Extra 14: The Surface

After about an hour of suffering from his headache, Chray decided on what he should do.

He may not be able to use his blessing, but he knew what direction it was taking him when it was active, so he made the decision that he should try and follow that general direction, in the hope he could find the exit on his own.

In any case, staying put wasn't going to help him much when he didn't know when his blessing would come back, and if he stayed any longer there was a chance that food could become an issue.

As such, Chray got up and began wandering through the monotonous halls, hoping that whatever route his blessing was leading him on was somewhat direct and the exit wasn't actually in a whole different direction.

As he walked, he pondered the place he was in, and what it was like and how it could have possibly been built.

The ruin was, simply put, massive, bigger than the capital massive, kilometres of endless hallways and communal rooms.

Despite its horrifically large size, every inch of the complex was intricately carved and expertly formed, with even things such as benches and decorative pots being carved out of stone and inlaid in the walls.

The sheer wealth and power of the people that made it, the Orshraka’s forebearers, was near incomprehensible.

“How could they have possibly done this?” Chray puzzled, the only place he had seen that wasn't intricately constructed and decorated was the layers below, and those were blatantly still in construction.

What's more, unlike the shining cities above, there seemed to be no areas relegated to the poor or rich, everything seemed communal in every sense of the word.

“You would think such a powerful society would have the sense to place doors.” Chray grumbled.

Somehow, despite the whole place being buried underground and likely hundreds of thousands living in the complex, there wasn't a single route to the surface anywhere.

Chray attempted to open a door only to be met with a wall of black sand, the fourth such passage already.

He chuckled a little bit, seems he was dumber than he thought.

Of course they had placed exits, but those exits were when the city was only covered in a thin layer of sand, nowadays that layer was several metres thick and had clogged every connection to the surface.

That meant that whatever exit they were going toward needed to be more than just an exit, it needed to have actively reached up into the air when the city was built.

For a moment, Chray thought this to be an easy task, considering the design of his own home and the frequent high towers and structures that graced it, but this place was not his home.

This place and by extension those who built it, seemed to have a complete aversion to open air, meaning that any kind of tower was likely very, very rare.

As Chray got up to investigate the complex a little bit more, a clear tremor rang throughout the ruins, causing dread in the warrior’s heart.

“Its fine” he told himself, “This place has been standing for at least 100 years, there is no way it could break down now.”

That confidence wavered as a second, much larger tremor rang out and the earth let out a groan.

“Kashrte!” The Gitririag swore, immediately setting off into a sprint.

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Chray’s luck had gone from bad to catastrophic, not only was he lost inside a ruin bigger than a city, but he was lost in a ruin that was actively about to come down.

“Why is this happening now, this place has been standing for a hundred years!”

The Keeper pushed it out of his mind, he could lament his misfortune later, right now he needed to move.

He ran till he found another, long hall and tried to activate his blessing once again, any headache was better than being dead.

Yet it wouldn't budge, still thoroughly blocked off by Chray’s own subconscious.

He tried again, this time mustering every ounce of adrenaline and desperation he could, and for a fleeting moment, a shower of orange sparks vaguely resembling his own form shot out, taking a sharp right.

With the vision came a feeling like someone had driven a knife through his brain and the Gitrirag faltered for a moment, but another tremor that brought dust from the ceiling and cracks to the walls scared Chray into continuing.

That glimpse of a vision was not much, perhaps near worthless, but it gave the Keeper a shred of hope of getting out alive and a direction and that was enough.

He slammed through the marked turn and continued straight as long as he could, but soon found himself coming into a great hall with eight separate tunnels branching off in every direction.

Chray made to go toward whatever path was straightest, but something about the room made him pause, a part of his mind insisting he stop and think.

He ignored it and continued on but another quake echoed from below, with enough force that it almost took Chray off his feet and completely shattered any image of the room he may have gathered from his senses.

Up ahead, in the very path he intended to follow, a great boom rang out as the tunnel collapsed and sand poured in like water.

Chray, all of a sudden was cornered and he didn't know what to do.

It was only now, searching for any route to escape, that the thing calling for his attention at the back of his mind came to the forefront.

The room Chray was in smelled different.

Even the Keeper didn’t know what to do with that, and in their panic almost ignored it once again, but when he took a deep breath to calm himself, he found that the smell wasn't just the smell of dust and age, but fresh, surface air.

Instantly, Chray searched for the source and found it with his enhanced senses, a stone panel high up in the wall.

He didn't take any time to think, he ran up to it and hit as hard as he could with his hatchet, smashing in the area as it was revealed the inconspicuous panel was actually a type of porous rock.

It seemed that the method the precursors used to supply air fresh underground was a series of vents and connections all across the facility, each one blocked at the end by a type of porous stone that let air through freely, yet blended with the rest of the stonework.

“But I've seen so many of these panels, and none let through air.” Chray lamented, but quickly shoved those thoughts aside, he had an exit now and he would not refuse it.

He squeezed into the vent, larger than would be expected of such a setup but still small enough he had to crawl.

Like a snake, Chray slithered through the connections at breakneck speed, putting every ounce of energy he had remaining into escaping.

Another tremor rang out, more of an aftershock of the last but still strong enough to bring down dust from the ceiling and the rumbling sounds of collapsing passages from around him.

Luckily, the people who built this place understood the importance of their air system, and had built the ventilation well, such that the damage to it even now was minimal.

The Keeper turned a bend and saw a beam of blue sunlight at the end of the passage, causing him to speed up even more and put the last ounce of effort he could into his escape.

For a long, anxious moment, the earth calmed and the only sound was the gasping and grunting of Chray crawling, the only feeling the raw skin on his forearms and burning in his lungs.

Like a miracle, he came out to a wide tower buried deep within the earth, half filled with black sand pouring down from the sides where great openings in the construction let in air from above.

Unlike any other room in the ruin, this place was unadorned with carvings or artwork, making its smooth walls feel almost alien, it was obvious no one was meant to be here.

Without delay, he climbed up the sand dunes to the slits which served as air intake, finding only two at the top still uncovered by sand.

Chray armed himself with his hatchet and set to work breaking down the thin piece of stone that stood between the two slits, the only thing between him and the outside world.

As soon as he made his first strike, the final earthquake reared its ugly head, the world around him shaking with a dull thud and the sound of shifting sands.

He slammed his hatchet into the stone again and again, caring not for the fact that the blade was being damaged or the resiliency of the stone.

A chunk of rubble hit his shoulder from the roof above, a stream of sand following it in short measure, yet it caused only a moment of hesitation.

Every instant, every strike felt like it took a million years, but soon the thin rock gave way to super enhanced strength.

With a sudden vault off of slowly building sand below, Chray escaped into the world above moments before the roof collapsed behind him.

Safe at last.