I Have a Military Shop Tab in Fantasy World-Chapter 112: Inside the Tower Part 8

The silence that followed was heavy and wrong.

Inigo stood still, his chest rising and falling in shallow, ragged breaths. The tip of his M4 Carbine trembled slightly in his grip, held low but ready. Violet smoke drifted from the epicenter of the Lady of Illusion’s death, curling and fading like it was being swallowed by the air itself. The echo of her last scream still seemed to linger in the corners of the chamber, a phantom wail stuck in the stone.

He shifted slowly, eyes scanning the scorched floor. Cracks ran like veins across the stone, lit faintly from below by flickers of magic too stubborn to die. The crater she left behind was wide, its edges melted smooth. A few feet from the center, something glinted faintly—metal, or maybe crystal.

Inigo crouched and brushed ash aside with the back of his glove. A shard of the Lady’s crown lay there—small, but warm to the touch. He pocketed it without a word.

Beside him, Lyra slowly lowered her bow. Her fingers were trembling. She didn’t even try to hide it. The final confrontation had drained everything out of her—body, mind, and soul. Her skin was pale, eyes distant.

"I think it’s over," she said quietly.

"No," Inigo replied, shaking his head. "She’s dead. But it’s not over."

She looked at him sharply. "What do you mean?"

Inigo stepped away from the crater, boots crunching against brittle floor tiles. "Feel that? The Rift’s still here. It hasn’t closed."

That froze her. "Wait. That’s not how it works. When the boss dies, the Rift seals automatically. Every time."

"Yeah. Every time." Inigo scanned the upper walls of the chamber. There was no visible portal, no glowing light, no sign of the sky or outside world. Just black stone, writhing slowly like the walls themselves were breathing. "But this one isn’t like the others."

"You think it’s because this place isn’t a normal Rift?" Lyra asked, voice dropping to a whisper.

Inigo didn’t answer.

Because deep down, he knew the truth. This wasn’t a normal Rift.

They weren’t in some corrupted section of the real world. This was something else. A full realm. And they had just killed one of its rulers.

"Let’s move," he said. "We won’t find answers just standing here."

They started the slow ascent, following the way they had come. The Lady’s illusions were gone now, leaving only the rotten stonework and putrid stench of old magic. No more monsters spawned. No more whispers chased them. The tower felt lifeless—like a tomb. And maybe that’s what it was now.

But as they climbed, something felt... wrong.

At first, it was small things.

A hallway that twisted slightly more than it did before. A staircase that stretched too long. A door that hadn’t been there.

They tried not to talk about it. They focused on walking.

After a full hour of climbing, they reached what should have been the tower’s highest floor.

But the surface wasn’t there.

Only another door.

It was open, leading into a new corridor they didn’t remember.

"What is this?" Lyra muttered.

Inigo’s jaw tightened. "We’re still inside."

"We’ve been walking up. This is the right direction."

"Doesn’t matter. The rules are changing." He clicked the safety off his rifle. "She was powerful, but she wasn’t the source. Just the gatekeeper."

Lyra stared at the corridor ahead. "Then what’s at the top?"

Inigo didn’t answer.

They moved forward.

The new hallway wasn’t stone anymore. It looked like glass, but felt like ice. Their boots made no sound on the surface, and the walls reflected their shapes in a thousand broken angles.

After fifteen minutes, they stopped.

There was no end in sight.

"We’re walking in circles," Lyra said. "I can feel it. This place—it’s folding in on itself."

Inigo dropped to a knee and drew a line on the floor with a piece of chalk from his utility pouch. A basic trick for mazes. They moved forward.

Five minutes later, the same mark was under their feet.

"No exit," Inigo muttered.

Lyra turned to him. "So what now?"

"We find the center. There’s always a heart in these things. And if we’re still trapped, that means something is still alive."

They turned back the way they came. The walls changed again.

Now they weren’t glass.

Now they were flesh.

Dark red sinew pulsed faintly along the walls. Strange veins throbbed beneath translucent skin. A low hum echoed through the space—not sound exactly, but pressure, like standing beneath a massive speaker before the bass drops.

Lyra gagged. "It smells like rot."

"Then we’re close," Inigo said grimly.

Eventually, the corridor opened into a massive circular chamber. Unlike the previous rooms, this one was untouched by violence. It was pristine—too pristine. At the center stood a statue of the Lady of Illusion, larger than life, arms outstretched. But it wasn’t made of stone.

It was made of bone.

Dozens—hundreds—of humanoid bones, sculpted and fused together into her likeness.

Behind it, a massive door loomed, half-formed from the same violet energy that coated her illusions.

"This has to be it," Inigo said.

Lyra approached the statue, her hand slowly reaching out.

"Don’t touch it," Inigo warned.

Too late.

The room shook.

The walls peeled back like paper, revealing nothing but black space and distant stars. The floor dropped out from under them, and they were falling.

Lyra screamed.

Inigo grabbed her arm.

Then the world slammed them down—hard.

They landed in a new space. No longer a tower. No longer a hallway.

A throne room.

The sky above was endless void, but the floor was obsidian glass. At the far end sat a figure.

Not the Lady of Illusion.

Something worse.

It looked humanoid—barely. Its skin was a mask of shifting ink. Its face was empty. And behind it hovered a series of shifting symbols, constantly re-arranging like a puzzle in motion.

It stood slowly.

"You were not meant to come this far," the figure said. Its voice was layered, both male and female, both echoing and immediate.

Inigo raised his rifle.

"We didn’t come here to ask permission."

The figure stepped down from the throne. "She was the key. The Rift remains open because the gate was never meant to be destroyed—only obeyed."

Lyra drew her bow, but her hand shook. "What are you?"

"I am what follows," it replied. "And now that you are here, there is only one path."

Inigo narrowed his eyes. "You’re the final boss."

"No," the figure replied.

"I am the Rift."

The chamber warped around them. The floor became molten, the air became claws. Magic screamed across their skin, and the battlefield rearranged itself in a kaleidoscope of death.

Inigo didn’t hesitate.

He fired.

The final battle had begun.

They weren’t escaping until it ended.

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