‘… a door?’

As soon as my ‘hammer fist’ hit the protruding rock, it immediately cracked open. However, it didn’t break in a logical way.

The breaking point where it started cracking wasn’t the part I hit with my fist, instead, it started cracking from the base up. For some reason, it seemed like it was made to break this way.

Furthermore, what was revealed under the rock was nothing other than a gate entrance! Considering the way the rock cracked, it felt more like a glass case lock that acted as a quick access door when needed.

Of course, the rock cracked fast enough that the normal human eye wouldn’t catch how it did so, but thanks to my Perception, it was harder for me not to notice it.

‘Is that why it managed to stay hidden this long…?’

.

Looking at the black swirling pit that barely fit for one person to slide in without squeezing, I couldn’t help but ponder on the nature of this Dark Gate…

If that special rock really acted in a way to conceal whatever allowed a gate to be discovered, then it did make sense that it managed to hide in plain sight while being this close to the Dragon Clan’s Stronghold.

‘Let’s keep it for now.’

Taking the rock’s possible special nature into consideration, I took out a container from my ring before using ‘Telekinesis’ to collect its fragments into the container before stashing it back into the ring.

While I was interested in studying it directly, I resisted the urge since I had something much larger to deal with. Just clearing a demon base would consume too much of my already limited time, focusing on something as time-consuming as research wasn’t particularly an option.

[ ‘Demon Base Corruption Gate’ (Two-floor) (Special)

Status: Active

Current Location: outside the gate ]

[ Time until Outer Invasion ] : [ 61d: 5h: 6m: 3s ]

Taking a quick glance at the system prompt, I was disappointed to find that its information was the exact same as the first demon base-type Dark Gate that I found. The only part worth my interest was the breakout timer.

‘It isn’t that long.’

While it made sense that the timer wouldn’t be as long as the one that I found when I just started out since time still passed in every domain, I couldn’t help but worry about the future if this continued.

‘If it goes on like that…’

The possibility of demons roaming free even without the help from the residents of the domain was looming ahead.

‘Should I… jump in?’

Trying to shake away the worry since I couldn’t find a definite solution to it, I put my focus back into the small gate entrance.

Looking at the narrow passage that didn’t seem like it would allow me to pass vertically, I decided to simply step into it.

‘This is new.’

As soon as both my legs touched the gate’s ‘entrance’, my body slowly started sinking down. Feeling my legs but not being able to see them was definitely a new experience that no other gate has given me.

Disregarding the physics of how gates worked, just coming into contact with the entrance would usually let you in as a whole, so this gate was particularly special in this manner.

‘…really?’

After my body had completely gone through the opening, I was barely able to take in my surroundings before the force of gravity took control of my body…

‘Is ‘falling down’ the theme of this domain?’

Having already experienced an even graver fall, I was only slightly annoyed by the repetition of the accident before I unfolded my wings to ease my landing.

Fortunately, the ground wasn’t that low, by the time I balanced myself with my wings aided by ‘Flight of The Wind Dragon’, my legs had already touched the hard ground.

‘I guess this is better than fainting.’

Since I had a particularly bad history with getting into demon base corruption gates, I found the current situation much better than the last two. After all, one started with fainting, while the other directly shoved me into a trial.

‘This is…’

Taking a look at my surroundings once more, I felt slightly vigilant, the large underground scenery looked very similar to me.

‘Did I get sent directly into the base this time…?’

Even though I mentally prepared myself, I started to doubt my suspicion. While this place was almost identical to a demon base, it wasn’t only empty, but it also had something that other bases didn’t.

‘More… holes?’

Hole-like openings were spread all around the ground, what was under them wasn’t visible as only darkness could be seen.

‘This is familiar.’

While it was confusing at the start, as I hopped into the Greatsword form of ‘Lightning Cloud’ and controlled it to cruise around using sword essence, I quickly felt a sense of familiarity.

It wasn’t that apparent while on the ground, but when I looked at it from above, all the openings were both uniform and distributed evenly. If there was another place that this reminded me of, then it could only be the underground hall in the first demon base corruption gate.

‘Is the gate reversed?’

Judging by my experience, it seemed like the openings were also mini-gates that I needed to jump into and clear so that I could access the base, but the sequence of it all felt awkward.

Furthermore, there was something that existed in the underground hall but was missing here. There was no large opening that had a counter for mini-gates cleared.

‘Well, I will know it when I try it.’

Having already entered the gate, I could only test how it worked. As such, I paused ‘Lightning Cloud’ above the closest opening to me and lowered it down.

The reason that I relied on ‘sword flight’ instead of using my wings was that it had the most efficient consumption when it was used to barely hover above the ground. On the other hand, my wings worked better at a higher altitude.

Since I didn’t want to fall again in case the earlier accident repeated itself, I planned to use ‘Lightning Cloud’ as a step to fly from instead of tumbling down.

‘As expected.’

As I went down through the dark opening, I encountered another gate entrance similar to the one I passed through earlier, confirming my guess.

No longer being my first experience of it, the access this time felt fast. However, I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows when I checked the inside of this mini-gate after my face had passed through…

‘Even more holes…?’