The group presses on, deeper into that cave. As they go deeper, the stink becomes stronger. Akino turned her left arm into a Geiger counter, that ticks slowly. More bones covered in blood and fecal matter could be seen as they go deeper, and Akino’s Geiger starts ticking louder and faster.

Akino: First, the meatball monster and now this! This is getting out of hand.

Lyka: Should we continue?

Akino: Yeah, we should. If that thing gets out of here, the whole forest will be consumed by these creatures.

Alexa: How about Olguk? He’s not immune to radiation like us.

Akino: We should tell him to stay he –

Before Akino finishes her words, they heard a distant roar. The monster that Akino and Alexa met when they left their pods, a four-legged flesh full of hollowed faces and protruding arms. Lyka was stunned on the sight, and Olguk collapses on the floor, trembling in fear. Akino turned her left arm into a minigun, and an extended mechanical arm appears on her back with cryo-missiles. Alexa turned herself muscular, her hair became spear-claws of a spear mantis shrimp and charges at the creature. As the two fought the monster, Lyka drags the orc away from the conflict and casts a protective spell on him.

Lyka: Stay here!

Olguk: G – got it!

Lyka runs back to the two to join in engaging the creature. Akino was able to freeze the legs of the creature, Alexa follows up by smashing the frozen legs, the creature falls, but it is noticeable that its injured parts are starting to heal. Alexa pounds the main body of the creature, but she could sense that with every hit she does, the whole cave shakes. She stops smashing the creature.

Alexa: Blast it with the gatling canon or something!

Akino: Do you want me to make this cave collapse?

Lyka: What are we going to do? Its healing already.

As the creature slowly regenerates, it releases a faint smoke from its body. Both Alexa and Lyka sniffed in the air, but Lyka sneezes and gags.

Lyka: What is that foul smell?!

Alexa: Is that methane?

Lyka: Methane?

Akino: Flammable gas… shit! I can’t shoot nor toast this dude!

Lyka: Why is that so?

Akino: If I light it up with this concentration of methane in the air, it may cause combustion that could lead to a damaging explosion.

Alexa: We can survive that explosion, but Olguk won’t.

Lyka: I placed a protective spell on him, he will be fine.

Akino: This cave will collapse if the explosion occurs, let’s say he’s well protected by that spell of yours, but the falling rocks may also collapse the floor, making him fall and trapping him.

Alexa: Methane asphyxiation may also kill him. But I’m not underestimating you, okay?

Akino: Are you pertaining something, kid?

Lyka: I – I can cast dark flames on it, burning it to ashes?

Akino: I just told you, we can’t light it –

Alexa: Hey, Aki! She has magic, remember?

Akino: I – I’m sorry…

Lyka: Mother taught me how to use the dark flame. When we hunt and didn’t place a lethal strike on the prey, we cast the dark flame on, soothing the pain that the animal feels, and killing the prey in an instant but painlessly. Like a mercy kill. The casted flame will instead burn the soul of the animal, making it dead.

Akino: Wow. That’s – that’s pretty useful.

Lyka raises her right hand, pointed towards the nearly healed creature. The creature slowly drags itself towards the three. Lyka nervously casts her spell, bluish flame started to appear on the creature. It stills releases gases, and shockingly speaks.

“HELP ME!”

“DON’T EAT ME!”

“PLEASE, I’M BEGGING YOU!”

“OH GOD!”

The creature has many voices, it kept on pleading until it stops moving and the releasing of smoke ceases. Lyka successfully killed the creature, and she collapses on her knees due to the shock of hearing the monster plead. Akino goes to her side and comforts her.

Lyka: Its – its…

Akino: It’s done now, don’t worry.

Alexa: Wow! The flesh isn’t even hot.

Lyka: The creature – it has ten souls… TEN HUMAN SOULS! ALL OF THEM BEGGING FOR HELP! WHAT DID YOUR WORLD HAS CREATED?!

Akino: I – I don’t know… every time we see them, we either let them be or we kill it fast. But most of the time we avoid them…

Lyka calms herself. She kneels near the dead creature, chanted a prayer, and stands.

Alexa: Ma, are you alright?

Lyka: I’m fine now. I’m sorry I snapped out of you, Aki… it’s just – undermining…

Akino: I know. We had the same reaction when we first encounter it.

Akino and Lyka went to the young orc and told that he must stay outside and prepare any first aid once they’ve rescued his companions.

Olguk: I want to save them myself!

Akino: Do you want to face that thing again?

Olguk: I – I think I can…

Lyka: We promise we’ll save them.

Olguk: O – okay, I’ll stay outside…

Akino: With that settled, shall we go on?

Lyka: Lead the way.

The two met up with Alexa, who’s been busy looking around that area. The whole place seems to be a dead end.

Alexa: What do you think?

Akino: That couldn’t fit itself in very small gaps.

Alexa: That is obvious… but take a look at this!

Alexa points to the ground. The ground seems to be normal, but when she touches it, that portion moves like a living animal, like a contracting flesh. It revealed a wide hole, with a dark area with a smell of rotting blood.

Akino: That stinks, and very disgusting!

Lyka: What happened to that ground?

Alexa: It’s weird, but this portion of ground was turned into a ‘flesh door’…

Lyka: I’ll just assume that monster did this.

Akino: We should head in now.

Alexa enters first, then Akino, and then Lyka. They lighted the whole area, the walls covered in flesh and stinking with blood. Corpses of goblins are scattered inside, all rotting and unpleasing. They circled that chamber, and saw a little gap, they lit it up with their LED lights and saw an opened metallic door.

Lyka: That writing is similar to your alphabet thing.

Akino: Facility B18… looks like we found what we’re looking for in the first place.

Alexa: Olguk’s friends must have entered inside.

Alexa hands some piece of cloth she found clinging on the opening of the door. It’s covered in green blood, an orc blood. Akino opens the door widely and went to the wall side, finding a control panel. She tweaks it, and all the lights inside that abandoned place opens, but dimly. The dimmed lighting reveals a hallway, with brown and red stains on the walls and floors.

Lyka: So, this is what a human structure in your world looks like in person…

Alexa: Yeah, but without this dirty stuff.

Akino: If Olguk’s friends are still inside, we should hurry. The radiation will kill them… but let’s hope that creatures with magic can be tolerant to radiation.

They went inside, walking briskly in that dirtied hallway. After a few meters, the hallway was cut into an intersection of three different directions. Akino releases some drones, one on each direction.

Akino: We go here!

Akino ran in the middle, the other two followed. The hallway ends into a large, warped lobby area. The usual plaque with the speech of the founder of the institution was hanging from the ceiling, the information desk area was conjoined with some electric stoves and metal benches, the concrete pillars were twisted like licorice candies, and some walls have rocks protruding out of it, but the walls weren’t damaged, as if the place was built like that. At the left corner near an elevator, two people, a human girl and a male elf, were sitting on the ground, wounded and covered in blood. They rushed hurriedly to the wounded and applied first aid.

Akino: Hey! Hey! Talk to me!

The girl groans as blood and saliva pours out of her closed lips, the elf was wheezing while holding on to his stomach with almost all his guts coming out.

Akino: Lyka, heal that guy. I’ll take this girl. She doesn’t have any major injury, but she’s experiencing internal hemorrhage.

Lyka: She’s bleeding inside? But I can see she protected herself with a magic barrier.

Alexa: Then the magic barrier didn’t do that much to stop the radiation from killing her.

Akino: She’s still holding on, the barrier did a trick but still staying in a highly radioactive place will slowly kill them.

Akino turned her mechanical arm towards the neck of the girl, she injects something on her. She did the same on the guy.

Lyka: Should I cast healing on her as well?

Akino: Yeah, and double their barrier. The potassium iodide will treat the internal contamination, but we should still be careful.

Alexa: I’ll carry them, ma. Give him to me.

Lyka: Thanks.

Alexa lifts the two injured, all the while Lyka continues to heal them, and Akino on the rearguard of them, they left the place went outside the cave where Olguk waits.

Olguk: Thank you! Thank you for saving them!

Akino: Dude, can you stay away for a while? We will decontaminate them.

Olguk: Decom – what?

Lyka: Ummm, she means they’re… diseased? Right! They’re diseased, so we’re going to clean them!

Alexa: Yeah! It will be bad if the disease spreads out, you know.

Olguk: Al – alright… but are they okay?

Akino: They are safe, don’t worry.

The orc leaves and goes to one of their makeshift tents to prepare some sustenance. Akino sprays a lot of decontamination chemicals on themselves.

Akino: Thanks for the save.

Lyka: I – I did nothing.

Alexa: Cleaning them because they’re diseased… that’s a new way of saying ‘decontaminating irradiated people’.

Lyka: Well, it’s because Aki’s always forgetting the ‘technical’ stuff.

Akino: Wha – Alexa! You told her?!

Alexa: What? He wouldn’t understand it if ma didn’t say anything.

Akino blushes off.

Akino: This – this is embarrassing…

Lyka: There’s nothing to be embarrassed about, we all make mistakes.

Alexa whispers to Akino.

Alexa: I already did you a favor, hehehe!

Akino: Shut up!

Akino finishes spraying them, they took the injured in one of the tents. Both Lyka and Alexa were assisting Olguk on looking the two, then Akino went outside to go back to the cave, Lyka follows her.

Lyka: Hey, you’re going back there?

Akino: Yeah… I need to know what happened there, so that we could know something what happened in our world… and possibly we could go back and solve anything we could.

Lyka’s expression glooms, Akino glimpses at her and holds her hand with a smile.

Akino: I said, WE. And you said that you’re coming with us, so no ones going to be alone.

Lyka blushes, and gently swats Akino’s hand.

Lyka: I’m – I’m not pertaining to anything… so, we’re going in? How about the adventurers?

Akino: Nah… Alexa will take care of them. She’s a good cook, remember?

Akino went to Alexa and told her to stay guard and help the adventurers.

Alexa: Really? Leaving the hard work, ON ME?

Akino: Mine’s much harder than cooking.

Alexa: Okay, fine. Goodluck with the date.

Lyka: D-Date?!

Akino: Just… don’t mind her.

The two went back to the cave, going straight to the facility. They went again to the middle path, entering the warped lobby area, and taking the elevator they saw earlier.

Lyka: Where are we going?

Akino: To the core chamber, it might store some raw information on what happened here. And get yourself ready, we might face something dangerous on our way there.

Lyka: I will.

The elevator stops, the doors open. Unlike on what Akino and Alexa saw when they entered the core chamber on the previous Facility-13, the lights were off. The whole path was covered with liquid as they step onwards, Akino lights up the place by having an LED light on her right shoulder. The path was flooded with blood, a bit higher than the foot ankle. Akino thoroughly inspected their path, saw some machine heads floating, broken rifle, and some other still intact MC-00 machines, sitting on the flood ground or splashing the blood on their machine ‘faces’.

Lyka immediately holds Akino’s hand after seeing those, terrified and shocked.

Lyka: Th – these machines… they’re the same ones we used on my training in your mind, right?

Akino: Yeah. But the ones we used in the virtual matrix were a bit different compared to these things. When we first encountered them, they were covered in flesh and blood…

Lyka: Speaking of blood, this pool smells like human blood… what happened here?

Akino: I don’t know… but they should be attacking us.

Lyka: Attack us?

Akino: We’re not registered in this facility, and they will treat outsiders entering this chamber as hostiles. But it looks like they’re not functioning properly.

Lyka: What’s that huge door?

Lyka points at the blast door ahead. They went straight to it, Akino tweaks the control panel on the right side to open the door while Lyka waits. The door opens a little bit, so they both help each other forcing the blast doors to open it widely. They saw server machines covered with red shiny moss, the floor still flooded with bloody fluids, and the singular hole at the center leading to the core of the facility. Mysteriously, the flood doesn’t fall down the hole, as if there’s an invisible wall blocking it. Akino touches one of the server machines to check if they’re working.

Akino: These are already wrecked.

Lyka: Can you repair it?

Akino: I’ll try.

Akino tried to repair the server, but she can’t. The zero entropic radiation doesn’t let her manipulate the machines’ parts. Instead, they just walked towards the hole. Lyka shivers as she saw the deep hole.

Akino: Is there something wrong?

Lyka: H – how deep is that?

Lyka backs off while cautiously looking at the hole. Akino stares at her and thought “what’s wrong with her? It’s just a hole”, then she realizes something.

Akino: Scared of heights?

Lyka: NO! I – I’m… I’m feeling uncomfortable seeing deep places, like cliffs or when I’m on a very high tree… it’s – it’s embarrassing…

Akino: Oh… then, I suppose you’ll stay here?

Lyka: Can’t you do it in here and not down there?

Akino: Sorry, but I must directly connect to the core. The servers in here are non-functional.

Lyka sighs in disappointment.

Lyka: O – okay… but how are we going to go down there?

Akino: The elevating platform is non-functional as well, so I can carry you down if you want…

Lyka: Okay… better than staying here.

Akino carries Lyka on her arms. Her back turns into a jetpack, they flew down the hole slowly. Lyka gazes at Akino’s face, she blushes but Akino doesn’t seem to notice her. After a minute, they reached the bottom part of the chamber. The usual flooded floor, the dome like chamber and at the center was a huge liquid sphere, the core of the facility. However, the core is tainted, covered in in rust like matter that has grown like salt crystals. Lyka was mesmerized at the sight of it.

Lyka: Is this where you store all the knowledge in your world?

Akino: Yeah. Well, not technically all, but let’s say it’s the brain of this place.

Lyka: And its soul…

Akino: Yeah, you could say that too.

Akino approaches one of the panels near the core.

Akino: Okay... let’s see… hmm… this should do it.

The panels lit up, and the rusted liquid sphere wobbles.

Computer Voice: Welcome to Facility B-18.

Lyka: Is that the core???

Akino: Yeah. Strange, the core where we woke up doesn’t have an artificial intelligence.

Computer Voice: Identification required.

Akino: HQC dash thirty-two.

Lyka: What should I say?

Akino: You’re the 101st, so…

Lyka: Oh. Umm… HQC dash one hundred one?

Computer Voice: Identity confirmed. Welcome to Facility B-18, what would you like inquire?

Lyka: Wait, it knew us just like that?

Akino: It only recognized us as equipment of this organization… but don’t worry, they won’t be able to control us.

Akino thought of something to ask. She looks at Lyka, staring at the sphere.

Akino: Why don’t you try asking?

Lyka: Me?

Akino: Yeah. Ask anything.

Lyka: Okay, I’ll try…

Lyka steps forward to the sphere.

Lyka: Can I ask, what is this place?

Computer Voice: This is the Facility B-18 of the Institute of Humanity. The institute discovered the zero-entropic region and simulated it during the early 21st century. The zero-entropic space led to different dimensions such as this place, designated as Dimension B, the second dimension discovered out of 153 others. The Institute established facilities on the discovered dimensions to investigate its dimensional properties and perform experiments that the Institute believes to benefit the mankind of Earth. Facility B-18 is the 18th facility established in this dimension as part of the extradimensional expansion of the Institution.

Lyka: Wow…

Akino: Could you elaborate what kind of properties discovered and experiments performed in here?

Computer Voice: HQC 32 and HQC 101 are not authorized to access these files.

Akino: Really? How about this?

Akino raises her left arm. A hologram appears on it, with encrypted codes showing on it.

Akino: Can you identify this?

Computer Voice: That encryption is a system algorithm of the universal language the natives of this dimension uses.

Akino: Did it come in here?

Computer Voice: No, the encryption code came from the very first facility established in this dimension, Facility B-1. Additionally, the Institution employed some natives of this dimension in making the encryption a success.

Akino: Lyka, you know about some weird people recruiting in this forest?

Lyka: That’s weird. There’s nothing, I mean I never saw weird humans wandering in this forest.

Akino becomes irritated.

Akino: At least you can show us where is this Facility B-1, right?

Computer Voice: HQC 32 and HQC 101 are not authorized to access these files.

Akino: Bullshit! Is the Institution still in touch with you?! Are they still trying to suppress me and Alexa?!

Lyka: Aki, calm down!

Computer Voice: I’m not at liberty to answer that questions.

Akino: Fuck it! I’ll just override you!

Wires extend from Akino’s head. She tries to connect to the core, but some sort of force field stops the her wires from touching it.

Akino: Oh, come on!

Computer Voice: Only the council can override the core. An authentication procedure is required to override the core.

Akino: And? Just say it!

Computer Voice: At the end of time, we will strive. At the end of the hands, we will wait.

Akino: Wait, what?

Lyka: A riddle?

Computer Voice: Authentication failed. System core under compromission. Facility self-destruct initiated.

Both girls looked at each other.

Lyka: Ummm…

Akino: Okay… I guess we should get out of here…

Computer Voice: System compromised. Eliminating security threats. Self-destruct beginning in 1 minute.

Akino & Lyka: 1 minute?!

Akino immediately carries Lyka and flew to the hole where they entered. She contacted Alexa via her telepathic communication while hurryingly flying outside the core chamber.

Akino: (Alexa! Get out there!)

Alexa: (What?! We just got ourselves comfortable here.)

Akino: (The facility’s core has gone nuclear! We only got less than a minute. Get out of there or protect them!)

Alexa: (Really?! Shit! Alright! Get out of there too! Protect ma, okay!)

Lyka: (We’ll be fine, Alexa. Just go and protect them.)

Alexa: (Okay, Aki, ma. Be safe! I’ll see both of you up here!)

Akino blasts the elevator, flew up the elevator duct, went to the lobby area, and reaching the exit.

The time ticks. Only 10 seconds left. They were able to reach the exit of the facility. 6 seconds. Realizing that it will be impossible to outrun the blast, Akino uses herself as cover to protect Lyka.

Akino: Brace yourself!

Lyka holds Akino. They hold each other. 3 seconds left. And then 1second, the timer ends. The two holds still for seconds. No explosion, no ground shaking, no blast of light nor deafening sound. Nothing.

Lyka: Wh – what happened? It’s supposed to blow, right?

Alexa: (Hey! You guys alright? I heard nothing down there. You guys still there?)

Akino: (Yeah… we’re still here.)

Alexa: (Then hurry up and get here!)

Lyka: (We’re on our way.)

Akino stands and went back to the entrance of the facility. Lyka holds her shoulder as she walks back to that place.

Lyka: Hey! Where are you going?!

Akino: I’m taking a look back. You go ahead and meet up with them.

Lyka: No! I’ll stay here with you!

Akino: O – okay. No need to shout, jeez…

The two went towards the entrance. They were surprised at the sight.

Lyka: Wh – what happened here?

Akino: I – I don’t know…

The door leading to the facility is gone, but there’s a space on the place where the door was supposed to be. They peeked inside only to see the pitch-black void. Akino uses her LED lights to further see what’s inside that black space. Nothing. There’s nothing, like someone or something mined that wide area into nothingness. The facility is missing, as if it was totally removed from that place without tearing the cave.