Alex turned to the sky, interested in what the old man was looking at. When he did, he found... nothing.
Bladedance looked as well, her eyes narrowing at the sight as well.
At this moment, it shouldâve been daytime for them, with the sun somewhere high in the sky. And yet, all they could see in the sky was darkness.
There was no sun, no shimmering sky, nothing. It was a completely empty darkness.
"Itâs not nighttime, is it?" the old man asked.
"No, it shouldnât be," Alex said, continuing to stare at the sky. He wanted to make sense of what he was seeing, but he couldnât. It simply didnât.
"Is that the sky?" Bladedance asked. "Why is it so empty?"
"The sky is always empty," Alex said. "Hell doesnât let you see stars or moon at night. This may be that."
"Then... is that outer space?" Bladedance asked.
Alex wasnât sure. He looked at either spatial wall on the side and saw how they grew to the top before growing unstable. However, both walls curved outward, not meeting the sky at the top.
If the Hell realm was circular, then the outer spatial wall would be in the shape of a donut, covering everything but just the center. And the inner spatial wall would be the hole of the donut, except the hole wasnât really a hole.
"Can you see anything up there with your eyes?" Godslayer asked.
"My eyes havenât worked since I had a seal put around me. Same with my weakened senses. I canât use them just yet," Alex told the sword spirit.
Still, he wanted answers.
"Let me go check what it really is."
Alex flew into the air, hoping to learn directly from the source. But as soon as he began flying, he felt a restriction upon him that grew the higher he went. He was barely any distance in the sky before he was forced to descend back down.
"Hell doesnât want me to fly here," Alex said with a frown. "Its suppression is strong around here."
Bladedance kept staring at the sky for a while before speaking, "Donât bother. I donât believe that is outer space."
Alex turned toward her. "Are you sure?"
"The barrier around Hell is a dome. The shape doesnât make sense from underneath, so that must be a barrier on top of a barrier."
"A barrier that stops light?" Alex asked her.
The woman shrugged. "There must be a reason. Since we canât fly up there, itâs better to just continue on. Letâs go in."
Alex thought for a moment and nodded. That was probably the right thing to do. If there was a barrier up there, then he wasnât leaving through it anyway.
While Alex and Bladedance focused on the second spatial wall, the old man kept staring at the sky, at the darkness.
âDarkness... Night... an Endless Night,â he thought. âCould the poem have been talking about this?â
That shouldâve been impossible, right? The shimmering sky had formed long after the poem was written. Or had this thing always been here?
"Senior? Please hurry. I canât keep this up for much longer," Alex said with a grunt.
The old man turned around and was surprised to see that he had already opened the barrier. He still didnât understand how Alex had done it, but he kept the questions for later.
He quickly ran up to the opening and walked inside.
Once both the old man and Bladedance had walked in, Alex went in himself, letting the barrier snap back to its place behind him.
Immediately, he hated the feeling inside of the barrier.
The surroundings before him were foggy and dark. He couldnât see beyond perhaps 3 meters before him, everything else hanging in a perpetual haze. There were some splotches of change in light and shadow on the fog, but not enough to even be a silhouette of something.
It was also unnaturally cold in there, the fog definitely having some Yin element to it. The lack of Yang was apparent right away to all three standing there.
"Where are we?" Alex asked, taking a step forward. But before he could move, Bladedanceâs hand moved out, blocking him.
"Look down."
Alex paused and looked out. To his surprise, he had nearly stepped off a cliff.
"Holy... thank you," Alex said, taking a step back, pressing against the wall. Only then did he realize that he couldnât sense the area around him.
"Iâm being suppressed here," he said.
"Same," the old man said. "Even my Qi is suppressed. I donât think I can use it."
Alex checked and it was the same for him as well.
"Whatever it is that is creating this suppression, it is strong," Bladedance said with a frown. "Even I am being suppressed."
Her eyes narrowed. "Thatâs not just it. Thereâs something else in the surroundings. I canât tell what it is, but it is strong. I donât recognize this aura at all."
Alex took a moment to see what she was talking about and let the surroundings press onto him. He had no spiritual sense at the moment, so he needed to directly sense the aura with his body.
It took him a moment, but he found the answer. When he did, he gasped.
"Itâs Time," Alex said in surprise. "Time aura."
Bladedance turned toward him in equal surprise. "Time aura?"
"Yes," Alex said. "More specifically, itâs... Temporal Swiftness. Time moves here much faster than it does outside."
Alex tried to check the rate of swiftness, but he couldnât tell. "Itâs at least 5 times faster though. One hour in here will be five hours out there."
Bladedance looked at him with a curious look on her face. "Donât tell me you have the Time Dao too," she said.
"No," Alex said. "But I am halfway there. Maybe even more."
Bladedance couldnât believe what she was hearing. Learning Space Dao itself was such a rare thing, and now he could sense Time aura as well. She was about to say something, when her eyes shifted.
The other two turned at the same time as well.
A glowing yellow light had appeared before the three of them.