Before us stretched a corridor precisely similar to that which, closing upon us, had forced us completely out into the hall.
Unlike that passage, its floor lifted steeply--a smooth and shining slide up which no man could climb.

A shaft, indeed, which thrust upward straight as an arrow at an angle of at least thirty degrees and whose end or turning we could not see.

Up and up it cleared its way through the City--through the Metal Monster--closed only by the inability of the eye to pierce the faint luminosity that thickened by distance became impenetrable.
For an instant we hovered upon its threshold.

But the impulse, the command, that had carried us thus far was not to stop here.

Into it and up it we were thrust, our feet barely touching the glimmering surface; lifted by the force that emanated from its floor, carried on by the force that pressed out from the sides.
Up and up we went--scores of feet--hundreds--.