556 Depressing Start to the Journey (2/2)

Dimensional coordinates were constantly moving. If there was a Dimensional Door on both sides between dimensions, then that would allow for a fixed teleportation point at a specific location. But since this Dimensional Door wasn't connected to any other Dimensional Door, the dimensional teleportation would be completely random for everyone who was sent through.

Since everyone would be teleported to different random locations regardless, leaving early by myself and meeting up with the others later would equate to the same thing.

By now, I no longer knew which specific level of the Chaos Abyss I was on right now, since the snake demons and other residents weren't even capable of speaking the most basic demon language. Still, I knew that I was probably somewhere between the 74th and 78th levels. Back when we had contact with Sophocles the Deceiver, it could be seen that he was in swamp terrain. So, all we had to do was keep going down.

”If we're lucky, we'll be out of this damned swamp by going down a single level. If we're unlucky, we'll have to go up at least four levels. That would mean staying here in this swamp with nothing other than unintelligent demons for more than a month.”

The Chaos Abyss was quite different from level to level. It could be said that each level of the Chaos Abyss was similar to a separate floor in the same tower. And, rather than independent dimensions, these levels were probably dimensional shards torn off from various worlds which were then demonically transformed to become part of the Chaos Abyss.

The Chaos Abyss also had the nickname of the Endless Abyss. It was unknown how many levels it exactly had, but there would definitely be at least seven or eight hundred. The great majority of demons would live in the first six hundred levels, for the farther you went down, the more treacherous the dimensional traveling would become and the more dangerous the dimension. The lowest dimensions would be filled with dimensional cracks. Not even the demons would be willing to go down to such death-filled locations without good reason.

Also, all maps of the Chaos Abyss would forever be inaccurate as the Chaos Abyss was constantly changing. An unstable dimension could suddenly become stable, while a certain entire dimensional level might suddenly disappear one day.

The most agreed-upon theory was that the will of the Chaos Abyss was periodically giving birth to new dimensions. Any dimension that the will of the Chaos Abyss viewed as worthless would be tossed out into the endless void, together with all its residents.

And, without the guidance of the Chaos Abyss itself, it would be almost impossible to find any specific person inside the Chaos Abyss. As long as I remained careful and low-key, I highly doubted that any Demon Lord down here would know that I was here anytime soon.

”Let's find a place to rest.”

The silly cat sent out a dozen of her clones, transforming them into sparrows which then set out in all directions to scout. I also stopped activating my aura of ice.

All the way here so far, I had been maintaining the lowest possible level aura of ice. While that aura of ice would be unable to kill these annoying magical creatures, it would help me to learn all their locations. The side effect was that the ice trail I left behind would take a while to disappear, meaning that I might be tracked down by a more powerful demon.

Well, I was no expert in the thief job class (and no thief would dare to enter the Chaos Abyss without being ranked Legend at minimum). I was more than willing to accept this consequence in exchange for preventing all ambushes upon me.

”Tsk, there's a black dragon nest directly in front of us that's less than three kilometers away. It seems that all those lizardmen who tried to attack you today didn't die for nothing. At the very least, they almost succeeded in luring you into this trap. Ha, you've already become famous in this district, oh revered slayer of lizardmen.”

I felt rather helpless about this. Most of the magical beasts in this dimensional level didn't even have language or words. Lizardmen and snake demons were two of the slightly more intelligent species since they at least knew how to build houses and villages. That was why I often went to their villages to avoid the rain and ”ask for directions,” along with ”borrowing” their homes and beds to sleep in.

Maybe due to their lack of understanding of the demon language, or maybe simply because they wanted to taste fresh meat, even though I clearly used the demon language to tell them that I would pay them money, it would always end up in a one-sided slaughter… Cough, I must have accidentally gone overboard. The lizardmen had come up with the nickname ”slayer of lizardmen” for me. I felt that this was the weakest and most pathetic nickname I had ever received.

”There's a lizardmen village to our left, approximately ten kilometers away. The lizardmen who attacked us today were probably from that village. Shall we go 'ask them for directions'?”

As expected of the silly cat, she already knew what I liked best. But today, I felt that we had an even better choice.

”…That dragon nest which is such an obvious trap is a lot closer, right?”

”Yep. Dragon nests are also far more extravagant than lizardmen villages. It'll be a lot more comfortable to sleep there, and we can even obtain some treasure. Why don't we rob that place tonight?”

”No, I would never do something like robbery. I only want to go there to ask for directions! At the very least, an intelligent dragon should know which specific level of the Chaos Abyss this is, and where the entrance to the next level down is.”

”…And then you'll rob the dragon afterwards?”

”No! I wouldn't rob even an evil black dragon. We're only going to ask for directions, and stay for the night!”

”…And then when the black dragon attacks you, you'll claim self-defense and kill it. In the end, isn't it still the same as robbery? Why whitewash it so much?”

”…Do you know the phrase 'curiosity killed the cat'? Harloys, you know too much!”