The vast pillars of darkness spread out and blanketed the sky, as this happened the onyx ocean rose from below the crystal floor.
This darkness reached and lashed out at anything and everything it could touch. It enveloped everything it could, that which could be considered living was consumed. I saw the remnants of the ice trees near the edge of the crystal island I had been on before be consumed as the malevolent onyx liquid bulged out and washed over the crystal ball like a tsunami.
Seconds later the crystal island begun to float once again on the onyx ocean, as it did many smaller shards of crystal floated up to the surface of the liquid. It seemed to regurgitate anything it cannot eat.
As the ocean rose and rose, higher and higher I started to become concerned. Despite the fact the darkness had already reached the height it was when I first landed down here, it didn't seem like it was slowing.
Brief panic overcame me before not even a moment later I had already started scaling the giant mountain. I had recovered my exhaustion naturally but with how fast I was now sprinting uphill, my stamina would quickly deplete.
'Fun.' I thought to myself sarcastically.
I had to just pray that it would stop before it reached me. Despite the fact I knew I wouldn't die, this dark liquid instilled such fear into me it was almost irrational.
'In all fairness who wouldn't be scared of some mysterious ocean of man-eating liquid.'
Looking up, the distance I still had to go was daunting, the sheer height was nothing short of unrealistic. Yet, it was still there.
It was getting cold now, which was a relief with the incinerating heat I had been experiencing the past god knows how long. If that kind of heat continued while I was using this much energy I'm pretty sure I would have melted into a puddle of sweat.
'Now that I think about it, I should be sweating right now. Hell I should have been sweating before in the light. Can I not sweat anymore?'
The immortality spell only became more and more confusing the more I learnt. Learning I couldn't sweat anymore was one more thing in a long list of changes to my body which seemed very unrelated to being immortal. In that moment a thought encroached on my mind.
'Was it really just my body that had changed?'
Even in my panic to run from the malevolent water my mind couldn't help but think back and note the changes in how I thought, how I acted, my emotions, every part of my being.
That very impulse to get lost in thought even when in life threatening danger was noted, I didn't have that before. I was always focused on what I had to do but now my mind wandered constantly no matter the situation.
Not only that my mind itself felt clear and faster than it had ever been, before I had thought that was due to regaining a youthful brain but...
The incline of the mountain was now too steep to run up, I now had to climb slowly. The dark horror beneath me wasn't rising nearly as quickly anymore to which I could only wonder why it even stopped at all.
I was getting distracted once again, I needed to just focus on climbing until I was in the clear. I was making significant distance though, after all this climbing I had nearly reached the edge of the caldera.
I had no choice other than to hope that the dark ocean stopped. To my luck a few seconds later, that is exactly what happened.
I held onto the now vertical cliff panting, I stayed there until I started to become dizzy from the hyperventilation. For some reason I was sure that being consumed by that dark liquid wouldn't result in an easy death.
After inhaling enough oxygen for an entire day I decided to keep climbing. My heart was still beating out my chest but once I looked up I got distracted by something.
Up above was a vibrant red light, it looked almost like the moon though a little larger. It also had a dot of black in the middle. It didn't take too much thinking to come up with exactly what it was.
It was daylight from up above with the now tiny floating country in the middle. It was truly staggering how far down I now was. The fact that the vast chasm I suspected to be the size of a continent back on earth was now comparable to the moon in size was a completely unimaginable scale. The scale of a containment in the first place was too vast to properly fathom, I only judged this abyss to be so by the fact the I had only seen vague outlines of biomes and barely noticeable mountains when I had initially been falling.
For a moment I tried to calculate how far down I must have fallen but too many of the variables needed were unknown. Thought occurred to me in the same moment which overwrite any other thoughts.
'Light from the sun in day, Light from below in the night, Why? To cast away the sea of darkness?'
It seemed significant that the ocean avoided the light, while at the same time there always being some kind of light illuminating this place.
Finally I was able to reach an arm onto the top and pull myself up using it. As I looked over the edge into the caldera I saw a faint pale glow coming from the middle of very middle of the enormous bowl shaped depression in the middle of this mountain.
I basked in the sight of the Lucious green forest within, it was a vast and almost enchanting in its beauty. The sight was reminded me of a photorealistic painting I once saw long ago.
'This isn't a trick right? All those trees better not be man eating monstrosities.'
I heaved myself over to the other side and begun to slide down the near vertical and smooth side. Or well I attempted to.
Much like a skateboarder trying a drop in for the first time, I became intimately familiar with how a stone surface against the face feels like. Only I wasn't slamming my head against stone or concrete, I was having my head slammed against a crystal substance far more solid than anything that should have been possible.
I continued my path down the slope rolling and bouncing the whole way down, covering the sides in more than a little blood. By the time I had reached the bottom I was a bloodied mass of broken bones organs. Turns out while the damage from so high of a fall was enough to completely wreck my body, it wasn't quite enough to outright kill me, or make me pass out for that matter.
'Either or would have been better.'
For some reason repairing broken parts was far more painful than just simply regenerating it completely.
The pain didn't last long though, a few agonising moments later my body was in prime condition once again. Free of the pain from my foolish decision.
I rested in the grass for a while, the surrounding trees reminded me of earth.
'I haven't been gone more than a few earth weeks and am already feeling this way.'
I wondered just how I would feel in a hundred years, a thousand years. I was well and truly immortal now, so unless there was some weird restriction on length of life then I would live... well endlessly.
I had always learnt stories about vampires and other similar humanoid creatures living for thousands of years but thousands of years is nothing compared to an actual eternity.
'That's enough of that for now.'
Sitting up I surveyed my surroundings. Neither the grass nor trees seemed dangerous, that was a serious concern of mine but it seemed to be without substance. This location was by all means a near perfect location, as far as anywhere down in this abyss was concerned.
There was one odd thing however.
I smelled smoke, it was faint but undeniably present. That would only ever mean one thing. It meant there was a demon within this forest and I had no way to leave.
'I didn't really think this all through did i? How uncharacteristic of me.'
At that exact moment I felt at the edge of my soul, a titanic force press against the atmospheric mana. The source of this force was slowly approaching me.
If I were still able to sweat, I was sure I would have in this moment. Especially because as time passed it became clear...
It wasn't just one demon.