Chapter 1536: Faceless Ones
It got a little boring since I was just literally following the guy while trying my best to keep silent without resorting to using my magic.
I actually believe this guy is a normal human. And yes, I mean a human, not a Mahun. As in this guy probably came from my old World before it got destroyed and he has been stuck here ever since.
It’s been quite a long time since my old World was gone but... I have a feeling that time works differently in this space so maybe instead of several years, he’s only been here for a short while.
For now, we were just simply searching for another way out, because that lift we came from definitely did not lead anywhere else.
The only good thing was that I didn’t really need to think right now since I was just following behind him and letting him lead the way. The bad thing was that, as I said... It was rather boring...
If I was alone, I would have just strolled through this floor without a care in the world.
And if the monster shows up, I’ll just beat it up and then make it my bitch.
I suppressed a yawn as I continued behind him, where we were just planning to follow the walls to walk along the perimeter of the room to see if there was another door that would lead us somewhere.
So far, aside from more bookshelves and even more bookshelves, we have yet to find anything else that would even suggest that it was a way out of here.
At least we have been quiet enough that we have not seen any signs of the monster ever since it left so... I would say that we’re doing well so far despite everything else.
On another note, I got so bored that I even pulled out some of the books from the shelves to see if there were any interesting books for me to read at least, only to realise that the books were complete gibberish.
The words on them weren’t words at all, like what you might see in a dream where the words are just a jumbled up mess of symbols.
I almost made the mistake of tossing the book aside after realising that it was rubbish but remembered that I should not be making any unnecessary sounds at the last moment and placed it on another shelf silently.
Feeling quite bored, I looked around to check that the monster was not nearby before turning to Grant to whisper, "Hey... How long do you think we’ll have to be here?"
He paused and turned back to raise an eyebrow at me, "Why? Are you tired already? I guess we can take a break somewhere... But we have to be quiet though."
"Not really, but I’m trying to clear this place as fast as possible. So if this is going to take a while..."
"Take a while? How long did you take to clear the last floor?"
"The one with the pools? Err... An hour, maybe? I dunno, I wasn’t timing myself."
His eyes widened and he let out a loud gasp, "One ho--"
He cut himself off as he covered his mouth with his hand, remembering belatedly that we weren’t supposed to make any noise on this floor.
Unfortunately, that seemed to be enough to catch the monster’s attention. Or most likely, the monster had already been nearby to begin with so it heard the gasp pretty easily.
I’ve already done this before so I didn’t panic and simply pulled out two books from the shelf beside us and waited.
The moment the monster appeared from around the corner, I first threw the book in my left hand to smack it in its face, prompting it to skid to a stop as though it was confused at being hit with the book.
When it recovered, I threw the second book to lob it over its head, letting it smack against another bookshelf a short distance away.
The monster jerked in response to the sound and immediately turned to rush towards the bookshelf that was hit with the book to slash its hand at the shelf.
I was honestly expecting the shelf to topple over and crash into the ground but... The monster’s hand simply bounced off from the shelf and the shelf rattled slightly in response but it did not even move an inch.
Huh... Interesting... That means the bookshelves are things that are immovable in this space.
So you could ram as hard as you want against the bookshelves and it wouldn’t even budge in this specific room.
I turned to look at Grant who was giving me a very thankful look since I basically saved his life again, even though he was looking a little hilarious with how he was desperately covering his mouth shut with both his hands at the moment.
I waved at him to show that it was no big deal and we watched the creature ’scan’ around with that satellite dish head before it slowly trudged away.
Honestly, I was pretty relaxed throughout the whole event but Grant only relaxed his shoulders when the monster disappeared out of sight.
He slowly lowered his shaking hands and let out a breath before turning back to whisper, "Thanks... Shit... Almost screwed us over, didn’t I?"
I waved my hand, "Don’t worry about it. Feels like we’re pretty safe with all these books around that we can use to make noise with anyway so it shouldn’t be a problem even if we made a mistake."
He nodded, "It feels like you’re the veteran here for you to react so quickly like that... Did you... Really clear the pool floor in just an hour?"
"I think so? Like you said, there’s no way to measure time in here... But I definitely did not take that long. It honestly might not even have been an hour to be honest. Since I haven’t stopped to take a break on that floor until I reached that elevator and found you."
"I see... You must have been either really lucky or really good then. I think that might even be a new record for the fastest time a person has cleared a floor around here... At least that I know of, of course. Usually a floor would definitely need longer than just an hour and... If you measure by sleep cycles, it could take several dozens of them before you can find the exit. Assuming that you don’t die during your attempt to escape of course..."
I tilted my head at him, "Just how many other people have you met during your time here?"
"A number... Things just... Blur together after a while... I don’t remember all of them but... I can at least remember there were more than a dozen at least."
"And everyone still ends up getting separated in the end?"
He shrugged, "In a place like this... It’s harder to stick together than it is to go separately. You get chased by a monster? You’d need to split up instead of running together. And when you split up, you might end up on a different floor during the chase and get separated."
Hmm... I can imagine that.
I was just about to tell him I understood when I widened my eyes when I saw what was ahead of us.
He saw my face and turned to look as well, spotting another guy who was dressed in a hoodie and carrying a large rucksack strolling between the bookshelves and looking quite confident of himself.
I’m pretty sure this guy isn’t one of the monsters on this floor so I was quite surprised to see him walking in like he owned the place.
That was when the guy turned to look at us and... I realised the person did not have a face.
It was like looking at a picture of someone who had their face blurred out.
"A Faceless One..." Grant whispered before slowly motioning me to back away. "I don’t know if this one is hostile or not but--"
He didn’t get to finish his words as the faceless figure spotted us and started rushing towards us in a menacing way.
I quickly stepped out in front of Grant and gave the thing a kick in its chest, sending it skidding back to smack against the bookshelf with a loud thud.
A shriek came from the direction of where the monster had disappeared too and it came sprinting back, smacking its arm into the faceless thing to knock it down to the ground.
Both of us then watched as the radar head creature mounted the faceless creature and started smashing its head into the ground before its head burst into an explosion of blood all over the floor.
Only when that happened did the radar head creature stand back up and despite not really having a face, I could tell it was proud of its work and it was basking in the kill before it stomped away.
Ok... So... Good to know that these things could kill each other too...
And what are these faceless ones?