Chapter 67 – End of the Road
Adam had no time to think and no real choices – he clearly couldn’t outrun the faction members following and hadn’t the experience to fight them – again, he had been too cocky and overestimated himself. If he lived, he would try and make sure that didn’t happen again.
He headed through the broken and barren forest, the men hot on his heels now being joined by more and more as time passed – he had at least a dozen now following him as he shadow-jumped through the sky.
If Libby hadn’t put down all the arrays around here to soak up the deadly energies – whatever they were, then that might have at least slowed them down.
The original plan was to make the guys follow him if they entered the village to the spot their companions had been placed – the crime scene, to give them the idea they had died of natural or at least reasonable causes and not at his hands.
But it was too late for any plan so flimsy now that he had revealed himself to be not just some lowly villager.
He headed in that direction all the same, not knowing what else to do.
“We could go into the tunnels and release the seals – we could survive there, but hopefully, they would not.” Said, Libby.
At least Libby could still think – his mind seemed numb now, thinking about the mess he was in yet again.
Libby had followed their escape plane and sent all the kids to an evacuation point – essentially a place hidden high up in the nearby mountains. Where they could survive within the larger original PD, which housed their food-generating areas. Everything was automated, leaving the kids safe with enough food and provisions to last indefinitely. But the problem still existed with the PDs in that someone still needed to be outside the PD to control the key to bring them back out.
In the plan, that was Thawain, as Adam’s job in the plan had been to draw the attackers away and then meet back up at some point.
“Ok. Let’s try that.” Said Adam, hating himself right now for not the first time for his inadequacies.
Within twenty minutes, they were near the hidden tunnel entrance – his attackers had not slowed or speeded up during that time. They were just toying with him, maybe enjoying the chase, or perhaps it was faction guidelines.
He shadow-jumped yet again, this time directly into the tunnel, and quickly headed down through the broken entrance. Sensing, his attackers pause, his heart was in his mouth, hoping beyond hope that they would stop there, but they were merely observing the situation as they soon continued their pursuit.
Entering the cavernous space where the tower was housed, Adam momentarily paused. “Will releasing the energies have any effect on the rate of disintegration of the tower’s scripts?” asked Adam, his mind coming into sharp focus for the first time that day.
It wouldn’t really make sense to doom the planet and only also die anyway from yet another botched plan.
“It won’t affect the structure one way or another; whether we are absorbing the energy or it is going straight into the environment makes no difference.” Said, Libby.
“Ok. Stop the conversion arrays,” said Adam.
The chamber was immediately filled with dark and as yet unidentified energy; Adam could, of course, see fine with his various energy senses – otherwise, it would be pitch black.
He could sense his pursuers just outside the chamber now, pausing yet again – then continuing into the chamber. Shocked panic racked his body. “Take me through the barrier! I must lead them away,” said Adam, panicking, wishing Echo could turn up his acclimatization skill to full.
“Are you sure, Adam? They may back off, and also, we have no idea what is beyond that space – except more of this dark energy.” Said, Libby.
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Adam knew the only plan that would keep the kids safe was the first one – for him to lead the attackers away.
“Do it and leave a fake body here. Let’s go.” Said Adam.
Libby was torn as to what to do, her prime directive causing her and the other AIs to go through every possibility at phenomenal speeds. They decided they could always bring him back if his life was immediately in danger on the other side – they would determine the threat level when it happened.
On the other side of the barrier – there were no swirling dark energies, just a replica chamber with the tower. What the hell? I mean, fantastic, thought Adam, but what exactly was going on here?
Libby also was puzzled but instead focused on her task watching the attackers on the other side of the barrier. After a minute had passed, she was fairly certain that they could not traverse the barrier – stupid humans, she thought proudly as her self-taught knowledge of magic script clearly exceeded theirs. Her annoyance admittedly was also due to the fact that they had almost ended Adam.
But the tower was confusing, so she spent some more time analyzing it while Adam decided out of his two options which he would choose to do next – as their attackers had now withdrawn from the tower chamber either tactically or due to the dark energies.
Adam was curious about what lay beyond – more scary cyborgs like last time, he wondered. And what exactly was Elios up to with these towers anyway – from what Adam knew, which was little, it was not a benevolent system. Maybe the plan was to unleash another load of death like the void beasts upon the people of this multiverse – he would find out.
He went to shadow-jump up to the nearest walkway across from the tower, but….nothing.
“Libby?” said Adam.
“It would appear there is no connection to the shadow realm here, so you cannot use those abilities here.” Stated Libby, even more, curious than Adam now to understand what was going on.
Adam made do with walking, his mind blank for the time being – he had no idea what was going on but just watched for any sign of trouble – at least his heightened senses were still working.
Libby turned the conversion arrays back on while she was still in range – no sense poisoning the village and local area.
Adam had thought the architecture of the chamber could not be surpassed, but on finally getting to the highest walkway under his own steam, he found a corridor covered in the most intricate carvings. He asked Libby if it was magi script, but she said nope, just fine carvings, fair enough.
He came to an intersection, the corridor he was in branching out three ways – he took the one leading upwards and eventually found himself outside, standing just inside a carved stone entranceway. What he saw took his breath away.
He was overlooking a deeply carved canyon, rays of early morning light giving it a certain majesty but what most drew his attention was in the distance possibly fifty to a hundred kilometers away, was a towering vortex of dark energies taking up the whole of the sky in that direction – the energies were almost luminescent in his energy sight. Ok, he was not going that way for two reasons – one too far, two instant death.
[https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/e8cb5e90-72ff-487d-a0a4-fb7cd7f81c26/dfyflm4-aa713bbd-f4e3-42a7-bc4d-780505438bb7.jpg/v1/fill/w_1280,h_1280,q_75,strp/new_realm_energy_vortex_by_nebzulus_dfyflm4-fullview.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7ImhlaWdodCI6Ijw9MTI4MCIsInBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcL2U4Y2I1ZTkwLTcyZmYtNDg3ZC1hMGE0LWZiN2NkN2Y4MWMyNlwvZGZ5ZmxtNC1hYTcxM2JiZC1mNGUzLTQyYTctYmM0ZC03ODA1MDU0MzhiYjcuanBnIiwid2lkdGgiOiI8PTEyODAifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6aW1hZ2Uub3BlcmF0aW9ucyJdfQ.GLd3zHFTrrLuHG0NlouO63_MxBdDHpNqEy84EeY7QM8]
Going back down into the corridor leading down, he then chose one of the other corridors at the intersection at random.
Down this corridor, everything seemed to be degraded either threw the natural process of time or something else - this was strange, of course, as it was all pure carved stonework.
There seemed to be quite a network of interconnecting corridors, but thankfully for Adam, he had his own thread-like to allow him to backtrack safely without getting lost – Libby. He kept using his energy sight to look out for anything interesting or deadly.
[https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/e8cb5e90-72ff-487d-a0a4-fb7cd7f81c26/dfyfmge-a9c6297d-38cd-4e13-8192-809627de411d.jpg/v1/fill/w_1280,h_1280,q_75,strp/tower_inside_realm_corridors_by_nebzulus_dfyfmge-fullview.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7ImhlaWdodCI6Ijw9MTI4MCIsInBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcL2U4Y2I1ZTkwLTcyZmYtNDg3ZC1hMGE0LWZiN2NkN2Y4MWMyNlwvZGZ5Zm1nZS1hOWM2Mjk3ZC0zOGNkLTRlMTMtODE5Mi04MDk2MjdkZTQxMWQuanBnIiwid2lkdGgiOiI8PTEyODAifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6aW1hZ2Uub3BlcmF0aW9ucyJdfQ.JeX61JU9PXYYXfog-DciHIuc8frpji4bwotkKI7XNHQ]
Eventually, after about half an hour, he came to a section with wider square-shaped corridors. There he came across yet another mysterious anomaly – a room with a small tower with ornate carvings all the way around with plenty of magic script for Libby to try and decipher and another vortex of dark energies swirling this time from the ceiling or was it the sky?
Adam thought now was the time to turn back - he had already got in enough trouble for one day.