Rhys slowly ascended the winding staircase. Right now what he wanted to do was reach the highest point in the castle so that he could look at the surroundings and see if there was a second way to get across the lake. A hidden bridge, a boat, something...
The further Rhys went into the castle the more complicated this place seemed to get. Halls that opened onto staircases and windows that opened into secret rooms. The higher Rhys climbed the more cautious he became. So far he had been able to memorise the path he was taking, but the higher he went the more confusing it got. Not to mention that this place was giving him the creeps. It was so quiet that the only noise he could focus on was the sound of his breathing and his wet sneakers squeaking against the floors. As he walked through the castle, he could not help but feel that someone was watching him.
Thinking about it now, he realised that the exterior of the castle was so different from the interior. The exterior looked medieval, the product of a race that wasn't that technologically advanced. However the inside was the complete opposite as the materials used for the floors and walls looked like a refined type of metallic rock, the architecture was impossibly clever, it was as if this place was designed for people to get lost. A honey trap of sorts.
Rhys found himself walking up a cylindrical tower, there were no windows but there were huge crystal gems embedded into the walls, lighting the black tower up like stars. Just from a glance, Rhys could tell that the gems were a low grade but a good quality. If Barrow saw these he would be pretty happy but Rhys was not particularly interested in seeing Barrow happy, so he ignored the gems and kept on walking. Surely there would be a lookout point at the top of the tower.
To his surprise, the tower steps stopped right in front of a sleek black door. There was no handle or groove to pull it open with, so for a solid moment, Rhys stared at the door helplessly. He stepped forward and poked it, hoping that it would magically open since there were no handy levers he could pull down.
Rhys placed his hand on the door and leaned on it for a moment to let himself think. If he could not get this door open should he try to find another tower where he could view the castle from? Or should he just go downstairs and try his luck with swimming across the lake?
Suddenly the door against Rhys's hand slid open causing Rhys to fall straight into the room.
He fell face-first into the room and winced as his burn mark made contact with the hard floor. When he opened his eyes and looked down, he could see some smudges of his blood on the white floor. While grimacing from the pain, he turned around to see that the door had shut behind him. He slowly got up while trying to ignore the pain and scanned the room around him.
This room looked to be the complete opposite of the rest of the castle. It was made out of smooth white marble-like material, the exact opposite of the black walls and floors outside the room. Although Rhys was disappointed to find no windows, he felt his convictions sway as he saw what this room was filled with: crystal crates filled to the brim with gemstones, and shelves of books that looked like scripts. Rhys blinked in disbelief at the treasure trove in front of him. A collection of such precious materials this vast was gobsmacking.
Rhys rushed over to the nearest glass crate and dug his hand inside. He pulled out a handful of beautiful red gemstones and from one glance he could tell they were at least B grade. One of these gems could easily sell for 100 000 Zen, enough to feed, clothe and house a large family in the good parts of District 20 for at least a decade. As amazing as this find was, Rhys knew it was worth nothing if he died there, however, he could not resist walking around the room looking at the gems.
He was shocked to find that there were even better crystals than B grade in the glass crates. He had managed to find two A grade crystals which pretty much melted his resolve. He couldn't help but slide the two A grade crystals into his pocket. It was no wonder to him now why Barrow had been so adamant about going through the black portal, with a raid like this anyone would go a bit crazy.
Rhys then moved on to the shelves of scripts. Scripts were basically manuals on how to control your power once you had been infused with a core. Like shortcuts on how to use and control your newfound powers. Getting a handle on your powers was apparently like learning to walk all over again and with the extraterrestrial tensions going on between earth and other species, the military didn't have time to wait for people to figure out how to use their powers naturally. So scripts became very valuable assets. In most cases, scripts cost even more than B grade gems.
Rhys reached out to a grey coloured book and dusted off the cover. It was wrapped in some kind of grey metallic material which Rhys found he could not open. A bit dismayed he put the book back and made his way to the centre of the room where we saw a rectangular object covered in a similar metallic cloth. Eager to find out what was inside, Rhys rushed to the centre and pulled off the cloth. His jaw dropped as a stared at the single object placed neatly on a black cushion. The thing he had studied for years, an object he had seen countless drawings of, the one thing he wanted most in the world...
A core.
Growing up coreless on earth was a one-way ticket to the bottom of society. People without cores were almost considered useless in modern society. Even in district twenty where Rhys lived, the poorest district that was riddled with crime, only the lowest of the low didn't have cores.
Although Gramps treated Rhys like his grandson, he was barely able to make a profit by running the script and gem store, so he had nowhere near enough funds possible to buy Rhys a decent core. Furthermore Rhys didn't feel right about making his gramps take out an infamous core loan which could potentially put him in debt all so Rhys could obtain a core. So Rhys had gone through his childhood and teenage years enduring the label of being 'coreless'.
In society today, being weak was the equivalent of being dirt. Being coreless had such bad connotations that were cemented in people's minds. If you were coreless, it somehow meant that you were uncivilised and backwards. There was this sense that you were not contributing to society in any way and were like a leech sucking up the taxpayers' money.
Although there had been many anti-discrimination activists who spoke out against the maltreatment of coreless people, the stigma still remained and discrimination was evident. Coreless people struggled to get jobs because nobody wanted to hire people who were so 'weak'. Rhys was particularly lucky because Gramps had taken him in when his mother abandoned him and taught him how to deal in gems and scripts, but usually, jobs in sanitation were the best that coreless people could get.
Rhys had read that more than a hundred years ago before the invasions took place, human society struggled with a lot of internal social issues like sexism and racism. Both of which were such mind baffling concepts to Rhys. Why would anyone ever decide your worth over something as abstract as gender and skin colour? Even trying to rationalise it gave him a headache. What mattered in modern society was strength and wealth, with an emphasis on strength.
If you had a core and were getting strong in order to strengthen and defend the human race, you were deemed valuable in society. Or if you were using your abilities to make advances in technology and knowledge, you were also valuable. However, if you were poor and coreless, what was the point of your existence?
This ideology was put into place when the invasions first started happening. Fleets of alien spacecraft arrived in Earth skies one day and indiscriminately rained down destruction across the world. Interestingly, those creatures did not use guns or anything like it. And it seemed that guns and missiles were useless against them as well. Their armour just deflected bullets and their ships were too agile for missiles. Instead of firepower, they fought with swords, arrows, spears and incredible magical-like powers. For the first time, humans got to see the powers of cores. It was the alien invasions that first introduced humanity to the power of cores. Or so we thought...
As it turned out, select people around the world had known about cores for millennia and had passed down the knowledge to their descendants. So before the alien invasions, there had been thousands of people who knew about cores and had gained abilities from them, but kept that knowledge to themselves, it's just that the invasions made such things public.
To stop humanity from becoming extinct, the people with abilities finally started giving out cores and scripts to others in order to create a militia that was able to fight against the incoming invasions. During the early days, cores could still be found around the planet and the military did huge mining operations in order to find every last core on Earth so that military personal who were fighting aliens could have powers.
Although Earth was colonised for a period of four years by the intruders, through emergency collaboration between the people with knowledge of cores and the military powers around the world, people were able to put their differences aside to fight for humanity.
Fighting off the invaders and freeing humanity was a struggle that took place over thirty years. However, these thirty years brought a new age of enlightenment to humanity. Through reverse engineering alien technology and learning about the powers of gems and cores, humanity made incredible advancements. Things like teleportation and spaceships were made real and easily available. Medicine also vastly improved.
Although humanity had improved in many ways, society also regressed a bit, with ideology returning to that of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Eugenics movements came back in full force as society felt that only through the strongest could humanity defend the earth. Laws were put in place to stop people with disabilities from having children, and furthermore, children born with disabilities were put to death.
Rhys knew that society had become vicious, and it scared him sometimes what people were willing to do in the name of humanity. His solution to all this was staying at home as much as possible, he didn't need any friends as long as he had Gramps.
Rhys stepped forward and reached inside the crate. He gently lifted the egg-sized object out and held it gently in his palm. He was surprised by how cold the core was to the touch, none of the books he had read ever mentioned them being cold, but this core felt like ice to the touch. So much so that Rhys could feel his fingers numbing as he held it.
The core looked like a stone egg carved from granite but with strange unidentifiable markings on it, this world's language perhaps. Although Rhys's area of expertise was Gems and scripts, he had done quite a bit of research on cores, however, he could not identify what type of core this was.
From the research he had done, a grey coloured stone usually meant something along the lines of body strengthening or more rarely telekinesis. However, this stone had a clear metallic sheen to it disqualifying it from those two categories.
A sheen or glistening surface often meant a higher-order ability, but Rhys had never seen a metallic sheen before. Rhys wanted to take it home and study it before infusing with it to make sure it was compatible with him first.
BANG! Bang BANG!
Rhys got a huge fright as heard fists clang against the door to the room.
"Stupid fucking door! Fucking open!" Rhys shivered as he heard Barrow shouting on the other side of the door.
Shit. If Barrow saw the core he would definitely try to take it for himself, and it was only a matter of time before the door opened and let him in, just as it had opened for Rhys.
No, Rhys was determined not to let Barrow take the core from him. However, that jerk would see the empty glass crate in the room and know Rhys had taken something.
Rhys moved quickly as he could because he sensed that the doors were about to open.
The door suddenly slid open as Barrow was about to connect another punch. Rhys and Barrow stared at each other for a moment and Barrow was about to say something but then he noticed that the room was filled with gems.
Barrow stuttered as he dashed to the sides of the room and dug his bloodied hands into the endless riches. It was as if fireworks were going off above his head, he could already see himself moving out of district twenty and buying himself a mansion filled with beautiful women. Barrow was so overjoyed that he began to weep.
Barrow turned around to look at Rhys when he saw another crate right next to the brat. Barrow possessively ran toward the crate and shoved Rhys out of the way. He flung himself onto the crate and reached inside, pulling out the large crystal gem that was inside it. Rhys grinned as felt the core safely tucked away in his pocket, where the crystal gem had been. He felt even more smug that the second A grade crystal was still in his other pocket.
Before Barrow had entered the room, Rhys had replaced the core with the A-grade crystal gem he had found in one of the crates.
"T-This, what grade is this?!" Barrow was practically shaking as he held up the crystal gem. "C-could it be A grade?"
Rhys was kind of disgusted by Barrow's pathetic expression but Rhys kept up the facade nonetheless.
"Even better," he lied. "It's amazing. From the energy coming off of it to the perfect clarity, I think that it might even be A+ or even S grade."
Barrow dramatically gasped as he clutched the gem in his hands, he had no idea that Rhys was telling a tall tale and had the real treasure in his pocket.
"Rich, I'm gonna be rich." Barrow smiled greedily as he stared at the clear gem.
"Hurry up." He suddenly burst out. "Mug found a second bridge on the side of the castle. We need to put as many gems inside as possible."
Barrow was suddenly at Rhys's side, wrestling the bag off of his back. Like a crazed man, Barrow sprinted around the room tipping the crates over and scooping the gems into the bag with his hand. Once Rhys's backpack was full, Barrow began stuffing his pockets full with gems until his trousers and jackets had strange lumps all over them.
Barrow than strapped Rhys backpack to his own back, determined not to let go of the gems. Rhys had wanted to take one of the scripts back with him, but such a large bulky book would only weigh him done when trying to get out of this world alive. Besides he still had the core and the other A-grade gem in his pocket, both of which were extremely valuable to him. The core could give him the strength he had always wanted, and the gem could help him and gramps live a cushy life from now on. Although he wanted the script as well, it would be in an indecipherable language so he would not be able to read it in any case.
Rhys and Barrow ran out of the room and back down the never-ending staircases and hallways until they finally arrived back at the entrance hall. Rhys was panting again, bending over to try and catch his breath. Barrow, on the other hand, darted off to the right side of the hall where he had sent Mug off to. Rhys followed behind in agony.
The pair found themselves at an arched opening in the wall. Barrow was the first to go through and Rhys followed behind, they found themselves on an elevated platform above the black water, high enough to be just out of jumping range of the eelworms infesting the water.
Above the platform was a sturdy-looking rope that was tightly secured to a hook above them. The rope ran all the way across the lake and was tied to a tree on the shore. It was a perfect line to the other side. However, Rhys cringed looking at it, he would have to use his lacking upper body strength to get him across the water. He was pretty much doomed.
Mug had already crossed the rope and was on the shore waving to Barrow. His presence on the other side gave Barrow and Rhys more confidence in the old rope.
Rhys reached upwards to get a hold of the rope only to be pushed to the platform floor by Barrow who shouted, "Me first!"
Barrow jumped onto the rope and then began to make his way across the thick coil to the shore. He grunted as he put one hand in front of the other, with the full weight of the gems weighing him down, yet he had a kind of madness in his eyes that kept him going on.
Rhys gritted his teeth angrily as he got up off the platform. Even though Barrow had gone insane over the gems, the guy still remembered to be a jerk to Rhys.
Rhys reached upwards, grabbing hold of the rope and was about to start moving forward when he made eye contact with Mug on the other side. He could clearly see a murderous look in Mug's eyes as the man stared at Barrow who was steadily making his way across the rope.
Rhys remembered that Mug had looked at Barrow the same way when Barrow had cut off Mug's friend's head. A hateful vengeful stare. Rhys paused for a moment and stared at Mug, he could not get over the feeling that Mug was planning something, so he let go of the rope and stood on the platform to watch.
Barrow was panting loudly as he reached about halfway across the rope. He was crossing the long distance at an incredible speed which only showed Barrow's determination. Rhys thought that it was amazing what desperation could do to a person. However, Rhys internally said his goodbyes to Barrow, as he watched Mug lift his axe high into the air. The axe began to glow a hot red as the gem fragment inside of it began to power up. With only revenge on his mind, Mug swung his axe downwards severing the rope.
Barrow's heart lurched in his chest as he felt himself fall into the water.
Rhys turned away as he saw the slick eelworms dash through the water towards their prey.
Mug sighed in relief as he watched Barrow being ripped to shreds by the disgusting eels. Mug felt justified in his decision since Barrow had killed his best friend, Mug killed Barrow in return. Mug proudly thought of himself as restoring law and order. He didn't give much thought to Rhys who was stuck in the castle, to him it was simply collateral damage. The axe wielding man simply turned on his heel and entered the forest on his way to the portal.
Rhys sighed as he looked out onto the water. The rope was cut so he had no way to cross it. The stepping stones were too shallow so the eels would just jump up and kill him. He was stranded, in the middle of an eel infested lake, in another world. All alone.
Rhys thought about Gramps who would wake up not knowing where his grandson had gone. Rhys wanted to cry but he was too exhausted to express his emotions right now. Was he really going to die here?
The gems that had been on Barrow's person were floating atop the black water, glistening beautifully while Barrow's carcass was being stripped to the bone by thousands of pairs of sharp teeth. Despite how gruesome it was, Rhys couldn't help but think it was an enchanting sight.
Rhys reached into his pocket and took out the core, fiddling with it for a bit as he walked back inside the castle.
Since the portal opened up into this world, it meant that this planet was on the colonisation plan, humans would come to this world in the near future to build a colony and mine for resources. Perhaps Rhys could wait until then, however, how he would feed himself during that time was a mystery.
As he walked he looked down at the core and wondered if he should try infusing himself. The process of infusion was tricky, and if he did it alone there was an eighty percent chance that he would die. Not to mention the shockwave that was produced when an infusion occurred could cause serious problems for him. Even if he did awaken a useful ability that he could use to get off this lake, it took years to train one's ability, and in that time, he would again need to sustain himself.
Rhys cursed again. He arrived back to the place where he had entered the castle. The original platform with the stepping stones across the lake. He sighed in disgust as he saw Mug's friend laying dead on the floor. His head cut off and his foot missing, his corpses lying in a pool of blood. This sight was not even close to the most disgusting thing he had seen today, a thought that he found kind of funny.
He walked over to the wall and slumped against it. He felt so drained, this raid had sucked the life out of him and would probably be the end of his life.
It was all his fault really, he had been the stupid idiot to believe in Barrow in the first place. Rhys thought back to when Barrow had approached him on his way back home from school. Rhys knew that Gramps was struggling to keep the business afloat and that any extra cash would be welcome, so when Barrow had offered him the chance to go on a raid with him, Rhys had been ecstatic. However, it turned out that Barrow had bought some stolen portal off the web, a black portal even.
Rhys sighed and hit his head back against the wall, however, something poked out against his neck. Rhys turned around to see the down-turned lever, the one he had pulled to release the monsters into the lake.
Sigh...
Rhys turned back forward and closed his eyes for a moment, willing sleep to come.
Rhys's eyes shot open and he spun around to look at the lever. Filled with hope, he got off the floor and pulled up the lever, returning it too it's original position. Rhys realized that he was probably being stupid, but if there was even the tiniest chance, he would try it.
Deep below the castle, the huge cage that held the leech creatures began to glow a ghostly white and like moths to a flame, the leech eels mindlessly swam back towards the cage. As soon as the monsters had swum inside, the gate of the cage shut, sealing them inside until the next time the lever was pulled.
Rhys, however, had no idea if his intuition had been right, but he knew a way to test it.
A few minutes later, Rhys managed to drag the corpse to the edge of the platform and kicked the body over the edge. To Rhys's delight, the leech eels didn't resurface, the body just floated on the calm black waters and nothing disturbed it.
Rhys immediately felt energised, the exhaustion was gone and now he had nothing but determination and adrenaline running through him. Rhys looked down at his wrist and saw that it was 23:48 Sector 5 time. Barrow had said the portal was timed to shut after three hours, so that left him 12 minutes to get back to the portal in the forest. He was pretty tight for time so Rhys didn't want to waste it by swimming for all the floating gems in the water. He just wanted to get to the portal before it closed.
Rhys ran off the platform and ran across the circle stepping stones to the shore. From then he kept on running deeper into the forest, his only thoughts were about getting to the portal in time. He didn't have any time to be tired, he had to get to the portal.
He looked down at his watch, seven minutes left. He jumped over roots, sidestepped rocks, dashed across puddles. His heart was beating violently in his chest.
Four minutes.
In the near distance, Rhys could see something red glowing, a huge smile broke out onto his face as he thought that he had spotted the portal. However, he watched horrified as the red glow he was seeing doubled. There was now a pair of red glowing dots, a pair of red eyes staring at him.
Then another pair.
Another pair.
Another pair and another pair.
Rhys froze in place as he realized that he was surrounded.