apes, for there lies speedy surcease from suffering; but insist in
your rash purpose to thread the mazes of the Golden Cliffs of the
Mountains of Otz, past the ramparts of the impregnable fortresses
of the Holy Therns, and upon your way Death in its most frightful
form will overtake you--a death so horrible that even the Holy
Therns themselves, who conceived both Life and Death, avert their
eyes from its fiendishness and close their ears against the hideous
shrieks of its victims.

"Go back, O fools, the way thou camest."

And then the awful laugh broke out from another part of the chamber.

"Most uncanny," I remarked, turning to Tars Tarkas.

"What shall we do?" he asked. "We cannot fight empty air; I would
almost sooner return and face foes into whose flesh I may feel
my blade bite and know that I am selling my carcass dearly before
I go down to that eternal oblivion which is evidently the fairest
and most desirable eternity that mortal man has the right to hope
for."

"If, as you say, we cannot fight empty air, Tars Tarkas," I replied,
"neither, on the other hand, can empty air fight us. I, who have
faced and conquered in my time thousands of sinewy warriors and
tempered blades, shall not be turned back by wind; nor no more
shall you, Thark."

"But unseen voices may emanate from unseen and unseeable creatures
who wield invisible blades," answered the green warrior.