*Clang…Clang…Clang*

The noise came from outside the cave non stop.

*Clang…Clang…Clang*

Finally a hole broke in the ceiling and a cascade of light poured down enveloping the obsidian black floor of the cave. The floor seemingly hand crafted to perfection, there were no scuffs, dents, or chips out of the reflective black material.

"Looks like you were right bout something being down here." A gruff and excited voice came from the top of the hole, a silhouette appeared in the light. it was an It was a chubby bald man whose fat clearly hid his muscles underneath, as his slightly wrinkled face scrutinized the ground of the cave. He threw the pickaxe he was holding onto bottom of the obsidian like ground of the cave, making a soft and quieter than a normal thud.

"It looks solid.." He said as he brought his hand to his chin.

"Woah… I've never seen a material like that." Came another excited voice as a head poked into the hole scanning the area. It was a much younger man who looked in his 20's, with wild brown hair and and dark circles under his eyes.

"Grab the ladder kid." The older man said, lighting a flare and throwing down illuminating more of the obsidian floor with a dark red light.

"Vince are you sure we should go down without informing the association? I couldn't fully decipher the symbol but it definitely said something about danger and punishment.." The disheveled man said, looking at the dark tile with skepticism but still bringing over the ladder.

"It'll be fine, this place has been closed off for centuries and I'm confident in avoiding any possible traps. This isn't my first time exploring things from the old world Ratten." Vince said with a chuckle, slapping the young Ratten on the back then throwing the ladder down.

Vince tied down the ladder and climbed down, landing on the hard floor with a thud, the strange rock under his feet seemed to partly absorb the sound. He raised an eyebrow and stomped a few times, very soft thuds sounded, like someone was throwing pillows at a wall.

"Weird…" Vince said as he picked up the flare on the ground, revealing a large hallway covered in the sleek unblemished black rock. Ratten descended the ladder behind him with less poise. As soon as he planted his feet on the ground he brought his face to the ground studying it with an amazed expression.

"Vince, I've never seen anything like this material before… It's extremely tough and on top of that it absorbs sound. Just this material alone is a treasure by itself!." Rattens excited tone spewed out as he picked up the pickaxe, even when Vince dropped it, it didn't even scuff the floor.

"Hmm" Vince scrutinized his surrounding as his expression turned darker. As he brought his gaze up to the hatch they had busted through. The underside of it was full of old sigils, however the complex array of strengthening sigils clearly surrounded the larger one in the middle.

"Ratten… can you clarify what that sigil means" Vince said in a gloomy tone, already having a rough understanding due to his experience. Noticing Vince's tone Ratten quickly brought his gaze up to the hatch.

"Woah, There's so many strengthening sigils here. I've never even seen some of these!" Ratten said in amazement, his curious gaze roaming all over the sigils. Then he noticed the main sigil and his expression lowered.

"I-it's a containment sigil, the aura powering it seems to have just ran out. We probably used up the last bit breaking through from the outside" Ratten said coming to a realization. The caution glyph on the top, the containment sigil, the oddly hard and absorbent material that the cave was made out of.

"This was a prison, to something very powerful…" Vince said as his gloomy expression slowly returned to his previous excited one but the wariness didn't leave his eyes.

"But it doesn't matter, there's no way whatever was in here is still alive. Not only was there no way of bringing it food, there was no air vents on the outside, and It's been centuries since this thing was built. It'd have to be something that the old world considered old." Vince said calming himself down with his own words as he started walking forward down the hallway. Ratten sighed and followed close behind him.

"It still doesn't make this place any less creepy." Ratten grumbled as they walked down the hallway. The hallway turned out to be pretty short as they soon reached the end of it. Obsidian bars descended from the roof to the floor like a prison cell, made of the same material as the entire structure. The bars blocked off the end of the hallway separating it from a small room. Vince brought the flare up to the bars illuminating them, revealing more sigils covering almost every inch of them.

"These are all containment sigils but they all seem to be focused on Keeping air out and still. It looks like they ran out at the same time we opened the hatch." Ratten said somewhat confused as to why someone would go through so much trouble just to keep air out. Vince partly stuck the flare through the bars revealing the contents of the room. The only thing in the room was a ball seemingly made of the same tough material. He brought the flare lower to the floor, revealing feathers spread throughout the room. Some were gray, some were black but they all looked old, frail, and drained of life. There were hundreds of feathers throughout the floor.

"How have these not turned to dust by now…" Vince said in amazement as he reached through the bars. He picked up a feather that was on the edge, bringing it back through the bars and closer to his face. He ran his finger along it, feeling how stiff and lifeless it was.

"Feathers but no bones?" Ratten said quizzically looking at the feather in Vince's hand then turning back towards the room. Suddenly a soft gust of wind seemed to blow in from the opening of the hatch. The gust of wind pushed the feather out of Vince's grasp as it flew between the bars, back into the room as it settled among the other feathers.

Vince's eyes showed a hint of surprise. 'I thought I had a better grip on that' he thought, as another gust of wind flew by them. The wind was weak as they barely felt it but it seemed to stir the feathers as it pushed them to one side of the room. Then Vince's eyes could only widen in astonishment as that small gust just seemed to pick up all the feathers as they started to fly around the room in orderly fashion slowly speeding up.

"U-uhh! Vince!" Ratten said panicked but couldn't take his eyes off the feathers flying around the room. Soon they started to change color as they flew, looking like a rainbow of dazzling light as each feather seemed to sport a different glowing color. Then the feathers seemed to push past them, knocking them both on their butts with the force of the wind behind it as the line of feathers flew towards the hatch.

Vince and Ratten could only watch in astonishment as the line of dazzling feathers wound up in a spiral and flew out the hatch, leaving not one feather behind. Ratten and Vince glanced at each other, then quickly ran to the hatch. As they looked up, they could see the feathers slowly forming a huge spinning ball in the sky. They could feel the wind outside the hatch going wild, every tree in sight seemed to rustle as if cheering. The feathers slowly started to condense into a large bird like form. Ratten and Vince could only stare as the figures wings flapped once and it seemed to instantly disappear from sight. Instantly the trees ceased their shaking and the wind turned back to the normal cool breeze.

"Ratten… what was that.." Vince said as if utter calmness had enveloped his entire figure.

"I-I don't know." Ratten said shakily. Ratten, a rank 3 researcher of the association, had no clue what that thing was. Vince frowned, this either meant the association didn't know what it was, or Ratten didn't have the clearance. Either option was just as scary.