Azimuth: The Elden Throne

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/Step…/

The hidden passageway led to a staircase leading further underground.

It was simple and smooth, the steps were wide and tall, almost too tall, enough to make Dale feel his weight whenever he took a step forward, and likely to be a pain in the ass whenever he made his way back.

There were no decorations around, no carvings, no lights, anything. Only dust, and a few weeds growing between the cracks of the stone, together with the roots of the trees that frequently burst through the ceiling and ground.

'It seems the Palace outside was just a front, like an oversized toy house…' Dale thought silently as he looked back to the entrance of the stairwell

'Maybe front isn't the right word… Would it be more akin to a monument? Something to symbolize an event, someone, or an idea.'

'If that's the case, what did the people of the past want to pass down? Was there anything here before they thought it was worthy remembering? Or did something happen here in the past?'

'I can see it as possible that they chose this place to build a garden for research purposes as well, the crystal could've been the source of this biosphere, but I can't put two and two together.'

'Why go through such a hassle when they could've done the same closer to the surface?'

...

The way down was long and silent, the longer he descended, the colder the air grew, and eventually, his breathing began to condense and his armor started building frost.

"Achiu!"

"..."

"Aren't you going to say "bless you"?" David asked with a frown as he tried to look at Dale's expression

"Really? How can a statue catch a cold?"

"I may be unable to get sick but I still feel it you know? It's much colder down here than up there I bet."

"You talk as if we were in different worlds…" Dale said out loud as he scoffed

/Step…/

With that, they arrived at their destination. A large pair of double doors blocked the rest of the passage.

They had no handles, no hinges, much less any gaps, they seemed to be fused with the walls around them, completely sealing what awaited behind them...

So maybe they shouldn't be called doors...

"Great, doors… At least we know whatever's on the other side will be in a half-decent state." Dale said as he touched the doors

'With all this wildness taking hold, I hope whatever's inside is in a decent state. Most of the things underneath the Church ended up corroded beyond use, thousands of items gone...'

"So… Are you going to show it to me or you are going to leave me hanging here? I can watch my surroundings with my powers and all that but that's tiresome…"

"Oh, I forgot about you for a moment… Here." Dale said as he raised David to the doors

"Oho… Wait, something's strange about these two… Yeah! Pay attention. Don't they look familiar to you?" David asked after he took a deep glance at them

"Hm… No?"

"Already forgot have you? Look, these doors look exactly the same as the Doors of Prosperity and Promise underneath the Church and the Southern Wall!"

"!!... Now that you mentioned it… They are… Too eerily similar to be a coincidence." Dale replied with realization as he took a step back, taking a glance at the doors as a whole

"I guess this proves it, this place was built by the same people who built the underground passage and likely many other ruins scattered throughout the South." David said with a 'nod' after thinking about it

"Can we go past it? Like last time?" Dale asked with curiosity, raising his fingers and touching the door, feeling its chilling and coldness

Whatever was beyond it was as cold as the harshest of winters...

"Difficult, last time I had the password for the door of Prosperity and you found the key to the door of Promise, this time, we don't even know what this door represents, if anything at all."

"I can brute force through it of course, but who knows what'll happen then? Besides, it is a waste of my hard-gathered energy, I would prefer if it was kept for real emergencies."

"You can try punching through it. I'm sure it'll have the same outcome." David said with a chuckle as Dale turned him around

"Very funny… It's a bit of a shame but we'll have to leave it behind. Not all doors are meant to be opened as you find them."

"And it's not like we're out of ideas, we can go back and ask Qrubin about it, maybe he'll have an answer for it, given he was a Grand Artificer and all..."

'There could be records about it in the books I brought with me as well, unless this was an illegal operation that couldn't be documented, which would only make things stranger.'

"If he had, wouldn't he have told us? At the very least, if there was anything meaningful inside…"

"You're putting too much faith in the old man, he likely knows so much he could preach us about it for half a lifetime, and with the fact half of his brain already rotted, I wouldn't be surprised if he forgot some things."

Dale raised his head, letting out a sigh as he crossed his arms, holding David between them.

"I didn't really plan to come back here after today, but it seems I now have a reason to pass by again. But for now, we return."

"Uhm... A new mystery, but an adventure for another time… I like the sound of that." David said out loud as Dale strapped him back to his waist

...

With this mystery left behind for now, the duo made their way out of the staircase, but instead of leaving the underground cavern, they approached the crystal to get a better look at it.

/Crunch crunch…/

/Sha sha sha…/

/Splash…/

As they approached the crystal, a symphony of sounds blasted their ears—dozens of sounds from creatures gulping down water to plants hustling in the wind.

The sounds didn't feel pleasant, but not entirely bothersome either, they were natural sounds, which was odd since Dale enjoyed listening to the sounds of nature whenever he was outside.

"This hurts not only my eyes but also my ears, my friend, would it be so much of a bother to give the crystal a trim and clean this place up?" David asked as he looked around

"Maybe later…"

'I'll take care of the Ants, to make sure they have no way to reestablish themselves.'

'I could be exterminating the species without knowing… But so be it, I'll let the people of the future bother with it.'

'As for the rest... They look like parasites... If it proves necessary, I'll take them off, but without someone here to take care of these critters, they'll just swarm the crystal again in no time.'

"Be careful…" David said out loud as Dale approached the lake

"..."

/Crouch…/

The lake's pale blue water made Dale think of milk, especially with its consistency as it dripped from the plants' leaves.

The 'water' poorly reflected his appearance, that of a red metallic helmet with a golden head held by his left hand, also fully armored.

His sword floated next to him and his spear stood in his back, its tip rising above his left shoulder, it was quite a cool scene.

Dale sometimes forgot his armor set was imposing up close…

/Splish…/

Being careful to not touch it, Dale pulled a mug from his inventory and filled it up with the pale water, trying to see if the System would have any say in what it was.

[Evsrakl's tears

Effects:

Extreme restoration of Body and Mind.

Calms the Spirit and incites healing and repairing of minor irregularities, aligning them to the body's optimal condition.

Highly nutritious but somewhat unstable. Indiscriminate consumption will provoke irregular and uncontrolled growth, leading to mutations of both the Mind and the Flesh.

Consumption by those wicked of heart has a chance to purify their worldly views, changing their way of thinking towards a more neutral state.

Consumption by those of ancestry not belonging to the Great Spirits can lead to one's Spiritual Collapse.

Description:

???

Unable to bear the loss of her beloved, ??? shed all of her tears and turned back, leaving behind all she built together with the coalescence of all her love and faith for her people.

From that, life sprung, twelve moons of grief succeeded by six days of commemoration, the tears that saw the end of an Era began to break down, signifying the start of a new, golden future.

???

To never forget the sacrifice of the ???, successive rulers would drink from the Well of Aspiration, hoping to reunite with their ancestors and to reinforce their will to govern and represent their people in the thorny road ahead of them.

???

…

]

"???"

'The what now?!'

/Splash…/

/GRAB!/

Barely had he the time to react, one of the fish jumped from the pond with great strength, almost slapping him in the face as it flew in the air.

Dale avoided the sudden tail strike by tilting his head and grabbing the fish before taking a look at it with the System interface.

[Deep Gray Carp

Challenge Level: 15-35

*Elite Variant*

]

'Hum... An Elite variant... But its level is negligible, it's just a fish that grew a tad too much.'

'And it's name is quite uncreative...'

The Carp itself was gorgeous, having a deep and colorful blue color with a tint of silvery-gray at the edges of its scales.

It wasn't very big, around two palms in length. It seemed rather docile, albeit it kept trying to break free from his hold.

/Throw... Splash!/

He threw the fish back onto the pond, and soon enough, it jumped back again, a very strange behavior but not completely foreign to him.

Some fish jumped high in a mating ceremony, maybe it was the same for this carp.

"So?... What do you think? Is it good?" David asked as he saw Dale stare down at the mug full of water, not questioning where he took the mug from

"I don't know... It seems safe for consumption, but I don't think it's okay for me to do so."

"Because even if the 'water' itself is safe, it doesn't mean whatever's in it is... Who knows how clean it is... I don't want to be the one to find that out."

"Fair enough."

"Still... I don't think the 'Geomancers' were the ones to make this."

"What makes you think of that?"

"Hm... Gut feeling... This is... A bit too strange, a different kind of weird compared to the other things we saw from the Corps." Dale said as he tried to create an excuse for the System

"So? Who do you think made this? Do you think they moved this here from somewhere else then?"

"That could've been a possibility... So, when I was in the Forest, I met with the Karkavan and learned more about their history and culture."

"From that, I came to realize that they're connected to another species that existed long ago..."

"So uhm... What do you know about Elves?" Dale asked as he dumped the mug's contents back onto the pond

"Elves?"

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Notes