, with several more tunnels branching out, but this time they were completely dark. The lobby even had a small window on the other side as a reception desk.

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“Hey!” Xiang called out in a deep but booming voice as we approached the hole in the wall. “Anybody still alive in there?! We need some company!”

Nothing happened, and after a few moments of silence, Xiang sent a fist at the thick wall. His strength showed again with the sound of the impact echoing through the chamber.

Shortly after, there was a loud clang from behind the window, followed by slow, uneven footsteps and the sound of more objects falling. A face appeared through the small hole. I could only see his head and part of his upper body, but I could tell he was quite scrawny. His face was drooping in a tired state, but at the sight of us, he suddenly lit up. A crooked smile of yellow teeth formed from his mouth, and his sagging eyes shined just a bit.

“Hello! Welcome, visitors! Sorry, I wasn’t expecting people here today, so… yep, so do you need something? Maybe you got lost and accidentally came down here? If so, then don’t worry! I can help you get back to where—”

Xiang took a metal card from his leg pocket and slammed it onto the sill of the window, making the man jump up in shock. “I’ll need you to set up the meeting room with you know who,” he told him, sliding the card over.

The greeter’s expression turned serious, and a hint of the tiredness came back. He nodded and took the card, disappearing from view in his room. A minute later, he appeared again, handing the card back along with a handheld lamp lit by a light bulb similar to the many we had passed on our way here.

“Okay, the room’ll be ready in a few minutes. I assume you already know where it is, so you may continue on your way.”

“And, a key.”

The receptionist swiftly glanced over at me in realization and quickly headed back into his room, returning with an old-fashioned key. Xiang grabbed the key from the man’s hand, making me worry if the ancient trinket might break under his strength.

As soon as we got everything it looked like we needed, we headed through one of the dark tunnels without any further conversation. Again, we were back in another labyrinth, weaving through turns everywhere.

These tunnels were completely different, though. It was completely dark, save for the light from the dim lamp Xiang was holding. I could only see a few meters in front of us, so as usual, I kept my eyes glued to the floor. That didn’t save me from the new stench, however. This place reeked of a rotting particular something, and I didn’t want to know what. Now, even breathing through my mouth couldn’t help block out the smell, and I wondered how the people with me were still going on naturally.

Instead of patterns of bricks placed on the walls like earlier, it was an endless array of prison cells. The light bounced off the long line of rusting bars. As we walked by, the bars cast long lines of shadows on the other side, and through the gaps between the shadows, I could see into the small rooms faintly. They each had a stone ledge built into the wall that was probably a bed, a hole on the other side of the room that probably functioned as a toilet, and nothing more.

I almost jumped back when we passed the first cell with an actual person in it. Or I guess it wasn’t a person. It was a pile of bones on the ground arranged in a skeleton that was slumped by the wall. The bones were cracked and brown, showing how old it was. Did they really just keep people here until they died? And they don’t even clean it up? I immediately looked away, but I couldn’t throw that image from my memory.

We passed a handful more cells with bones inside before finally coming to one with a live person. He was sitting on the ground with his legs crossed. In front of him was an empty silver plate that gave off a blinding reflection to my dark-adjusted eyes. My eyes made their way up to the person’s body. The light showed that he actually had a regular build and was a lot healthier compared to the receptionist we had met earlier. He was wearing sturdy cloth clothing, and his hair and beard were trimmed to give him a mildly handsome appearance. But just after a split second of studying him, we made eye contact. His face held a calm expression, but fear suddenly took me, and I looked away.

“Think this is already crazy enough?” Ben said, breaking the silence yet again, “You gotta see the lower floors. Though you won’t be visiting there today.”

We must have gone by at least half a thousand cells through all the turns and hallways, and my feet were hurting. Most of the cells were empty or had a dead person, but a few housed actual prisoners, who were mostly sitting, standing, or lying patiently. None of them talked. They just stared as we walked by as if they were zombies wearing a calm human appearance.

We stopped at one of the cells, and Xiang used the key he got to unlock it. This particular cell had no distinguishing feature. It had the same stone bed and the same toilet hole. None of the cells even had a number marking them, so I wondered how Xiang picked this cell out of the rest.

“Well, we’re at our destination!” Ben exclaimed as Diane shoved me in. Arthur was pushed in by Wayne right after. “And of course, your little princess,” Ben continued, throwing Angel in. She landed on the ground with a loud thud, and I clenched my teeth in both pain and fury.

“I’ll give you guys thirty minutes to talk before we come back to take you away,” Xiang told us, “say your final words to each other instead of wasting your time trying to escape.”

I nodded silently, but Arthur just held his head down, not showing his face. Xiang closed the cell door, locked it, and the group left, going deeper into the maze. As the sound of their footsteps faded away, their light dimmed in the distance, leaving us in pitch black.