Chapter 70 Labyrinth Of Despair

• Having breached the outer perimeter of The Citadel of Ever-Mourning, the team plunged into a darkness far more profound than the perpetual twilight of The Bleak Expanse of Umbral. The interior of the colossal fortress was not constructed of mere stone; it was a labyrinth of solidified despair, its very architecture designed to disorient, to crush hope, and to break the will.
• The air grew heavier with every step, the oppressive psychic influence of the Shadow Weaver becoming a palpable weight, a suffocating blanket of misery that seeped into their very bones. Corridors twisted without reason, leading to dead ends or back upon themselves. Walls shimmered with illusory shadows, and the vast, echoing spaces were filled with the silent screams of tortured souls, a constant, low thrum against the fragile shield of the Moon-Tear Shard.
• This realm was not designed for physical combat, but for a war of the mind. The Weaver's primary defense here wasn't the Shade-Constructs they had battled outside, but direct psychic and psychological assaults, tailored with insidious precision to prey on their deepest fears, their most agonizing regrets, and their most gnawing doubts.