Chapter 158: Sense Of Danger.

"So what then, did these gods destroy this world and all its people? Why?".

The question made by Hannah was what Damien and Andrea wanted to know more than anything, why destroy what you claim to love, and if you don’t love them, why dictate their fortune and misery at your whims.

Damien sighed lightly. "Let’s say the five carvings beneath the stars are corrupt gods, then what about this one to the side, they appear to be men".

"Those are human champions ". Andrea suddenly said.

Damien glanced back suspiciously. "How did you know, the carvings look like sweet potatoes from here".

Yuri and Hannah chuckled lightly, but Damien wasn’t joking, they were so poorly drawn one would think the person wanted to skim over them quickly, they must have not liked humans or at least held some level of resentment towards them.

Damien concluded solely to himself.

Still, he couldn’t ignore the difference between the champions and the gods. The five figures beneath the stars had been given far more attention, while the humans were almost an afterthought. Their bodies were crude, their weapons barely distinguishable, and even their shapes seemed rushed compared to the rest of the mural.

Yet Andrea had recognized them immediately.

Damien narrowed his eyes as he looked over the carvings again. If these were truly champions, then they had stood against the gods themselves. That alone made them important enough to be remembered, but the person who carved the mural had clearly not considered them worthy of the same effort.

"Six champions and-".

"No-". Yuri interrupted. She pointed to a section of the mural, right next to the other champions, but not very visible, it was another carving, but it barely made it into the rock surface, it was more like a sketch really.

It was of a sole figure, drawn so plainly one would think it should not matter at all.

Damien’s gaze appears to be drawn in the simplicity of it all, until he finally murmurs. "No, not a mistake. Seven champions indeed".

He stared at the seventh figure for several seconds.

Unlike the others, it wasn’t properly carved. There were no clear details, no weapon that could be identified, and almost nothing that suggested the figure was meant to stand out. Whoever had made it had barely scratched the shape into the stone, as if they had either been unable or unwilling to finish it.

But that was precisely what caught Damien’s attention.

The other six had been deliberately placed together, yet this seventh figure was slightly separated from them. It wasn’t erased, and it wasn’t damaged. It was simply there, hidden among the rough surface of the wall.

Damien walked around the mural and went towards the statue, Andrea and the others followed him closely behind, until he stopped by the statue’s head.

The enormous stone face was worn away by time, leaving behind little more than the rough outline of what had once been a man’s expression. Damien stared at it quietly, his gaze moving across the damaged features as if he expected to find something hidden beneath the layers of dust and ice.

"You are one of them, ain’t you". Damien whispered to the statue in an almost possessed state. "You were there, and you fought, you fought hard. But the gods were too strong, now you are here, remains of rock and dust".

There was a solemn silence that washed over the surroundings. Nobody immediately responded to him.

For once, even Damien didn’t seem entirely aware of how strange he sounded. He was simply staring at the remains of the ancient champion, trying to imagine what kind of battle could have reduced an entire civilization to ruins while leaving behind only fragments of its history.

Hannah finally broke the silence.

"Damien, statues don’t talk".

Damien agreed, but if he did so out loud, he would truly seem insane, he wouldn’t let it be so right before the girls, so he turned and said briskly.

"Perhaps so, but this is the Tower of Mysteries. Who’s to say for sure that statues don’t talk, you know what. If I ever meet a talking statue, I will string it up and bring it over as a gift for you".

Hannah didn’t care whether he was joking or not. She declared proudly.

"It’s a promise then, you now owe me a talking statue".

Damien glanced at her with a slightly skeptical expression. He wasn’t entirely sure whether she was actually serious, but judging from the confidence in her voice, it seemed like Hannah had already decided that the matter was settled.

Andrea suddenly turned her head and looked around them, her eyes were cold as she monitored everywhere she could see, her dormant ability, Fatal Inkling, was activating again.

This wasn’t the first time it happened, in fact it happened frequently whenever she chose to explore this region of the Ruins of Humanity.

She remained silent for several seconds, her gaze moving across the ruins and the frozen wasteland surrounding them. Whatever her ability was warning her about, she clearly wasn’t interested in waiting around to find out.

"It’s time to go everyone, we have over stayed our welcome".

Damien and the others didn’t feel anything, but they knew full well to trust Andrea’s instincts. After everything they had experienced since entering the ruins, none of them were foolish enough to ignore a warning from Fatal Inkling.

Damien gave the mural one final glance before turning away. There were still plenty of questions surrounding the ancient ruins, but whatever answers were waiting for them weren’t worth risking their lives over.

The Therizon came to Damien as he mounted it, Hannah joined him, the others had other means of transport, one of the soldiers used his Dormant ability and made a sort of carriage using ice.

It was truly wondrous, at least Damien thought so.

Soon, they began leaving the area behind, the undead bird carrying Damien and Hannah while the others followed using their own means of transportation.

...

"Where are you?". Camila said to herself from the very top of the wall, overlooking deep into the frozen wastelands.

The wind blew against her as she continued staring into the distance, her eyes searching through the endless frozen landscape as though she expected to see someone eventually emerge from it.

She sighed a heavy complicated sigh, even Daisy that just landed behind her could feel the heavy weight of it.

"You know there’s a chance he might have survived".

Camila shook her head and turned to Daisy. "Do you truly believe that?".