Alma 95 Hell Built Upon Heaven

A man-made hell — there was no better way to describe it.

"Surely you jest, Ka'an. Has anything we've been through ever been normal? Do you really think that the word 'normal' can even apply to us?"

The hidden tunnel system they'd been traversing through was supposedly connected to Xibalba itself. It'd been a secret escape route that a couple of high-ranking officials had created just in case of an emergency.

Unfortunately for them, it'd been discovered before they'd ever get the opportunity to even use it. Ironically, the escape route ended up damning them.

It'd been the extermination squads who'd benefited from the escape route in the end. They'd used it to infiltrate the facility undetected during their assault, to great success…

Reed scratched his head and said, "…I guess not."

Normal people don't go looking for trouble — they stay home and take care of their families.

They don't go on daring rescue missions and they sure as hell do not infiltrate abandoned, top-secret research facilities.

No, normal people hear about crazy fools who do that kind of insane stuff on the evening news. That's what normal people do.

Eventually, they'd reached the hidden entrance spending an hour trekking through the old tunnel system. The ancient gate loomed over the pair as they stared at it in contemplation.

Reed stroked his chin and said, "As always, Mulian technology never ceases to impress. Isn't this more than five thousand years old, at a minimum? Just look at the damn thing!"

It hasn't rusted a single bit despite having been down here in this damp, humid cave for more than five millenniums. The damn door is older than everyone on this continent and it still hasn't worn down in the slightest…

"You think there's such a thing as building something too well?" said Reed. He put one of his ears on the giant door, gave it a couple hard knocks and said, "It's thick as hell, too. I think we might have a problem…"

Sure, they could blast the door open easily — that wasn't an issue — but it was too dangerous. If they put too much strength into the attack, there was a good chance it'd collapse the tunnel. And even if it didn't, the destructive blast would likely end up alerting their enemies…

This is going to require some finesse. We can't just—

His thought process was suddenly cut short by something truly astounding. It'd been so shocking that it'd caught him completely off guard.

She had opened the door.

Not with a secret code or special key of some sort. Nor had she used an Anima technique to open the heavy door. No, she had not done anything of the sort.

In fact, she had not used Anima at all. That was the scariest part.

She'd opened the sealed door with her bare hands. She'd pushed it open without the assistance of Anima, using only her raw, physical strength.

The sealed door — which weighed several tons — had been effortlessly bent open by Lu'um in less than a minute. She forcibly bent the enormous, metal door open as if it were made of dough.

Reed stared at the elegant, fair maiden who had abused the sealed door in disbelief and wondered if he'd finally lost his marbles.

Lu'um raised one of her eyebrows and said, "What? Never seen someone open a door before, Ka'an?"

".........…No."

Reed felt as if he'd seen something he shouldn't have. From that day forth, Reed would always stare at Lu'um in a different, slightly more respectful light, much to her confusion...

Xibalba ended up being everything Reed had expected and more. The entire place reeked of a particular stench that he couldn't put his finger on. It was a mixture of something godawful that he'd smelled before.

Infested.

"Do you know what that stench is? Smells positively atrocious."

A grimace formed on Lu'um's face and she said, "I'm sure you already know what that stench is, Ka'an. It seems that they were unable to remove the smell, even after decontaminating this place…"

"Ugh, how bad did things get down here that they couldn't remove the stench from the walls?" said Reed.

It makes no sense. This place looks so damn clean and spotless, you'd think it'd never been used in the first place. You'd think a couple thousand years would be enough for the stench to dissipate…

"You don't want to know, trust me. It's not the kind of thing that you can just forget once you've learned about it."

Reed scoffed and said, "Who do you take me for, sweetcheeks? A coward who's scared of his own shadow? I think I can handle one horror story."

Lu'um rolled her eyes and said, "Don't say I didn't warn you, then. It's not my fault if you have nightmares about this later…"

She paused for a moment and then said, "…They researching on how the Infested were capable of violating the laws of nature. Even with Anima, we were only capable of bending them to a certain degree before we encountered an impasse."

"We could use Anima to cheat, so to speak, but we were never able to bypass the fundamental forces that governed the universe. They could. So what did the researchers do in order to learn how the Infestation's secrets, you ask?"

"They played with souls. Tied one soul in two bodies — perfect clones of each other — something heretical to even think about. An offense to nature itself and an unimaginably evil thing."

"...What are you talking about?" said Reed. He was beginning to feel a vague sensation of dread…

"The soul and the body are tied to one another, Ka'an. They naturally pull on each other, much like gravity in a certain sense. A mysterious force keeps the two of them connected. …So what do you think will happen if you tie two bodies to one soul?"

Reed had a rough idea of what she was implying but didn't want to answer, so he kept quiet instead. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "…I don't know."

"The soul cannot handle the pull of two bodies. It is like having your arms tied to a horse and your legs tied to another horse… and both running away from each other. The soul will end up being torn apart at the seams until it breaks. The pain experienced by this double-body pull defies all description, Ka'an."

"And those who have their souls shattered will experience a final death — never to reincarnate ever again."

"But why?! Why do something so terrible, even when they knew what it'd cause?!" said Reed in abject disgust and anger.

"For knowledge, Ka'an. When one is tethered to two bodies, a spiritual connection is formed between them. A bridge. It was how they got the knowledge they wanted. One body would be given to Infested to take, and the other would be kept in a secure, detonation-triggered prison cell."

"The soul, tied between two bodies, would become the bridge between the infected body and the non-infected one. Once connected to the Infested hivemind, the unwilling victim would have access to their information network and by extension, their knowledge... if only for a short period."

Lu'um pointed at one of the many rows of doors and said, "These are all prison cells that once held them. If the prisoners lost themselves to the Infested Hivemind or their souls shattered, the bomb collars on them would activate as planned, killing them instantaneously."

She dragged Reed into one of the dark, abandoned prison cells and said, "This where we obtained the knowledge to create the Guiding Pillars, the Altar system, and the Heavenly Barriers, Ka'an. By making an unknown number of innocents suffer unspeakable misery and torture on a level unprecedented."

Reed lurched over and dry heaved as he did his best to reign himself in, to no avail. He retched out his stomach's contents and hurriedly stumbled out of the prison cell in disgust.

"T-This... is what you people did?! What in the FUCK is wrong with you people! …Oh my god. Astrid and Sebastian are probably in one of these cells, aren't they?!" said Reed.

Lu'um patted Reed's back and said, "I will not defend what happened here, Ka'an, but I want you to understand that we just wanted to survive. When you're pushed to the brink, you'll do anything to live. Desperation sets in and you lose sight of everything you once held to be true."

"What we did will never be forgiven, but we did what we had to do to gain back the advantage on the Infestation — The Divine Furnace. We swore that we would not lose to them, even if we became monsters ourselves."

"We swore to protect our home — our universe — no matter the cost."

Chapter end