Shrouded Seascape

Halting her descent, Anna pondered for a moment before she conjured a sphere of corrosive flames and hurled it into the room. The fireball made a round within but encountered nothing.

Immediately afterward, everything reversed as if it were a tape being rewound.

The corrosive flames moved along its previous trajectory and returned to Anna before vanishing into thin air.

Anna, who had sunk partially into the floor, resurfaced. The thick door of the containment cell that had melted beneath the corrosive flames healed and closed once more.

And just like that, a new cycle began.

Halting her descent, Anna pondered for a moment before she conjured a sphere of corrosive flames and hurled it into the room. The fireball made a round within but encountered nothing.

Anna repeated her movements without making a sound as if she had become a mime. Everything in the cell seemed to be in the middle of a loop, and it seemed like the loop would continue until the end of time.

After a brief yet lengthy ten minutes, the situation finally changed. Anna, whose figure had been partially sinking and resurfacing, finally sank completely.

Her eyes remained above the surface, and Anna gazed at the distant, empty containment cell in puzzlement, thinking to herself, This shouldn't be empty. Did I miss something?

An organization as immense as the IMF wouldn't construct an empty building a kilometer underground for no reason at all. She couldn't help but suspect that Lucius had lied to her.

"Should I open the remaining two doors?" Anna contemplated but found it incredibly risky. However, she knew that her options were extremely limited.

This site was located in a polar region. To escape, she'd need a tool that would allow her to take flight. In addition, she had to plunge the entire site into chaos, or she wouldn't get far, even if she somehow managed to escape.

After all, there wasn't a single living person within a five-hundred-kilometer radius of the site.

A soft noise generated by leather shoes hitting the ground echoed, and the clown in a neat red suit appeared before Anna in a burst of colorful paper confetti. It was now wearing a tall top hat with brightly colored purple sequins.

The clown removed its hat and bowed to Anna with utmost elegance, revealing a void behind its mask. Its clothes contained nothing behind, making it seem as if it were floating in the air. The clown had no fleshly body, or perhaps the clothing and mask were his true form.

"Speak. What's going on up above?" Anna asked.

The clown put its hat back on and shrugged, seemingly helpless. Its gloved right hand flipped, producing a magic cloth decorated with star patterns. The clown draped the magic cloth over Anna, and the latter magically found herself back on Level -16.

When Anna raised her hand, she inhaled sharply at the sight before her.

The scene unfolding before her was beyond her imagination.

The small hole she had made with her corrosive flames had expanded into a massive opening. The seven floors up above had collapsed, creating a massive hole.

Debris, corpses, and bizarre Anomalies were suspended in midair as if gravity had ceased to exist for them.

The wails, roars, the crackling of electricity, and the forceful, rapid noises from the shattered waterpipes combined together to create a harsh discordant mixture of noises.

"Did... did you do all this?" Anna asked incredulously.

The clown hastily raised its finger and waved it gently.

The scenery transformed, and the chaos instantly returned to normal; the hole that Anna had opened with her corrosive flames had vanished without a trace.

The cacophony had disappeared in an instant, and time seemed to have turned back before everything became chaotic.

The clown walked up to Anna with a playing card that said, "You did this?"

"Shhh… Quiet," Anna mouthed to the hideous clown mask.

The abnormal phenomenon reminded Anna of when she opened that door on the bottommost level only to find nothing behind it. Anna finally realized that the door she opened had contained something. She simply couldn't perceive it.

Lucius' words about how they could only use negation to describe the Anomaly on the bottommost level popped up in Anna's mind.

"It's not pure; it's not clean.

"It's not heavy; it's not dead; it's not happy; it's not fond of humans.

"It's not square; it's not round; it's not an organism; it's not a plant. It can't generate friction with any objects.

"It does not possess wisdom, but it's not stupid."

The most dangerous Anomaly in the entire site had truly been released by Anna.

Now, Anna was in a dilemma. She had unleashed that Anomaly to deal with the IMF, but she had no idea what it was, and its abilities were unknown to it as well. How could she make use of it to escape?

Rumble!

Rumbling noises suddenly echoed from a distant corner.

Anna signaled at the clown, and her figure vibrated before melting into the adjacent wall.

The clown erased itself with the magic cloth just as a robot resembling a tank emerged from the distant corner.

The floor was evidently being supervised by robots. The massive robot was moving slowly, and the equipment on its head scanned the floor from all angles, ensuring no blind spots whatsoever.

However, the fact that it failed to detect Anna meant that it lacked the ability to scan the walls.

When the robot turned a corner, Anna poked her head out from the wall. She had noticed something amiss. She had caused such a massive commotion, so how come the IMF had only dispatched robots for routine patrols?

This was out of script; weren't they supposed to mobilize all of their combat teams to attack and contain her along with the other Anomalies? The bizarre situation made Anna think of the entity she had just released.

Anna furrowed her brows in contemplation. She approached the clown and reached for its neck, but her arm phased underneath the mask, grasping nothing.

Realizing that the clown had no neck, Anna could only give up.

She lowered her voice to the minimum and whispered, "I don't care why you approached me, but we're in the same boat until we're out of here. Let's work together to get out of here. We'll discuss what happens once we're out."

The clown's previous actions had told Anna that it was trustworthy.

Anna was in a strange situation that demanded allies rather than enemies, and the potential ally was an Anomaly that seemed to have good intentions. With that in mind, Anna knew that she had to seize this opportunity to enlist the clown's help.

The clown nodded cheerfully. It took the hat from its head and placed it on Anna's severed hand.

Pop!

A crisp sound reminiscent of firecrackers echoed, and the hat was removed.

Anna's severed hand was reattached in an instant. Before Anna could rejoice, however, she noticed the wrinkles and calluses on her brand-new hand.

"This isn't my hand. Where did you get this hand from?