“Can you see where this dwarven tunnel leads to? I want to be certain I’m not sending my men into a death trap.” Captain Dio siad while her image was trapped within the small orb. Arthur expected her to want to investigate the tunnel so her concerns were understandable.
“No I can’t, it goes quite deep below the surface. I can also feel an air flow coming from down there, clearly this tunnel was dug by experts who knew how to allow air to flow through to prevent suffocation.” Arthur answered as a loud crack could be heard from more bricks cracking and breaking.
“That is unfortunate… I will be sending more guardsmen to your location as reinforcements, gather everyone at the temple aside from the detectives and brief them on the situation. We will be sending in a team led by you as soon as possible, preferably when you receive the reinforcements.” Captain Dio then quickly turned to someone off from the imaging enchantment and shouted at them to go to the temple of Velerin.
“Keep around half of the guardsmen at the scene watching for trespassers, the last thing we need is someone poking their nose around and finding the tunnel and getting themselves killed by something that wanders out.”
“Of course Captain, when should we expect reinforcements?” Arthur took the communication orb from detective Lyco and directed him to speak with the guardsmen and the other detectives and inform them of the situation.
“Hopefully within the hour, but if they are running late I will contact you through this communication orb.”
**********
The conversation did not last much longer than that as everything of importance had already been discussed, Arthur then went upstairs while leaving the two guardsmen to continue their task of breaking down the remaining wall. When upstairs Arthur found all the remaining guardsmen standing in the main hall along with the detectives and detective Lyco waiting for him and an explanation.
Everyone was clearly expecting an explanation from Arthur which made him give detective Lyco an annoyed look that said ‘I thought you were going to tell them.’ Arthur quickly turned his mind back to the situation at hand and stood where everyone could see him and began his explanation. “We have uncovered a secret doorway that leads to a passageway leading deep underground. Around half of you will stay here with the five detectives and keep the temple secure from anyone that might come looking, the other half will be joining me down the passageway to investigate and see if it had anything to do with what just happened here. Now, are there any questions?”
None of the guardsmen said anything, instead they simply looked at each other with a look of confusion and a bit or worry. The detectives on the other hand were far more vocal, two stepped forward where they could be seen and spoke starting with the one on the right. “How deep does this passageway go sir?”
“I don’t know.” Arthur answered plainly and turned to the second detective on the left.
“Where exactly is this passageway sir? I didn’t find anything of the sort as I looked around the temple half an hour beforehand.” The second detective asked what was likely the only question that Arthur was actually able to answer.
“The entrance of the passageway is located in the basement, that is why it will be the responsibility of those that remain to keep that part of the temple specifically off limits and under the most security. When reinforcements arrive we will decide who will be staying here and who will be joining me. But for now fan out and keep watch, some of you should also patrol the outside of the building as well just in case someone tries something.”
For the next half hour Arthur kept the temple secure with the help of the guardsmen that were not breaking down the magic infused bricks in the basement, when those two were done Arthur gave them a break but asked them to keep an eye on the entrance, and if they saw anything craw out they were to shout out as loud as they could to alert everyone else. Thankfully by the time the reinforcements arrived that was never needed.
Another ten guardsmen arrived at the temple with a full briefing from Captain Dio before hand so they did not need to hear it from Arthur, quickly the twenty guardsmen were able to organize themselves into two groups of ten, the first was to stay within the temple and keep it secure while the second was to follow Arthur down into the underground tunnel. The group that was to follow Arthur was made up of all the original members that followed him aside from the two that broke down the magic infused bricks, they were replaced by two guardsmen that just arrived.
Quickly the group following Arthur organized themselves down in the basement while Arthur gave them a rundown of what was going to happen. “I will be leading the investigation, which also means I will be the first to enter the tunnel. Once we reach the end we will set up a secure area close to the tunnel entrance. Now, are there any questions?”
No one said anything as Arthur stood waiting, after a half minute he spoke again saying “Very well, pack your things. We will be staying down there for quite some time.”
******
With all ten of the guardsmen under his authority Arthur started walking down the tunnel with them all behind him. Arthur conjured up a small flame to act as a light source for him while the other guards had a proper torch for themselves. Arthur kept the flame about a meter in front of him to keep an improvised weapon close enough to use. Before they entered the tunnel properly Arthur took notice of some very old metal hinges on the top and bottom of both sides of the opening.
The trip down that narrow tunnel was long and silent as everyone listened for anything that might be a danger. However the only sound that could be heard was from the light air flow of the tunnel and the metallic footsteps from the metal boots each of the guardsmen wore. It was a little unsettling for Arthur to hear, but he kept his composure and continued on until he saw the end of the tunnel that opened up into a proper room.
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The room like the tunnel was carved out from the surrounding stone rather than built like a normal building. This gave an uneasy and almost claustrophobic feeling to Arthur and the guardsmen that followed him inside. On the walls old torches could be seen that died out days or even years ago for all any of those present knew.
The only other sigh of recent interaction was a small amount of dirt that was tracked across the floor towards a far door on the other side of the room. Once each of the guardsmen were inside the room and prepared Arthur opened it up with some conjured earth a good two meters away in case of a trap of some sort. Thankfully the door opened without issue and without traps. Unfortunately no one was prepared for what they would see on the other side of that door.
“By the name of all that is holy.” The door opened up into what appeared to be a large underground city in a large open and stony cavern, within this city they saw were these large metallic poles that had these dim blue growing crystals that gave off just enough light for all eleven of those there to understand it was a city, upon a closer inspection they found the poles were made from iron and were partly hollow but still very thick and heavy. The blue crystals reminded Arthur of those that were within the mages guild that were used to light the underground portion. These crystals are able to generate enough light to see without any smoke or other byproducts from normal fires or candles.
“Why would someone build a whole city down here and then block it off with magic infused bricks.” Arthur wondered out loud as the guardsmen with him watched in awe at the sight before them. At the sound of his words they snapped out of their awe and followed him as he walked towards the nearest building.
The walk to it took around a minute, clearly there was some form of distinction between the room they exited from and the buildings they were approaching. Once they got closer they took notice of how they too were mostly carved out of stone rather than built with proper materials, there were of course a few buildings that had parts of stone bricks but they were just small parts.
Upon an investigation of the interior of several of the buildings they came to the conclusion that they were currently in a residential area of some sort as the buildings contained furniture such as beds, drawers, and even tables for eating along with all the utensils. There were enough buildings to house more than fifty people even if each person received their own house, and there was plenty of evidence to prove that clearly was not the case. Some of the small buildings even had cribs for babies and smaller beds for children, the people that lived here had families and were expecting to live here for quite some time.
The interiors of these residential buildings had a combination of old candles and torches that had long burned out, to the left of this residential area was a field with plants growing presumably for eating and other day to day purposes. None of the plants were anything that Arthur or any of the guardsmen with him recognized, there were three plants that looked to actually be used for eating rather than a weed of some sort. The first was a brown mushroom that was around the size of a grown human’s foot, the second was something that looked very similar to wheat but with a very pale white color instead of the soft gold that they were all familiar with, the third and final likely edible plant was a bush of some sort that was grey in coloration and grew these brown nuts that were around the size of grapes. Arthur took a few samples of each plant in his bag just in case they were valuable or useful.
There was another plant that was also white in color in those few fields, it was long and around the height of a fully grown dwarf that reminded Arthur of a vine. The former inhabitants used wooden sticks that they stuck around where the plants were growing from to help with its growth, there were many of these plants that did not have any such sticks but they likely grew after the disappearance of the inhabitants. Arthur took a sample of this unknown plant as well.
Once the surrounding area was scouted out in addition to the residential area and fields Arthur had the guardsmen return to the room at the very end of the stairway for the evening and to sleep in. When in such an unknown place it was best to keep everyone within one area to prevent anyone from disappearing without notice. As everyone settled down Arthur established patrol schedules and a proper place for an improvised bathroom, which came with a rule that no one goes to said bathroom on their own.
Each patrol consisted of three people with one exception which included Arthur, each patrol would take place just outside the room and within the room itself with the door open. The person in the room would of course watch everyone within the room just incase something entered through the tunnel, the two outside, or one which would be Arthur, would watch for anything that might pose a danger to everyone else. Those dangers might include wildlife that naturally lives in such a place or even livestock that escaped when the people disappeared, though they did not see any fences where that livestock might have been it does not rule out the possibility of other settlements down in this large open cavern.
Arthur scheduled himself for a patrol shift at midnight so he could actually get some sleep beforehand, he also sent someone to go back up the stairway to inform detective Lyco about what they found so he could report it to Captain Dio. The reason for this was the Captain did not have any spare communication orbs to hand out let alone one with the proper strength to penetrate such depths, even the detective’s orb only had the range of about three times the size of the city of Antium.
Eventually midnight rolled around and Arthur was awoken by the previous shift as well as the other guardsman that would be watching the inside of the room. Arthur quickly and quietly stepped out of the room and took a seat on an old chair that one of the guardsmen brought from the residential area. It, like most of the other furniture there was made out of solid stone yet was sculpted like a normal chair thus decreasing its weight considerably, it was evidence of considerable skill of someone when this place was still inhabited.
Arthur quickly discovered just how boring such a task is, the expensive and small pocket watch he was given by the previous guardsmen said it was only 12:15 leaving Arthur another forty five minutes to watch for anything that might show up. ‘And to think I only did this to set a good example to the guardsmen that are following me, I never realised just how boring patrol is. I swear that time is slowing down as this continues on.’
When Arthur checked the watch after what felt like at least ten minutes he was disappointed that only five had passed, furthering his annoyance with the task. ‘All I can do is hope that we don’t need to stay down here for more than one more day. If I need to do this more than one more time I will lose my mind.’
Arthur felt the boredom drilling deeper into his mind as he tried to find something interesting to look at, he first tried the old residential area and all its lights, but he quickly gave up as he along with the guardsmen with him already looked through it.