You could almost hear a creaking sound as Seth froze in place and his bones tensed up, the words 'disposal point' echoed in his mind for a minute or so before he snapped out of it.
"Of course, that would make sense since I was here when I woke up, I most likely died here after being disposed of… but doesn't that mean I was brought back to under the capital after being taken from that dungeon? Then whoever they were, lets just call them the organisation for now, they had a base of operations underneath the capital? How the hell wasn't it noticed?" More and more questions filled Seth's head, he felt every time he may have an answer more questions just piled up.
He then looked at Silva with a questioning gaze. "Then what is that light coming from the ceiling?" he pointed towards the gap that was about 5 meters away that shined with light.
("Most likely that light is caused by mana crystals, they passively absorb the surrounding mana and at high capacity they give off a bright light, they were likely used in mass to power whatever the hell they were doing")
"…"
He was stumped, although the revelation of this areas purpose was a slight shock there wasn't anything else to find even though he wanted more answers, he used his spirit vision and followed the black aura that was pulsating throughout the cave and traced the direction it was flowing.
"It's going to the deeper part of the ravine; it must be linked to the mass of darkness I saw"
("Most likely, the question still stands, what is it? This energy is definitely similar to spirit energy yet at the same time it has something different, the way its acting seems aimless coating everything it can touch, what is its aim? Does it even have one? Why does it exist in the first place? Sigh I never thought I would have to deal with something like this again…") Silva cried in lament, his memories were still vivid from his last summoning, he didn't want to go through that again yet here he is.
"I guess we should keep going, no matter what our aim is still the same in the end" Seth stated and they both nodded at each other before starting to make their way out of the small cave, but unbeknownst to both of them as Seth was walking through the black energy, it seemed to try and latch on to the Seth's bones as they made contact before falling off, each time it happened the aura seemed to become more frantic as if grasping at straws yet soon Seth left the area and it returned to its original form.
They continued walking through to the depths of the ravine at an even faster pace than before, the further they travelled the thicker the dark aura became eventually coating every inch of the walls and surroundings, there was no sign of life at all, not a single plant or small insect chirped the only thing that echoed was the sound of Seth's bones tapping against the hallowed grounds.
'This place is damn creepy, I thought the rest of this place was bad enough, but this just takes the cake, not a single thing is here, it's like I entered an entirely different world'
No matter where he looked there was only rocks, the walls and the ground, as they continued on the surroundings seemed to lose their natural shape and became smooth even reaching the point of looking like they had been hand crafted steadily by a sculptor, the un-naturalness of the scene sent chills down his spine.
("I can't move any further") Silva said out of nowhere.
"What, why?"
("I don't know, I just have this feeling, it wouldn't be a good idea for me to travel forward or I'll regret it, I don't think I can come even if I merge with your spirit again, I feel like I'm facing an immemorial beast that has its jaws wide open, in my current state I'd just be a raindrop falling into a sea because I'm a spirit")
Seth was silent as he stared into Silva's eyes, he could almost see a deep sense of fear filling the innermost mind of the small spirit yet he himself only felt a chill from the environment, he didn't feel the fear Silva felt.
"Alright, I'll go ahead, you stay here" He said waving his hand to like he was saying 'No worries'
("Be careful") Silva's voice echoed as Seth walked on hoping he would at least listen to his warnings; he didn't know why Seth was fine, but his senses still told him whatever was ahead was beyond dangerous.
… … …
Seth had continued on for almost half an hour, the Ravine had turned in to a long tunnel and the further he went the less light reached him, at one point there wasn't a single shaft of light shining on him or the environment, not just that it seemed the walls or the black aura covering them were muffling the sounds of his footsteps, he felt like he'd entered an isolation chamber; Nothing but his thoughts to accompany him.
'At least I can use [Mana Vision], without that I'd be as blind as a bat!'
Spirit sense was no longer any use to him, when he used it all he could see was a thick sea of black aura covering every inch of his surroundings and even starting to encroach on his bones, luckily it didn't seem like it was able to affect him and just acted like sticky water, or slime.
It wasn't long before something new appeared in his vision, a bright light that seemed piercing in this black environment, as Seth reached the light a large area entered his view, something he never expected to see was in front of him.
It was a wide area in the shape of a dome, almost perfectly shaped but what he was focused on was in the centre, at first it seemed to be a tall structure but when he looked closer he realised it was a colossal sword that was stuck in to the ground right in the centre of the area; Just its handle was at least twice as high as Seth and its blade was much larger with a width of about two to three people, the blade seemed to be adorned with what looked to be a form of circuitry that glowed with a azure light.
The hilt was a bright gold that seemed to reflect every inch of the room and attached to it was a large number of chains crossing from the hilt towards pillars in eight directions, the pillars were also adorned with similar marking and as Seth looked upward, he saw a grand sight of an almost unbelievable number of crystals that covered the ceiling like a sea of gems all of them glowing and flickering with light.
"What the hell is this place?! I thought I'd be seeing some den of a monster, but this looks like… well some sort of legendary shrine of a sort…"
He walked into the room and started to look around, he approached the nearest pillars that even touched them to see if he could get a reaction from them but there was nothing, no matter what he did they were just still and un-reactive.
He turned on his spirit vision once more and he saw what he slightly predicted, the black aura seemed to the trailing out from the base of the sword where it was thickest, it seemed like it was split up between all eight pillars.
"This looks like a seal of some sort; I mean that's all I can assume… but what should I do?"
He stared at the setup before him and contemplated, from the looks of it whatever this thing was someone had taken the time to seal it with this intricate set up, meaning it was at least a large threat, enough so that it would make someone go through this effort.
But the problem was, the dark energy seemed to be leaking from the seal, so it wasn't functioning properly, assumingly over the years it has decayed one way or another not that he was an expert of such things, he just assumed based on his logic.
Then there's the fact that he needed to get rid of whatever was interfering with to use the teleporter in the first place, the scales seem to be tipping in favour of getting rid of the seal somehow.
"Of course, there's the problem of dealing with whatever is stuck under there but I mean, it can't be worse than being stuck here literally forever, right?"
He inwardly convinced himself as he approached the giant sword, he said he'd get rid of the seal, but he honestly had no idea how, as soon as he stood in front of the sword he could almost feel a powerful aura flowing through it; Without hesitation he placed his bony hand on the metal.
*Crack*
Dumbfounding Seth as soon as his hand touched it a crack formed at the position of his hand.
"Seriously?" He gulped somehow; he felt his actions had already put him in a position of no return.