A week had flashed by since the conclusion of the life-and-death duel.
Rusted iron bars jutted out across the fractured ground like the snapped bones of a gnawed carcass. Within the ruins of the Blood Arena, where cages lay shattered and pillars remained broken, members of the resistance group Clepsydra were busily scavenging up and down, salvaging the relics left behind by the Chrono-Entropy Corporation.
Quicksand was wandering aimlessly through the debris, holding a cup of Coptis root tea and biting down on his straw. The spectator stands, which had once been packed with audiences roaring like wild beasts, now held nothing but the weeping wail of the wind brushing past the empty seats.
Two Clepsydra members were conversing in low tones down a corridor. Catching sight of Quicksand walking their way, they bowed respectfully—the youth’s swift and clinical combat skills in the Blood Arena had earned him the widespread respect of the resistance members.
“Ah, the Invincible Newcomer. You’ve arrived?”
Highly satisfied with the title, Quicksand nodded. “What are you looking at?”
The resistance members stepped aside, allowing Quicksand to see what lay at the far end of the spotless, bone-white corridor of the 2030 branch. There stood a heavy, massive titanium door engraved with a Penrose stairs design. A dry, chilling wind seemed to leak through the narrow seam of the frame.
“This should be…” The Clepsydra member hesitated for a moment before continuing, “…the entrance to the Time Labyrinth controlled by the Chrono-Entropy Corporation.”
“The Time Labyrinth?”
“Diamonds explained the general idea to you, didn’t he?”
Quicksand cut him off coldly. “Don’t call him ‘Diamonds.’ Call him ‘the cruel, black-hearted boss.'”
“Right, well, your ‘cruel, black-hearted boss’ should have mentioned that the Corporation has a specialized prison meant for locking up rebels and anyone else they find disagreeable. That is the Time Labyrinth known as the ‘Penrose Stairs’—or the ‘Stairs of Paradox.'”
“What does that mean? Don’t make it too complicated; my infant-sized brain can’t process it.”
“You can think of it as a highly peculiar prison. Those locked inside by the Corporation feel as though they are perpetually running along a never-ending staircase. It is entirely pitch-black, stripped of the flow of time, leaving the inmates to endure eternal loneliness and agony.”
The Clepsydra member pointed toward the graphic on the door, clarifying the concept.
“Look, the ‘Penrose Stairs’ is a paradoxical geometric figure. A person walking on it will never reach an end; going up is simultaneously going down, and moving forward is moving backward. It’s a simple yet agonizingly cruel Time Labyrinth. Once you enter, there is no escaping.”
Staring at the emblem, fragments of images suddenly flashed across Quicksand’s mind, resembling the dancing static on a screen without a signal. Memories regarding this place seemed to be hidden away in some dark corner of his brain. He asked, “There must be many innocent citizens imprisoned here. If we destroy this door, can we not rescue them?”
“We cannot.”
Suddenly, a voice floated in. Every single word sounded incredibly light, drifting like soap bubbles blowing in the wind. Quicksand turned his head to find a youth dressed in a white suit leaning casually against the wall. His platinum-blonde hair was perfectly styled and smooth, and he wore a flippant smile in an elegant posture, looking as though he were posing for a magazine advertisement. It was Diamonds.
Ever since the battle with the 2030 branch ended, Diamonds had been missing for days. Madame Spades had told Quicksand that he was out fooling around, digging for information through the sewer-like alleys of the Lower District. Seeing him now, Quicksand felt as if a lifetime had passed.
Diamonds walked over, his eyes casually sweeping past Quicksand. “Black-hearted employee, shouldn’t you be working at the bar? What are you doing slacking off over here?”
“What about you? It’s broad daylight and you’re out here slacking off too, aren’t you?”
“I am evaluating the assets of the Chrono-Entropy Corporation.” Diamonds stroked his chin. “I happened to overhear a line or two of your conversation just now. So, you’re interested in this Time Labyrinth?”
Though Quicksand felt slightly displeased, his curiosity ultimately won out, and he quietly kept his mouth shut to act the part of an attentive student.
Diamonds abruptly asked, “Do you know what an Asamkhyeya Kalpa is?”
It was an abrupt, seemingly irrelevant term given their current conversation. Quicksand didn’t understand it in the slightest, but he puffed up his chest to save face: “It’s a Buddhist term.”
“Not only is the Newcomer invincible, but he’s truly omniscient as well. You’re right. Now imagine this: what if you hadn’t come over here to wander around today, but had stayed behind to work at the Poker Bar instead? Or what if you hadn’t drunk Coptis root tea, and chose to buy a cup of coffee instead? What would have happened?”
Mystified by the line of questioning, Quicksand stiffened his face. “Nothing would have happened.”
“Exactly. These choices appear trivial, yet the universe diverges precisely because of these microscopic variations. It splits into a world where ‘you are helping out at the bar,’ a world where ‘you have come to the ruins of the branch,’ a world where ‘you are drinking Coptis root tea,’ and a world where ‘you are drinking coffee.’ The total number of these worlds is vast beyond count. If we were to use a specific unit to measure them, that unit would be Asamkhyeya.”
“In Buddhism, Asamkhyeya signifies ‘innumerable’ or ‘uncountable.’ In ancient times, it was a numeral far greater than the sands of the Ganges, roughly equivalent to 10^140. Buddhism also speaks of ‘minor kalpas,’ ‘medium kalpas,’ and ‘great kalpas.’ A ‘great kalpa’ represents a single cycle of the universe’s creation, existence, destruction, and void, spanning roughly several billion years.”
Diamonds explained the theory with absolute clarity, causing Quicksand’s head to bob back and forth like a roly-poly toy. The nearby Clepsydra member looked as if he were listening to advanced calculus and had already retreated a safe distance away.
Diamonds continued, “Therefore, an eon measured in Asamkhyeya signifies countless cycles of great kalpas. A Bodhisattva must endure an Asamkhyeya Kalpa before achieving Buddhahood. Consequently, this term represents an unfathomable, infinite stretch of time.”
Quicksand took a sip of his tea, his face expressionless. “Even if you launch into a grand speech about it, I still don’t comprehend how massive that number is. It doesn’t feel real.”
“You can visualize it this way: if you added up every single atom in the entire universe, the total would still fall short of one Asamkhyeya. Under the weight of tiny divergences, the number of worlds reaches such a terrifying magnitude.”
“So what? What does any of this have to do with the Time Labyrinth or this sealed room?”
Diamonds smiled, his gaze settling upon the heavy door. “The reason this place is dubbed a Time Labyrinth, and the reason prisoners can never break free, is because once you step inside, you will witness shards of time counted in units of Asamkhyeya. These temporal shards originate not only from our current world, but from countless parallel universes as well.”
“Think about it. If you held a single grain of sand in your palm and accidentally dropped it into a vast desert, would you ever be able to find it again? Trying to return to your original world after entering the Time Labyrinth is a feat far more difficult than that.”
Hearing this, Quicksand couldn’t help but feel a sudden pang of dread. It was then that he abruptly recalled a dream he used to have. He had been running along a never-ending staircase, surrounded by endless sheets of drifting ice. The frozen sea stretched out boundlessly, and the icy shards reflected fractured, surreal landscapes. Only now did he realize with hindsight that the scenery in his dream bore a striking resemblance to the Time Labyrinth Diamonds was describing.
Could he have been inside this Time Labyrinth before?
Noticing his distraction, Diamonds asked, “Well? Did you catch all that?”
“I understand the gist of it. But where did this Time Labyrinth come from in the first place?”
The Clepsydra member called out from a short distance away, “Bah! It’s a garbage dump manufactured by the Chrono-Entropy Corporation! Although they possess time technology, it’s still immature. They disrupt too many timelines during their time jumps and can’t process the fallout, so they dump it all into a single location, which gave rise to this Time Labyrinth!”
Quicksand rested his chin in his hand. “According to the black-hearted boss’s logic, the place is packed with uncountable shards of time. If you can’t find the exact time you belong to, wouldn’t it be fine to just pick any closely resembling shard and step into it? The difference between a world where ‘I drink Coptis root tea’ and one where ‘I drink coffee’ shouldn’t be that massive, right?”
“That absolutely will not work. Time rejects outsiders, much like a human immune system treats a transplanted organ as a foreign body. If you wander into the wrong timeline by mistake, you will slowly dissolve and fade away, melting just like a block of ice, haha!” The resistance member laughed boisterously, entirely failing to notice that Diamonds shuddered slightly.
“Then the people trapped on the Penrose Stairs… will they truly never be able to return home?” Quicksand asked, a strange wave of melancholy washing over him.
“There are exceptions,” Diamonds spoke up suddenly. “If one possesses a temporal ‘anchor,’ they can navigate back to their original shard of time.”
“And what is that?”
“Imagine it this way. If you possess a one-of-a-kind treasure, you can utilize it as an ‘anchor’ to identify your home while drifting through an ocean of time shards measured in Asamkhyeya.” Diamonds shrugged. “Though judging by the state of this door, even if anchors do exist, no one has managed to locate the exit of this labyrinth to this day.”
Having completed their tour of the branch ruins, the two caught a taxi back to the Poker Bar.
With Quicksand acting as the driver along the way, the discussion regarding the Penrose Stairs continued to linger in his mind. His memories were fractured, but he sensed that this anomaly was tied to his past. He stole a few glances at Diamonds through the rearview mirror, only to see the man resting with his arms crossed, his head tilted against the back of the seat as if he had fallen asleep. The neon lights scraped across his cheek, leaving behind a trail of vibrant, sunset hues.
Arriving before the bar, Quicksand nudged him. “Dead boss, we’re here.”
Diamonds remained motionless. Showing no mercy, Quicksand gave him a hard shove, intending to simply push him against the car door. Yet Diamonds still didn’t wake. His face was stark white, and when Quicksand touched his forehead, it felt as hot as a burning coal. Quicksand froze in place for a moment, contemplating whether he should divert their course back to the Affordable Clinic. Just then, Diamonds snapped his eyes open and glared at him: “Are you insane! Can’t you wake someone up like a normal person?”
“A gentle wake-up service costs extra.”
Diamonds stepped out of the vehicle. “Deduct it from your wages.” Seeing that his movements appeared unimpeded, Quicksand began to doubt the burning temperature he had felt just moments before. He asked, “Is your health alright?” Diamonds brushed it off as if playing dumb: “What wouldn’t be alright?”
“Are you sick or something?”
“You’re the one who’s sick. Who even asks a question like that?” Diamonds shot him a sideways glance.
After parking the car, Quicksand walked into the bar to find Diamonds already slumped over the counter. Madame Spades had forbidden him from drinking alcohol, placing a goblet filled to the brim with a thick, medicinal liquid right next to his hand. Smelling the bitter stench that rushed straight to his head, Diamonds’s facial features contorted into a tight grimace.
“Madame, if you serve a concoction like this, the patrons are going to smell it and run away,” he attempted to bargain with her. “Can I skip drinking it?”
Madame Spades replied flatly, “Then why don’t you ask your own body if you can skip living?”
Diamonds took a tiny sip, his face twisting into an expression of profound misery. Before long, he broke into a violent fit of coughing, leaning over the dinosaur-egg-shaped trash can to vomit. The fluid he coughed up wasn’t black medicine, but rather bore a distinctly bloody hue. Seeing this, Hearts grew anxious from the side, but Madame Spades merely waved her hand and handed a handkerchief over to Diamonds. “This brat is just throwing up a Bloody Mary; he chugged a massive glass of it just a moment ago.”
Quicksand inquired, “What kind of medicine is that?”
“Medicine to strengthen his constitution. Haven’t you noticed how fragile this boy is? He skips work twenty days out of a month.”
His face entirely pale, Diamonds accepted the handkerchief. “I’m afraid that if I take another gulp, my soul will fly to the outer heavens and I’ll end up skipping work for a full thirty days.” A family crest was embroidered along the edge of the handkerchief, showing nested spades sewn with precise, tight stitches. Wiping the corners of his mouth, he offered a completely unapologetic apology, “My apologies, Madame, for ruining your handkerchief.”
“Keep it. Once something falls into your hands, I never harbor any expectations of getting it back anyway,” Madame Spades chuckled softly.
Diamonds offered a serene smile. “Madame, you clearly hail from an esteemed, wealthy household. A mere handkerchief or two is surely something you can easily part with. Judging by the family crest embroidered on your cloth, you must be of aristocratic descent, aren’t you?”
“What aristocracy? We are just an ordinary, small-scale family. My father made his fortune by manufacturing pharmaceutical agents, and I was merely an apprentice working under a pharmacist once upon a time.” Madame Spades idly stirred the ice and gin within her glass using a bar spoon.
Diamonds froze. “Is that so? Seeing how meticulous you are with your lifestyle and attire, I assumed your family possessed deep financial roots.”
The color on his face seemed to drain away bit by bit, like melting wax. After sitting before the bar counter for a little while longer, he ultimately couldn’t endure the exhaustion and headed up the wooden stairs.
Quicksand accompanied him back to their room. The moment they stepped inside, Diamonds collapsed straight into the large cardboard box—it was his turn to sleep in the box tonight. Unable to bear the sight, Quicksand began folding the bedding, saying:
“Go sleep on the bed.”
Diamonds didn’t budge. Only when Quicksand gave him a firm nudge did he speak up in a raspy, hoarse whisper: “Wake me up for work tomorrow.”
“I’m the one handling all the labor around here. What work do you even have to attend to?”
Diamonds mumbled incoherently, sounding as though he were chewing on a mouthful of sticky rice. “There’s plenty to do… Do you honestly think… the Corporation only has… a single branch? Our next enemy is the 2035 branch… And then there’s the Time Labyrinth… I still have to… map things out with Brother Hearts.” Studying him closely, Quicksand found this man growing increasingly mysterious. His background, his combat prowess, and the origin of his bizarre illness remained shrouded in a thick fog, keeping anyone from seeing his true colors.
Suddenly, Diamonds broke into a harsh racking cough. Quicksand hauled him up and, following his weak instructions, poured him a glass of water. A colorful array of pills tumbled into Diamonds’s mouth, resembling a heavy handful of bait fed to a fish. Quicksand repeated himself, “Go sleep on the bed.”
Diamonds shook his head. Quicksand countered, “I never pegged you for someone who sticks so strictly to an agreement.”
“I’m afraid… you’ll hold it against me later.” Diamonds coughed. “Spit it out, do you want a raise or a vacation?”
“I want both. Though you actually need to have the breath left in you to give me a raise and a vacation for that to happen.”
Diamonds was finally dragged onto the bed by Quicksand, settling down obediently. That said, he continued to toss and turn like a pancake on a skillet. Eventually, he sat straight up and complained, “Too cramped.” Sharing a single bed with Quicksand as amicable neighbors was something he simply couldn’t manage. Quicksand replied, “Work hard then, boss. Once you can afford a luxury mansion, I’ll finally get to sleep on an eight-hundred-square-meter bed too.”
In the end, they squeezed together like interlocking mortise and tenon joints to drift off to sleep. Once the lights were turned off, the vibrant neon glow from outside flooded into the room, rippling across the ceiling like the surface of the water viewed from the bottom of a fish tank. Within the dark space, Quicksand felt like a piece of luggage crammed into a cargo hold, tightly compressed, as the other man’s heartbeat vibrated across the small gap and seeped into his own chest.
Amidst the heavy silence, Quicksand whispered, “Black-hearted boss, are you asleep?”
After a long pause, Diamonds mumbled indistinctly as if his mouth were full, “Asleep.”
“I was thinking about the Time Labyrinth,” Quicksand said. “I feel like I’ve dreamed of being in that place before. It feels like my past is somehow tied to it.”
Diamonds replied, “What could your identity before your amnesia possibly have to do with it? A Time Cleaner or an imprisoned convict—take your pick.”
Quicksand’s mouth felt as though it had been sewn shut. After a long silence, he asked, “Then why are you so familiar with it?”
“Because it’s common knowledge in the Lower District.”
“Liar. I saw the resistance members stammering, unable to string two sentences together about it, yet you launched into a massive lecture.”
“Because I am a convict who managed to escape from within it.”
Quicksand’s heart suddenly seemed to skip a beat, as if someone had stolen that single instant of his life away. He grabbed Diamonds by the shoulder. “Really?”
“…Because I am a Time Cleaner whose sole job was to track people down and throw them into the Time Labyrinth.”
Quicksand fell silent, staring coldly at Diamonds. He was beginning to catch the distinct scent of complete nonsense.
Diamonds’s eyelids felt as though they were glued shut, and he huddled deeper into the blankets. “Out of everything I’ve said, one statement is a lie. Go ahead and guess, clueless employee.”
“I guess that every single sentence you speak is a lie.”
Diamonds offered no further response. Quicksand murmured into the dark, “Who are you? Why were you able to trade blows with that monster in the arena? What kind of illness are you suffering from right now? And why did you bring me here?” He turned his gaze toward the mirror in the room, which looked blurry and indistinct as if covered by a dense layer of mist, before softly whispering, “And who am I?”
There was no answer. The question felt like throwing a pebble into a stagnant swamp, failing to stir up a single splash of water. Though they lay tightly pressed together on the same bed, they were bound to share entirely different dreams. Quicksand suddenly felt as if everything that had transpired since his arrival at the Poker Bar was nothing more than a fleeting illusion, leaving him entirely unsure whether waking up would bring a beautiful conclusion or a cruel reality.
Looking down, he could see Diamonds’s chest rising and falling in shallow rhythms, while the colorful neon lights cast shifting ripples across the quiet room. He had fallen asleep.
