Blackness. Everything before her eyes was black. A scent that felt like death permeated this place.
Here, Ch'en could not perceive up, down, left, right, or the cardinal directions. It was as if this place had no concept of space whatsoever. Perhaps here, such a concept was utterly meaningless.
"What's wrong with me? Am I... dead?"
The moment after she had touched those flames, before her consciousness could even register what was happening, Ch'en was abruptly pulled into this realm.
Looking around, she could see tiny specks of starlight within the pitch-black space. But the pattern of their distribution confirmed they were definitely not the sky and stars. It appeared that, due to her contact just now, she had been pulled into an environment resembling a spiritual world.
The problem now was that she didn't know how to get out. Or rather, at this moment, she couldn't find a single clue to leave this space. It looked as though she was trapped inside by her own actions.
Yet, Ch'en didn't show any sign of panic; on the contrary, she was incredibly calm. It was precisely to understand everything that had happened here, and to understand what these Infected had endured, that she had gone back to touch those flames contained with negative emotions. If she encountered danger because of it, she was willing to accept the consequences. Because this was an action of her own choosing.
"But where exactly is this place? Why isn't there anything here?"
Ch'en began to walk forward aimlessly. Perhaps this was only "forward" in her own perception, but sitting still to wait for someone to find her was out of the question; she might as well start walking in one direction and see.
After an unknown amount of time, Ch'en, who felt no physical exhaustion, noticed those specks of starlight seemed to be growing larger. It was as if they had discovered her and were streaking toward her.
Before she could react, those things rushed past her like meteors. However, the contents they carried brought a significant impact.
Ch'en understood then. Those weren't stars. These white lights were the most profound memories of these deceased Infected—scenes they could never forget in their lifetimes.
As white lights continued to streak past Ch'en, each time, she felt as though she had watched a multi-hour documentary compressed into a few seconds, consuming a massive amount of her mental energy.
Within these memory fragments, the memories of all sorts of Infected were preserved. They were adults, children, or elderly. These people all had one thing in common: they were brought to this company named Rhine Gold and subjected to various forms of torture.
Some of these people had been forcibly taken here by slum gangs. Ch'en even memorized the face of every single gang member, to facilitate later investigation.
Some suffered from some strange illness, then accepted assistance from a self-proclaimed Infected relief organization, and after a while, once everyone trusted them, were brought here. Ch'en even saw several of the "eyes" she had placed in the slums; they had been captured while trying to spy for intelligence.
This also told Ch'en a fact: the reason these people met with such a fate was because there was a major faction within the Lungmen gangs helping them in secret.
Fortunately, as these memories flowed through Ch'en's mind, they only left a general record. Otherwise, she might have had her personality altered due to witnessing too many memories.
Fortunately, the perpetrators were firmly remembered by Ch'en. She also discovered what kind of power was backing the thugs daring enough to capture people in the slums. Fortunately, the opponent was merely a "high-level thug." As for the reason, it was nothing more than money and prospects. The opponent used money and orchestrated incidents to help him perform merits in exchange for his help capturing Infected.
But according to the understanding from these memories, this didn't seem to be an isolated incident. If she wanted to do something about it, she feared the resistance wouldn't be small.
What Ch'en didn't discover, however, was that while she was immersed alone in this tidal ocean of spirits, the Holy Water splashed on her body also had a reaction.
Seemingly because it discovered the possibility of her soul being rewritten, the Holy Water was awakened at this moment, using its own power to protect her safety. At the same time, the Holy Water used its power to suppress the root cause of Ch'en entering that space—the extremely tiny Originium crystals within her body.
This was also the reason Ch'en could see those memories. As an Infected, the minuscule amount of Originium in her body resonated with the Originium in these flames.
This was also why the other two people beside her couldn't sense this strange power—not just because her mindset had progressed significantly, but because she was an Infected.
And when the Holy Water suppressed the activation of the Originium in her body, Ch'en suddenly felt the meteors getting further and further away, until they couldn't even be perceived by the naked eye.
"I swear to you, I will make sure these people receive their due punishment!"
The moment before leaving this space, Ch'en, feeling something, shouted to the empty realm. Subsequently, her figure vanished from this space.
Ch'en's figure gradually vanished, and the tiny specks of starlight around her seemed to twinkle. A long time later, they also vanished.
This place was merely a gathering spot for these wrongful souls. They also weren't clear how this living person had tumbled into the domain of the dead. But speaking of which, although they couldn't see the day Ch'en's promise would be realized, it was quite nice to hear such a promise.
In the next moment, the flames swept through here, and these souls also turned into raging flames to join the climbing procession. They weren't clear if Lungmen would uphold justice for them, so they planned to "repay" those fellows properly using their own methods.
When Ch'en returned to reality, she felt as though she had worked overtime for a week straight without sleep or rest; she felt completely awful. The moment her consciousness returned, a massive amount of fatigue flooded her body. She almost lost consciousness and fainted on the spot.
She recalled the memories she had seen, and a wave of self-reproach surged into her heart.
Those experimental subjects who had been turned to ash were also people she had sworn to protect! And the reason they met with these things was also related to the LGD. If the Guard Department could have noticed the issues earlier, how many dead Infected could have been saved? She couldn't imagine.
Fortunately, she used the earlier situation of using Cloud-Rend as an excuse, allowing everyone to shift their attention from her and think about how to leave this place.
"This place is filled with fire everywhere now. Even if we find the previous secret passage, we won't be able to get out, right?" Lemuen looked at the sea of fire surrounding them. Her first thought was to escape along the secret passage. But now, whether the passage still existed was a question.
So, she could only turn her gaze to Jeanne beside her. Since the other party mentioned evacuating, there must be a safe way to leave this place. The others didn't speak either, just following step by step. They weren't familiar with this place, nor did they know how to escape safely from the sea of fire.
Then, they might as well follow the most confident person. If she wasn't sure about leaving, she couldn't just light a fire like this.
"Just follow me, but don't wander too far. I don't have much control over the fire beyond a certain distance!" Speaking, Jeanne controlled the fire in front of her to part to the left and right, like the Red Sea being parted by Moses.
But because her mana was not that abundant at this moment, she could only separate the fire two meters ahead; further distances were still surrounded by flames.
Everyone could only follow Jeanne step by step. Because of the fire's scorching, they couldn't find anything to serve as a marker; there were only flames and bare walls.
Everyone followed step by step behind Jeanne. The fire behind them merged back together after they passed, as if no such path had ever existed.
Finally, Jeanne led them to a large hole. The walls and soil that should have been above seemed to have been pushed away by something, allowing a direct view of the sky. Clearly, this was the path that huge Earth Dragon had escaped from earlier. There indeed was a shortcut to safely leave this collapsing place, but provided they could fly.
"We aren't flying up, are we? Although I'm from Laterano, my wings don't have the ability to fly! Do you two possess flight abilities?" Speaking, Lemuen's eyes looked at Ch'en and Gin beside her, but received only a shake of the head.