"As one explores, they may come across pits that lead deep into the floor. They tend to be pitch black, and light generally can not penetrate more than a few feet into the darkness…"
"It is unknown what happens to wanderers after falling in; however, none have reported doing so and surviving."
You've done so; you've taken the plunge, and at least so far, you've survived. We have, too. There's a reason they don't know, though — there's no way back from this. This is your life now, and it's not getting any better. You're not gonna live down here; you only get to survive.
They think they have it bad up there, but they have no idea.
Either way, you're here to stay, so let that idea roll around your head for a bit. Now, I may come off as harsh, but we're all in this together — that doesn't change the fact that only the strong survive, so that's what you'll have to be from now on. If you can't, then we can't promise to help you.
Take my advice: just read through this page, follow my advice, and never expect that you're safe down here. Optimism is what gets you killed.
– An Ousted
Description
Level 72, known primarily as "the Pit", is the first of many levels belonging to a subset dubbed "the Pitfalls". The only way to enter is by falling for a very, very long time down one of those pitfalls on Level 0. Most likely, you were minding your own business, and happened to have fallen down this inescapable hole. While this fateful mistake is going to make your life a hell of a lot harder, you've still got your life, so hold onto that. Nonetheless, entering a pitfall ensues in a fall that lasts hours, sometimes even days, eventually interrupted by an unwelcoming body of frigid water. Somehow, the impact is largely harmless, though one's equilibrium is completely thrown off from both the collision and the hours of air time.
The Entrance
The entrance to the Pit is a puny puddle in the grand scheme of things, but happens to be the only bit of luck that any of us down here have. The water is deep, enough so to break your fall, but is salty enough to keep anyone from drowning. That won't be first thing you notice, though — the bone-chilling temperature that rips your soul straight from your body will be. Once you're out, you'll notice the overpowering odor of the salt-water, mixed in with something older, like the core of an ancient stone.
On one side of this pool is a shallow end leading to a rift in the rock that's lined with glowing mushrooms that you'll see just about everywhere down here. The mushrooms stay lit for a while after being plucked from the stone, but they fizzle out after about a half-hour, so they aren't the most useful. Entering this passageway is the only way to go1; however, it is also the way towards imminent danger — you can't win down here. You can only survive. You'll learn that soon enough.
Here's what's ahead of you: Three sections, none of them are good news, but they get worse in order. Compared to the rest of what's down here, though, the Pit is the goddamned Garden of Eden.
The Passageways
Once you've gone through the entrance tunnel, you will find yourself in a much brighter part of the level, illuminated by more of those neon mushrooms. The cave walls tighten after the initial pathway, leaving hardly any breathing room — you couldn't outstretch your arms in its width if you tried. The passageways could be likened to a maze, though there are routes that can open and close on a dime, so navigating it is unreliable. Regardless, like any maze, just keep your hand on the right wall and keep moving. Eventually you'll get there.
Before travelling through this part of the level, it's important to bear in mind that the cave is quite unstable; the walls will, at random intervals, begin to shake and shift, making balance difficult to maintain and causing rocks to become dislodged and possibly be flung at you. With how cramped the paths are, rubble can easily build up and prevent you from advancing or even bury you entirely. The walls don't shake because of anything in here. There are levels below this one that make the Pit look like a rest stop; evidently, you'll feel them before you see them.
If the walls start shaking, get low and cover your head with your arms. Don't press yourself against the wall — I learned that the hard way and I'd rather you didn't. Anyway, keep moving.
Some sections of the passageways have been sealed entirely by rubble. You'll know when you find them — stacks of rock piled to chest height with no way around them. At this point, it's best for you to backtrack. I wouldn't try to move the rock, otherwise you may risk being buried in it.
The air in the passageways has a particular quality to it — dry and mineral, like the inside of a broken tooth. When the smell shifts to something wet and organic, you're close to the exit. It's not a good smell, but it means the bog is near. After some navigating, you'll encounter a hole that looks like it was crudely carved into the ground leading into a pool of muddied water. Doesn't matter how gross it looks — there's gonna be times where you have to do unspeakable shit, so consider yourself lucky that the water is warm.
The Bog
The bog is just about what it sounds like: an extremely deep, somewhat thick, and algae-infested body of water. The stench it gives off is pungent and earthy; I wouldn't advise giving it a taste unless you really need to. The surface of the water nearly reaches the ceiling of the cave that it fills, yet leaves just enough room to cram half your head above the water. The bog is narrow — maybe twenty feet across, if I had to guess — and it leads in a straight line that's easy to follow. The lighting is scant down here since the mushrooms are adverse to moisture, but it's just enough to see where you're going.
There's quite a few different creatures that live in the bog. Some have been given names, while others haven't:
They're not fish — more like pale, oversized isopods that cling to the cave walls just below the waterline. They only become a problem if you grab at the walls for support, which you will, because it's dark and disorienting in here and everyone does; their mouths suction onto anything they touch, and while their bite isn't so harmful, the reflex of letting go and going under can be. The ceiling in the bog is low enough that going under isn't a minor inconvenience, so if you lose your footing in the deeper sections and can't right yourself immediately, you have nothing to push off of. Not everyone who's gone under in the deeper sections has come back up.
Once you've paddled along for some time, you'll find an opening similar to the one from which you entered. There is another way, but you won't like that either — emerge from the hole and try your luck first.
The Squeeze
The squeeze earns its name within the first twenty feet, and by the time you realize that, you're already committed.
The walls come in gradually — enough so that you can keep moving and telling yourself that it opens up soon until you're turned sideways, laid on your stomach, and climbing up a slope all in a few meters, exhaling before each step because your lungs need the room. The floor is uneven. The ceiling drops in places without warning. You will scrape things. You will bleed a little, probably, and you won't have space to look at where.
The layout feels almost intentionally difficult — corners that require you to rotate your head before your shoulders can follow and angles that can only be passed through with your arms pinned and you're inching yourself forward with your toes. There is a correct way through each section, but finding it takes time you'd rather not spend standing still in the dark with stone against your chest and back and nothing in either direction but more of the same.
There are marks on the squeeze's walls — not exactly carvings, but the kind of marks fingernails leave in soft stone. They appear as tally marks in some places. In others, just long parallel scratches at about shoulder height that stop abruptly. The marks are present throughout, but you feel them before you see them. The light doesn't reach well and your face is close enough to the stone that your cheek finds the grooves before your eyes do.
If you can manage to shimmy through to the end of the cave, it'll slowly open up and take the pressure off. If you can't fit through, then you may have to backtrack to the other exit. There's a specific moment in the squeeze where going back becomes the worse option, though. You'll feel it. You'll have to wait for you body to thin itself out — suck the water off your damp clothes, it helps… it helped me. Anyways, if you reach the end of the squeeze, you reach the end of the level.
Egress
Once you reach the end of the squeeze, there is a ledge above an enclosed cliff, which will lead you to a deeper level of the pitfalls, the enshrined monastery. This, however, is not the only way to exit the level, though it is the safest and most tested. While the enshrined threshold isn't incredibly hostile, it can be extremely disorienting and leads to a few dangerous places, so tread lightly.
If you submerge yourself in the bog and feel around the walls, you may find a sizeable tunnel. This eventually leads to the aquatic abyss, which is largely undocumented at the moment, but you better have quite the lung capacity if you plan on taking this route — we haven't heard back from many people who've made it through.
This was the easy part, the place where the least people die.
I know you're skeptical, because I was too — until I witnessed it myself, over and over again.
You will witness it too. Then you won't be.