37 Stabbed
The corridor after the trap looked the same as the other one. It was slightly wider, but that was the only difference. Now, what Arthur saw after walking through the corridor for five minutes was incredible.
A huge open area that looked like a gigantic cave. It had tons of destroyed buildings and streets as well. A huge underground city made by humans, but now belonged to the beasts.
Screams and roars of beasts echoed throughout the underground city, and the strange voice talked inside Arthur’s mind once again. He couldn’t understand it, and now it seemed it was not guiding him, and was only making him angrier.
“Where should we start? There are a lot of ruins in this place.”
It was hard for Arthur to think straight with this voice messing up his head. He asked Kai for an opinion of which direction they should take.
“We should make our way over there.” Kai pointed at a place, and when Arthur saw where he was gazing, he smiled. It was a sort of palace, presumably from whoever ruled this city. Differently from the rest of the buildings, this palace was not falling apart.
With a goal in mind, they went their way. There was a stair which led down towards the city. They used it and soon were in the middle of a ruined street.
The street had holes in it, and plants grew all over the place, and it was the same with the surrounding houses. Arthur did not know why, but he felt a familiar presence inside this underground city. Perhaps it had something to do with the voice inside his head?”
“Watch out!”
Arthur saw, from the corner of his eye, a beast pouncing directly in Kai’s direction. It was going after the weakest of the group. He gathered all the strength he could on both legs and dashed in Kai’s direction. They were close to each other, but Arthur did not want to risk being sloppy and have something happen to his disciple.
“Huh?” Kai said.
The beast’s mouth was near Kai’s head, and for a moment, he felt his death, but then a punch came flying. It was Arthur who arrived at the right time.
The punch was so powerful that the creature’s cheek distorted, and it flew, hitting a house nearby, destroying whatever was left of it. Arthur would not let the beast have another chance.
He ran towards it and made use of the opportunity. The beast was still recovering from the punch, and was on the ground. It roared as soon as Arthur got near, and tried to bite him even though it was on the ground.
Arthur grabbed both parts of the beast’s mouth and used his strength to tear it apart, splitting the beast’s head in two. Blood spurted everywhere, and brain parts were all around Arthur, and also in his clothing.
It was gross, but that was what it took to survive in that world, and in that dangerous place.
“Are you okay, Kai?”
“Yeah, yeah. Thank you, again.”
“It is nothing. Let’s keep moving. It is not a wise decision to stay too much in one place.”
“You’re right.”
~~~~
“How will we pass through this?” the man said.
He was one of 6 high-ranking members of the order who went down to explore the place. After walking down for some time, they arrived at the open room, where Arthur completed the puzzle.
There was only one problem, though, and that was the roof who went up and down non-stop.
“It has an interval of 5 seconds, which means we have to cross this entire room in 5 seconds, or we die.” the leader said.
“That’s hard. What should we do?”
“I have an idea. Six of us use spells to slow down the roof, and one passes to the other side using all means possible. Then, the person on the other side helps the rest of us, so it will always have six people slowing down the roof, and one passing.” The leader said.
“That’s a good idea. Who wants to go first?”
It was a good idea, but no one wanted to go first…
~~~~
“Did you hear that? It came in this direction!” Claridge said.
The noises down there made their way up to the surface, and Claridge’s group heard it as they were looking for clues about the place. After gathering everyone, they ventured to where the noise came and found the rocks.
It was not open as before. The low-ranked members from the order hid its location, and they also hid behind bushes to attack whoever came looking for the place.
Truth be told, they did not expect anyone to come, as whoever was exploring the place was already down there. Claridge proved them otherwise.
A clash between Claridge’s group and order members happened in the area. Casualties from both sides, but Claridge came on top in the end.
“Where is the entrance? Tell me!” Claridge yelled to one of the order members.
It took him some time to get the answers he wanted, but in the end, one of them told where the place was.
“All right everyone, let’s work together to move this rock. Let’s go!”
The group now only had 8 people, but it was enough to move the rock and descend into the underground.
~~~~
That first beast attack was surely not the last. All kinds of beasts tried to overcome Arthur as they made their way up to the palace. Most of them did not have a level higher than 20, which was nothing in Arthur’s eyes. He killed creatures that looked like panthers, imps, more centipedes, and it even had a beast similar to Sully.
“I don’t know who this is. Kill the fake me!” yelled Sully inside Arthur’s mind.
They had to traverse throughout the entire underground city to reach the palace, and with all the attacks from beasts, it was not as easy as it sounded.
The good part was that most beasts were weak, so after an hour, Arthur reached the palace.
It was higher than the rest of the city, and they had to climb the stairs once again.
The palace was even bigger than the one Arthur worked as a chef. It had immense columns made of an unknown black material, like an obsidian. The style reminded Arthur of the constructions in Greek, like the temples. The difference was it was way bigger and presumably had many rooms.
Once they were up and staring at the palace’s entrance, Arthur had a feeling someone was watching, and as he gazed backwards, he saw The Doom Order arriving in the underground city.
“No way. Why are these bastards here? Fuck. Is Claridge one of them or what?”
“Who?” Kai also looked, but he couldn’t see anyone. He did not have the eyes of a dragon, that is.
“The Doom Order.”
“What? The crazy people that wanted to destroy my village?”
“Yeah, we have to enter the palace. Now that we killed a lot of beasts, it will be easier for them to get here.”
There was only one option, and that was to enter the palace. The palace’s door was enormous. It had 8 meters wide and 15 meters tall. Why had they built the entrance this big? Just to show off?
They passed through the door and saw what was inside. A perfectly decorated palace. It even had magical lights that never ran off, completely different from the rest of the underground city.
The halls were tall and gave off a different vibe. It was not like the claustrophobic corridors they went through to get there.
“This is so preserved, as if someone lives in here. No one is living here, right?” Kai said.
Arthur was ready to answer him, but then the mysterious voice echoed inside his mind again, but this time, he could understand it.
“Who dares to trespass inside my domain? Who do you think you are? Go back before I end your lives!”
The voice was hoarse and spoke in human language. Arthur thought he had been the only one hearing it, but Sully and Kai also did.
“Did you hear that? Arthur? Is that the voice you heard before?”
“Yeah. It sounds the same, but now we can understand it.”
“So you’re saying to me you followed this creepy ass voice, in the middle of the night, alone?”
“When you put it like that…”
They couldn’t go back after everything they went through, so Arthur continued forward. The voice continued to treat them, but did nothing, as if it couldn’t and was only spitting nonsense.
“You see? It is only trying to scare us. There is nothing in here-“
Arthur looked down and saw the tip of a knife in his stomach. It was painful and bloody. Something attacked him from behind, and he had not seen a glimpse.
“What happened?”
The attack wouldn’t kill him, of course, but what if more attacks came, and are just like this one that he couldn’t see what attacked him?