Going down all the way from the Old Machinery Yard.
The deeper she went, the black iron plates on the ground gradually transitioned into dark red stone bricks.
Celine walked down the stone steps for a moment, and an open area soon appeared ahead.
The so-called Red Well was not an actual well.
Over a dozen black stone pillars formed a massive circle, with a teleportation array nearly ten meters in diameter laid out in the center.
Intricate dark red runes extended from the ground all the way up the surrounding stone pillars. From a distance, it looked like a deep well soaked in blood.
The space above the teleportation array distorted slightly.
Through the flickering red light, she could faintly see blinking lights below, though it was impossible to tell the exact distance.
Several tall beastkin stood on both sides of the entrance.
The rhinoceros beastkin at the very front stood over two meters tall, his exposed gray skin resembling rock, with a heavy iron band wrapped around the single horn on his snout.
Beside him, a crocodile beastkin wore black partial armor, his scaled long tail slowly sweeping across the ground.
Further back stood a masked man.
He sat behind a wooden table with several black stone slabs in front of him used to inspect passes, appearing to be the person in charge of this entrance.
Most of the people passing through held tokens made of various materials.
Bronze tokens, bone tokens, black iron tokens, and occasionally even special credentials wrapped in silver chains.
When it was Celine's turn, the rhinoceros beastkin raised his thick arm to stop her.
“Credential.”
Celine pulled the dark red iron token from beneath her cloak. The rhinoceros beastkin took it and pressed it into the center of the black stone slab on the table.
The distorted mark on the back of the iron token immediately lit up.
【Registered Guarantor: Gunner】
【Visitor Access: One person】
【Accessible Areas: Outer Ring Gambling Hall, Regular Spectator Area】
【Status: Valid】
The man glanced at the phantom projection, then raised his eyes to look at Celine.
“Looking for Gunner?”
“To discuss a transaction from the Old Machinery Yard.”
Celine's tone was calm. The masked man didn't press further, only pointing his hand to the side.
“Inspect.”
The crocodile beastkin unhooked a porous, grayish-white bone shard from his waist and waved it around her.
The bone shard vibrated slightly as it passed by the Radiant Ring, but no warning light went off.
The rhinoceros beastkin threw the iron token back to her.
“You can only enter the outer ring, and private duels are strictly forbidden. Violate the rules, and we'll break your hands first before discussing compensation.”
Celine nodded, pocketed the iron token again, and stepped onto the teleportation array, watching the dark red runes beneath her feet light up layer by layer.
The light on the surrounding stone pillars rapidly converged toward the center. The solid stone surface beneath her feet seemed to suddenly vanish, and her body sank.
The sensation of weightlessness lasted only an instant. When her vision stabilized, she had already appeared on another teleportation array.
The surrounding space was much wider than the area above.
Over a dozen teleportation arrays of various sizes were lined up along the edge of the stone hall. Every few moments, a red light would flare, delivering new guests.
Some ran forward excitedly the moment they landed.
Others walked back dejectedly from the direction of the gambling hall, looking as if they had already lost all their black tokens.
There were also two blood-covered beastkin being carried out from another passage, blood dripping continuously from the stretchers beneath them.
The porters paid them no mind, skillfully navigating around the crowd toward a rusty iron door.
Celine's gaze lingered on the iron door for a moment.
She had no desire to know whether what was being recycled there was equipment, corpses, or something else.
A deafening uproar constantly echoed from ahead, causing even the ground beneath her feet to vibrate slightly.
Following the sound, Celine walked through an arched corridor and saw betting windows lining both sides.
The staff inside the windows belonged to various races, including arachnids with eight compound eyes and undead whose upper bodies floated inside glass jars.
Large quantities of black tokens were continuously fed into the windows along automated tracks, exchanged for betting tickets stamped with numbers.
The further forward she went, the noisier it became.
Once she passed through the final black curtain, a massive circular arena appeared before her eyes.
Tiers of spectator stands extended upward from the central arena, the highest points nearly vanishing into the darkness beneath the dome.
The different sections had clearly undergone special modifications.
Ordinary spectators sat on stone steps and benches, while massive giants and bull beastkin occupied reinforced, spacious platforms.
Aquatic guests soaked in a row of suspended pools, watching the match through transparent crystal walls.
Special high platforms were built on several crossbeams for the avian race to perch on. Dozens of winged figures crowded there, flapping their wings in unison whenever a heavy blow landed in the arena, stirring up massive gusts of chaotic air.
Almost every race that could be seen in the Secret Alley was gathered here.
They held their betting tickets high, cheering and shouting for every attack in the arena.
The scents of alcohol, blood, and various unknown spices mingled in the air, making it almost suffocating.
Looking up, several massive crimson crystals hovered above the arena.
The crystal surfaces continuously scrolled through tonight's match list, player information, and real-time odds.
【Match 17】
【Rock-Armor Lizardkin Saron vs. Thunder Avian Fika】
【Current Bets】
【Saron: 365,482 Black Tokens】
【Fika: 436,752 Black Tokens】
【Draw and Double Death: 63,481 Black Tokens】
The last row of numbers was still jumping. Whenever someone threw black tokens into a nearby betting station, the numbers on the crystals would change accordingly.
In the central arena, the battle between the two competitors was reaching a fever pitch.
The Rock-Armor Lizardkin was covered in thick, gray scales. With every step he took, the stone slabs beneath his feet cracked.
The Thunder Avian opposite him flapped his wings, his body skimming almost directly above the gravel.
Purple arcs of lightning rapidly converged along his wings, transforming into several slender bolts that struck the Lizardkin's back armor from different directions.
A scorched smell instantly filled the air, and the betting numbers above immediately fluctuated wildly.
Thousands of spectators stood up at the same time.
Some cheered, some tore their betting tickets to shreds, and a red-eyed, double-headed ogre cursed the two different competitors with his two separate mouths.
Celine stood at the entrance, looking at the blood-stained arena in the center, her brow furrowing slightly.
She had seen many brutal dungeons before, but those at least wore the guise of survival and missions.
This place, however, existed solely to entertain the audience.
“It really is...”
Celine paused, ultimately failing to find an adequate adjective.
"Brutal" might have been too polite; what was truly amplified here was desire.
She withdrew her gaze and soon spotted human faces in the spectator stands—they looked like Descenders.
As long as rewards and benefits existed, these people could indeed worm their way into anywhere.
But the biggest problem right now wasn't why there were players in the Red Well, but where on earth Gunner was.
She looked up and scanned the densely packed spectator stands. The entire Red Well held at least several thousand people.
The old gnome had only told her that Gunner was in the outer ring, but not which specific area he was sitting in.
Tall, hunchbacked, covered in grayish-black lumps on the right side of his body, with a horn on his forehead.
The features were indeed distinct, provided she could spot him among thousands of creatures of different races.
Celine rubbed her temples. If she had known, she should have made that gnome give her a more detailed location.
Another loud explosion erupted from the battle in the arena.
The Rock-Armor Lizardkin grabbed one of the Thunder Avian's wings and tore him straight down from midair.
The Thunder Avian pressed a highly compressed ball of lightning against the Lizardkin's chest with a backhand strike.
Blinding white light instantly engulfed half the arena.
Taking advantage of everyone's attention being focused on the center, Celine retreated into the shadows behind the spectator stands.
Several Soul Threads slipped from her fingertips, climbing up the stone wall and quietly wrapping around an empty railing high above.
The next moment, she used the pulling force of the Soul Threads to quickly ascend, landing on a narrow maintenance walkway at the very top of the spectator stands.
Though far from the central arena, the view from here was enough to overlook most of the Red Well.
Celine held onto the railing and scanned the area below once more.
Just then, the odds on the central crystal suddenly stopped ticking.
A shrill cry echoed from the arena.
The Thunder Avian was struck in the shoulder by a war hammer, sinking half his body into the shattered ground as the lightning on him rapidly died out.
【Winner: Rock-Armor Lizardkin Saron】
The moment the result appeared, the entire Red Well boiled over.
Cheers nearly blew off the dome.
At the same time, in a semi-enclosed booth near the outer ring, a tall figure suddenly stood up.
“How is that possible?!”
He slammed his palm onto the table, sending the wine cups and bone dice in front of him flying.
His right side was covered in grayish-black lumps, and a thick, backward-curving horn protruded from his forehead.
As the betting tickets on the table turned to ash, his initially red face rapidly flushed purple.
Two streams of white steam immediately blew out of his nostrils and ears.
Celine looked at the exasperated figure, her eyes lighting up slightly.
“Found him.”
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