The tunnel was long and silent, there were a few lanterns here and there, and I had to be careful not to hit my head on them.
But after walking anxiously hoping the guard won't suddenly return, I finally arrive at a small room with only a chest and another iron door.
I looked in the chest and saw two levers and 5 enchanted diamond pickaxes.
Why would they leave such valuable tools in such a random chest? Do I need them later to progress?
After a few hard moments of thinking what I should do, I decided to not take any pickaxes, instead only a lever.
With that I opened up the second iron door and broke it before entering, making the door automatically shut itself behind me.
"Phew, that was close."
I whispered to myself.
A few blocks later I was in another room, but this one more cozier. It had a few chests and furnaces, and even a plant here and there.
Is this more of a bunker than a vault?
The room had another iron door which was open this time, fortunately.
I didn't even bother to check the chests in fear of being heard, so I just went through the door again, this time leading me to a bigger room all made with obsidian as I expected.
What I didn't expect to see, was a few dozen villagers who were mining blocks of obsidian. From where do you ask? Well, this brings me to the second most shocking thing, which is in the middle of the room and I can only describe it as a lava generator.
There's a floating glass cube, and inside a pool filled with lava, under the hot lava it's a layer of dripstone block, and underneath that the dripstone itself. If you're paying close attention to those, you can see a small steam of lava running over them leading to a small drop that fell into a caldron.
That's how they managed to cheat the system into making infinite lava, I've seen in a few videos that this is possible, but I didn't expect that it could be used in this world as well. It was kind of ingenious that they even found it.
"I'll go check and see if we still have some fire resistance potion left."
My sock was interrupted by a guard coming with hurried steps towards me, I quickly got out of the doorway so he wouldn't bump into me accidentally.
The villagers that were working, glanced towards the noise before returning to their mining.
With silent steps, I started to explore the strange place, without realizing that one of the Villagers still looking at the guard's post with narrowed eyes.
The place was big but it didn't have too much in it. Everything was split into 3 sections, the workspace where there were dozens of Vilgers mining in their designated workstation, the second was the break area, which had a few tables and chairs for when they eat, and the last one was the prison, where there were a few cells with two beds in each.
There were no chests or crafting tables, nothing to entertain, and I'm sure the working hours were not reasonable.
But I couldn't do anything for them, I couldn't even escape my obsidian cage, and that one didn't have a roof to stop me, so I shook my head in disappointment and got closer to the guard and the purple robe villager listening to their talk.
"I'm sorry sir, but you came too early this night, so the last patch of blocks is not ready. It would take around half an hour before they finished mining."
The guard apologized, and the other grunted in displeasure but nodded his head in understanding.
"Sorry sir, but we're out of fire resistance potions."
A voice from my left was getting closer, it was the second guard.
"Perfect! Not only do I have to stay in the same room with those filthy traitors, but I also have to suffer in a hot room! Why did that stupid Ali have to get sick? Especially when the party is being held in a few weeks, I'm I not busy enough already? Are there any other news guards?"
The guards only responded with silence, and the man was not pleased at all, he didn't want to be there, and the guards didn't feel comfortable either.
"Whatever, I'll wait in your station until everything is collected, I don't want to be bothered with anything until then!"
With that, he turned around and entered the guard's station without looking back.
I didn't want to be in the same room with him for the next half an hour, so I walked around more in case I saw anything interesting. Unfortunately, this isn't a vault so the original plan is thrown out the window, unless I come back later and steal a diamond pickaxe, then I can mine the obsidian myself, I could probably help the prisoners to escape as well, making them a great distraction. But no, I don't think that's a good idea, even if I help them get out, maybe they deserve to be here, and even if they don't deserve it and manage to get out, the Sultan will make everything in his power to capture or kill them, since they know the secret of making obsidian.
I just shook my head and continued walking around with careful steps.
The work area was busy with a lot of movement, so I didn't try to get too close to that place, the resting area was empty, and after a few rounds I'd already seen everything that could be seen, so the only place left was the cells.
It was a long hallway, with cells on each side, they had iron bars so you could see through them and an iron door that kept the prisoner there.
Each door was open, and I could see the lever right beside it. It was most likely broken when everyone was inside but it looked like a typical cell.
Out of curiosity, I went inside to see if there was anything that I missed, maybe a secret tunnel.
"I can't believe that someone went there of their own free will."
Suddenly I heard a feminine voice from behind me, followed by the sounds of the door closing.
I froze in place.
"Camon, say something, I know you're in there even if you're invisible."
I didn't move a muscle, maybe she was bluffing.
"I'm not bluffing if that's what you're thinking. While it's impressive that you managed to get your hands on the legendary invisible potion, your supplier doesn't have too much experience since I can still see your particles if I concentrate enough."
"How did you even know I was here?"
"Oh, so you're there! And here I was bluffing."
I heard her say in a sarcastic voice. I turned around and saw a villager in a simple brown tunic, with brown hair and green eyes that had a smirk on her face.
"Who are you, and why are you here?"
"I'm a nobody, and I didn't intend to come here, I must've got lost on my way to my room and ended up in here by mistake."
"Well mister nobody, from what you're saying, I understand that you are living in the palace and you snuck down here. Now it would be a shame if I yelled after the guards to arrested you, actually I don't they they'll even do that, they'll kill you on the spot since you found their biggest secret."
"Ok, ok! There's no need to make rushed decisions, what do you want?"
"Why are you truly here?"
".... "
"I think the guards are looking suspiciously at me."
"I thought this was the vault."
"You thought this was the vault? I don't know if I should call you stupid or crazy for trying to steal from the Sultan. But since you have access to such rare potions, I think it's the latter."
"Yeah, since you found out the real reason why I'm here, why don't you open the door please."
"Not so fast, I want you to take me and a few friends out."
"Sorry, but I couldn't do that even if I wanted to, I only got the potion by chance, I don't have any more on me. And even if I do manage to get some more, I don't think I'll be able to get in here through the same method."
Of course, I was lying, I could ask Froggy to make more for me since I had the ingredients, but there's no need for her to know that.
"That is true, you got lucky that only half of the guards were working today for some reason, and the ones that are here are pretty lax. Hmm, wait a bit here."
She then left from my sight of view and I quickly got closer to the iron bars, took out my iron pickaxe, and started to hit the iron bars. Suddenly a loud sound was heard through the whole prison. It was me hitting the bars only once. And that made me stop.
It was too loud surely a guard must've heard it. I started to panic, and as I saw a guard come to check the noise, I hid behind the iron door so my particules won't bee easy to see.
The guard finally arrived, looked at the door, then through the bars, and scratched his head in confusion, he then went to the next cell and yalled:
"Aisha! You better keep it down unless you want to sleep on an empty stomach!"
He then went back to his college without waiting for a response.
After a few more minutes an angry villager came to my door again.
"Do you want to die that badly? Why do you have to be so difficult, couldn't you wait a few minutes in silence like a normal person!"
She clearly was mad at my actions, but how could I know that mining those bars would make so much noise?
"Anyway, I want you to send this message to Omar, he's a guard in the palace, I'm sure you can find him if you ask around."
She then handed me a book through the space between the iron bars. I quickly took it and put it in my inventory.
As much as I wanted to open it up and see what was inside it, I couldn't do it since it would've been easy to see, and I didn't want to piss her off more than I did. Better not push my luck.
"OK, I have the package. Can I leave now?"
"Yes of course."
She said with a bright smile as she pulled the lever that opened the door.
With narrowed eyes, I went to finally escape from there only to be stopped by Aisha once again.
"You didn't ask how I would know that you delivered the message."
"I honestly thought, that you have that much faith in me."
I said with a sarcastic voice while thinking if I pushed her I could run for it, but decided against it since she could yell for the guards.
"You're such a comedian, but no, in that book there's a message that would help me know if he got the package in time. The whole book is encoded so you wouldn't understand it even if you tried to read it. And if in two days I don't get my confirmation, I'll speak with one of the guards, that someone from the palace managed to sneak into their factory with an invisible potion. And I don't think there's a lot of people that have access to such precious resources like you."
She was bluffing, I was sure of that. But to my misfortune, her bluff could be true, since the only person in the palace who is capable of doing those kinds of potions is Froggy. And that would get him in trouble, and even if they don't suspect him, I'm sure they'll put more security around him just to be safe, and that would make our escape much harder.
They could also suspect that someone from the Stone Kingdom is the perpetrator, but at the same time in a few weeks is the New Year's party, and they don't want to get on their bad side.
I'm sure there's a high chance of nothing happening since she is a prisoner, but there's still a chance in her favor. And the only reason that I even consider her deal, is because she doesn't know anything about me. She doesn't know who I am, how I look, or how I got here. So even if I sent the message there won't be too much risk.
"Ok, I understand the consequences."
She raises her eyebrow in surprise but lets me pass her.
I then went to the guard's posts, waiting with the grumpy collector until he finally got the goods and left the prison, with me right behind him.
This time I didn't have to break the stairs since I exited with the collector through the hidden door.
With that, I was finally in the hallways of the palace and waited until I was sure I was the only one. Then I broke a block from the ground and covered it fast, I was back into my cozy tunnels.
Finally, I sighed in relief.
"That was too crazy even for me. I had enough for today I'm going back to sleep and solve the problem tomorrow."
With that, I went back to my room, drank some milk to wash out the invisible effect, and went to bed.
"Let's hope tomorrow won't be as crazy as today."
With that final thought, I went to sleep.