Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 327: Boundless Darkness

Lady’s Juice. On top of the monster nest.

Angor exerted his Nightmare Domain. Without much knowledge to go with, he simply followed Sunders’ instructions carefully. Everything went smoothly until now. His Nightmare Domain engulfed the tunnel and slowly mended it.

First, he tried his best to sustain the Nightmare Domain. But when he threw a larger Nightmare Stone in there, the tunnel began fixing itself without the need for an extra effort.

And Angor was left with nothing to do.

He turned around to observe the dragonflies nearby.

There were a lot of “wanderer” dragonflies and “guard” dragonflies who possessed more vivid colors. The creatures created a dreamy rainbow around the area, which looked brilliant when observed from a distance.

The guards didn’t react at all when they saw Angor doing something to the tunnel. They kept praising the queen and Shava.

Also, the teacup band and toy soldiers all hopped out from a corner of the Nightmare Domain and began to sing and dance around the colorful blaze.

Compared with Sunders’ tensed situation, Angor was enjoying a child’s circuit, easy and relaxed.

About three minutes later, the tunnel was almost closed up. Only a small opening which barely allowed one adult to squeeze through was left.

“Is everything okay, Angor?” Sunders’ voice came.

Angor quickly shushed the teacups. “Yes, sir, only a tiny bit left. It should disappear soon.”

“Heheheh… I so very wish to see you soon, Angor, my disciple…” “Sunders” replied in a strange tone, like a whisper.

Angor tilted his head. Was that Sunders?

“Um, what’s going on, professor?”

He heard someone panting badly.

“It’s fine. Just… I met a long-lost friend. You just heard him.”

Before Angor could speak again, he heard the same strange voice.

“Ah… I’m eager to examine your soul. Will you die for me, my dear disciple?”

“Don’t mind him. Tell me about what happened on your end,” Sunders said.

Angor found it weird that Sunders’ “old friend” just called him “my disciple”. He considered and decided to leave the matter. However, he still believed this strange character sounded a lot like the younger Sunders, who he met when he was inside the Nightmare Realm. But that individual looked more serious and composed.

“I have no problem here. The dragonflies didn’t do anything to me. They are still calling for their queen and Shava.”

“Good. My tunnel will close up in about one minute. We must seal them at the same time, with our delay below 5 seconds. Can you manage it? If not, I’ll slow my progression according to yours.”

Angor noticed the noise of explosions in the background which meant Sunders’ situation was not as safe. He considered a little and nodded. “I can control my speed.”

“Very well. Get ready!”

As Angor watched the hole grow smaller and smaller, he felt a little nervous.

Ten, nine, eight…

He counted while he looked carefully at the remainder of the tunnel shrinking visibly.

Three, two…

Angor felt his heart racing madly. Under such tension, he failed to notice a shadowy figure slowly materializing out of thin air behind his back.

Only one second left. Angor was confident that the tunnel would soon vanish.

A sudden hurricane assaulted his back.

He couldn’t react at all. His body was knocked into what was left of the tunnel by the powerful wind.

“What’s going—” Sunders heard Angor yelping. But the gentleman didn’t get to finish his question as Angor’s tunnel had completely closed up by the Nightmare Stone.

At the same time, the connection was lost. Angor could no longer hear Sunders’ voice.

Angor’s heart was still beating like crazy. He reached out with his hands but he couldn’t find anything he could grab on.

Desperation quickly took over his mind.

Why’s this happening?? At the last second?

He already began to regret his decision of coming here alone, just because he was too confident that nothing could hurt him. He should’ve asked one of the wizards to accompany him just by using a simple excuse, and Devildare could give them something to keep off the parasites.

But he quickly gave up that thought. This was no time for regrets.

He felt his body falling and falling as if a bottomless swamp awaited below. He could do nothing to stop his fall.

He quickly remembered Sunders’ words—that the tunnel was essentially a special plane passageway. Compared to those constructed in a hustle, this one was relatively stable.

He desperately searched for anything related to plane passageways in his brain.

A plane passageway was an endless space where day and night, maps and landmarks didn’t exist. If he were to keep falling, he would probably get trapped in an eternal time stream and die of old age at this rate.

He needed a space coordinate to get out of here.

But where to find such a thing?

Besides, only wizards who could fly around could travel through a plane passageway, and Angor didn’t know how to fly. His only way was down. Forever.

He panicked when he thought about the possibility of spending the rest of his life falling in this darkness.

But he didn’t get to freak out because he suddenly found himself slowing down. Then he came to a complete stop and… began to float upward?

He had lost his sense of directions in this complete darkness.

It took him a while to realize that his collar was strained against his neck, which meant… someone was holding his collar as they moved up.

“Who is it?” Angor asked and noticed that his voice came out smaller, in a very strange frequency.

He also found out that it was getting difficult to breathe here. However, he could still manage.

Since there was air… maybe an exit that led to the outside was nearby? Even so, he didn’t know how to locate it. He couldn’t possibly feel his way around using pure luck.

“Hoot!”

“Toby?” Angor reached out a hand and felt a pair of talons grabbing his collar.

Wait, Toby was strong enough to carry him now? As Angor recalled, the bird had powerful burst power but not in the long run.

Did Toby grow stronger? Or… was gravity here actually lower?

He didn’t have time to consider these questions now. “Are you stressing yourself now? Call twice if yes, once for no.”

He couldn’t really see Toby’s body language in here, so he thought about a dumber way to communicate.

“Tweet!”

So, Toby didn’t have any problem with carrying him.

Feeling desperate didn’t mean he would give up hope easily. He had to find a way out—for Toby, for Jon, and his brother, Leon!

With Toby here, he would have no problem moving around for now. So he had to think of how to leave the plane passageway next.

He had nothing to go with yet. According to Sunders, without a space coordinate, he could go nowhere. Not even the two ends where the tunnel originally connected.

And of course, he couldn’t leave Toby to wander aimlessly. Doing so meant circling around the same place and wasting strength. Jon once told him that someone blindfolded could never walk down a straight line on flat ground because his or her brain couldn’t ensure the direction without any extra information as a reference. All the tissues in the man’s body would make small “mistakes” and cause the human body to walk in a large circle.

He had to think of something to escape the situation.

He recalled Jon’s words, about how to avoid “running in circles”.

“A landmark…” Angor remembered one viable way to do it.

But was there anything like that in this darkness?

He could see no directions, no light, nothing…

He thought about placing something of his own and using it as a sign. But he had nothing that could remain in one place. He could not use something falling down as a landmark.

Then he thought about the nightmare aura he felt when he stood in front of the tunnel just now.

There was a nightmare aura inside the tunnel. Could he follow it?

He closed his eyes and released his spirit feelers, and he was thrilled to sense something.

“I don’t know if we can get out that way,” he said. His voice brightened up a little as he continued, “I found the stream of nightmare aura which is slowly decreasing into a direction. We’ll head toward the source of it. Listen to my guidance, Toby!”