Could the master of this place be conducting human experiments? And given how thoroughly she’d been examined, was she going to be one of the subjects for said experiments? A shiver ran down her spine.

But there was no hidden staircase in the cupboard either. “I need to hurry. This can’t be good.” She was going to end up as the next experiment at this rate!

Toward the back of the room there appeared to be a kitchen separated from the main room by a wall. In its corner was what looked like a refrigerator powered by a cold manastone. After a moment’s hesitation, she looked inside, low-key expecting to find frozen, half-dismembered corpses within. Thankfully, however, there was nothing immediately recognizable as an eyeball or a limb—only neatly arranged, meticulously cut pieces of meat.

Liz decided not to think about what kind of meat this was.

She passed through the door and entered a room with a table set at the center. At a glance, it looked like a dining room, but given the kind of deviant that frequented this place, she couldn’t take it at face value.

“Hee hee hee...”

“Who’s there?!” Liz exclaimed, turning around at the sudden laughter to find...

Nobody. Nobody at all.

“Wh-What the...” Sweat formed on her back, her pulse quickening. Liz took deep breaths in an attempt to collect herself. Once she’d calmed down, she searched the room here and there, but didn’t find the secret passage leading underground.

“Eh heh heh...”

“A-Again?!” Liz frantically looked around, and...

No one. No one was there, yet somehow she could hear that voice as though it were right next to her. As though she weren’t the only one in the room.

Liz swallowed hard. “C-Could it be the voice of a victim of his experiments?”

“Ohh, it hurts! It huuurts!”

“Waugh! Eek!” Liz shrieked, trembling like a leaf in the wind. “I-I see what this room is for...”

So the mastermind conducted human experiments, dissected the bodies in the kitchen, then stored them in the refrigerator. As for the stored meat, well, no doubt it was eaten here—

“It huuurts! Don’t eat meee!”

As though coming from the hells themselves, the voice vibrated in Liz’s eardrums. Instinctively, she broke into a run. “N-No, stop!”

“Waaait!” called the voice, chasing after her.

“Ahh! Ahhhhhh!” Liz dived into a space at the end of the corridor—the bathroom. It was moderately sized, perfect to wash corpses in. “Oh, I can’t take this anymore! What is this place?!”

“Remember meee...”

“Gah!” Liz yelped, breaking into another run. At the end of the corridor was what looked to be a bedroom, with two beds next to each other. But she couldn’t be sure of that. She couldn’t be sure of anything anymore! Where was she, and what was happening?! What a terrifying place! She’d underestimated the overlord of the slums! “Ugh...”

She crouched down then and there, trying to suppress her shakes. The enemy was more formidable than she’d thought. Maybe she should flee and try again another day.

“No, that won’t do.” They’d seen her face now, so she couldn’t rely on the same trick anymore. She sat down for a bit, taking several long breaths. Then, she lifted her head, and said, “Fine. Bring it. Do not underestimate me!”

Gritting her teeth, she slowly stood up. She was an intrepid member of the Black Guild. She’d manipulated countless men. She would not let something like this stop her! Years spent in the underground depths of the Guild, home to all manner of demons, hadn’t been for nothing!

As she rose to her feet, slapping her cheeks, she stopped trembling. Liz quickly checked the possibly-a-bedroom-but-who-knew-really space, the corridor leading to it, and the corpse-washing area, but found no entrance to the underground.

“What in the blazes?”

Could it be that there was no path? As time went on, she grew more and more impatient. Liz hurried back to the room with the beds and noticed a set of stairs right by the door.

“A second floor?”

Wait. Hadn’t Gaion mentioned a captive woman beckoning from the second floor? Maybe there was a ladder leading directly to the underground level from there. And if the captive was there, maybe she’d know something.

If she was still alive, that is.

“All right,” Liz murmured before slowly heading up the stairs.

***

“Oh! Zenos!” Lily called out, running up to Zenos—on his way home from his rounds—on the side of the road.

“Lily? What’s up?”

“I came to get you. Lynga brought in an unconscious lady, and I couldn’t help her.”

“Is it serious?”

“I’m not sure, but she won’t wake up.”

Zenos stopped for a moment, gazing up at the fading sun. “I have a bad feeling about this. Let’s hurry.”

***

Back at the clinic, now enveloped in the colors of twilight, Liz cautiously climbed up the stairs.

“I’ll find a clue this time for sure.” There’d been no entrance to the underground on the first floor, so if there was anything to be found, it’d surely be on the second floor. The stairs seemed very old, creaking loudly with every step, as if no one had used them in years. “That doesn’t make any sense, though...”

If that were the case, how would the woman Gaion had seen on the second floor have gotten there?

One step. Two steps. Three steps. For some reason, with every step she took, the air grew chillier and chillier, a freezing cold pressure seeming to push back against her body. “I said. Do. Not. Underestimate. Me,” Liz muttered as she continued to forcefully lift her legs in defiance of the biting cold.

Finally, she reached the second floor.

“What the...?” Her words trailed off as she looked around at the pitch blackness in speechless confusion.

The second floor was a deep, pure black, and she couldn’t see so much as an inch ahead. An overwhelming chill pierced her skin, making her teeth chatter. There was no sign of anyone. She couldn’t sense a single living creature. There was only the freezing darkness and silence, so deep it felt like nothingness.

Liz whimpered and felt her breath quicken, feeling a primal revulsion. Overwhelming dread. The muggy stench of death, clinging to her body. A dark miasma swirling in the air, worse than even the depths of the Guild’s underground abyss.

“No, really, what...?” she groaned. Liz was scared, her every instinct screaming at her to turn back right now. Her knees nearly buckled.

But she frantically straightened them, standing firm despite herself. In the Black Guild, reputation was everything. If she turned tail now and fled, she would lose everything. She knew that.