Free Web NovelChapter 217: Darker
The first problem they encountered is the way to enter. All the tunnel holes they saw on their side were higher up, with no way to reach them. Maybe Catena could have crafted them a pillar platform to reach one, but Azaroth wanted something they’ll be able to reach on their own.
So they made a walk around it, studying the strange structure as they rounded it. Finally, they saw an opening into the darkness at ground level when they almost made a full circle of the mountain.
They studied it. The surface was like any other crypt’s, but darker, without any hint of light. It seemed more like an already hunted crypt.
No one said anything as they stepped forward. They’ve hunted enough crypts to know enough about each other when they were in hunting mode. They covered themselves in essence, and each brought out their weapons while they made their formations ready to use at a second’s notice.
Azaroth made sure he was ready, then he stepped through into the darkness. Unlike a normal crypt, when he passed through this portal there was a bit of resistance. He felt as if he’d been cut away from something and brought into another, a slight pushing back that really didn’t do much as he successfully stepped through.
He went into a downward crouch with his sword raised immediately, but there was no danger. He heard the others’ arrival, and he stood, his eyes trying to take everything in. They landed in what appeared to be a courtyard made of darkness and nothing else, except for the closed door that shone with golden light in front of them.
Azaroth frowned. He hated to walk into things unprepared. What’s happening here? Did the first portal not lead to the crypt but to another portal connecting to the crypt?
He turned to see the portal that brought them here, and what met him was darkness. They were standing midair, with darkness covering everything like a cloak except that door. Something told Azaroth that they wouldn’t be coming back unless they took care of the crypt through the golden door. If it was even a crypt.
With no choice but to move forward, they walked towards the door, and it opened soundlessly for them, sucking them inside with a flash of bright light.
"Now, where is this?" Stallus demanded, turning around to take it all in.
They were underground, that’s for sure. But it was strange. They were in a tunnel shaped like an old mine shaft, large enough to let a stink wolf pack pass through undisturbed if they were arranged side by side.
The massive tunnel was lit up with a soft white light with no source, like fake daylight.
"Are we supposed to go forward in the tunnel?" Stallus asked, and it reminded her of a similar crypt where they got lost in a tunnel loop.
Fortunately for them, that didn’t happen this time as they picked the direction they were facing when they got there. It didn’t take them long to get to the end, and they were met with a small normal human doorway that unlocked with a simple push of the wooden door.
"I don’t like this place," Alex said as they entered a small room. The room was a sitting room of sorts, with chairs and tables arranged at the center. But unlike a typical sitting room, there was something that looked familiar facing them at the far wall.
Azaroth bent over the runes and sigils that ran over the surface of a black metal table. "It looks like the control room Kael showed us with Arc."
The others nodded, and they began to wonder. Where was this place?
But with nothing interesting going on in the room, they made their way to the second door, and a quick glance inside showed another room, but bigger. This one was filled with metal, rusted armor, and weapons littering the ground in heaps, covered in heavy layers of dust.
They poked around a bit, but there was nothing that stood out except for the weapons that turned to dust at a single touch. They soon moved on and entered a hallway that led to different rooms. Just like the room with the rusted weapons, there was also a room that was obviously a medic’s or healer’s room.
It’s just as big, with rows of tall white shelves that curved around the room. Maybe there were sick beds or such, but everything must have rotted away into dust. The shelves were made of metal, engraved with enchantments, and even then they were rusted, while the potions and herbs on them had long turned to dust. Rotted.
"Just where is this place?" Catena whispered as they also moved away from there. "The scale of this place, they must have been serving millions of people."
Azaroth didn’t doubt it, but it annoyed him a little that all the valuables had turned to dust. Unless... They checked room after room, each serving a different purpose. They saw classrooms with still-durable metal but cracked and crumbled platforms. Libraries with shelves that reached high up into the darkness, but with books reduced to dust and dirt.
They entered a room that must have been for potion making. One of the enchanted tables with its apparatus was still standing, but heavily rusted. It was too heavy to move. Another room had enchanted metal spikes driven into the ground in rings. There must have been over a thousand such rings. Azaroth thought it a training room.
They reached the middle of the hallway when they felt a presence, just a brush, but it was like eyes were boring into their heads, only to look back and find nothing. From then on, though, they felt eyes on them, watching them. But no matter what they tried or where they looked, they found no other presence except their own.
It made them tense, their muscles stiffening and their hackles rising because it was almost as if they were being hunted. Azaroth hated that the most because he was used to doing the hunting.
