Chapter 123: Ancient Settlement (a)
Chapter 123: Ancient Settlement (a)
“It was nice to meet you!” Elliot said in a loud voice as she walked away from him and soon disappeared into the crowd.
Elliot turned around and walked towards the barrier, but before he reached near it, John’s voice sounded from behind him.
“Where were you?!” John said.
“We have been looking for you all over the place.” Thei said.
“I got swept away by the instructor, man,” Elliot replied.
“Whatever, let’s go! Adventure awaits us.”
Elliot, Theo, and John went towards the barrier, and their bodies turned into countless bright speckles the moment their bodies reached an inch away from it. A mysterious force sucked each of the particles, taking the consciousness of the three boys in for a ride.
‘Eh, what the hell is going on? Why have my body turned into jelly? Why can’t I feel it? Where am I? What’s this greyness and blackness?!’
Elliot couldn’t figure out where he was, what he was right now, but he could not feel his body and tell that he was in some kind of a tunnel with grey and blackness all around him, falling down towards the light at the end of it.
A moment later, the countless specks of light that his body had turned into came out of the tunnel, and immediately those specks joined together to form his carbon-based body.
“Holy shit guys, that seemed like something straight out of a movie! Was the barrier some kind of wormhole? Did you guys experience the same thing as me? Guys? Eh? Ah!”
In his excitement, he said a few words too many, only to find it weird that he couldn’t even feel his friends around him. Were they even here?
He moved his head to the left and the right but didn’t see anyone!
‘I am in this place all by myself.’ Elliot’s eye widened as he found himself in an unfamiliar place.
‘What should I do?’
‘Let’s calm down, first!’
He took a deep breath and then exhaled it in one go, decreasing the uneasiness and excitement bothering his heart.
‘Let’s determine where I am.’
Right after, he looked around once again with a gaze of scrutiny to get a better view of his surrounding.
He could make out a grey rocky wall on each of his sides and tell that he was in a long corridor, long because it stretched endlessly, and he couldn’t see its end. The passageway was so dark that he could only see several meters into the distance.
He looked upwards and saw a round thing embedded into the ceiling, releasing a fire-like glow that was more than enough to illuminate his surroundings. He could make out that many more of the same round orbs in the ceiling, equal distances apart from each other. However, the so-called bulbs weren’t glowing, making him wonder why?
There was a wall behind him, blocking his way.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Of course, this place itself was a mystery.
“I am stuck in a corridor.’
‘Behind me is a wall, and ahead of me is an endless dark passageway.’
‘Going ahead seems like the only choice as it is the only path. However, It’s too dark!’
‘I can use my golden energy to illuminate the darkness, so it’s nothing much to worry about.’
‘Of course, I am sure that I will encounter danger the deeper I head inside the corridor. Isn’t that what happens in horror movies?’
‘It would be better to think of something else than blindly charging head straight into danger.’
Elliot thought for a moment and decided to do a few things.
‘First off, let’s see whether I can make a path of my own by destroying the walls or not!’
To test out the durability of the walls, he balled his right palm into a fist and struck at the wall behind him.
Bam!
When his fist met the wall, along with a resounding reverberation, a gush of wind burst out, fluttering his clothes and ruffling his hair.
This wall sure is sturdy! Elliot was left with surprise as there wasn’t even a single scratch on the grey rocky wall. It seems like his fist wasn’t strong enough to damage the material it was made out of.
“I guess my fist that can break the bones of a magician in the channel opening stage isn’t strong enough to damage the wall. It must be made out of something extremely sturdy.”
After he failed to break the wall behind him, he stomped on the floor and punched the walls on each side but again and again, he failed to even leave a scratch on them.
There was no weak point!
The material that the ancient civilization used to make this place was indeed sturdy enough to completely resist the punch that can even kill a magician in the channel opening stage.
The second thing he wanted to check out was whether he could take out the source of the light out of the ceiling or not.
First off, he used a hand made out of the essence of life to touch the so-called bulb, and after confirming that it’s not hot enough to burn it, he used the said hand to grab it tightly and pull back, intending to pull it out of the ceiling. To his surprise, the bulb didn’t even budge from its place. It was as if the ceiling and the bulb were one entity, inseparable.
‘Only one way left, huh.’
‘Although I know that there’s a high chance to encounter danger, I can only head deeper, just like the creator of this place intended the explorers to do.’
With no choice but to move ahead, Elliot started to head forward. He had only moved under the second so-called bulb when it released a flame-like glow that brightened up his surrounding.
‘Oh, the bulbs will automatically glow when I step near them. That’s great!’
Now, he didn’t need to use his essence of life to illuminate the darkness.
Elliot headed deeper into the corridor, and after moving for like four hours, his eyes landed on the first out-of-the-ordinary thing in this place, a statue.
A bronze statue of a scaled humanoid with two black wings and blue eyes was right in front of him!
“Rawrrrr!”