The next day, Max was ready to leave for the Thorne Family when he was called by the Leader of the Phoenix Order guild.
After meeting with her, he left the guild and boarded a flying vehicle, heading toward the Thorne Family while it soared through Central City.
The Thorne Family, along with the other three major families, had their headquarters in the northern part of the city. Likewise, the five guilds were situated in the southern corners.
Since Max needed to travel from the extreme south to the extreme north, he decided to take a vehicle. Moreover, he wasn’t familiar with the way, so his only option was to use a train or some other form of transportation.
The vehicle he chose was cylindrical in shape. Inside, two rows of seats were arranged on either side for passengers, with two front seats designated for the driver and the conductor.
Max sat in the far-left seat, feeling bored as he waited to reach the Thorne Family’s area as quickly as possible.
After what felt like hours of travel, the flying vehicle finally came to a stop.
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Max disembarked and looked around.
He found himself at an intersection, or rather, a street where five other streets branched off in five different directions.
Max observed each of the streets, noticing the notice boards along the sides.
On one of the boards, "Thorne Villa" was written in bold golden letters.
’Is this the path leading to the Thorne Family?’ Max wondered. He hadn’t expected the Thorne Family to be so bold as to display such banners pointing the way to their headquarters.
Max didn’t dwell on it and began walking toward the path beside the notice board.
However, he quickly noticed that the direction he was heading toward seemed barren. All he could see was wasteland, with an endless concrete path stretching toward the horizon.
’Is this an illusion?’ he thought, his brows furrowing. If it was, reaching the Thorne Villa would be impossible.
Determined to test the reality of the path, Max quickened his pace, first breaking into a jog, then into a full sprint. The wind whipped past him as his boots pounded the concrete.
For several moments, he focused solely on the path ahead, convinced he could outpace the strange unease creeping over him.
But as the minutes passed, an unsettling realization took hold. The scenery around him wasn’t changing. No matter how far he ran, the wasteland remained static—an endless loop of nothingness. It felt like running on a treadmill, endlessly moving but never progressing.
"What is this?" His breaths grew heavier, frustration mixing with rising dread. Max slowed to a stop, his heart racing in his chest. The silence was suffocating, and the vast emptiness seemed to close in on him.
"This isn’t normal," Max muttered, scanning his surroundings.
He knelt and touched the concrete. It was solid, cold, and unyielding. Nothing about it suggested illusion, but the impossibility of his situation was undeniable.
"What is this place?" Max muttered, his expression growing solemn. He had been sure that he was moving forward, but everything around him had remained still, mocking him as if the forward movement he felt was nothing more than an illusion.
"Is this some kind of test by the Thorne Family?" Max wondered aloud, then turned around, his eyes narrowing.
Just like the endless concrete path and the barren wasteland meeting the horizon in front of him, the same scene appeared behind him. For a moment, he even felt confused about what was the front and what was the back.
"Damn, they’re really playing tricks on me!" Max cursed under his breath, frustrated with the Thorne Family.
Illusions were something he hadn’t encountered before. He had never faced an enemy with illusions, nor had he seen one before this. Therefore, he had no idea how to escape from an actual illusion.
Max paused for a moment, closing his eyes and calming himself. ’There has to be a way out of this illusion,’ he told himself, taking a few deep breaths.
Understanding that everything in this world had counters, Max believed that illusions must also have their own counter. He just had to find it.
He contemplated his options, considering various methods, until his thoughts settled on the three basic stats of his body: Energy, Physique, and Soul.
Energy had a direct connection to the mana everyone possessed.
Physique represented the constitution of his body, its defense, and its overall performance.
Lastly, there was Soul. Max had always considered the Soul stat to be rarely useful for humans. Unless someone was a Runemaster, having a Soul stat was like possessing a treasure chest without a key to open it.
In simple terms, it was useless for anyone who wasn’t a Runemaster.
But what if that assumption was wrong? What if this was only what people in the Inner Circle believed? What if his understanding was limited all along? What if there was more to the Soul stat than he had ever been aware of?
As these questions filled his mind, Max calmed himself completely. He decided to test his theory.
Focusing inward, Max imagined himself drawing a rune. He concentrated deeply on his soul power, but instead of channeling it into a brush or a stroke, as he would when crafting runes, he let it flow freely.
He released his soul power outward, unrestrained. Like wisps of air, it began to scatter in all directions.
Max kept his eyes closed throughout the process, relying entirely on his senses. Even if he had opened his eyes, he wouldn’t have been able to see the soul power. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t feel it.
He sensed the soul power spreading around him, creating ripples in the unseen fabric of the world, like waves in water.
Crack!
An odd cracking sound echoed out of nowhere.
Following that, he opened his eyes, only to see everything before him vanish. The concrete path, the wasteland, the horizon—everything disappeared, replaced by endless darkness.
’I’ve been in this darkness all this time?’ Max’s eyes widened in shock. He couldn’t believe he had been running down the path, unaware that he was actually in a world of darkness.
A chilling question rose in his heart.
’Since when was I trapped in this illusion?’ Max thought, his eyes narrowing as he recalled his actions: meeting Alice’s mother, boarding the flying vehicle, then leaving and heading down the path beside the notice board that said "Thorne Villa."
As he pondered in the darkness, the scene shifted. He found himself standing on a battlefield, surrounded by hundreds of corpses.
In front of him, soldiers stood with spears and swords pointed at him. They were dressed in traditional medieval-style clothing and armor.
As Max observed them, the soldiers quickly began to attack, thrusting their spears and swords toward him.
"Huh?" Max was shocked and tried to use his Magic Sword Bullets skill, but to his horror, he found that he couldn’t sense any mana in his body. When he attempted to use the skill, no swords appeared beside him.
At that moment, the soldiers’ attacks came crashing down on him.
Panicked, Max instinctively raised his hands in front of him, only to see an old shield appeared before him. It blocked some of the attacks, but the force behind the strikes from so many people was enough to send him crashing to the ground.