Chapter 1617: The Crystal Pillars
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
You could not be too serious with the sprites, as they would not even realize that you were being serious with them or understand what seriousness meant…
So Hao Ren instantly gave up asking how the sprite could forget such a piece of important information, and instead got the sprite to explain more on what she knew about the Lair of Nightmares so better understand the thing…
Of course, staying in the ventilation tunnels near the core area for too long was not the smartest of moves so they went into a deeper tunnel with the sprite leading the way as they sought more information.
Like what the sprite had said earlier, she did not know too much about the Lair of Nightmare.
The surviving sprites on Amantir were just a small portion, and for the surviving sprites, their range of activity is also limited. To survive, they had to fuse with the planet’s core and create a powerful barrier to cut off outside contact. While that ensured their survival, this also basically meant that the sprites were locked in a cage.
The sprite’s only means of communicating with the outside world was through the crystals scattered across Amantir, and all the crystals on the planet were basically now tainted by the Mad Lord or turned into energy source by the corrupted monsters. With most of their resources destroyed, with the usable ones barely ten percent left, and even if the crystals could be used, the sprites were not bold enough to activate these channels. They could only discreetly use the narrow bandwidth generated by the crystal’s resonance to collect information from the upper levels. And three to four of the crystal veins happened to pass by Amantir’s crystal and the Lair of Nightmares, and this was the sprite’s only communication path in this terrifying land.
With the little sprite’s garbled explanation, Hao Ren understood that there was originally nothing beneath the crystal. Before the fall of the planet, the underground control center was an intricate and thick rock layer, and the layer extended deep into the mantle, further down is the crystal pillars zone, and the grid zone and the Lair of Nightmare was only formed after the collective ‘fall’ of the guardians.
And its formation was not too long after the equator rift tore open.
The Lair of Nightmares was not directly under the crystal, but towards the south, this allowed it to avoid the canyon area of the equator rift. The Lair itself was a wide ellipsoidal zone and is sealed within a powerful and strange energy field. The sprites were hard-pressed to tell what was within, and could only roughly understand that it was a complex cavity with many monsters in it.
The Lair of Nightmares was close to the equator rift, and some of its ‘contents’ could pierce through the energy barrier and extend deep into the canyon. In there, the corrupted monsters had created many structures to utilize extended contents, and that was what ‘summoning platforms’ Hao Ren saw.
As for ‘the big monster in the center of the Lair of Nightmare’ that the sprite had repeatedly mentioned, Hao Ren till the end did not make out what it was supposed to be. He could only assume that it was a very powerful minion of madness, and is equipped with supreme power and mastery over the mind and the dream, almost rivaling Lockmarton. To allow Amantir to ceaselessly create new armies, the monster was within a long slumber as it weaved a massive nightmare, and its nightmare was projected into the real world through the extension platforms.
From there, a huge amount of brain monsters gathered around a piece of equipment called the Pillar of Nightmare, and their duty was to dream together with the “big monster” in the Lair of Nightmares and to “lead” the monsters from the nightmare out into the real world.
And this entire process had everything to do with Amantir’s crystal.
The sprite was not sure what was the link between the two. From their observation, they could see that the energy from Amantir’s crystal is connected to the Lair of Nightmare beneath it, and was transferring a large amount of information.
That had Hao Ren worried.
He was worried that Amantir’s crystal had already been totally corrupted by the Mad Lord’s power if that was the case, it was difficult to say if it could still combine with the other two crystals to swerve as the waypoint.
“Say, does sprites like you will come out often?” As they headed into the deeper tunnels, Hao Ren curiously asked the dancing sprite who was dancing in the holographic projection, “The aura we sensed earlier was yours right?”
“We don’t come out usually!” The sprite immediately shot back, “It’s all monsters up there and once we go out we might not be able to return. A few curious sprites died when they went out scouting. We usually send an observer up once every hundred years. But this time an observation route we had set on the surface had detected a very strange energy reaction, and then a group of unknown people started bumbling into the monster’s base, and I was sent out to check things out.”
As she said, she puffed her chest up, “That aura you sensed earlier was of course mine! I was following you guys for a long while, but all of you are so dumb and never noticed me, and even went to attract the monster’s attention. If I did not intervene then, you all would be dead by now.”
“Alright, alright, thank you for saving our lives.” Hao Re grinned at the little sprite before looking around. “Say, that sort of place your shelter is?”
As the group had been underground for quite a long time now, and it was clear from the map that they had already left the command center’s area and entered an unmarked tunnel as the walls around them had changed from metal to a sturdy rock with a unique glow. In between the rocks were shining crystals of all sizes, and that allowed the normally dark tunnel to be somewhat visible, and within the tunnel, the hum of the operating machines could no longer be heard, that meant that the team had already passed the machinery base and had entered an even more ancient part of the planet.
The sprite had to use the MDT’s various sensory modules to sense the outside world, and while her senses were much more acute now, as there was a data structure layer between her and the outside world, plus the lack of practice leaving her fumbling, the tiny one took a good while before she could ascertain their location underground. “Oh, oh! We are close to the crystal pillars. After that is the big grids, and beneath that is our hiding spot. But we do not need to scurry about in the crystal pillars and the big grid, there’s a direct path to the shelter~”
“What is the crystal pillars and the big grid?” Y’lisabet asked out of curiosity.
“This planet is created by the goddess, so it is different from the other planets.” the little sprite blabbered on, “The mantle beneath the crust is not your normal mantle, but a cluster of massive supporting pillar-like structures made out of crystals. That is the crystal pillars layer. Within it there are tons of automated energy unit and ancient facilities as they support the operations of the planet, even the monsters dare not touch the items within the layer, while the big grid is the layer between the crystal pillars and the planet’s core. It’s meant to keep the planet stable and to regulate energy and information from every crystal pillars. Part of our observation route is directly connected to the big grid!”
The little demon was drawn in by the incredible structures explained by the sprite and gawked in wonder, “Woww…”
As they spoke, the team had exited the winding underground cavern and the sight that appeared before Hao Ren left him with a dropped jaw.
It was a flood of wondrous bright colors before him.
There was no foreboding darkness that they had come to expect, and the width and the brightness of this underground world had exceeded everyone’s expectations.. Hao Ren only saw a forest of crystals extending from end to end, and everything within sight was made out of clear crystals. The woods, the hills, and valleys, the rivers, the trees… all these were reflecting a colorful, almost phantasmal light from an unknown source.
Just like a frozen world.
In the endless crystal world, Hao Ren saw the massive crystal pillars that supported Amantir’s upper structure. They were neatly arrayed across the crystal world, like the mythological world pillar than held the heaven and earth together, and the radius of the massive pillars could support a city on each one, while the upper columns extended into unfathomable dark abyss above.
And they had just come down from one of the crystal pillars.
The lower part of the gargantuan pillars had a ghostly light supporting them, and within the light, Hao Ren saw many floating ring-like structures circling the pillars. Those were probably the ancient structures the sprite was talking about.
The realm deep within Amantir was operated automatically, since the day that the goddess of creation had created this planetary starship. Even when the surface had changed, and the taint of madness rampaged across the planet, the operations here did not seem to be affected.
No, it was not totally unaffected. As Hao Ren’s sight swept across the crystal world, he very quickly noticed that the crystal pillars had been tainted as they had a very unusual purplish-red glow, and the circling rings were letting out violet dark lightning arc that looked awfully dangerous.
“I… Is aw something like this in the visions from the Throne of Destiny,” Vivian mumbled as if sleep-talking. “But there are many animals there and even a crystal stag…”
“That is probably the crystal pillar zone beneath the core,” the sprite explained. “The core and the three planetary fortresses are the same, all created by the goddess of creation, and their interior similar. Amantir’s crystal pillar zone was actually a lively place once, many crystal animals lived here, but as the crystals started warping, the areas where the animals could live shrunk and they are now gone. Even these forests… are dead, but the crystal plants won’t rot away after they die, so you could still see them.”
“Even if the monster can’t come down here, the taint had already reached here,” Y’zaks looked at the already warped crystals in the distance as he shook his head, “Even if you hide here, you will be consumed sooner or later.”
“We know, but we don’t have anywhere else to run,” the little sprite in the projection shrugged. Her tiny frame let that seemingly adult gesture looked a little amusing. “The shelter is after the great door. I’ll lead the way.”