Underworld

In Chapter 3065, the illuminated the dark expanse of the Underworld, revealed landscape consisted of a desolate vista with rough, uneven stone ground, jagged rocks, and what appeared to be ruins barely visible at the edge.

The tunnel was entirely devoid of any features. Its walls seemed to have once been adorned with masterful reliefs and engravings, but these had been erased by the merciless passage of time and the endless tides of the eerie white mist. The walls were covered in a chaotic mess of jagged grooves and deep fractures, and several sections of the tunnel had collapsed, forcing passage through ancient rocks. Deeper inside, the fractured walls and crumbling ceiling gave way to sections that looked formed from molten lava, while smooth, strangely shaped rocks were scattered throughout, indicating that impossibly fierce flames had once raged there, melting the walls and incinerating everything trapped in the darkness. The floor of the tunnel was covered with countless jagged rocks resting atop a thin layer of white powder, which was revealed to be bone dust. As the passage continued, more and more bones appeared until the whole tunnel was carpeted by them like a vast graveyard, preserving the remains of a great number of living beings that had perished there.^[7]

The tunnel eventually opened into a colossal spherical stone chamber, its vast expanse drowned entirely by darkness. Even almost blinding radiance could not reach the opposite wall. The chamber contained the skeletal remains of countless humans and enormous beasts, broken weapons littering the floor, and the ruined remains of makeshift barricades and defensive fortifications that had once barred the mouth of the tunnel. Most of the chamber's floor was entirely carpeted with stone shards, which piled into tall mounds.^[7]

Among the rubble were the shattered remnants of countless Stone Saints, recognizable by fragments such as a broken head showing the contour of a brow, the recess of a closed eye, the broken remnant of a nose, and the corner of a slightly parted mouth. These were the remnants of Children of Nether, who had turned to stone after their deaths.^[7]

Contrary to the common belief that the Underworld was a single space buried deep underground, it actually consisted of roughly three layers, each more dangerous than the one above it. Rather than being one titanic cavern, it was an interconnected system of many enormous hollows.^[8]

• The uppermost and safest stratum was hidden inside the Hollow Mountains themselves, whose peaks were enormous vertical caverns that widened from top to bottom. This upper layer had once contained the settlements of the Stone Saints and served as the point where the Underworld connected to the outside realms. During the height of the Stone Saint civilization, it functioned as a commercial hub where outsiders came to trade, travel to other realms through the Underworld, or perform burial rites and sacral vigils to ensure a safe journey for the shadows of their dead.^[8]

• The middle stratum, located below the mountains and submerged in ancient darkness, formed the true heart of the Stone Saint civilization. It housed Nether's throne and the city surrounding it, where most of the Stone Saints lived close to the stronghold of their creator.^[8]

The Underworld contained many settlements, but only one city — the city where Nether, the Demon of Destiny, had reigned.^[9]