Chapter 83: Beneath the Hill

Chapter 83: Beneath the Hill

Different sizes

all moving through the labyrinth in absolute silence. Such a sight was actually what made Sky’s blood run cold, dozens of apex predator types, some the size of wagons, slinking noiselessly through the jumbled ruins as if they were made of smoke

His fingers were curling around his sword’s grip, the cold leather of the hilt pressing into his palm as he struggled to reconcile the ghostlike silence with the vast, writhing shapes slithering through the darkness below

"They’re hunting" muttered Sky, barely audibly

"Yes" said Chloe, wide eyes fixing on her display. "Us?" Sky asked, tensing up and ready to leap down the slope if a pack of the things drew close enough

"No"

She continued staring at her display, hands frozen in mid-air over the glowing geometric figures that floated there

"They’re hunting each other" said Sky, looking up at her in mild surprise. "What?" Chloe expanded a few sets of information on her display, her fingers trembling slightly as she pulled the translucent boxes closer to center between them, where the three warriors could see. Sky and Vesper both looked down at the holographic sight, the red blinking dots forming a chaotic battlefield

On the display, two sets of red dots were closing in on each other, the two figures converging on a narrow stretch of the labyrinth

There was a flash of information on the display as the signals clashed

A couple of the blinking dots vanished, only for more to appear elsewhere, forming vaguely similar shapes with greater density and brightness, as if the lost dots had been devoured by their brighter counterparts. Right there, in the heart of the labyrinth, was a grisly battle being fought in absolute silence, the combatants unseen but their very life force burning in ghostly red lights

"It’s like the whole ecosystem resets at night" said Chloe, watching the red ghosts on her display collide and merge. "The weak are eaten and the strong carve out their hunting grounds, sort of like the divisions we picked out during the day, only forced and much more violent" Sky was looking out over the edge of the labyrinth, watching a great shadow suddenly buckle and writhe before vanishing into the darkness, devoured by three much smaller shapes that in turn vanished shortly after

"So sunset isn’t just a time when it gets dark" said Sky, realization dawning on him

"No"

Chloe’s voice was suddenly quiet, the electronic hum of her visor taking on a forlorn note

"It’s a feeding period"

Suddenly, a great bellow sounded out from far below

It was such a physically powerful sound that Sky’s chest almost caved in on itself, the pressure from the sound alone pressing against his ribs like a vice. It was nothing like the guttural shrieking of the lesser beasts they had fought thus far, this was deep and resonant, a sound that carried with it an inescapable feeling of ancient power

Great birds were scattering from the gloom beyond the labyrinth, pale wings catching the distant glimmer of stars as they fled upwards, away from the great ruins. Their cries of fear echoed through the trees as they abandoned their nests, hundreds of them flying off in great disorganized flocks

Then another great roar sounded, louder, answered by a third, and the sound rebounded off the monolithic walls of the labyrinth complex, echoing and reverberating until it sounded like the whole world was screaming. The very air seemed to thicken, the atmosphere pressing down on Sky’s shoulders with an almost tangible weight. His Danger Sense flared up, not with the steady pulse of before, but with a writhing, stabbing pain at the back of his skull that made his breath come faster. He turned on the spot, his boots skidding on the dirt at the crest of the slope

"Something’s coming"

Vesper raised her blade in response, the golden glow of the blade throwing long shadows over the hilltop as her typically calm expression turned into something hardened and focused

Chloe’s visor suddenly flared up red, a bright defensive warning

"No" she said, eyes locked on the strange symbols in her display as she shook her head, recalibrating the sensors in frustration. "It’s not coming up the hill" a pause, as the wind suddenly died down to an eerie silence "It’s coming from underneath"

The hill was lurching, rising and falling in great pulses like the breathing of some great beast

Sky dropped into a crouch, steadying himself as he kept his footing on the crest of the slope. Dust was rolling down the slope, great thick clouds of it rolling away from the valley below to reveal the ground at the foot of the hill. His eyes were on the slope itself, watching as pebbles bounced and skittered away from an invisible force deep underground, the ground itself seeming to pucker and tighten like the skin of some great animal.

Sky turned his gaze to the hillside. "Tell me that’s normal"

Chloe said nothing, the weight of her silence far more terrifying than anything she could have said. A long, deep CRACK echoed from the depths of the hill, the noise not coming from any visible source. It wasn’t the noise of breaking rock or grinding stone, not the sound of a creature walking or even roaring. It was the sound of the very hill itself taking a deep breath

THUM

It was an impossibly deep sound, vibrating far below the range of human hearing. It resonated in Sky’s very bones, in fact, his pulse suddenly syncing up to the rhythm of the great subterranean beast. Sky narrowed his eyes, his dark gaze burning with something like determination

THUM

The very ground beneath them was trembling, sending clouds of dust and dirt into the air. The weak blue lines of the warding stones Chloe had somehow managed to activate during the day suddenly flared up brilliantly before shattering into nothingness, the blue sparks dissipating into the dark air. The warding stone was gone, whatever had been beneath them making it utterly ineffective. Vesper lowered her blade slightly, using the staff to steady herself on the rising slope. "Chloe"

"I know"

Chloe’s fingertips were flying over her display, her code-strings dancing across the air as she abandoned all conventional tracking protocols in favor or sending a pulse of information deep into the earth, searching for a source of vibration. Her face went paler and paler as she processed what she was seeing

"I found something"

Sky turned to look at her, his grip on the Blood Blade making his knuckles whiter than before. "What is it?"

She turned the display towards him, expanding the information until the familiar labyrinth map took on the appearance of a narrow strip along the top of the image. An immense structure loomed beneath the hill, a great cavernous void in the shape of an inverted pyramid stretching far below them.

"It’s an excavation site" said Chloe, her voice distant as she stared at the glowing display. "It’s all sealed up, too, protected by some kind of localized field to keep it hidden from view. It wasn’t on any of the scans we did during the day"

Sky turned his gaze from the display to the crack in the hillside, his boots pressing into the dirt as he took a careful step back. Puffs of warm, stale air were coming from the fissure, the scent of copper and dust filling his nostrils. He looked up at the black labyrinth, then back down at the opening in the hillside 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

"Where does it lead?"

Chloe was silent for a long moment, her fingers twitching over the controls as she watched the strange information stream over her display

"I don’t know"

Another pulse of vibration sent another wave of dust rolling down the hillside, nearly sending Chloe to her knees. She dropped her hands to steady herself, the holographic map bobbing gently in the air. Another set of strange symbols blinked onto her display, not appearing in either the labyrinth ruins or the valley beyond. They marked the very bottom of the excavation site Chloe had discovered, the sigils hovering just above the earth and rising slowly up the hillside.

Not red

not blue

but something else entirely, a strange black color that seemed to warp the surrounding light, bending the very gridlines of the display towards itself like a miniature black hole. Sky narrowed his eyes at the strange symbol, an odd feeling of unease settling in his chest. "What is that?" Chloe shook her head, her voice nothing more than a frightened whisper. "I’ve never seen a signature like that before. There’s not even a name for it in the system, whatever it is it’s some kind of corrupted energy threat" Vesper’s grip tightened around her Holy Scepter Blade, the golden light seeming to pulse defensively as it reacted to the strange black markings

Then, from beneath the hill - THUM

something was waking up, and Sky could almost feel the weight of its ancient eyes upon him, peering through the darkness at the small group of explorers who had trespassed upon its domain.