9 Gate of Sloth

Mack touched the door and like before, it seemed nothing happened, but turning his head back, he saw a room that was thin but long. So long that he could not see the end.

The room was like a giant tunnel, fifty meters side to side and twenty meters to the top, and the length of it Mack could not estimate, because he could not see the end of the tunnel. It was very similar to those train tunnels from Earth.

Looking in front of him, Mack saw there was another metallic sign.

"Make haste or be slow, but be sure to achieve the goal. At each step, a new test."

"I guess I need to go to the end of this tunnel, but this last phrase is intriguing. Is this some riddle?"

Mack was not sure what to think and walked forward, but just as he took the first step, he felt something strange.

He could not pinpoint what it was and took another step, then he felt it again. It was like his body had suddenly become heavier.

Then he walked for a few steps and was sure.

"The gravity of this place is increasing at each step I take. I see. This place must have some kind of gravity field generator, like in the movies."

Until now, the effect was not big. Mack took barely ten steps. He could feel the effect, but was not strong enough for him to suffer from it, but he was sure, one or two kilometers and he would not be able to handle it anymore. He would probably need to crawl to move.

"What to do.... Now I know why the sign says make haste or be slow.... If I try to get used to the gravity I will suffer less but will also take much more time."

This was not a test to see if he could or not adapt to the increasing gravity. He felt like he needed to go as fast as he could.

Having decided on what to do, Mack raised his head, took a deep breath as if he was preparing mentally for the next suffering round.

Then, from his lips, the mantra-like phrases he memorized from the book hummed. He needed any bit of help he could have, and for unknown reasons, humming those phases helped him to be more mentally strong.

In the middle of this long, empty, and dark tunnel, this same man ran. His long hair moving with the motion, and from his lips an eerie mantra-like music could be heard.

He was alone in this place. He did not need to show off to anyone, didn't need the approval of others, didn't need to save a girl or to rescue his family. He ran because he wanted. He ran only to himself. He ran to defy his own limits.

With each step this man took, the air seemed to become more dense. At each step, his muscles did a bit more force to contain his own weight, but he didn't stop running.

Only death itself would make this man stop.

In this long dark and empty tunnel, the noise of each step reverberated, making eco along with the eerie humming sound of the mantra.

With each step, his stride become larger and with each step, Mack could feel the burden increasing.

This was hell for anyone lazy.

This was the second gate of Hel floor in the Tower of Chaos, The Gate of Sloth.

If someone was not determined enough they would simply stop, and don't take any step further.

Humans are beings that adapt easily to their surrounding circumstances, but here, if someone was not determined, they would be like a frog boiled in water. Slowly increasing the temperature until the frog stopped breathing. The only difference here is it was the gravity instead of the temperature.

Running along the tunnel, Mack focused only on his breathing and the mantra.

His Muscles, after running for over a thousand steps, got sore. He felt like carrying two times his own weight already.

For any regular human, running with this weight, they would barely be able to walk, let alone run.

Just when Mack passed the mark of two kilometers running, the entire feeling of enhanced gravity stopped. He almost fell on the floor because of the weight difference changing instantly. It was like trying to walk using the same force to jump.

~plop~

Mack felt on the floor, tired. His forehead was covered with cold sweat, his breathing rough and his heart beating fast.

He threw the backpack to the side and just stood there, laying on the floor.

After a few seconds of resting, he seated and looked at the floor where the gravity had returned to normal. There, he saw a thin line draw on the floor that stretched from side to side of the tunnel. He moved his head in the direction he was running to, and a few centimeters in that direction, he saw another line draw on the floor.

Mack suspected this was like a safe spot to rest. Only if one reached here they would see that this was a safe spot, because the line on the floor was so thin that was impossible to see it from a few meters.

This ancestor of his was indeed cruel. No one would suspect that were safe spots. If you took step by step and walked slowly, you would suffer the increased gravity for a far long time, but if you blindly run, you would eventually reach here, and in far better conditions.

Truly a cruel joke.

To confirm his hypothesis, Mack walked to the line and took one step outside, and as expected, the gravity increased. He then pulled his feet back, and the effect was gone.

"I guess this will be like a sprint and a marathon at the same time." Mack said, looking to the horizon and not seeing the end of the tunnel.

"I hope the food I got from the cube can last until the end of this tunnel."