Chapter 1530: A Box

Erend now intended to find the Dragonborn, but before he could do that, he needed to locate the source of the strange energy first.

He already knew that the source was somewhere inside this facility because he had sensed its presence from the moment he arrived. Even while he had still been outside the factory, the strange energy had already reached his senses.

Now that he had explored deeper into the facility, its presence had become much stronger.

Erend left the room filled with computers and returned to the long corridor.

He continued walking while occasionally glancing toward the open doors along the walls. Each one led into another section of the facility, and he could not help wondering what might still be hidden behind them.

There could be more records, more machines, and more information about what had happened to this world.

His curiosity continued to bother him.

Part of him wanted to enter every room and investigate everything he could find. The more he learned about the facility, the more obvious it became that the history the people of this world had been told was incomplete.

There were simply too many inconsistencies between the civilization he had seen here and the Valthoria that existed today.

But Erend eventually shook his head. No. He could not waste any more time.

"Maybe they can uncover the rest of this mystery themselves later."

Once he found the Dragonborn traces, he and Eccar, Aesa, and Sylven might even be able to help the people of Valthoria secure this facility.

If they could protect it from the robots or any other kind of security measures in this place and gain access to the remaining systems, perhaps the people of this world could finally begin uncovering their own lost history.

But that could come later. For now, Erend needed to find the Dragonborn.

He continued down the corridor, moving deeper and deeper into the dark interior of the facility.

His footsteps gradually became faster as he followed the strange energy he could sense ahead of him.

The deeper he went, the stronger the energy became. It was no longer just a faint presence in the distance. Erend could now feel it clearly through his enhanced senses.

He passed several rooms filled with unfamiliar machinery and eventually reached a large intersection.

He turned into another corridor and continued forward. The passage became increasingly isolated as he moved farther from the main sections of the factory.

After several minutes, Erend finally stopped. He had found it. The strange energy was strongest here.

In front of him stood a pair of enormous metal doors that completely blocked the passage. Unlike the other doors throughout the facility, these were exceptionally thick and heavily reinforced. Their surfaces were darkened by age but still looked completely intact.

A circular locking mechanism was embedded in the center of the doors. Several small digital screens and panels surrounded it. They had probably been used to verify the identity or authorization of whoever wanted to enter the room.

Erend stared at the doors for a moment. He obviously had none of the required credentials. Normally that would have been a problem. For Erend it was barely an inconvenience.

He clenched his fist and gathered Fire Magic into his palm. Instead of releasing a large attack, he compressed the flames into a tiny concentrated mass of heat. The temperature around his hand immediately rose.

Erend placed his palm against the metal door and the alloy began to glow.

The intense heat slowly penetrated the thick material and softened it without producing a tremendous explosion.

Erend maintained the concentrated flame as he moved his hand across the surface, cutting through the metal with controlled precision.

The alloy gradually melted and a section large enough for Erend to pass through eventually separated from the door. He pushed the weakened piece forward and the heavy metal plate fell onto the other side with a deep metallic crash.

Erend stepped through the opening.

The moment he entered, he immediately realized that this room was different from another room in the facility.

First of all, it was enormous, filled with massive pillars that rose from the floor into the darkness above. They were incredibly thick and appeared to have been constructed from the same powerful alloy that formed the walls.

The ceiling was equally massive, reinforced by layers of metal that looked strong enough to withstand an enormous impact.

In fact, almost the entire room seemed to have been constructed from an extremely durable metal alloy.

It did not feel like an ordinary laboratory, more like a containment chamber.

The entire structure seemed designed for one purpose: to prevent whatever was inside from escaping and to prevent anything outside from reaching it.

Erend activated his Dragon eyes. The darkness immediately disappeared from his vision.

He scanned the enormous room and found countless machines positioned throughout the room. Some were connected to thick pipes while others were attached to strange mechanical structures that Erend could not identify. Several large devices stood around the walls, their surfaces covered with old panels and inactive displays.

He did not understand the purpose of most of them. But he could feel the energy. It was coming from the center of the room.

Erend’s eyes moved toward the middle and he saw a massive metal container standing there.

The structure looked like a gigantic reinforced box. Thick metal plates surrounded it from every side and several pipes extended from its surface into the surrounding machinery. Faint traces of the strange energy seemed to flow through those connections.

The closer Erend looked, the stronger the energy became. There was no doubt now that whatever he had been sensing since arriving at the factory was coming from inside that container.

Erend immediately jumped forward.

His body crossed the distance in an instant, and he landed directly in front of the massive metal box.

He examined its upper surface and noticed that the thick plate was actually a sealed lid.

Erend grabbed the edge with both hands. The metal resisted him for only a moment. Then Erend applied his strength.

The metal bent under his hands. He forced the lid up until the entire plate warped and separated from its locking mechanism. Erend pushed it aside and finally looked inside.

His eyebrows raised. Inside the container was a large quantity of liquid.

It glowed with an eerie greenish-blue light, illuminating the interior of the metal chamber with unnatural radiance.

The liquid moved slowly despite the complete absence of any visible disturbance.

Erend stared at it. The strange energy he had been sensing was coming directly from this substance.

—