Jim ascended the final step and set foot on the sixth floor. The atmosphere shifted immediately—gone were the chaotic echoes and crude jeers of the prisoners below. Here, a suffocating silence loomed, thick and unnatural. The walls, though still a pale shade of white, seemed to absorb what little light there was, casting long, eerie shadows.
Unlike the lower levels, where prisoners rattled their cages and shouted obscenities, the captives here were subdued—beaten, broken, shackled beyond measure. Each inmate was bound at the wrists, ankles, and neck, heavy iron chains rendering them immobile.
Bloodstains marked both their bodies and the stone beneath them, the result of relentless torture. Some lay sprawled against the walls, their bodies slack and lifeless; others barely clung to consci
