noveltune Chapter 1656: Upgraded Pasa Rope
Chapter 1656: Upgraded Pasa Rope
"Hahaha...""Kekeke~"
"Fufufufu~"
Maniacal laughter echoed through the dead wasteland like rusted blades scraping across bone. Three ghostly figures stood around a gigantic clay pot suspended above an immense black fire, their translucent bodies twisting unnaturally while they stirred the ’thing’ inside with massive wooden poles.
Every movement released thick bubbles from the boiling liquid, bubbles that burst with muffled screams trapped inside them.
What was inside?
The pot overflowed with writhing grey souls. Some still resembled humans, while others looked like melted remains of whatever they once had been. Hollow faces stretched open in endless agony, mouths wide enough to tear apart their own features, yet not a single scream escaped the pot.
Their sound vanished before reaching the air itself.
The boiling liquid peeled fragments from their souls layer by layer. Whenever one tried to crawl upward, the ghostly cooks smashed it back down with the poles, forcing it deeper into the burning abyss beneath the liquid.
And only a short distance away... another group of ghosts lined souls in rows like prisoners awaiting execution. Chains made from black smoke wrapped around their necks while the ghosts lashed them repeatedly with dark whips covered in jagged hooks.
"Hahaha! That’s right! Scream louder!" one ghost shrieked with twisted delight. "Does it hurt now? Where did all that pride go, huh?!"
WHIP!
The black lash tore directly through the soul instead of flesh. Fragments scattered into the air like torn ashes before painfully stitching themselves back together again. The souls convulsed soundlessly, their bodies twitching across the scorched ground while the ghosts laughed harder at their suffering.
"Again! Again! Don’t let them breathe!"
WHIP!
The entire place resembled a living nightmare stitched together from punishment and madness.
Further ahead, another group fried souls alive over iron pans.
The souls crackled violently like meat dropped into boiling oil, their gray skin blistering and splitting apart while smoke leaked from their screaming mouths. Some tried crawling away, only for skeletal ghost hands to shove them back onto the burning surface.
"Hmm... disgusting smell from disgusting souls... kekeke~" one ghost muttered while flipping a soul over casually, as though cooking livestock.
And beyond them... another group stood beside enormous grinding stones stained black. The ghosts fed screaming souls directly between the rotating slabs.
Crrrrccckkkknnnkkk~
Crunching noises echoed endlessly as souls were crushed apart inch by inch, their bodies stretching like wet cloth.
And... and... the horrors simply continued.
Every direction Aether looked revealed another form of torture. Hanging souls with missing faces.
Souls stitched together into flesh-like lumps.
Souls forced into cages filled with black insects that devoured them from the inside.
The entire ground resembled an empire built from torment itself.
Aether stood frozen before it all, horror slowly tightening around his chest.
"..."
Even after witnessing wars, bloodshed, and death... this felt different.
This place did not kill. It prolonged suffering until pain itself became meaningless.
Nyx happily dragged him forward by the hand as though showing him a beautiful garden she had carefully nurtured.
Her eyes sparkled with excitement while the tortured souls reflected within them like tiny burning stars.
"This is my last ingredient," she said proudly. "I worked very hard on it."
Aether subconsciously swallowed. His throat suddenly felt dry as he watched the soldier ghosts continue torturing the souls without pause.
None of them looked tired. None of them looked merciful.
The worst part... the ghosts genuinely seemed to enjoy it.
"What..." Aether’s voice came out quieter than intended. "What exactly are they doing to them?"
Nyx blinked innocently at his reaction before smiling softly, almost adorably. "They’re refining the souls," she explained as if discussing ordinary cooking.
"Grinding them down, removing impurities, condensing the essence into liquid form."
As she spoke, she reached into the pouch hanging from her hip and pulled out a tiny bottle no larger than her pinky finger. Inside sloshed a thick purplish-black liquid that moved slowly like living ink.
Merely looking at it made the surrounding air feel heavier.
Only one or two millilitres existed inside.
Aether stared at the bottle in silence. Somehow... that tiny amount felt heavier than mountains. Countless distorted faces briefly surfaced inside the liquid before melting back down again.
"You..." He hesitated for a moment. "You put that into food?"
"Mmhm." Nyx nodded cheerfully. "Just one drop."
She held the bottle carefully with both hands, smiling proudly like a wife showing her husband the result of weeks of hard work.
"Do you know how difficult this was?" she asked with a small pout. "After two whole weeks, we only managed to make four drops. Hundreds of souls had to be boiled, crushed, purified, and reduced before the essence stabilised properly."
Her tone carried genuine frustration over the inefficiency of the process rather than horror at the suffering involved.
Aether slowly parted his lips, wanting to respond... yet no words came out.
What exactly was he supposed to say while standing inside a hell where souls were butchered into ingredients... and Nyx looked at him with the innocent expression of someone seeking praise?
"Wait... how did you even get the souls out of the Grenthollow? Aren’t there restrictions there?" Aether asked, his tone filled with confusion.
The last time, he had barely managed to save Nyx alive. Even surviving inside the Grenthollow had felt impossible... yet now she was casually extracting souls from it as if plucking flowers from a garden.
Nyx nodded lightly. "There were..." she replied softly before raising her hand toward the cracked Pasa Rope wrapped around her wrist. The rope coiled gently around her pale skin like a living serpent, faint wisps of grey energy leaking from the fractures along its surface.
"For some reason," she continued, "after I saved you and Delphine... the rope changed. It can pass through the Grenthollow’s restrictions now and pull souls out easily."
As she spoke, she led Aether deeper toward the base of the Grenthollow.
The massive structure towered endlessly into the starry sky above, its six enormous stairways around the mountain stretching upward like pathways leading to a summit.
The moment they arrived near the first staircase, Aether’s eyes narrowed in surprise.
Two headless naked figures stood motionless upon the lower steps.
Male and female bodies alike remained unnaturally still, where their heads should have been, only blue ghostly flames flickered silently above the necks.
The moment those flames sensed Nyx’s presence, every figure immediately dropped to one knee before her.
The flames on their necks trembled violently in submission.
Aether’s expression stiffened.
Even Mary had never received such obedience from the creatures within the Grenthollow... yet these things bowed before Nyx without hesitation.
What exactly was happening here?
And that was not all.
The lower steps, once crowded with endless trapped souls, now appeared far emptier. Some souls still remained frozen upon the stairs, while new ones slowly climbed upward like prisoners marching toward judgment.
Aether felt another chill run through him.
Without speaking further, Nyx stepped toward the staircase and slowly loosened the Pasa Rope from around her wrist. The cracked rope slithered through the air unnaturally, its surface faintly glowing beneath the fractures.
Then suddenly...
SHHHK!
The rope shot forward like a hunting spear toward one of the unmovable souls standing upon the first step.
The moment it touched the invisible restriction barrier surrounding the staircase, the space itself rippled violently like disturbed water.
Black distortions spread outward in circles as though reality resisted the rope’s intrusion.
Yet the rope forced its way through anyway.
Aether’s pupils contracted.
The restriction did not stop it.
The rope wrapped itself tightly around the soul’s neck before Nyx gave a small pull backwards with her hand.
The soul was instantly dragged out from the staircase.
The barrier rippled again like calm water was disturbed by a falling stone before the soul completely passed through the restriction and collapsed, trembling onto the ground outside.
The trapped spirit looked utterly confused, its grey translucent body shaking violently as if unable to comprehend what had just happened.
Nyx held the rope casually and looked toward Aether with an innocent expression.
"That’s it," she said simply.
"..."
Aether’s lips twitched violently.
That’s it?
How the hell was that "that’s it"?!
She had just done something even Mary never achieved. Even Grace herself had once stated that no one could bypass the Grenthollow’s restriction and take the soul.
Yet Nyx had casually pierced through it and dragged a soul out by force.
Aether immediately grabbed the Pasa Rope for closer inspection.
The cracks covering its surface pulsed faintly beneath his fingers. Strange energy seeped from within them.
Without wasting another second, Aether instantly descended into his Twin Domain.
Darkness folded around him before his figure appeared before the bird cage suspended within the twin domain.
"Grace," Aether called seriously while raising the cracked rope. "Look at this."
Grace, though visibly surprised by his sudden appearance, focused her gaze upon the rope almost immediately. Her sharp eyes slowly narrowed as she examined every fracture spread across its surface.
Silence stretched for several moments.
"Interesting..." she muttered quietly. "Very interesting."
Then her eyes lifted toward him.
"Tell me everything."
Aether quickly explained the situation, from Nyx entering the Grenthollow to pulling souls directly through the restriction barrier.
Grace listened without interrupting, her expression gradually turning more thoughtful with every detail. By the time he finished speaking, even she seemed slightly unsettled.
"To think she managed to accomplish this..." Grace murmured softly. "Hmm... perhaps in the future she may obtain an Authority."
Aether frowned immediately. "What do you mean?"
Grace ignored the question for a moment and continued examining the rope carefully.
"You need to understand something," she explained slowly. "Nothing enters the Eternal Prison from the outside unless the prison itself opens... or the Eternal Chains drag something inside. That is the fundamental law governing its existence."
"But this rope forcibly entered the restriction."
Her tone became quieter.
"It violated the nature of the Eternal Prison itself."
Aether’s gaze sharpened.
"And worse..." Grace continued, "It didn’t merely enter. It pulled a living person from within."
"That restriction is far stronger when preventing escape than preventing entry. The fact that this rope bypassed both conditions means..."
She paused while staring deeply at the cracked surface.
"Its structure changed."
The cracks faintly glowed beneath her gaze.
"No..." Grace corrected herself quietly. "Not changed."
Her voice carried genuine surprise now.
"Its law was rewritten."
Aether stared at the rope again. To him, those still resembled ordinary fractures spreading across damaged material.
But Grace slowly narrowed her eyes.
’To others, these may appear as cracks...’ she thought. ’But they are not cracks anymore.’
Ancient symbols slowly reflected within her pupils.
No, more accurately... the rope itself had indeed cracked, but those cracks were no ordinary damage. Ancient texts had formed within them, spreading across the surface like laws carved directly into existence itself.
Aether frowned deeply. "Law? What exactly do you mean by that?"
Grace took a slow breath before looking at him with visible irritation.
"Damn man... It’s not just you. Even the people around you are absurdly weird," she muttered while rubbing her forehead. Then she waved her hand dismissively.
"Forget the complicated part. Just remember this... the rope forcibly entered the Eternal Prison."
Her tone turned serious.
"Do you understand how insane that is? Even dangerous entities cannot bypass those restrictions. The Eternal Prison’s barrier is vastly superior to the Grenthollow’s restriction."
She pointed toward the cracked Pasa Rope in his hand.
"But because this thing entered that place, survived it, and even pulled a person out from within... the rope adapted."
"It modified itself," Grace continued. "Mutated. Its existence changed to withstand that level of restriction. Now it can forcibly enter and extract things from any restriction below Eternal Prison level... and who knows it might even enter Eternal Prison again."
Aether hummed thoughtfully after hearing the explanation.
Honestly... it made sense in a terrifying way.
If something survived being crushed by a Level 100 existence and evolved through that experience, then what threat would a mere Level 50 restriction pose afterwards?
That was essentially what happened here.
Still, Aether’s curiosity remained.
"But... what did you mean by its own ’Law’?" he asked while looking at the rope again. "You kept muttering strange things earlier."
Grace immediately shook her head with annoyance.
"That’s not something you need to know right now. Just leave already."
Her irritated expression deepened.
Seriously... this bastard only visited her whenever he needed information.
What happened to the old him?
Back then, he constantly talked, constantly annoyed her, and constantly lingered around the cage even when she ignored him completely.
He used to chatter like a pest that refused to die.
Now?
Now he barely visited unless he wanted answers.
Aether inwardly sighed.
’As long as nothing dangerous happened to Nyx... that’s enough.’
He turned to leave the Twin Domain when another thought suddenly struck him.
"Right," Aether paused before glancing back. "What about those headless things? Why did they suddenly appear again?"
As far as he remembered, those creatures vanished after he took the Mountain away from the Grenthollow. Even after the Grenthollow resumed functioning later, the headless beings never returned.
Grace’s expression instantly changed.
"What do you mean they appeared?" she asked sharply. "Those Soul Guardians... appeared again?"
Aether nodded slowly. "Yeah. I think that’s what they were called."
Then his expression turned slightly stranger.
"And... they kneeled before Nyx."
"...WHAT?!"