The band shakily awoke from their slumber. They felt rested, alright, but perhaps a little too well-rested. Their legs felt limp, seemingly having forgotten how to even stand. A couple of them tripped and stumbled, taking extra effort to even move their limbs. It was like they were poisoned with some invisible mist. Only Sofis could move relatively normally, slowly combing her hair and already well-dressed while everyone else was still struggling to even grab their items.

‘Scholar, you—’ the other woman shook in sheer disbelief at the state of her weakness.

‘I didn’t do anything,’ Sofis defended. Even that woman knew it was a blind accusation. Despite her bringing over many belongings, all of them were at the very least checked by the treasure hunters themselves. They all knew what she brought, and poison was certainly not one of the items.

Still, it was as if the entire band was stricken with something overnight, whatever that may be. The luggage felt far heavier than they remembered, the wheeled chests barely movable despite being mostly empty. For many, it seemed as if they wanted to move, but their bodies simply forbade them to do so.

Sofis looked at this in bewilderment. She didn’t initially smell any strangeness in the air, nor did she notice any particular change in the hall. There was simply something off, and that was it.

‘Yawn… Unto the next one, everyone,’ Gennai ordered, dragging his legs forward as he attempted to push open the door before him.

That’s when Sofis noticed: the doors looked new. Unlike the rotting doors before, the one here was well-kept and in fine condition. No matter how far Gennai exerted himself, the door would simply refuse to budge. There was no other path other than the way back.

Many of the treasure hunters began closing their eyes. They were tired again. They had only just woken up from what looked like hibernation, and were now ready for another one. What energy they might’ve had before they entered the structure was nearly sapped away completely. Instead of any sort of morale, all the band had now was a collective inexplicable form of tiredness.

The environment felt grey for Sofis. She couldn’t make out the details of her surroundings, the vegetation wilting and blending in with the walls. It wasn’t that her vision had suddenly become impaired. She believed she could still see everything fine, just… the world didn’t seem the same compared to how she last remembered it.

‘Everyone, what happened?’ Jorn asked. Somehow, he was still decently awake, though he too was suffering from the same weakness of strength.

Everything felt slow. She couldn’t think much. Was this some sort of effect kicking in? She had no idea. She violently shook her head. Though she didn’t have that same physical weakness, she was struggling to maintain a clear mind. Something was definitely poisoning the environment.

None of them could afford to stay here for any longer.

She hurriedly stepped towards the door and pushed it. Sure enough, it was difficult to move. She shoved and leaned against it with her entire weight only to budge it a little.

‘Scholar, keep going… ’ With Gennai gradually losing his senses, all he could do was to encourage her to push on. This was no ordinary wooden door. The friction didn’t make sense. Every little inch took an immense amount of strength to move. At least the door wasn’t sliding back.

A whiff of new, fresher air. Her senses tingled. She felt as if a little more strength had been added to her muscles. For a moment, ignoring the dust and dirt on her clothing, she pushed harder onwards, letting more and more air in until the band was visibly becoming more awake.

‘Keep… going…’ She could see a glimpse of the next hall now. It looked about the same, except for one thing: a massive pile of books just sitting in a mess at the end of the hall. Books. Knowledge. This was it. Treasure.

‘Do you see it?’ Gennai asked excitedly.

‘Yes. Treasure.’

With renewed strength, they continued further until the doors were opened wide enough for the wheeled chests to pass through. Strangely enough, after all that work, they were instead more energised and strengthened with no hint of exhaustion even for a scholar like Sofis.

‘Good work.’ Gennai said and smiled. Sofis nodded back.

The band entered the next hall. It was far narrower than the first, though it still possessed a formidable atmosphere. There was no candlelight inside, but dim light was nevertheless reflected around the room, creating many long shadows that stretched nearly to the ceiling.

Sofis immediately noticed one thing: there were no plants here, no wood, only the presence of cold, grey stone. She walked towards the pile of books she noticed earlier. It was a stone sculpture. Gennai had actually noticed a chest that seemed to be overflowing with jewels. It was made of stone as well, the ‘jewels’ inside being nothing more than various different sized pebbles.

Sofis swore she saw them as legitimate books earlier when she was pushing open the door. Perhaps her eyes needed to get checked.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

The hall was mildly colder, the air seeping through cracks in the stone. Still, after a short while of exploring the area, the hall was becoming suffocating. Not in the literal sense, but the gradual feeling of greyness once more, the slow loss of detail in her vision.

Taking out her journal, she began to document her observations. It was not exactly the most exciting or frightening thing she had encountered thus far, but the pure instinct that something was off was still there. Her body was beginning to feel heavy, her handwriting barely legible as she struggled to move her pen across the page.

She couldn’t quite explain this sensation. It was something like an urge to rest without the need to rest. They had literally just woken up from a good sleep. There was no need to rest right now. Yet… as she looked around her, everyone was extremely lethargic and slow, a few even seeming to lose their minds a little as they bumped into random but obvious obstacles.

‘Gennai, we should leave,’ the other woman starkly said. ‘I don’t like this place.’

‘We’ll leave later,’ Gennai answered without a hint of fear in his ears. ‘For now, collect these in the chests.’

Sofis saw a large box of pebbles being passed onto the woman. Numerous other boxes lay around, the treasure hunters placing pebbles by the dozens into those crates.

But those… were pebbles.

‘Hey… What are we doing?’ She quickly approached Gennai and inquired.

‘Collecting treasure.’

‘What?’

‘Isn’t it obvious? Do you not see the diamond, gold, silver, rubies and sapphires before your eyes?’

‘These?’ Sofis pointed to a random pebble.

‘The most beautiful lump of gold I’d found,’ Gennai gleefully said. ‘Thanks to you, we got our first load of treasure.’

‘What… do you even mean?’

She didn’t understand it at all. Had the entire band gone insane in the span of a few short moments? No, logically speaking, it must be her with the error.

The day supposedly passed with the ‘treasure’ being collected without much of a hitch. No one could really tell when it was day or night anymore. Whenever everyone felt sleepy, it was most likely night time. When everyone but Sofis were working, then it was most likely day time. The chests quickly filled up with loot, the treasure hunters increasingly happy with each new addition to the stockpile. Sofis couldn’t believe her eyes. These were professional, seasoned treasure hunters, but they couldn’t even differentiate between a pebble and a precious stone.

‘You’re seeing all this, aren’t you?’ a voice called for her. Sofis turned around. It was that woman.

‘Yes.’

‘They’ve gone mad. Only we know the truth.’

‘Or have we gone mad?’

‘I know we’re not. At least I’m not.’ She slowly sat down, her breaths becoming heavier despite barely physically exerting herself.

Sofis glanced at her. She only just realised it was quite out of character for the woman to approach her like this.

‘Say, Scholar,’ the woman said. ‘How long do you think our sanity is going to last?’

Sofis didn’t answer. She simply didn’t know. Not that the woman was expecting an answer out of her. The air was becoming thicker and heavier still.

‘My mind… It’s blanking out now as well.’

Sofis had no reaction. She was the same. Her pen paused in the middle of writing a word. She was still thinking, but she was slowing down. Whatever air was in this hall was slowly suffocating them.

She thought she saw skeletons moving around the hall. She blinked, and they became the treasure hunters. For a moment, her world became entirely black, but the next, it was back to normal. No one was noticing these changes, mindlessly collecting pebbles as they began to lose their sense of self. The chests, though not numerous, seemed endless with their bounty, that the treasure hunters rapidly became like mechanical parts, moving to and fro monotonously.

What were they supposed to do here? It was to collect extremely valuable treasure for them, and research for her. Right. That was what they were supposed to do. Her mind was still relatively untainted. But… she couldn’t possibly rely on herself becoming sane for much longer. The other woman had already lost her mind, joining the others in their pebble hoarding.

If this was some sort of poisonous air, then there must’ve been some sort of origin. It could’ve been from the previous hall, from one of the cracks in the stone, or perhaps some other form of ventilation. Keeping her mind running with random thoughts as a headache began to buzz, Sofis walked back towards the way they came from. Accidentally knocking over one of the treasure hunters, the man simply picked up the fallen pebbles and kept going as if nothing happened. The names and faces were beginning to fade away from her memories, but her mind was still focused upon the task at hand.

With some difficulty, she reached the door and placed a hand on the floor, hoping to feel some sort of air flow. And there was, except… it was a cool air, the exact same sensation before they entered this hall.

She scrambled across the floor, hoping to sense some kind of heavy air to then block out and rescue these strangers. She only knew the air was damaging to her state of mind and she needed to stop the air flow somehow. There was nothing.

She needed to block off the air, or else…

No, she needed to collect knowledge. Books, yes. That was it. Books were extremely valuable. She needed them.

She walked towards the pile of books. They looked grey, but they were a treasure for her. She picked one up, or so she expected. Instead, the book just wouldn’t budge. Strange. She tugged on it harder. It was practically glued to the floor.

She yanked it. Hard. The cover finally shifted. No, that was the floor. A hole opened up beneath her, and she disappeared into the abyss. What little dim light became absolute darkness, her foggy eyes cleared up from the sudden gust of cool air. Wait, she was falling. What was she doing? The air, the air… Wasn’t she going to find the source of the heavy air? Did she step on a trap of some sort?

Riiiiip. Her clothes caught onto something, and the corner of her sleeve was torn right off, unable to even barely break her fall. She was falling further and further, the light barely a spark in the distance. She couldn’t feel anything, though she imagined she was falling down some sort of pipe.

She needed to stop—

Thud.