The next morning started early with the party being up and ready long before dawn arrived. They quickly ate some road rations, consisting of bread and jerky, they had in their space bags. Then made their way to the Guild Master’s building where Delilah was waiting for them with another person and some bags.
“I figured you’d be here early. This is Edrahni. He is our best explorer. The bags have supplies for exploration, from food to rope and pitons. His tracker can be bound with your party’s to make it easier too. I’ll let you lot all talk and prepare.” Delilah said as she went inside her house.
“Hello. My name iz Edrahni. It’z nize to meet you all. I zhall be helping you reach the zecond floor of the ruinz.” Edrahni said with a heavy accent.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Fergus and I use a bow. Griff there is a close combatant, Stephanie a middle guard, and Gaia has her bonds. Malachite is a vanguard, Shadow a defender and damage dealer. Liv a supporter and Antonio an attacker. Gaia can do a bit of everything.” Fergus said as he motioned to each member specifically.
“Ok. Zoundz good. I’m a zcout. I can detect trapz and zuch easier then mozt.” Edrahni said.
“Alright. Are you set to go now?” Griff asked.
“Yez. Whenever you are ready.” They replied.
“Then let’s head out.” Stephanie said as the group moved towards the South Gate.
Gaia could roughly sense Edrahni’s form and it seemed a bit odd. He was hunched and extremely thin but she couldn’t sense anything very clearly. The gate was only about a minute away from the Guild Master’s house. It was opened rather quickly upon Edrahni’s word and the party moved towards the ruins. They were about ten minutes down the path from the gate. Close and visible but not close enough to create a problem if monsters came from it. Upon arriving at the ruins edge Gaia felt the mana density rapidly change. It felt similar to the dungeon and portal she’d been in before. There wasn’t a designation like the other two though. It was more like a gradual but rapid change due to the party’s speed.
When they’d gotten about a couple hundred feet within the ruins perimeter, she could sense everything within her mana field. She could sense the ground and the outlines of her companions. She could tell the ruins were truly ruins with destroyed buildings and walls. The path they’d come in on was cobbled but heavily deteriorated having large sections of cobblestones missing. The ruins truly seemed to be the ruins of a large city. She couldn’t feel the edge from where she was and guessed they had a while to go to find the actual ruins entrance.
As they continued Gaia was mesmerized by the layout. For a city known as the capital of demons from myth, it was well planned. There was the main road they were moving on with medium sized paths between buildings spaced relatively evenly apart. There even seemed to be sections denoting residential to mercantile to even governmental. It mainly started with the foundations of smaller buildings placed in the outer section, then larger buildings with more tiled open areas, and finally large buildings with what may have been a central square in the last section. She guessed there would have been another section for the Eternal Lord and his eight demons in the center, but now all she could sense was just a massive hole into the ground.
The way the hole was made it seemed like whatever had been there had been erased from existence. Like the entire area was ripped from reality and destroyed. The only thing that led her to believe this notion incorrect was a staircase spiraling down along the edge. The stairs appeared to be created from the stone along the holes edge but levitated where it was with some sort of magic. It wasn’t connected to the side walls but was free floating around a foot into the air.
This was going to suck. Gaia wasn’t afraid of many things, just a measly three things. One was spiders which she’d kind of gotten over, second was open ocean since she never knew what could be under her feet, and third was heights. In the time since she’d come to this world she’d come across all three. The spider during her training camp and requests afterwards. The water during the dungeon but to a lesser degree until the boss area. The heights with this disparaging quest.
She lamented that she would need to go down these free floating steps over a massive hole but took comfort in that she could ride on Malachite’s shell. She could just pull her mana field in and just imagine it was a normal staircase. The party moved to the edge and followed Edrahni down the stairs. As they carefully made their way down the stairs Edrahni explained what they knew about the ruins.
“We have been exploring what we now know is the firzt floor. You might be wondering why we don’t know how many floorz there are when there’z this mazzive hole in the zenter. Well, the reazon iz that the only ztairway that can be zeen in the hole is thiz firzt one. We aren’t sure if the ztairwayz to the other floor or floorz are hidden zomewhere or if the ztairwayz are connected and hidden by zome kind of magic. Thiz could mean there are more ztairways juzt like thiz one that are hidden from view unlezz you’ve reached that floor. We just aren’t sure where to look and there are many thingz we can learn or find in each floor. Thiz iz alzo why exploration is zlow, we don’t want to mizz zomething becauze we juzt rushed pazt it. We, however, will be moving to find the ztairway from what the Guild Mazter zaid.” Edrahni explained.
“Yes. We need to have reached, and likely be on, the second floor before midnight tonight.” Fergus said.
“Very well. The firzt floor iz juzt up ahead. It iz zimilar to the what we zaw above. The largezt differenze iz that the areaz are connected by tunnelz and a natural cave network.
There are zome larger cavernz that we have explored, but there are likely many otherz we will need to in order to find the ztairway down. There may alzo be trapz and monzterz down here too. Make sure to be on guard and vigilant. I will guide you and zcout for trapz az we move.” Edrahni stated as the party stepped off of the stairway.
The path to the first floor was a gargantuan tunnel. It was fifty feet tall and thirty feet wide the entire way from the stairs to the entrance of the first floor. They walked for a few minutes before reaching the start of the floor. They entered and Gaia sensed that the area was indeed similar to the ruins above but the buildings were in much better shape down here. One of the buildings she sensed was immediately left of the entrance tunnel and seemed to be carved directly from the stone. The roof of the building was the cave’s ceiling and the building beside it shared a wall. The oddest thing about the buildings were that all of the rooms had a ridiculously high ceiling. If a normal house had a ceiling of ten feet for each floor, these were all at least forty feet tall per floor. The doorways were just as massive but were just empty holes now.
From the floor of the cave to the ceiling was high enough her senses couldn’t reach it. The cave was massive in comparison to the party and the buildings made them feel like ants. They could spend days searching around the buildings and not explore it all, just due to the difficulty of getting around. Each stair was the size of them, they didn’t know why the stairway down to this floor was their size if the floor was likely inhabited by giants at one point.
“Thiz iz the zection that haz been explored thoroughly. The areaz we’ll be going to are further out. If you are ready I will ztart zcouting juzt ahead of you.” Edrahni said.
This was the first time Gaia focused on Edrahni since the mana density skyrocketed. She finally got a good sense of what he looked like. Her best description would be a monstrous human. He was about half a foot shorter than Fergus and was unnaturally thin with a hunched posture. His arms and legs were longer than a regular humans and seemed to end in sharp claws or talons. His face was gaunt and long with no symmetry. If the guild master hadn’t introduced him as a member of her guild Gaia likely would have mistaken him for a monster.
He seemed to notice when she gasped slightly. “Ah, it’z your first time zeeing zomeone like me izn’t it? I am zomeone who fed on living monzterz to zurvive. It led to the form you zee now. I waz onze a human like your friendz. I am what people call a fallen human. I am zomewhat humanoid with monztrouz characterizticz. I hope it won’t cauze any problemz.” Edrahni explained.
“Not at all. Just the first time I’ve gotten an actual sense for your form.” Gaia said.
“I’ll be ahead checking for any trapz or monzterz. If you all dizcover anything or change direction juzt call out to me, I will come back immediately.” Edrahni said as he ran forward, dropping lower and using all four limbs to gain speed.
Gaia wasn’t scared of the man and felt bad as that seemed to be how he took it. It was more just the difference between his personality and appearance. He seemed to be very polite and respectful while his visage was menacing. There wasn’t much she could do about it at the moment as he was scouting ahead, and they needed to move quickly. She decided to apologize to him later when they could.
The group moved forward rather quickly, while still being cautious, and found that there were many traps that were disarmed. They came across a few monsters and Gaia thought she discovered the theme for this floor. Everything was massive. The monsters they came across were all very low-level stone rank and were dealt with in moments, but they were all three times the size of a person. The further out they got from the floor’s entrance the more they realized this floor may be circular like the ruins above ground. They came across a large wall, reaching beyond her field’s influence, with a large hole likely where a gate had been.
When they passed through, they noticed there were a few sections of the ground to either side that weren’t stone like the rest. Instead, there was dirt and, from the smell, some kind of plants. She guessed they survived due to magic or were some kind of cave plants like moss or lichen. This came to be incorrect when Gaia moved closer and felt what seemed to be large leaves like from a massive tree or bush. When she got closer, she noticed the big bush smelled like a carrot and as she focused on the leaves of the plant she realized it likely was a gargantuan carrot.
This meant the trees may actually just be bushes that were multiple times their regular size. As she realized this, she thought that if she could get the seeds of the giant plants, she could possibly grow them outside. She didn’t think about this for long as they moved past the plants to continue their search. Her party members knew that if there was anything that could distract her, it was plants and the prospect of growing her own.
They moved on and began their search in earnest now that they’d left the heavily explored area. The area they were in had been looked over but the Journeyman’s Guild focused on slow but thorough exploration. This meant that the areas were meticulously combed through by multiple groups before moving on to another area to ensure they didn’t miss anything. This also meant exploring the entire floor would take an extremely long time. The party didn’t have that luxury, so they rapidly spread out and searched before continuing to another area after they didn’t find anything.
This continued for hours with occasional giant monsters appearing and swiftly being dealt with. The further out from the center of the rings the party got the higher the monster’s levels. They were still only in the second ring with the first being directly around the entrance and hole. Each ring was enormous in size though. From the entrance to the gate they passed through had likely been a few miles, with this just being a straight shot. This didn’t include the rest of the ring, it also meant the rings would get exponentially larger until the outer edge of the city.
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This meant they had what was likely hundreds of miles they would need to thoroughly search with around fifteen hours to do so. The quest was looking increasingly impossible to complete, unless they just happened to stumble into the stairway by dumb luck. It was even more frustrating that she hadn’t been able to reject the quest and instead was forced to do it. The more she thought about it the more she realized that it was inevitable she’d fail, like that was what was supposed to happen.
She didn’t like that she was once again forced into a situation against her will, due to a being that literally decided to force this situation for its entertainment. As she thought about it she continued searching with her Mana Field but didn’t notice anything off or different as Malachite moved. They had spread out over a large distance so they could search a wider area with each person moving quickly. The only reason it was possible for them to search such a wide area as quickly as they did was thanks to their superhuman senses.
Their eyesight and thinking speed had improved as their levels and stats increased. They were able to spot small details within moments while still moving at a speed a normal person couldn’t hope to ever reach. Gaia was able to sense if the mana was different as long as it was within her field no matter how quickly Malachite went. This let her cover an area quicker than the others since she only had to stop if her senses picked up anything while the others had to go inside buildings to search.
Edrahni had been called over when the party split up to expand the search area and he went forward towards the next ring to scout it. The party had to be cautious for any traps since Edrahni couldn’t scout the areas all of them searched as he couldn’t be everywhere at once. They were cautious and thankfully they hadn’t set any traps off or noticed them before any injuries could occur. This didn’t slow the party down much but every second counted. The party met back up at the gateway to the next ring since they hoped the way down would be somewhere stronger monsters were, like it had been in the dungeon. They didn’t have any proof that’s how this worked but could only do what they thought would lead them closer to their goal the quickest.
The search continued for hours with no luck. They’d already gone through three rings since entering the floor and each ring was larger than the last. There was no chance they’d be able to search the entire city before midnight. It was so large that, even if they had a week, they may only search through half of it at their frantic pace. They could only continue forward and hope they miraculously found the way down.
The time limit was shrinking at what felt like an ever-increasing pace. They searched through the areas just around the main roads from the gates they entered and left. They didn’t have time for any more exploring if they continued with their initial idea. They met at the gateway to the sixth ring and Gaia finally decided they should just move directly to the outermost ring before searching again. It was a last-ditch effort hoping their hunch that the way down was at the place where the strongest monsters were.
The party thought about and agreed. They could only search so much of an area within the time they had left. Their best bet would be to follow their initial idea and just make a mad dash until they reached the area they hoped it was in. Then they could search more thoroughly there. Edrahni was called back and told about their decision which he agreed would likely be their best bet. He sprinted ahead to disarm any traps along their path since they’d be moving forward extremely quickly.
Stephanie joined Gaia on Malachite’s shell and the party rushed through another two rings before they reached the outer wall of an eight ring. There they found an actual gate, whereas all of the other rings just had gaping holes where they guessed a gate had been. This one had an actual gate, two massive doors sat made from the same stone as the wall with intricate designs carved along its surface.
The doors were each at least thirty feet wide and went well past Gaia’s senses in height. The designs covered every inch of the doors and made images. She couldn’t sense them all since the doors were gargantuan and likely reached the ceiling from her guess. The ones she could sense depicted multiple scenes of humanoid monsters with bulky figures, horns and little to no clothing.
At the highest edge of her senses, she could tell there was another depiction but only got the lower half. There were multiple sets of legs and feet that appeared to be on the move. There wasn’t anything else she could understand from this without the entire image. The next image depicted a group of the monsters, which she guessed were Giants from their size compared to the trees carved, fighting with smaller humans and monsters within a forest. The one after it depicted a singular giant meeting with a much smaller human. The giant was muscular and had six horns with long hair and short beard. This human seemed odd, she didn’t know why, but they were beautiful. The human was carved with immense care and respect.
The depiction following this had the same Giant kneeling in front of the human. The images following this depicted the Giant returning to his people. They all moved together following the diminutive human and built a circular city. The final depiction showed the leader of the Giants following the human when he left the city. She could only guess this was a set of carvings depicting the creation of the first floor of Xerios.
Down the middle of the gate, with half being on each door, were eight carvings all of which were the same. They all depicted a water drop. Gaia didn’t know why these were here, but considering there were eight of them and eight rings they’d passed through, she could only think the worst. She figured each one likely had something to do with each ring.
“I think we found our way down. The only issue is that I can only assume it requires something to be done in each ring.” Gaia said disheartened.
“I agree that we found the gate to the way down, but why do you think it requires something to be done in each ring?” Stephanie asked.
“We’ve gone through eight rings and how many water drops or whatever there are, are there? Eight. If I’m right, we’d need to figure out what needs to be done, after finding whatever mechanism is connected to this on each ring. I also highly doubt they’ll be in the same place in every ring, and even if they were, it would take us days to find where they are in each ring.” Gaia replied harsher than she meant to.
“We only have about three hours left until the deadline. There’s not enough time to even make it back to the entrance before it’s all gone.” Gaia finished after a moment of silence.
“Well, is there anything else we can do? What exactly did the quest say?” Griff asked.
Gaia took a moment to take a few deep breaths before trying to pull the quest up for them to see. As she’d said there was only about three hours left. Griff read it and went quiet as he thought about what it said. It only said they had to reach the second floor of the ruins not that they had to reach it the usual way.
“Edrahni!” Griff called.
“Yez?” Edrahni said as he ran to the group.
“Has anyone tried breaking or digging the floor? Do we know if it’s able to be damaged?” He asked.
“Not that I know of, no.” Edrahni said wearily.
“Alright. Well, shall we try?” Griff asked the group.
“What do you mean?” Stephanie asked.
“The quest just said we had to reach the second floor. It didn’t say how we did so. U figured we could try digging or breaking our way through the floor.” Griff explained.
There was a stunned silence before Stephanie whipped her great hammer out and slammed it into the floor. There was a loud whoosh of air before a resounding crack. To Gaia’s senses she could tell the floor cracked but it didn’t seem very deep. Stephanie then started slamming the hammer down repeatedly and the cracks got wider and wider. It was more like creating a small crater than breaking the floor but it did prove the floor could be damaged and therefore could possibly be broken through with enough time and effort.
Now they just needed to hope they had the right tools and time to break through the floor this way. If they didn’t, well at least they had hope it was possible this way. The party began attacking the floor in the same spot. Stephanie smashed her hammer into the floor with all the strength she could muster. Griff fired mana shots and smashed his gauntlets into the stone. Fergus used his arrow dagger to pry the cracked stone apart and at times let Stephanie use it as a chisel. Malachite fired water shots to fill the cracks hoping it would slow any regeneration, if there was any. Liv used her own poison shots in tandem with Malachite to try and weaken the stone. Antonio used his mandibles to break chunks off and moved any loose debris. Shadow defended and fought the monsters that approached due to the noise. Gaia helped Shadow by distracting the monsters.
The party all worked together hoping to complete this quest, but as time dragged on, the hope was starting to fade. The hole was slowly getting deeper, but they didn’t know how deep they would need to dig before they reached the second floor. It could be another foot or another hundred. They were all starting to slow down due to the continuous stress and physical exertion. When Gaia checked, the time there was only about an hour left.
After relaying this, the party redoubled their effort. This was their last option. Either they made it through to the second floor this way or they failed the quest. Gaia was blocking the incoming monsters while watching the timer tick down. The monsters were coming almost constantly due to the consistent commotion at this point. They were all massive but none were humanoid which was odd since the floor had been constructed by humanoid giants, but she didn’t have the chance to wonder why.
She could sense the hole being made by her companions and it had grown quite a bit since they began. It had started as a few inches and was now about five feet deep. The progress was visible but they still didn’t know how much further they would need to go. The time passed quickly with the party’s hope similarly diminishing. By the time the hole was about seven feet deep the timer had dropped to five minutes. It was at this point Gaia hopped into the hole.
All of her party members were already within and she hoped it would decrease the number of sides she had to guard. There was now only one direction to worry about, up. Even if they completed or failed the quest they would be exhausted and surrounded by monsters at this point anyway. The work in the hole continued with Gaia basically being a shield above her party.
The timer had ticked down to the last ten seconds when her party members all started to brutally strike the floor. She could sense a few small cracks that led into a wider area. As the timer hit one the floor of the hole broke and the party fell.
“We did it.” Gaia thought as they fell for a few seconds.
Then, they hit water. It was flowing downward at a steady and fast pace. Gaia was sliding along the bottom where the current was a bit slower as was Stephanie due to her armor. It did cause her some worry since she couldn’t get to the surface to breathe, and her other companions were quickly being pulled further from her, including her bonds. They had already been pulled beyond her fields range and were likely only getting further from them. This continued for a few more minutes until she sensed something that made her heart drop.
Just at the edge of her mana field was a cliff, which she was being dragged straight towards. She tried to grab the floor or anything she could reach to slow herself down. What few plants there were on the riverbed, were immediately pulled free from her momentum which had steadily started increasing. The floor under her had started sloping gradually with it being a slow descent but now it was closer to a leaning wall. It wasn’t but a few seconds later that she was thrust over the edge of the riverbed and was in an open free-fall. Luckily Stephanie was beside her and they grabbed each other to keep from being separated.
The pair fell for around a minute. They were able to take a couple shallow breaths as the water turned to mist, before they were submerged once again. This time they sunk for while. Gaia could barely sense things in the water as it was infused with mana. It drastically reduced her sensing range and made everything blurred. They reached the bottom of the lake after half a minute and began moving in a direction Stephanie suggested.
Gaia followed behind her as they moved along the lakebed and reached an incline after a few minutes. They moved up it for another couple minutes before they breached the water’s surface. After they got above the surface they could finally take in a few deep breaths. Thankfully, ranking up decreased the need for certain functions. One being the need to breathe, which took a while to get used to. They didn’t need to breathe as often so they could go for around a half hour before needing to or passing out. This was mainly since their bodies were changing when they ranked up, which removed some of their “weaknesses.”
They moved out of the water and onto the shoreline of what Gaia could only assume was the second floor. Then she realized that Liv and Antonio were still with her. They must have been kept together due to her armor. She was about to check on them when she heard an all to familiar voice in her head.
“Well, you put up a nice effort. Had you had a few more minutes you would have succeeded. It was also quite entertaining so thank you. In return for the spectacle, I’ll wait until you find the other misfits of your little band. Then you’ll have to deal with the consequence of failing.” The Amalgamation stated.
“What?!” Gaia cried.