He got to his feet, and tried to get his bearings. During his mad dash from the soldiers he hadn't really paid much attention to his surroundings, and now he was lost. He still had the map, but he had likely covered dozens of miles of ground over the last half hour. He was in the middle of what looked to be an abandoned city, and it seemed to be a lot larger than many of the other cities that Jonathan had found. He had not noticed it on the way in because most of the buildings simply looked like mounds of ash, but now that he was unleashing his perception, he was able to pick out the outlines of buildings underneath.

He pulled out his map, and took a look at it, seeing if there was anything marked on it. He found the dungeon, and looked at a small circle of land around it, eventually finding his way to what looked like this city. It was a small circle, marked only as Danger, in capital red letters. Jonathan sighed, and shook his head. Of course he would end up in a place like this, just through sheer bad luck. So far however, nothing had been apparently dangerous, and Jonathan wasn't sure how much to believe the map. He still wanted to get out of this place as quickly as he could however.

He folded up the map, and set off for the way that he had come from, picking up the pace somewhat as the light of the day began to dim. He did not want to be in a place like this after dark. He knew that some of his fear was irrational, as he was likely one of the strongest beings in this area as of the moment, but he still felt uneasy about this lost city. The long shadows of the unnaturally steep ash heaps started to stretch over the land as the day faded into dusk, and a profound coldness entered the air, so cold that it felt unnatural. Such temperatures were not common within the Ash Heaps, which, while not being a desert per se, was generally hot and dry. However, this was not a meteorological chill, but rather one of the supernatural variety.

Jonathan started to send his mana coursing through his arms and into his hands, prepared for anything that was to come. He picked up his pace to a light jog, which for him, was about the speed of a car. Jonathan kept running, but something strange was happening with the landscape around him. The air kept growing colder, and the heaps of ash kept on appearing on the horizon, as if the city never ended.

Eventually, he spotted a break in the monotony, in the form of a vast and derelict cathedral, built in the middle of the patch of ruined buildings. For some reason, the ash had not claimed these dwellings as its own, and Jonathan sped towards them, as the air began to bite at his skin. Frost was forming on his armor, and Jonathan knew that the temperature was well below freezing by this point. He was fine for now, but if it kept dropping, then he would be in serious trouble.

Jonathan was breathing out streaks of vapor at this point, and icicles of frozen breath were falling to the ground in his wake. He ignored them, and kept his pace steady, eventually reaching the cathedral. The building was even more imposing from close by, and it stretched for hundreds of feet in every direction, made out of dark stone and pieces of twisted metal. Half of the roof was gone, and it was in an oddly spherical shape, as if some great meteor had fallen here in times long past.

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The temperature immediately went back to normal as he passed through its shattered doors, hanging on their hinges by threads of dark metal, and into the center of the building. It had a sacred, funereal air to it,but not because of worship, but because of death. A sepulchral ambience suffused the area, and Jonathan suddenly felt very small indeed, smaller than he had felt in a long time. It was as if he was suddenly being pressed up against the thin line dividing life from death. The interior of the cathedral was taken up by rows upon rows of graves, dug deep into the ash. Each of them was topped by a thin slab of stone, inlaid with faint scratches that had once been the names of the dead. The graves grew more ornate the closer that they got to the center, with the central grave being a large mausoleum made entirely out of bleached rock, which glistened slightly. Whatever Jonathan had stumbled upon here, it was not something that he had any wish to be part of.

As he paused to regard the graves, a scratching noise started up from beneath the ground nearby, and Jonathan jumped. This whole situation was beginning to grow alarming. He turned his back on the graves, and made his way towards the exit. He could tolerate a lot, but the undead were something that he was yet to have to face.

As he neared the doors however, a sudden gust of wind picked up around him, and the doors slammed shut, creaking violently on their twisted hinges. Jonathan ran the rest of the way, and tried to open the doors. However, they were held shut by something other than simple gravity, and they would not budge, even in the face of his incredible strength. Jonathan turned around, only to see the ash beginning to shift atop the many graves that lined the interior of the cathedral. He frowned, and started towards the far end of the cathedral, where the large hole in the roof was. If he got to that, then he could possibly escape through it. However, the monsters in the graves had other plans.

One of them emerged from the ground in front of Jonathan, hissing low through rotted lips and teeth. It reached out, and grabbed his leg, moving with a speed and strength that seemed far beyond its means. Jonathan tore his foot free, scanning the monster as he moved.

Ashen Thrall(Basic)

Level 60

Jonathan gritted his teeth and kept running. He was surrounded by hundreds of monsters that were all quite high leveled. He had no idea what this place was, but he knew that it was quite dangerous. He cursed his luck for having drawn him here, but he knew that it was really his stupidity that had led to this situation. Jonathan had been too engrossed in his own woes to notice where he was going, and as a result he had entered this city, filled with the spirits of the dead.