The hole leading to the bone region was located at the absolute center of the base, it was normal for it to be located here when one thought about it. It was the reason the base existed after all.

When Rune, Arik, and Astryde passed through the perception blockers of the biggest dome of the surface base, a hive of activity was unveiled to their perception.

The whole size of the hole, multiple kilometers in diameters, had been streamlined and arranged to welcome a gigantic platform of metal layered by an energy construct.

‘Whoa, is building this big that easy? Or are there vested interests in making it this big? For the future maybe? Or it was scaled up after a smaller elevator?’

Curiosity abounds, Rune couldn’t help himself and wondered how all of what he was seeing happened.

But more impressive, or as impressive as the elevator itself was the thousands of people present and working. Just from a single perception sweep, he could split all those people into tens of different groups with each their own objectives.

At the center were the energy builders, ascertaining the stability of the construct, around them were the momentum providers, 100 of them, in all four directions were supply groups charged with moving hundreds of crates, moving around were checkers and mechanical engineers making sure everything was going fine, another group seemed to manage the overall situation from the top of the dome…

And then there was the user group, the one they joined and who was waiting at the side for the elevator to be ready to descend.

“You still have your camera Arik?”

“Oh,” hearing the reminder made by Rune, Arik woke up from his stupor and took out an arm-sized camera. It was the one used to film the park, so it had benefited from a high budget of tens of millions of EP, and the resulting quality was really worth the price they had paid from what Arik had said.

After he finished configuring the camera settings, he turned it on, smiled, and made it float before him with his back towards the gigantic elevator platform full of activity using his energy, “This is the elevator leading to the bone region, I’m with Rune and Astryde, it took us 2 months and a half to arrive, we weren’t told anything…”

‘A true informant!’

Rune could only nod repeatedly while trying to make him laugh by making weird facial expressions after seeing the instant transformation and the way he wielded the camera, Astryde was just waiting at the side for their antics to be finished.

With only half an hour remaining until the planned departure time, they had all the time in the world and no pressure. That’s why they were able to do what they wanted, even when being watched by hundreds of uniformed patrollers who looked at them like freaks.

If it wasn’t for the arrival of what the group of 3 could only interpret as “military officers”, the vlog-like video would have even lasted during the last 10 minutes before the departure.

It had to be said that a few people in very expensive-looking and very adorned patroller uniforms escorted by scary-looking dudes was the right way to show they held some authority.

When one of the officers looked at them, and it was very much clear he was looking at them in particular, they could only act like he didn’t exist, or at least Rune and Arik acted like he didn’t exist, Astryde just looked back and nodded as if they knew each other.

Then came the time of departure, and the officer who glanced at them took a step forward, appearing to be in charge of the group of people who’ll use the elevator, Rune’s group included.

“All 318 of you,” his deep energy-infused voice was perfectly audible as he started to speak, “I’m in charge of leading all of you to the front base while passing by the deep base to deliver materials and receive equipment, after which I’ll give a crash course on the accumulated knowledge we have about the bone region.”

No name, no details, just a straight-to-the-point presentation, pinpointing what everyone here was for. As he spoke, all the supply groups and more than 90% of the technical crew started to vacate the platform, leaving behind only a huge amount of crates.

“Following that, you’ll all, or nearly all,” he explicitly glanced at the group of adventurers, “Be assigned to a new squad commander, let’s go, the elevator is going to depart.”

At the same time as their group stepped onto the platform, another group also stepped on it, they were much less numerous and were most probably not patrollers, most likely transiting scientists that came to the surface base for some reason if Rune had to give his opinion.

A few minutes after they all went to the mid-center part where the area was void of anything, the momentum providers started to touch different floating propulsion cores, and the platform started to descend.

“Expect the travel time necessary to be 5 hours, it’s also not excluded that the elevator may have to stop brutally if something was to happen, it has already happened, and going from 80 kilometers per second to zero isn’t a pleasant experience,” the officer informed them of the answers to the most likely questions that popped in the mind of everyone as the gravity felt by everyone started to lighten significantly.

“The gravity will be reversed soon, so go where there are structures made to receive you, don’t worry about the crates, they’re fixed.”

It seemed the group of momentum providers didn’t care about accelerating gradually to their maximum speed as, soon, the gravity started to be reversed, and those at the center acted like it was normal as they rotated their bodies to this time step onto the “ceiling” to adapt to the new gravity.

“Arik, psss! Camera?”

“Yes.”

“You bunch of kids.”

In good humor, the group started their antics again. Whatever happened was a reason for having fun for them, it was so new to Rune that he kept finding new things to think about.

“Woah, how’s your perception Arik? Mine is only seeing flashes at the side, it’s so much better than only free falling for days and days!” Taking a purposely more excited voice, Rune was happy to follow the way Arik just showed him.

“We only have a quarter of a second to observe what’s external to the elevator at this speed, and that’s with a peak tier 4 perception sphere,” once again in vlog attitude, he let out all his thoughts, making sure anyone who saw the video later would want to experience what they were living?

“I’m really excited to see what this deep base will look like. Looking at all the crates of materials being transported, it wouldn’t surprise me if it was ten times bigger than the surface base we just saw!”

“Rune is doing strange things… Let’s ignore him and start to hypothesize on how the IGS brought monsters down to test the effects of the bone region on them, we’re all intellectuals except for my friends looking at me like I killed his family, right?”

“Oh…”

“From the information I gathered before coming here…”

Acting like he had been hurt by what he said, Rune left him to do the video alone.

As nothing was planned to happen within 5 hours, he found a sufficient justification to do one thing on which he had accumulated a lot of insight but didn’t have time to study them all.

So he summoned a 10-centimeter in diameter orb of cosmic mist.

‘Time for some intent tinkering.’

…

As the officer “said” before departing, nothing would happen until after their stop at the deep base, and it really took them 5 hours before Rune had to stop tinkering with his intent.

The energy builders and the momentum providers alike were changing their idle ways and he soon understood why, as strange marks started to appear on the wall of the tunnel. First gigantic green circles, then yellow, and now the gravity was lessening rapidly.

They were clearly and obviously indicators put there by the IGS to help the crew of the elevator knows when the elevator was nearing their stop and should slow down.

From 80 kilometers per hour, the speed was reduced to a few kilometers per hour, and it was then that red indicators started to appear in Rune’s perception.

The gravity then started to reverse once again, coming back to its normal state as the speed was once more reduced, and then the red indicators switched to black ones.

The elevator arrived at its first stop out of two.

And compared to his guessed estimation of ten times bigger than the surface base…

‘I’m not that far I think, multiple floors descending further down than what my perception is able to see, every item is checked so far.’

With what Rune could see, his mind concluded it was the first-ever time he saw something that clearly showed it belonged to the scientific domain in the Endless.

‘It’s so similar to the science station I visited back during my onsite training, full of people who know what they’re doing, and me who only understands one part of it. Even though this part changed from the exploration engineer part to nothing.’

The way this deep base was made could be described simply: A cylinder with the hole tunnel piercing the center.

The elevator continued to descend, ultimately stopping at a big open section in the middle of the deep base, and seeing all the transformation that took place, Rune’s mind was blown.

“Sigh, Arik…” He joined Arik who was still filming, “Long is gone the time where the tunnel was only a tunnel, look at that. I’m only a rural citizen, is taking a bit more than a year to transform everything like that normal? Back in the day-”

“Go away, I’ll even edit your part out.”

Rotating his body by 180 degrees, Rune changed his target, “Sigh, Astryde… Is it normal for-”

“Yes it is,” and that was the answer that finished the discussion.

Or not.

After nonchalantly turning away, she turned his way again and finally satiated his curiosity, “You probably don’t know cause you’re so ignorant, but EP taxes exist, and the IGS is very happy with making all their earnings circulate again in the market.”

“So no problem with money, ok.”

‘Taxes? Something to check out later.’

“Yes, in terms of budget, as long as something looks good and there are good reasons, it’ll receive billions of EP of budget easily. As for the manpower and the technical prowess, believe me when I say that adventuring when someone possesses engineering skill is completely stupid if it isn’t for leveling their masteries,” like a teacher, Astryde took the time to answer with not just a yes or no, but also gave the reasoning behind.

“Mmh.”

“As for the time of 1 year, it’s largely enough. Search for videos of workers making skyscrapers, machines are not needed anymore, and when a team of tier 3 with maxed stats is taken into account, enormous concrete blocks can be piled up like it’s nothing, and they’re even able to melt the concrete to make perfect joints… Sigh, sounds amazing right?” Ending her answer by sighing, she even moved and impressed herself by talking about that.

“I’m adding that to my list thank you.”

Soon enough, the platform was secured by pincers on the side and hundreds of people stepped on it to bring out all the supplies intended for them. The small group of probable scientists also exited the moment the elevator stopped moving.

As for the user group, a few people started to approach them, with one of those few going for Rune directly.

“Rune Tudor, Astryde Sirle, Arik Tiddeldom, please come with me, your custom equipment is ready,” inviting them to follow, the male rululu didn’t express anything, like it was routine for him.

Following behind him, they went through a door that slid open automatically and arrived at an expansive room, just next to the landing zone where the elevator was waiting.

‘Well, what do we have here…’

“Yikes, that’s what my nightmares are about, that’s also what I expected, unfortunately,” Astryde was the first to react, and she made the exact reaction Rune was having in his mind.

“Well, with only bones remaining in the bone region, it’s not a new rule that is added, it’s the whole board that is flipped,” the rululu who escorted them here seemed to understand what they were feeling and made a rational comment about where they were going.

“Doesn’t change the fact that this room looks like a creepy props stock room,” Arik sharply answered with a weird face.

Despite their strong reaction at seeing the “custom equipment”, the rululu didn’t care and led them to a platform in the center of the room, “Step onto it, we’ll have your measurements that way and have the right equipment given to you in just a few minutes.”

When the group stepped on it, the platform activated and he started to use his energy to select different pieces of equipment, separating them into 3 packages on which their names were written down.

A few minutes later they were given their packages and escorted back to the elevator, where new groups of people were repeating the exact same scene as what happened at the surface base.

“Do you know when the elevator is leaving? Can we explore the deep base?” Arik brought the subject up, seeming very interested in making more content.

“Mmh…” Using his connected lenses, he checked things and issued a reply that Rune and Arik very much liked while politely smiling, “You have 2 hours. You can visit the base, but I need to remain with you so I’ll follow after you.”

And that’s how the 1 hour and 50 minutes long deep base filming crew was created before vanishing from existence, only hectic footage remaining from it.

…

“I repeat! The feeling of dread you will feel is purely artificial! Do not panic, and under no circumstances should you let this panic control your mind!”

The elevator was ready to depart again, and the officer was finally starting to endorse his true role: Leading the first-timers to the bone region’s front base and making them take a crash course on the way.

“Oh, yeah, that feeling is no joke, it’s what completely blocked me from descending further.”

“Really?” Even Arik seemed taken aback by what Rune just said, not to mention Astryde.

“Mister ‘I go suicide my avatar’ was controlled by his primitive instinct? What will become of us then?” She exaggerated a bit, but a sliver of true expectation appeared in her eyes soon after.

“It’ll be my first time being transformed into only bones anyway, so I’m the same as you.”

In their own corner, the group of 3 Undecided kept their worry at a minimal level, they had secured the packages they were given and only waited for the elevator to pass the region transition.

“The crash course will start in 20 minutes! By that time we’ll have all been transformed and for you first-timers, you’ll have the time to experience this new state for some time. Start thinking about all the problems inherent to being transformed in the bone region. If at the end of the course I didn’t answer all your questions, you’ll be allowed to ask them. It’s not like you have something else to do, right?”

Using the descent to make them undergo a crash course was a genius move. Nobody could ignore what was said when they had nothing to do.

It was then that the elevator really started to pick up speed, and from zero gravity, the gravity was once again reversed.

A few seconds later a feeling of dread appeared, one Rune was intimately familiar with.

‘Hello you dread, my old friend? I’ve come to see you once again… It matches somewhat, doesn’t it?’

At the speed they were going, the elevator couldn’t stop, and in a flash, the usual dark rocks were completely replaced by its grey version he knew so much.

They had completely passed through the transition, and the new region started to make its special rules known to them.

“I’m tripping…” Arik was the first to externalize what they were feeling.

Rune and Astryde would have answered him if the situation was normal, but it wasn’t.

It wasn’t pain, it wasn’t death, it was just pure condensed weirdness, accompanied by a spicy layer of dread that their lizard brain couldn’t control and kept them from thinking and acting normally.

However, as it was their own body that was the target of those special warped region’s laws, they could perfectly understand what was happening. They were even able to see in real-time how little by little… Their skin, flesh, organs, nails, and hairs were being dissolved.

‘Exactly as I remember it, health is migrating, the flesh is losing its volume, the only difference is that my health is still alive and that it's all of my body that is subjected to this phenomenon.’

At the same time, Rune observed that his bone structure was also modified. Bone’s junctions where cartilage could be found were transformed to keep the integrity of the general structure, and internal energy cycles started being made by magic.

The bone region wasn’t a trap region where anyone who entered would be trapped forever, it had been tested again and again before the first sapient team went through the bone transformation that the warped law had no real impact after exiting the region.

‘I’m being transformed to fit into the new warped law. The good news is that for such a heavy warp to have happened, the warping quota must have been completely and utterly depleted, so probably no distance warping? The bad news is that it must have been a hell of a quota to begin with, so maybe tier 6 or 7?’

After the intense feeling of dread receded, his usual logical and rational mind took over and it even went into overdrive as it remembered all sorts of relevant knowledge from the guide.

In a few minutes, the transformation was finished and Rune was now faced with a new issue he knew would happen.

With all organic matters gone, everyone was left with nothing in terms of physical senses, literally nothing. Their eyeballs were gone, so no sight, their eardrums were gone, so no sound, their skin was gone, so no touch… Everything was gone.

Even their brains.

The physical clothes used by nearly everyone also didn’t have anything to cover anymore, and as they weren’t made to cover humanoid skeletons. Rune, with his energy clothing, didn’t have this problem and just opted to keep them as they were, not becoming a nude skeleton.

Not one of the 3 Undecided was ready to speak yet, not only due to not having recreated a way to speak, but also due to so many new developments taking place.

‘Can I artificially recreate any of my senses using energy? How are the physical senses specialized doing under those circumstances?’

And then…

“Oh Astryde, what beautiful bones you have! I never thought I would say that one day, and believe me when I say I kept it in a corner of my head for a few weeks already!”

He wasn’t the one who said that, and he didn’t think Astryde was the one who said that either, so it only left one person as the culprit, the bearded shorty who wielded the camera.

By habits, he turned his head, but only his perception allowed him to “see” what was happening: Arik had created a weird energy construct and placed it near his “mouth”.

Still, with his perception, Rune started to analyze the energy construct that allowed Arik to emulate a larynx, the universal answer nature found to create complex sounds in mammals once added with a mouth and a tongue.

‘Well, it seems I messed up and didn’t study before the exam, freak my studies habits.’

And his conclusion was that it was a very complex energy construct that couldn’t be replicated just like that.

If he could grin, he would. It was so easy to see he didn’t prepare that it reminded him of those days where he got so obsessed with entertainment that he forgot he was a student.

‘Yup, I think I can make so many connections now that I think about it, the exam is now, all the entertainment is the intent tinkering at the park, the repeated mindless fights during the travel to here, and the filming crew when we reached the surface base.’

Having reached an irrelevant but funny conclusion, he shook his head as he reached for the secured package containing custom equipment.

He would have to act like a mute for the next few hours or days.