Chapter 36: The Castle of the Depths, Tantalus
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 36: The Castle of the Depths, Tantalus
After leading my two trainees and one animal to the classroom on the 4th floor, I immediately began my lecture.
“Alright, quiet down. Everyone, settle down! Let's begin today's lesson.”
As always, Azzy yawned reflexively, then went to the back of the room to lie down on her belly. Of course, it was to be expected. She showed no intention of understanding, let alone the capacity for it. The gap in wisdom and intellect conveyed through language is vast. Is it true that to a dog, a human's voice is received the same way a human receives a dog's bark?
However, a gentleman finds lessons even in the discourteous. A dog may know no manners, but a human cannot stoop to its level. I addressed my trainees with as much dignity as I could muster.
“I'm about to tell you a fucking awesome story, so you'd better prepare to be amazed. Get ready to give me a thunderous round of applause, too.”
“If it's not that great, you'll be getting a dagger instead of applause. Go on.”
The Regressor, clearly still annoyed about being dragged here, shot back sharply. Can't even tell a joke around here. How am I supposed to explain anything with this intimidating Regressor staring me down?
Lamenting my teaching authority, which had fallen past the floor and straight into the Abyss, I began my explanation to the one human and one corpse before me.
“To check your concentration, I'm changing today's lesson to a more active, participation-based format. The Abyss. Does anyone know the meaning of this word? Yes, Trainee Tyrkanzyaka?”
The vampire lifted her parasol slightly and answered in a relaxed tone.
“Is it not a word used in the Order of Gaia with a meaning similar to hell? The fate of land cursed by Mother Earth, land that has lost her support.”
“Correct! Ten points to Trainee Tyrkanzyaka! These points will be reflected in my personal rankings later, so be sure to save them up!”
Having paid her for the answer with an empty promise, I continued.
“That's right. The Abyss is the hell often described in many religions, specifically the hell of the Order of Gaia. When describing the most horrific place to punish sinners, this was the first concept those mama's boys from the Order of Gaia came up with. And just like you'd expect from mama's boys, they think a place without their mother is hell itself. My, how pathetic.”
Worse than a purgatory of burning sulfur, worse than an underworld of eternal suffering.
The followers of the Order of Gaia feared their feet ever leaving the ground. They didn't have to look far for their source of terror. Falling—the dizzying sensation of your feet leaving the earth, and the horrific disasters that result from it. That was the hell of the Gaian followers.
“However, that land, which should have existed only in Gaian doctrine—a hell so simple and lacking in impact for something they tried so hard to conjure up—manifested in reality due to a certain incident. That place is right here: the Abyssal Prison, Tantalus.”
I tapped the floor with my foot to emphasize that this very ground we stood upon was part of the Abyss.
“After the Military State established its plan to use the Abyss—the hell of a fairly major religion—as a mere prison, Tantalus came to be seen as a place for heinous criminals. But its true nature is not that of a prison. It is a land where one cannot tread. An abyss where you fall forever, doomed to die in solitude, devoid of time and space. That is the Abyss.”
However.
You should sense something strange here. You should notice the contradiction and challenge my words.
You should be asking why we, who are inside the Abyss, are able to stand on solid ground.
Simply lecturing at someone isn't real education. It's an educator's duty to help their students think and reason for themselves.
Having posed the question, I read my trainees' thoughts.
‘Ooh, how interesting.’
‘I already know all this. When is he going to get to the structure of Tantalus?’
“Woof…”
I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up. They have zero motivation to even try to guess the answer!
And that last one wasn't even a thought! She's literally barking!
“Aren't you all curious? How we can be standing on solid ground in such an abyss?”
“I am curious. Do explain.”
What a bunch of ambitionless louts. Am I supposed to spoon-feed them like baby birds in a nest?
I grabbed a piece of white chalk and turned to the chalkboard. In the middle of the green board, I drew two long, vertical lines. The Abyss.
“Now, look. The Abyss is fundamentally a bottomless pit, a deep chasm where one falls for eternity. Therefore, if someone were to fall into the Abyss…”
I twirled the chalk, catching it between my fingers, and drew mana up from my elbow, refining it. A faint Alchemical Glow, proof that it was imbued with an Arcane, shimmered at the tip of the chalk as if melting into the air. With this enchanted chalk, I drew a stylized person between the two vertical lines.
The drawing spread its arms and legs, glanced down once, then looked forward again before plummeting comically, like a character in an old cartoon.
“Since there's no bottom to hit, it will just keep falling and falling. It would be a rare experience, one where death finds you long before impact does.”
As if in the real Abyss, the drawing flailed its limbs as it fell to the bottom edge of the chalkboard… and then vanished.
Thanks to the simple enchantment on the chalk, any drawing made with it can move according to my will. It requires very little mana, so even a mana-starved wretch like me can use it.
The Military State's chalkboards are two-sided. The drawing reappeared on the back of the board and began to climb up. A moment later, it emerged at the top of the board and began to fall all over again.
So, what do you think? Pretty neat trick, huh?
‘Moving pictures must be common these days. It's novel, but… seeing as no one else is surprised, I suppose it's nothing special.’
‘His finesse with mana is impressive. Hmph. So, this is just the basics, is it?’
I pulled a trick worthy of a star instructor, and their reaction is this lukewarm. So much effort for so little return. Even the notoriously fickle stock market is more predictable than you two.
Tch. Enough with the party tricks. I'll just get on with the explanation.
“But while the Abyss may be bottomless, it's not wall-less. There's no ground to stand on, but there are cliffs surrounding it on all sides, right? And what if there was a small ledge somewhere on these walls? Or if one were to make a ledge.”
I drew a small, jutting ledge on one of the vertical lines. The endlessly falling figure bumped into the newly appeared ledge and bounced up. Flailing its disproportionately short arms, the figure barely managed to find its footing and stand on the protrusion.
“Like this, you could hold on and stand for a moment, right? Even though this is the Abyss, you would no longer be falling.”
Of course, it's hardly enough space to live a proper life, as humans require a certain minimum area to survive. But the vampire, being a corpse who only needs enough room for a coffin, looked at the drawing with confusion.
“Hm? With that much space, couldn't one live a normal life?”
I shook my head at the vampire's question.
“Mother Earth's curse isn't so lenient. This is just a workaround. If it's earth you can stand on, it's still considered land. And in the Abyss, such land will eventually erode and vanish into the depths.”
As if on cue, the chalk ledge began to slowly flow downward like melting wax. The figure standing on it hopped about nervously, pressing itself flat against the wall. But it was no use. The Abyss is cursed land. The Mother of All does not permit anyone to stand on solid ground here.
Soon, its footing vanished completely. Having lost its tiny, handspan-wide sanctuary, the figure resumed its endless fall….
“And so, countless adventurers threw themselves into the Abyss, seeking the legacies rumored to lie dormant in its depths, only for their own worldly possessions to become legacies themselves. They hammered spikes into the walls and tied themselves with ropes, but with the very earth itself subsiding, they too eventually became food for the Abyss. It was only by learning from the deaths of these fools—the kind who have to taste something to know if it's poison—that people finally gained the wisdom to stay away from the Abyss. However, our glorious Military State decided to make use of this very characteristic.”
Above the Abyss I had drawn on the chalkboard, I drew a large disc. On top of it, I depicted a large, five-story building and a towering lamp. Unless they were idiots, they would have immediately recognized the building.
The vampire sighed softly.
“So this is that place.”
“Yes. The Military State built a colossal structure. So colossal, in fact, that it's a circular structure that covers this Abyss like a manhole cover.”
“A manhole?”
“Ah, a person from a thousand years ago wouldn't know what that is. Just think of it as a well cover. Anyway.”
I waved my finger like a conductor. The chalk drawing of Tantalus began to slowly descend over the Abyss, its movement slow but heavy, like a massive meteor.
A great thud seemed to echo in my ears. It was only a chalk drawing settling on the board, so there was no actual sound, but the ponderous movement and the detail of the chalk dust scattering as it landed made me imagine one.
Satisfied with my own dramatic flair, I continued the explanation.
“To the Military State's Engineer Corps, concrete is the stone of all trades. They used it to shape the land and erect pillars, creating a massive structure that they placed over the Abyss. Then they released prisoners onto it. In this space cursed by Mother Earth, all those who dared to set foot on something solid should have sunk into the depths below.”
However.
The land may sink. But concrete does not. Because it is not a collection of earth and sand, but a single, separate object.
“But this concrete structure—mined by humans, processed by humans, poured into molds by humans over a steel skeleton, and designed piece by piece by humans—can never be considered land, even if it is made from the earth's bounty. It is, through and through, a massive structure 'made' by 'humans'—an object. Normally, an object should fall to the bottom of the Abyss, but because this structure is wider than the Abyss itself, its edges caught on the cliffs. As a result, Tantalus doesn't fall. It merely sinks. Like this.”
The walls of the Abyss flowed downward like thick mud. Simultaneously, the massive structure covering the Abyss also sank lower and lower.
But it does not fall. A manhole cover might flip, but it won't fall through. Caught on both walls, it slowly slides down, subsiding while maintaining a precarious balance.
“And so, we are living on sinking land. Like a piece of bread caught in a throat.”
I should thank Gamma.
If he hadn't thought to descend through the control center basement, I never would have figured this out. Thanks to him, my knowledge has grown.
The last piece of knowledge you left behind... I'll put it to good use.
‘This ground… to think it's all an artificial object… I thought it felt unusually uniform for rock, but this is astonishing.’
The vampire looked back and forth between the chalkboard and the floor, her expression one of fascination. She perched lightly on the edge of her coffin and even tapped the ground with the tip of her foot.
Come on, don't just be fascinated. Feel something, will you?