Capítulo 231: Chapter 231: Traces of Expedition Team (Edited)
As the caravan of camels drew closer and closer to the city wall, the city wall became clearer in Tom's eyes.
Although much of it was submerged in yellow sand, the walls remained a magnificent spectacle from the past. There were at least two walls, the outermost one being five meters high, with a gentle slope behind the first wall and a second one erected behind it, which could have been ten meters high, including the gentle slope.
This is an astonishing figure, and the city walls are not made of rammed earth but are made of blocks of the same type of stone as the pyramids. Made of such sturdy material, it is no wonder they have survived thousands of years of sand and wind. The collapsed areas are the openings that remained in the city walls. The wind entered through there, causing the stones to wear down more than the rest, and eventually, they collapsed completely.
As Tom rode on a camel atop the wall, he realized that only the first wall was three meters thick, and one could tell that the entire city was impenetrable.
Once inside the city, everyone felt relieved to be sheltered by the solid walls and felt alive after a catastrophe.
Most of the city's buildings were already half-buried in the sand, and without the sturdy walls, the ruins would have been buried in the sand. Most of the city's wooden houses had collapsed, and only the masonry ones remained, barely standing.
Tom and the others looked around and finally chose a large house. Roughly estimated, it must have been over a thousand square meters. It was more of a warehouse than a large house, and Tom was sure it was a storage place for important items. Because even though it had collapsed and was buried by the sand, there was still an outer wall, and the house itself was a large circular room made of piled stones.
Old Yushadu had stayed outside to accommodate the camels, and if the herd had escaped, the expedition would have been in a lot of trouble. The others were the first to rush into the house. The three students were a bit less fit, and the day's hardships had already exhausted them. Once inside, they sat on the floor, took out their water bladders, and drank, splashing water on their heads to remove the dust from their faces and nostrils. Dr. Hunter, who had relaxed his mind, fell straight to the ground and fainted.
That was when Dr. Hunter's students noticed their professor's anomaly.
"Doctor, what's wrong? Doctor!" Will tossed his water bladder aside and immediately grabbed his professor, his voice attracting the team's doctor towards him.
The team doctor briefly checked Dr. Hunter's condition and found that he had only broken his arm and suffered some loss of strength. He anesthetized the doctor and put him to sleep, then he treated his arm, took out his medical kit, and applied a cast.
"What happened?" Alyosha frowned, asking the team doctor. Dr. Hunter's injury would have a significant negative impact on the team's search.
The team doctor shrugged, "He accidentally hit something, I suppose."
"As long as we don't have a fever at night, there's no problem." The doctor's diagnosis calmed the students once again. Will took out a blanket, laid it on the floor, and placed the professor on it to rest.
After all this, they all had a little break, and old Yushadu entered the house from outside.
Tom had time to take a good look at the house.
A quick glance confirmed his suspicions that it was an arsenal. It was a place where weapons were piled up inside the city. There were still a large number of weapons stacked on the floor of the house. The dry desert conditions had preserved them well, until now. The main categories were daggers, spears, hammers, and bows, mostly made of bone, stone, and to a lesser extent, bronze. In addition to the weapons, there were leather armor and leather shields that had almost completely decomposed.
If this was an arsenal, then the separate facade and thick walls of this room made sense: if a rebellion occurred in the city, the guards guarding the arsenal would be able to defend it and await help.
Tom's eyes wandered, finally landing on a strangely shaped war hammer. He only glanced at it briefly, but soon realized it was unusual, and upon examining it for a while, he realized it was a wand!
It was a wand, albeit very crude and rudimentary, but it was a wand nonetheless. It was just very different from the current wands, and it had been crafted to resemble a war hammer: it had a brass head at the end of the wand, with small nails. Apparently, its previous owner was also a melee magician.
The others also recovered from the panic of the sandstorm, gradually realizing that these were the ruins of an ancient city that no one had ever discovered! Thinking about this lifted everyone's spirits.
Alyosha picked up the remnants of some weapons from the ground and prepared a fire, but Will almost fell onto the pile of firewood.
"They're artifacts! You can't touch them!"
There's still a lot of rotten wood here, and using it to start the fire can save the team's fuel consumption.
Fortunately, Sara and Alan had the sense to pull Will away. The contents of the city could indeed be called artifacts, but not all of them had conservation value. At least the rotten wood that was scattered everywhere could be burned as firewood.
Once the fire was lit, everyone could see the interior clearly.
A pile of objects in the corner of the room caught everyone's attention.
"A sleeping bag?" Allen approached and asked in astonishment.
There were half a dozen empty sleeping bags in front of them, along with a pile of charcoal ashes and a couple of backpacks, with remnants of food drying in a lunchbox next to the ashes.
"It seems like an expedition has been here before." Alyosha approached Alan, took a look at the remnants of the camp, and concluded.
"However, one thing is suspicious, it seems they left in a hurry," he said as he crouched next to the objects, rummaging through his backpack and pulling out a military canteen, unscrewing it to reveal that it was filled with water.
"No weapons, no supplies, in this state, where could people go?" Alyosha whispered, as if talking to his companions or to himself.
Raider Yegor pointed to his sleeping bag and said in Russian, "Captain, look, the sleeping bag isn't even unzipped, this is very strange."
Alyosha remained silent for a while, continuing to rummage through the left-behind belongings until he finally found a notebook.
"Take a look at this." He handed the note to Peter, who quickly skimmed through it.
"It's from an adventurer from America, according to the notes. His team must have ventured into the desert nineteen years ago, attempting to break the world record for the fastest crossing of the Sahara," Peter glanced at the notes, "They had a bit more luck than us, they didn't encounter a sandstorm, they stumbled upon this place by chance."
Estado de energía semanal
-- Ranking de
Poder 
-- Piedra de
Poder