Sitting on a malformed bench, I remained patient, waiting for a confirmation to my speculation. Around me, my summons were busy with killing off the approaching aberrant creatures, while I was back in my Soul Projection state watching the visually painful battle. My summons appeared as three dimensional shapes made of death and natural mana with black and blue colored souls, and the battle itself was what an abstract painting would have looked like if it had instead been a movie.

Nearby, an aberrant creature that was killed left behind a shattered mess of red mana, but that wasn't all, as the dark crimson clump that was the creature's soul popped out like a cheap gumball. However, even as I watched, the red clump quickly broke down, almost like its mana was sucked back into the red veins parasitizing the bluish walls. In the end, all that was left of the soul was a fingernail sized bright red gem, that shattered and disintegrated.

The ramifications were horrifying. I knew of certain spells that were designed to absorb souls, but no undead, who wished to maintain their sanity and the integrity of their soul would ever do such a thing so casually. It was like sticking a randomly chosen heart into one's body and hoping for the best. The final result was almost always a systemic breakdown of the body. Doing that to a soul was a 100 times worse.

However, even all that was not what worried me. It was something else that I couldn't accept was real. I had seen it happen earlier almost by accident when I was passing by the room, and I hoped I had been imagining things. So, I waited in my current spot, staring at the inside of the room in front of me.

My patience was finally rewarded when I saw a spell formation emerge from a vein of red mana covering the room's floor. The complex spell formation changed at a speed I couldn't keep up with, going through several iterations of structural changes before freezing in a final, bizarre assembly. Almost immediately, red mana was pulled from the mana vein below, coalescing into bony parts that eventually formed a full aberrant creature in a matter of a few seconds. However, that wasn't all. In the center of the aberrant creature, the spell formation finally condensed into a fingernail sized, red gem before solidifying into a crimson soul.

I snapped out of the Side Realm, staring at the newly born aberrant creature in disbelief, as it let out a roar announcing its birth. “Gaaarrrrr!”

“How in the hell?” My mind was racing a hundred miles per hour trying to make sense of what I had seen, not even caring as the aberrant creature rushed me before being dragged away by Slith's tentacles. Everything in Neduzar's memory screamed, telling me what I had seen was impossible. Souls were a combination of mana, memories, and a core individuality, the last of which was an unknown black box created by the Side Realm, and it was that core individuality that formed the very foundation or origin of a soul. However, the mysterious spell in the room had almost instantly created the red gem or aberrant creature's black box/core individuality.

That was not something even a lich of Neduzar's ability had been able to do in his heyday. Even the so called gods of this world were restricted by the Side Realm when it came to the origin of souls. Something other than the Side Realm being able to create such a thing was beyond horrifying. Looking around at the red crystalline veins pulsing all around me, I suddenly felt like I was in the jaws of some monstrous entity, being savored and toyed with.

Standing in the intersection, I began hesitating. What had initially been a exploratory venture was turning into a serious foray into the unknown. My gut was telling me that this place was a serious threat, not only because of what I had seen so far but because this was all that I had seen so far. The question now was the level of danger waiting for me up ahead and if I wanted to take that chance. Everything that had been familiar in the fortress was becoming distorted, and everything I thought I knew about souls from my memory was becoming doubtful. In this place, there was only one thing that had any semblance to Neduzar's memories.

My roving sight finally fell on the black strands of the necromantic spell tightly bound into the red, mana veins. The further I had gone inside this region, the number of those strands did not increase to match the density of red veins. However, they still stubbornly persisted on every mana formation, in every room, and on every surface. Each strand that broke, slowly but doggedly repaired itself. It was the same spell that I recalled, yet not wholly the same.

My memories of the spell told me a different story, one in which the [Web of Despair] was capable of restraining the strongest of High Tier existences and even plunging entire armies and cities into hopelessness. However, watching it barely endure, I wondered how much of the Soul Focus was intact, how badly the Mana Pool had weakened, and once again how long Neduzar had been sealed. Maybe it was my pity or maybe it was some lingering regret that was deep inside Neduzar's memories, but I reached out to one of the dark strands, touching it carefully.

“Traiiitooor...”

The whisper rippled through my soul, and I yanked my hand away as I flinched backwards. Around me, my summons went on alert as they took up guard positions again, staring vigilantly around. I stared at my hand and then at the black strands, confusion slowly turning to understanding.

Hesitantly touching a black strand again, I didn't have to wait long. “Traiiiitooor... Deeeefennnd... Guaaaaard... Endddd... Looooyaaaltyyyy...”

The mechanical yet feminine voice stuttered in a brittle whisper, eliciting a jolt out of the depths of my soul. Something deep inside me recognized that voice, and memories of the past streamed through my mind, each one telling me that I had to move forward... that I had to find the source. The regret and despair that flooded my mind made it hard to think, and for a bit I felt like I was being swallowed by some deep hole. Maybe that was the final straw, as I forcefully clamped down on my emotions and pulled my hand away from the black strand.

Staring back down the hallway ahead of me, I clenched my fist in uncertainty. I didn't understand everything that I had just felt, and Neduzar's personal memories were a mess in my mind However, something deep inside was telling me that my strength was needed... that I needed to move forward. Maybe it was stupid to trust such a feeling, but the last word of that whisper stuck with me for some reason.

“Loyalty, huh?”