The air in Entry hall 854 was no longer breathable by ordinary lungs.
As the scalding wash from the upper breach met the ancient, thick tar-rich silt layers of the Hadal floor, thick plumes of hydrogen sulfide and boiled away sulfur bubbled up through the flat stone slabs. It filled the vaulted hall with a dense, greenish-yellow smog. The gas had a sickening, heavy sweetness that clung to the lining of the throat like warm lard.
Qiao Ming walked through the murky fog, his chin tucked into the collar of his stiffened oilskin coat. His bare feet made wet, sucking noises as he lifted his soles from the carpet of warm stone slime that coated the dark rock flags. Every toe was flared and working, testing the balance of the stone floor before bearing his weight. Beneath the slime lay dangerous pockets where the rotten-egg acid had eaten hollow chambers into the soft limestone beneath the dark rock pavers. Step on the wrong joint, and the flat stone slab would tilt, plunging the land-mapper into a boiling sump of liquid sulfur.
“The air is burning,” Yan Zhiqiu murmured behind him.
She had wrapped a strip of oiled sea-silk around the lower half of her face, tied tightly beneath her dark hair. Her breath came in short, rhythmic sips, filtering the acidic smog through the salt water-soaked fibers. In her left arm, she cradled the Broken Slate, holding it against her ribs like a wounded bird. The jade edge of the…
