It turned out that the cave was no longer the enclosed space with only one entrance guided by the flow of water. As Jongin went in search for the rogue piece of rock fallen from the Cinnabar, he noticed a breeze of air that should not be there.

Squinting his eyes and piercing his gaze through the damp air, Jongin realised that where there should have been a wall, there was now emptiness. Not quite believing what he was seeing, Jongin extended his arm, noticing belatedly the intermittent tremors of his hand. As he leaned forward, his fingertips grazed thin air, reaffirming that his eyes were not deceiving him. What was supposed to be an impenetrable cave had cracked, revealing a seemingly dark and endless tunnel; a tunnel that came straight from the most haunting legends of history.

It did not take long for shock and surprise to replace fear and confusion. In the blink of an eye, Jongin fearlessly walked into the tunnel with his phone as the only source of light.

The lightless path seemed to be endless, unfolding with each step he took. At there same time, there was an impossible to ignore stench of stale blood lingering in the air. To distract himself from the smell, Jongin  focused on what little he could see.

The tunnel was not small by any means. In fact, even if Jongin expanded his arms to his sides, he could not even graze the walls. Walking through this tunnel, claustrophobia was the least of his concerns. If anything, there was a higher possibility of something or someone crawling unnoticed along the ceilings, ready to launch a surprise attack on any unaware passerby.

This secret tunnel that appeared out of nowhere was not a naturally occurring one but rather manmade. It had a worn out structure with detailed engravings comparable to those found in the buildings where the royal family resided. As Jongin allowed the palm of his hands to travel along the uneven surface of the wall, vivid complex shapes and forms came to life in his mind.

After walking for what felt like an eternity, the tunnel widened, eventually leading into a dilapidated garden. It went without arguing that at one time, this garden must have been a magnificent creation that even the wealthiest king and most revered god would have been jealous of. However, like everything else that walked over the earth, the garden had fallen victim to the passing of time and neglect. Now it was a mere skeleton of what it used to be. All around Jongin were wilting trees and the overcast darkness reigning over everything. Yet, there was also a veil of light that lifted the darkness whilst dimming visibility at the same time. Because of this, Jongin was unable to determine whether he was still inside the cave or if he had walked long enough to have exited into another realm that did not abide by the rules of time and space known to