The tunnel spat them out into a new kind of hell.
This one was beautiful.
They stood on the threshold of the second level of the labyrinth, a cavern so vast it felt like a world unto itself.
The air was still, silent, and tasted of cold, clean ozone.
Everything was crystal.
The walls, the floor, the ceiling—all of it was a single, unbroken mass of a strange, translucent mineral that pulsed with a soft, internal, and deeply unsettling light.
The light refracted through a thousand different facets, painting the air with a dazzling, disorienting kaleidoscope of rainbows.
"Whoa," Jax breathed, his voice a hushed, reverent whisper that was swallowed by the cavern's immense silence.
He leaned on his high-tech crutch, his eyes wide with a manic, architectural glee.
"This place is sparkly."
He took a hesitant step forward.
The sound of his boot on the crystal floor wasn't a crunch.
It was a chime.
