Bab 18: Chapter 17: Guards
Just now Oberon noticed the hundreds of engravings along the walls. Each looked more desperate and deranged than the other, and few gave actual clues on how to open the door.
He searched the wall, and read through the words, till he noticed that the floor was also a note. It was hard to notice under all the roots and dirt. Looking at the giant nightshade tree he had an idea.
'Time to test out the new abilities.'
He covered his palms in metal and pressed them against the bark.
His palm instantly turned a fiery red, and a loud creaking sound erupted. Not even a second later a small flame was kindled. Like a small flame in the dry season, the fire spread out. Oberon watched in amazement and wonder as the flame's tongue slithered up the tree. And soon the whole room was lit aflame.
A blazing fire engulfed the whole room. The flames ate away at the tree as Oberon just stood there looking at the sight.
It was beautiful, so full of energy and power. It seemed like it could burn endlessly. But every good and bad thing will eventually end, or so he thought.
He stood there just watching the fire for a few minutes till finally only the glowing coal and ash were left.
The smoldering ash reminded Oberon of his "past" self. Desperately trying to cling to life and not going out... Nah, he was just thinking too much.
Looking at his hands Oberon chuckled, or at least tried as only the sound of rasping sand came out. 'This emotion, how curious and amusing.'
Pushing it away he refocused on the task at hand.
Covering the floor in vital sand he pushed everything to the side and cleared the floor.
The floor revealed a large magic circle, with 18 small indents around it and a text on the bottom.
It read, 'Rukia, the goddess of this land has blessed us. But yet again the humans betrayed her. No more. Only her children will be able to claim her power. We aren't worthy. Her children will rise. Maybe not in our times, but they will rise. Hoddur will know their wrath. Laton will fear her children once again. Spill your blood and let her chosen child reclaim what is righteously his.'
As Oberon finished reading through it he could only stare up.
Rukia the goddess of the sand, the sun, and time was revered by the continent's people. But Laton the god of the west was always in dispute against her, splitting the continent's faith in two. But as Rukia graced her believers with knowledge and power and her own children, her influence grew and grew. Till the more zealous ones became corrupted and betrayed her.
The cruelty of their deeds made her regret her actions. So she swore to never bless a human again and only watched them in silence. That was what Oberon knew from old tellings in the church. There were many iterations of that story, but the ending was all the same.
Rukia, being saddened and stopped helping her believers.
...
Holding his hand over the indents on the floor he let core sand flow from his palm. He once saw a sand golem, type mage, draw a ritual circle. Thank Rukia that he didn't delete those memories as he would have no clue what to do. So he slowly filled each bowl, and to his wonder, the mythrelite door creaked and clicked.
As the last grain of sand filled the bowl the door slowly moved to the side. Loud humming and moving cogs rang out the room, tremors, and rumblings could be heard kilometers wide.
A could mana-rich draft instantly enveloped Oberon. The cube in his body hummed to life, draining the surroundings of its mana.
The cube filled itself, but all that mana was only little dribbles for the large ocean of mana it contained.
Behind the door, there was a long corridor leading even deeper into the ground. The walls are made out of finely polished marble. It stretched so far that even his scans couldn't make out the end of it. But nevertheless, he ventured forth. The walk was long, and Oberon had much free time to let his mind wander. He thought about all the things humans did, and somewhat understood why they did what they did. But sympathy and empathy were still hard for Oberon to grasp, including other emotions and thoughts. He never thought about why he existed or fear true death.
Because in the end, he knows that Rukia will be proud of his accomplishments no matter what he does.
Oberon was so deep in thought that he almost missed the sword in front of him.
Cursing his newly gained mind to have let his guard down, he sends a pulse in front, seeing if there are any enemies nearby.
A few seconds passed in absolute silence as he waited for the signal to come back.
After getting nothing but emptiness back he kneeled down to pick up the sword.
The sword crumbled as he picked it up by the hilt.
'How strange.'
Looking at the pile of dust for a moment, he just stood up and continued walking, but this time without letting his mind wander again.
A couple of hours later he noticed that there were some blade marks on the walls.
The further he went the more signs of a battle could be seen on the walls. Even some parts of the ceiling were heavily damaged.
Reaching a sudden left turn he noticed a lot of movement behind it.
Turning the corner, the large corridor opens into a ginormous cave where many stone buildings reside. The structures were all in good condition, and the place was lit up by hundreds of mana lamps. Cloaked figures walked around collecting water from a water stone or just mingling with their kind. He even saw what he presumed as children playing around a fountain.
It looked like an underground city. But who are the veiled beings that inhabited this place?
Oberon's mind raced to find any conclusion, but only blanks turned up. How could anyone survive the war, even the hermits up north didn't. Or the secluded darklinks.
'It probably is an underground city. But how?' though Oberon. He couldn't make up the creatures fully draped in what appeared to be some kind of animal skin and carapace.
Oberon stood at the edge of the entrance and slowly walked towards the city. His weapons were already out and his sand figure got covered in metal armor.
As soon as he stepped into the open, a cloaked figure spotted him and shrieked.
All the mana lamps shut down and they fled into their homes.
Oberon continued to advance forward slowly. Even in the permanent darkness, the mana waves lit up in his vision. Large clusters of mana could be seen everywhere, especially in the walls.
As he was slowly approaching the underground city a loud bell rang. Then the ground began to shake as the stone walls of the cave split open. Large bronze-colored hands reached out and tore through the slit.
Oberon continued to watch on as he saw Alandro guards emerge from the walls. For a moment his system stopped as he couldn't comprehend what he just saw. Dozens of the most elite alchemical-altered living stone guards in an underground city? They predated his time and the creation of those guards where banned. The reason why? No one knew as it was scraped from the history books.
"..."
Before he could even realize what happened the sound of metal scraping metal rattled through his head. The impact was so strong that his whole body tilted to the side as he saw the culprit appearing beside him with a longsword.
Taking a step back to regain his footing and superheated his whole body. The energy consumption was absurd but he couldn't hold back against those things. He never fought or even saw them, but in his core, he knew they were dangerous. The large energy signature spoke for itself, as it burned in his vision like the sun.
Holstering his shield up and branding his weapon he noticed that only the one that attacked him moved, all the others were just standing a slight distance away from them and observing.
Another attack came as the guard made an overhead slash, the movement was far to quick to counter. But having anticipated an attack he could barely raise his shield in time.
*Clang*
Sparks flew as the metal shield was dented.
The force behind it made him buckle his knees but with the high processing power, he swung his arm and aimed at the guard's torso.
It didn't even flinch as the superheated metal made a shallow cut through it. Black liquid seeped from the partially cauterized wound. The pressure from the longswords never relented as was adamant about cutting Oberon in two.
Seeing that he can't back off, he reformed his blade into a spear and thrust his spear forward.
Not expecting the weapon to change it pierced his body, but didn't go right through it.
The hardness of the guard's toughness was unexpected to Oberon, but nonetheless, he pushed onwards as he made the shield tilt and the longsword seemingly slid off as he pushed his whole weight against the spear. The guard let go of his weapon and threw lightning-quick punches that dented his armored body. His core was rattled and disorientated but he poured more energy into his core and produced a large amount of vital sand and encased the guard.
He could feel it struggle to get out, but after a few quick stabs with his spear all movements stopped. Retracting the sand into his body again he could feel the tense atmosphere that the other guards were giving off.
But even after seeing the perforated body oozing black blood, the others didn't move.
"It is truly a child of Rukia..."
A voice sounded from behind the rows of Alandro guards as they stepped away to reveal a tall man with golden eyes and runes all over his face.
"You have proven yourself, child. Let us talk in a more suitable place." spoke the man and slowly walked back to the city.
Oberon watched as the guards slowly walked back into the walls again before the stone walls sealed back, even the one that Oberon "slayed" stood up as flesh and stone mended itself and disappeared into the walls.
As he stood there alone he felt like a lost child not knowing what to do.
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone