Footsteps echoed throughout the rooms as the puddles shook.

  Julo's Uncoiled instinct begged him to leave at the slightest motion.

  Despite the horrible decision, his mind was fixated on finding the black notebook. Even with help, the hefty feeling of the item being in everywhere was crushing his soul beyond what he could imagine.

  [Turn right.]

  The static repeating voice ringing in his skull with constant pieces of information to follow removed the burden on his chest.

  She was really helpful. Maybe a bit too helpful.

  The thought didn't make it into his head before a black shadow-like figure made its way towards him in the corner of his eyes before his cold metallic trigger rose.

  Bang Bang

  These creatures seemed to appear almost every time in all of the rooms he had entered.

  'It's seriously getting annoying.'

  Of course, with a repeating appearance he had been expecting this one to appear as well.

  Bang

  Shattering the blob on the floor, another step rang out into the room.

  [Getting closer.] Excitement filled her voice.

  The ground cracked at the sudden stop of movement before recovering as he kept on walking forward.

  Ignoring the thought that had crawled into his mind, his alert system sharply stabbed through all of his bones.

  Before long, the misty surroundings flowed in and out of his lungs without a moment's notice.

  The moisture from the dimmed misty room he had entered, wetted his lips with water vapor rushing to his bodies as droplets of water condensed.

  'Eh?' His premonition begging him to leave, and his other half wanting him to stay out of necessity. The contrast between two intense instincts scrambled his thinking.

  Droplets, shaken off his hands, rushed to the nearby surfaces before rapidly evaporating and returning to mist.

  His eyes fixated on the weird surrounding, the hurried droplets reformed on his skin as if desperately trying to escape this room.

  His mind raced with doubt before deciding to ask.

  'Is this norma-'

  [Absolutely! Now go get the notebook.]

  ...

  A deafening silence manifested into the room as his lips completely lost blood, turning into a pale color.

  His heart increased, his hands numbed, his eyes slightly shaking with the available cognitive he has, his mouth spread.

  "Are...wait nevermind."

  He suppressed his mind, desperately trying to not leak any signs of suspicion. His thinking slowed down, he let his non thinking brain take over him. After all, a human still had the intelligence of a human even without a language to think with.

  Unfortunately, it was too obvious if he didn't think anything.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  And he wasn't even quite sure if that'll halt the mind reading but it wasn't like he could choose.

  With his eyes straightened, he looked ahead to find a closed room. A break from the rooms.

  Almost all of the rooms he had entered led to another room that also led to another, making a loop of rooms.

  Darting his eyes through spots where the notebook could be, his feet moved closer to the middle.

  Before he could have the chance to take another, his premonition fired off once again, this time the danger side winning.

  Each step felt like he was walking in the lion's cage, his deepest desire for the notebook to grow legs and reveal itself was getting stronger by the minute.

  However, as his mind was darting through regret, his sensory of technology pinched his nerve.

  Something large, something slime-like was blocking his sensory, or at least preventing a few of them.

  It wasn't unusual for the signals to be blocked...Unless it was something invisible.

  His legs bursted with precise agility, overclocking the muscles to tear apart before pushing it to its utter limit

  The door faced him with one rough rotation as his movement dragged the air behind him.

  Louder than the bullet out of the barrel, the misty air slammed the door shut with no additional warning.

  The sight of the mist suddenly gaining form before immediately slamming the door stunned him as the cold surroundings slowly lost its colors.

  The dim room lost its colors, turning bright red before turning brighter, brighter, brighter.

  Eventually, everything shot at Julo's mind, the millisecond switch between two distinct colors, shot at his eyes as his cognitive ability was hindered beyond what he could imagine.

  However, he wasn't gonna sit like a wandering duck.

  His right sweaty hand rose, pushing off the door as he skillfully redirected his speed to the opposite corner of the blood room. Of course, the skillful swipe was a fluke. Julo had never done anything remotely similar to this.

  The bright colors reduced its effectiveness with time as the middle stared at Julo. It had stopped all of its attempts to hide itself. From the corner of the room, a massive blob of flesh emitted a bloody sight with all two corners connecting in the middle. However, the main body had yet to reveal itself.

  From the corner to the middle, the convulsing interconnected blob led to the enormous heart. A literal heart. With the heart, the grotesque smell of intertwined human flesh, clashing against each face smashed against another, trying to fuse into one giant being. And the engraved face of successfully merged beings, laying its desirous eyes on him.

  The utterly unholy sight carved itself into his eyes. Even if one wanted to forget, they would never.

  As Julo's breathing became louder than ever before, a black spot slowly obstructed his line of sight. Consistent deep breaths were dropped as he sighed peacefully full of relief.

  'Wait. That's an arm!' Perhaps, thinking that every bad scenario was a dream was a habit that he needed to get rid off.

  His long hair waved at the incoming attack as it briefly remained in the air before the flesh slammed into his chest. Ducking simply wasn't enough.

  His left right covered in mangled flesh, wriggling in pinning Julo to the wet wall. Moisture of the red mist crawled into his skin as it turned into a liquid. Even now rushing to a place without a heart

  With his back pinned to the wall, another spiraling darkness covered his sight as it gradually grew bigger.

  Shivers burst through his spine, a seemingly death attack with no chance of leaving alive. He trembled, the fibers of the leg, left unused with fears, fully accepting death.

  The tensed face relaxed, with his eyelids reliving all tension.

  Maybe, it would be peaceful...

  ...

  'Mind domain, huh.'

  His eyes shot forward, regaining his cognitive ability. The Versile energy path condensed into his left arm as gas emitted from behind.

  Using his Versile to evaporate the objects behind his arm, the pressure couldn't take it any longer.

  With a shockwave, pieces sharped through the air, with a section of the wall completely obliterated into unrecognizably.

  What used to be horrifying, grew to be a piece of visual information. No thoughts, no attempts to describe what it looked like.

  It was just what it looked like.

  Heart racing, his hand shot forward, point blank at the heart without hesitation.

  The otherwise horrifying sound of the empty gun would've been terrifying in any other situation.

  Fortunately, this was not the situation.

  The painted floor of the heart's parts shook the faces and without any warnings evaporated into the same mist that filled the room.

  One by one, they crawled out of the solid state, from the eyes to the nose and to the chin, all of it were replaced by a mist.

  Julo froze at the sight, his premonition vanished without a trace. The previously feeling of soul's wish unfulfilled were instantly replaced by the sorrow of peace.

  His mind couldn't comprehend what had happened, in a single tick of the clock these events flashed through.

  The heart wasn't clearly anything he was supposed to see like the crawling being Julo saw.

  The mist, cleared out of sight, was suddenly overshadowed by the bright lights from the ceiling.

  Buttons, levers, and triggers made his eyes certain of what was behind the now gone being.

  A machine.