Chapter 185 - First Remnant
"Dampen the lights. From here, we must rely on our other senses. Remember your training." Zorbek ordered as they moved. The space ahead of them grew increasing large.
They did not want to alarm the denizens of the darkness. They weren't here to just hunt for carcasses.
During the one-week preparation, in addition to cultivating hard, they were taught by Kasif. His Earth Pulse was a unique bloodline ability that allows him to detect the surroundings like he was seeing them with a different pair of eyes.
Under the Queen's order, Kasif did not reject and carried it out faithfully. The ability was vital to the exploration of the dark world.
The hunting team couldn't replicate the ability, but Kasif's teachings allowed them to gain some insights in the usage of their earth abilities that produce a much weaker effect.
Although they couldn't 'see' like the leader of the shadowguards, they could at least sense the movements in their surroundings.
"Yes, Captain!"
The lights from the lanterns were killed and the sunstones dimmed into a soft glow. Their vision grew smaller and the dark world felt infinitely larger as the darkness threatened to swallow them whole.
"The air is very fresh and rich here." Leon commented, squatting over by the ground.
"Your Highness?"
Zorbek took deep breath and all his pores automatically opened. He felt very comfortable, but he soon frowned, "That's strange. Normally, we would only find such concentration and purity of air in areas with vibrant plants and vegetation like great forests."
"Exactly." Leon tapped the rock-hard ground several times, before continuing, "The ground is incredibly rock solid. It's impossible for plants to grow here, not to mention there is no sunlight. Not unless… no, never mind."
There were tenacious and higher-level spirits plants that could survive in the harshest of conditions back in the Divine Realm. But what were the chances of finding one that can burrow its roots in the rock-solid ground and live without sunlight in this world?
Leon couldn't think of any other plausible explanation. However, the world was full of mysteries and many things people didn't have answers to.
Perhaps, the ancient civilization had technology that drew air from above ground and pumped it into the underground? That didn't seem likely and even outrageous, but not out of the realms of possibilities.
Continuing with his outrageous thoughts, why were the remnants of the ancient civilization only found underground? Were they the type of civilization that lived underground? Or did a giant floating landmass dropped and buried everything under?
Leon slightly shook.
The attentive Zorbek noticed and asked, "Is something wrong, Your Highness? Should we head back?"
Was the prince getting cold feet already?
"No, we continue forward." Leon shook his head and said determinedly. What he felt wasn't fear, but excitement and curiosity.
The history of this world… he wanted to know more about it!
Having experienced death once, it wasn't so scary anymore. What was scarier was the loss of a loved one.
"Yes, your Highness."
Zorbek obliged and continued leading the group at the forefront.
For this trip, they have only brought big backpacks, loaded with some food supplies and nothing else. There were no carriages nor wagons. The carcasses were secondary. Exploring the second floor and finding relics was the primary objective of their first trip.
The group proceeded with caution and limited lighting to avoid alarming the creatures lurking deeper in the darkness.
Surprisingly, the ground continues on a downward slope, the deeper they went despite already arriving at the second floor.
The second floor was much larger than Leon anticipated. However, he was curious as to what extent.
Using his [Spirit Eyes], Leon attempted to peer into the infinite darkness.
[Spirit Eyes] allows him to improve his eyesight by several folds to hundreds of folds depending on his mastery of the spirit art, whereas the mastery was dependent on his usage. The more he uses it, the higher the mastery. As such, even if he mastered the spirit art in his past life, he had to start from scratch in this life.
At his current mastery, it was no problem to see up to a dozen mile away in normal cases. However, the darkness of the second floor had heavily restricted his vision to a few hundred yards.
Over two hundred yards away, he spotted more soldier ants.
"Zorbek, we'll head this way."
Leon pointed to a different direction. It was better to avoid confrontation with the ants.
Not understanding the reason, Zorbek quietly nodded with a frown. He was the leader of this hunting team, but he still had to listen to the words of the prince.
Using [Spirit Eyes] takes a toll on Leon's eyes due to the characteristics of his pseudo-Grandmist energy, which was heavy and made his eyes drowsy. As such, he only used it briefly to scout.
Sometime later, Zorbek suddenly stopped and crouch over by a patch of blacken earth, before making a swipe with his fingers.
"What is it, Zorbek?" Leon asked.
Feeling the black smudges on his fingers, Zorbek replied, "The ground here is scorched black, your Highness."
"I see. No doubt, it must be traces of Grandpa Don's battle with the ants."
Leon reactivated his [Spirit Eyes] to observe the traces of battle in their immediate surroundings.
The side effects of using [Spirit Eyes] kicked in immediately, making his eyes droopy appear nonchalant from an onlooker's perspective.
Lilith was surprised and asked, "Could it be that you can see in the dark?"
"Yes."
Although she had suspected it, his answer still left her more surprised. Her own eyesight was also not too bad, being able to see up to 20 yards away. Wanting to compare, she asks, "How far can you see?"
"A few hundred yards."
"How is that possible!?"
Lilith's jaw dropped, while the palace guards became shocked. Zorbek turned around in surprise and noticed the soft grey glow in Leon's eyes.
"I'm using a special technique."
A light bulb seemed to have lit up in the heads of Zorbek and the palace guards when they heard Leon's answer. To think that such a method to see in the dark was possible? They immediately mistaken the grey light in Leon's eyes to be that of the metal attribute.
Leon noticed their expressions and warned, "I advise you all not to attempt at whatever it is you're all thinking right now."
However, his warning came a tad too late.
"AHH! My eyes!"
One of the palace guards cried.
"Urgh…" Leon wanted to facepalm.
The palace guards were all earth-users. There was no way they could use [Spirit Eyes] with earth elemental energy. It was akin to throwing dirt into their eyes.
"Nooo! I can't see!" The palace guard said fearfully with his eyes shut tightly.
'Ha! What can you see with your eyes closed?' Lilith quietly thought as she took pleasure in the palace guard's suffering. On this trip thus far, these palace guards had been sneakily giving her ill gazes. It's good for them to suffer a bit.
Leon inspected the palace guard, before he assured, "Don't worry, the pain is only temporarily. You'll be fine after a while."
True to his words, the palace guard recovered after a short moment.
"I-I'm fine…? Thank god I can see again…" The palace guard exclaimed, not that he could see much in this place anyway.
"Don't do it again. My [Spirit Eyes] isn't something you can replicate with awakening cultivation." Leon stated.
"Let's continue. There's a building to explore."
Fifty yards ahead of them, he had discovered a half-buried building sticking out of the incredible tough ground, but not as tough as the building itself. It was made from an unknown composition of alloys.
The only way to enter was through the large broken windows, but the group did not enter immediately.
There were engravings on the building's exterior for the group to study. Upon closer look, it turned out to be runic inscriptions.
Leon was dumbfounded. Just how advanced was this ancient civilization in runic inscriptions? Even a building exterior could be engraved with runes.
"There's some sunstones on the ground." A palace guard discovered.
"Pack it. We must bring back all the relics we find." Zorbek said with half focus as his mind seemed to be preoccupied by the previous matter.
For an instance, his eyes glowed with azure light before disappearing, but no one seemed to notice. He resumed focus on the present task at hand with a satisfied smile.
Continuing their inspection, there were several empty sockets on the exterior.
"Could the sunstones be placed into these sockets?"
Another palace guard attempted to socket the sunstone as they appeared to be of matching size.
However, his hand was quickly grabbed and stopped by Zorbek.
"What are you thinking? What happens if the sunstone suddenly gets powered by the runes and light up? Do you want to attract an army of ants over to swarm us?" Zorbek admonished. Leon also looked over with a disapproving gaze.
"I'm sorry, Captain!"
The palace guard broke out into cold sweat at his thoughtless mistake.
"Let's look inside." Leon said, seeing there was nothing else they could gain from outside. None of them understood runic inscriptions.
"Yes, your Highness."
One of the palace guards nearest to the broken windows, was the first to enter upon hearing the command.
However!
The palace guard flew back out a few moments later, tackled by a soldier ant that sneak attacked him!
Snap! Snap! Snap!
The ant made several attempts to bite off his head!
Gripping the mandibles with both his hands, the palace guard struggled on the ground as he wrestled with the ant. The soldier ant was too heavy for him to free himself!
"H-Help!"