Gravity vanished.

  The Slayer’s body floated within the shattered "Reincarnation Node." This was no longer crimson rock or pitch-black void, but a bizarre, grotesque, and extremely twisted "Flux Tunnel."

  The surrounding scenery looked like the screen of a broken, vintage television set—countless colorful specks of static jumping madly.

  An ordinary person would go insane from sensory overload after staying here for a single second.

  But the Slayer didn't even blink.

  He was falling.

  Or rather, he was "traversing" through this tunnel where the concept of direction did not exist.

  His armor's warning lights flashed frantically. The data stream on his holographic visor scrolled like a waterfall, displaying the extreme anomalies of the surrounding environment.

  [WARNING: Spatial curvature extremely unstable.]

  [WARNING: Multiple unknown radiation sources detected.]

  [WARNING: Laws of physics undergoing random rewrites.]

  The Slayer reached out and muted the alarm.

  Too noisy.

  His gauntlet-clad hands remained rock-steady in the zero-gravity state, gripping the Yin Yang Shotgun. He even adjusted his tactical posture in mid-air, the muzzle tracking rapidly with the strange lights and shadows flashing past him.

  Regardless of the rules, as long as it has a health bar, it can be killed.

  ...

  Netherworld, Control Center.

  The place was in an uproar. Every instrument was screaming. The holographic projection of the Abyss had transformed into a giant, pulsating "Hedgehog Ball," expanding and contracting violently.

  "Hold it steady! Crank the energy threshold to the max! Don't let the signal cut out!"

  Singularity’s hands flew across the console, his eyes locked on the chaotic data waveforms on the screen.

  These weren't regular sine waves; they were jagged, broken, and spiked, looking like a tangled mess of barbed wire.

  "Incredible..."

  Singularity looked at the fragmented images captured in the corner of the screen.

  On the walls of the tunnel the Slayer was traversing, bubble-like "Windows" occasionally flashed by.

  Through those windows, Singularity saw completely different scenes:

  In some windows, there were oceans of flowing liquid metal.

  In others, countless giant eyeballs screaming in unison.

  In others, bizarre architecture that defied geometry, constantly folding in on itself.

  "Slayer, you are currently in a very dangerous, but also very fascinating place."

  Singularity grabbed the microphone, explaining at rapid-fire speed, even though he knew the Slayer probably didn't care about the theory.

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  "We guessed wrong before. This isn't just an elevator shaft to the 'Next Level'."

  Singularity pulled up a topological map of the multiverse. If a normal universe is a perfect sphere, then the place the Slayer was in now was the irregular gap left between countless spheres squeezed together.

  "This is the 'Edge Junction of the Multiverse'."

  "Those windows flashing by are projections of other unstable planes. It's filled with massive amounts of unknown rules and discarded data."

  Singularity suddenly slapped his thigh, as if he had figured out a key problem.

  "I finally get it! I finally understand why there are so many grotesque demons in Hell that completely defy biological logic!"

  He circled the black substance on the screen that was trying to leak in through the cracks.

  "Demons aren't 'fallen souls' at all—at least, the high-tier ones aren't!"

  "They are Invasive Species!"

  "They are monsters born from the cracks between these unstable planes. Because the rules here are chaotic, they grow however they please—some are all teeth, some have no physical form, some are just balls of rage."

  Singularity watched the descending green dot on the screen.

  "The Netherworld and the Abyss, being at the bottom of the universe, act like a giant 'Funnel'. The monsters from these cracks flow down via gravity to us, and were then blocked in the Abyss by that damned Blood Sea Ancestor, turning it into their breeding ground."

  "The so-called 'Hell' is actually the sewer and waste processing plant of the multiverse."

  "And now..."

  Singularity watched as the depth readings on the screen began to stabilize. The surrounding chaotic spatial turbulence gradually disappeared, replaced by a sense of cold, hard Order.

  "...You have passed through the waste pipe and are about to reach the Source."

  *BOOM————!!*

  The Slayer smashed heavily onto the ground.

  No dust rose.

  Because the ground was made of some unknown black alloy, hard to a heinous degree.

  The massive impact force only dented the ground by a few millimeters, producing a dull metallic thud.

  The Slayer slowly stood up.

  At this moment, his feet were planted on solid matter.

  He raised his head, scanning this new world beneath the "Limitless Void" through his visor's tactical lens.

  There was no sky here; overhead was a mechanical dome emitting a faint, cold glow.

  There was no magma; instead, there were countless massive pipes pulsating with dark red energy, plugged into every building like blood vessels.

  Yes, Buildings.

  Unfolding before him was no primitive lair.

  It was a colossal Fortress City forged of black iron and white bone.

  Towering spires pierced the dome, each carved with profane runes. Under the light of those runes, countless shadows were patrolling in perfect formation.

  They wore standardized armor.

  They held charged weapons.

  There was no chaos here.

  Here, there was formidable "Order."

  The Slayer's finger gently tapped the grip of his chainsaw.

  This was the source.

  This was where the garbage flowed in.

  This wasn't a wilderness.

  This was a Barracks.

  His breathing remained steady, but beneath that calm rhythm, the core reactor of his armor began to emit a low hum—the sound of materialized rage.

  The more organized the demons, the more they deserved to die.

  Because this meant they understood organization, they understood plunder, and they understood how to manufacture suffering more efficiently.

  The Slayer took his first step.

  *Clank.*

  His war boot stepped on the metal ground, the crisp sound echoing on the edge of the deathly silent city.

  A patrol in the distance seemed to sense something. Several beams of crimson searchlights instantly locked onto him.

  The Slayer did not dodge.

  Facing the light, he drew the giant sword from his back.

  ...

  Netherworld, Control Center.

  Singularity looked at the magnificent yet evil underground city and couldn't help but suck in a cold breath.

  "That makes sense... that makes sense..."

  "Chaos is just the surface. How could a race capable of cross-plane invasion be just a bunch of screaming beasts?"

  Singularity picked up his notebook and wrote a line at the end of this chapter:

  "The truth of the Abyss is only the tip of the iceberg. Below is not the end, but the Frontline."

  He looked at the Slayer on the screen.

  "Slayer, welcome to the militarized version of 'The Backrooms'."

  *Next Chapter: The Slave Mine. Since they value rules and organization, we will use more violent rules and a larger organization (even if it's a one-man army) to teach them how to be ghosts. The Slayer says: I like it when they stand in formation; saves me the trouble of aiming.*