The ascent was simple and easy for it was climbed before from dragon claw marks. Sometimes it was best to follow another’s steps.
Reaching the lip, Cage peeked over while wedging his knees in a solid crack. The tunnel was smaller and would be a tight squeeze for a dragon, but to the right was another glowing skeleton, but of a man. Judging from the pelvis and skull’s structure it was a man who had laid down and didn’t realize the tainted water was deadly as all the cloth had rotted away long ago, but a slender metal tube in the ribcage could have held water. If it had been filled it would have taken awhile to cool, likely till this point.
“Serves to be prepared.” He whispered before climbing all the way up when no threats were present. Deep into the cave, darkness returned and no more glowing plants offered light. Needing a stretch, he did so before saying “Flint.” And retrieving the hard rock and that of the original torch. When he got out of the wind he struck the stone on the edge of the ice axe to throw sparks. In minutes the flame came back to life. One ice axe was put away, not knowing what awaited as he continued on, glad he didn’t tire easily.
No more bodies were found, but about an hour later the first torch began sputtering. A second was relit. Cage knew he had another twenty torches, an oil lantern and a pouch of oil rendered from animal fat, enough for over two hundred hours of light. Still, Cage had a deep feeling it would need to be rationed if to last. That original warning coupled with the anger and scorch marks spoke this place would not be friendly.
Again the tunnel didn’t have forked passages and snaked up, down, left right and once he thought it a dead end till he had to look up as it curled backwards like a hose. The climb was challenging, but so far he didn’t get lost.
When the second torch was halfway through, Cage decided he made enough headway. No use overdoing what has already happened. The best way to be sure to leave was to sometimes stop and rest. Overexertion wouldn’t give success, just hinder it or worse. He made an arrow out of small rocks to remind him where he needed to go before killing the fire and sitting on a cushion. Hearing remained alert while his eyes closed to rest.
Sleep and tiredness beckoned and he allowed it some, but part of his mind stayed on high alert. One sound would be more than enough to rouse him.
It was three days according to his sleep cycle when Cage finally left the tunnel and along the way he spotted ancient signs of where hundreds had rested over eons. He knew eons was the closest timeframe he could use because of decomposition of things he’d found and also magic kept The Deep mostly unchanged for he had yet to come across a single sign of tunnel collapse and that the last visitor to this place was more than a thousand years, he’d guess. The freshest object being a piece of brittle wood one gentle touch broke apart.
Heat and sulfur remained his constant annoying companion, but the sharp tingle of magic that came from everywhere became accustomed to like the barest of breezes. And magic remained beyond grasp, not even a flicker of a simple orb of light could be conjured. So far no more bones or bodies were found, likely any others realized the stupidity by now.
Hyperawareness set in and Cage harnessed it, his reactions could only benefit. The faintest sounds were clearer and his eyes so accustomed to darkness could pierce further into the constant curtain.
That all changed as what felt like mid afternoon came.
Distant, unnatural light made him pause. He killed the torch again, put it away and approached more silent than an expert assassin.
The confusing tunnel opened into an immense, subterranean room where more glowing plants offered a respite of light. It would have been beautiful if not for a giant graveyard.
Bones from dragons, men and several size varying griffin lay scattered in broken heaps for over a mile. Cage spent an hour looking over and counting sixty dragons, eleven griffin skulls and hundreds of humans laying everywhere in random order. Bones were broken, most being petrified. Cage found a large green dragon scale that looked in marginally good condition. But what had caused their deaths? He wondered silently. Bone markings showed blunt force and stabbing from something exceptionally sharp. And what could cave in a dragon’s skull? He stayed silent. It was obvious the dead fell where they rotted from time. There was no longer the smell of decay, even from sulfur’s masking properties.
It was then Cage noticed blackened statues. Thousands placed along the walls. Many were covered in glowing moss, but even distance couldn’t hide that all were made of an exceptionally hard gem, likely diamond. Cage noticed the figures were of sentient beings. The smaller statues were of men or women. Larger ones were of dragon, griffin and what looked like a much kinder looking Tiaxm. There were other creatures on platforms all around the room, some being aquatic. The Tiaxm though was as large as Daku had been when facing the scouts, making that one a warrior, but this sculpture had long fingers with no claws, tiny flat teeth and four short legs. Only now did Cage believe the Tiaxm were once timid herbivores, transformed into what they now are.
The displays told Cage immediately that these statues were all at least over two million years old. As he looked Cage found all the statues carried a weapon, at least those with hands, like dragon, man and griffin. A long gem sword and a round mace made up the weapons. The bones that were petrified all spoke of the weapons the statues carried. Joints of the creations looked to be able to slide together, mimicking motion as if alive.
Golems! He mentally realized. They were magical constructs tasked with guarding. Whatever it meant had Cage grinning. Whatever set off the golems, he knew they would be relentless.
Due to the size of the room and the thousands of golems standing along the walls, forever watching the dead, Cage forced his challenging personality back, knowing he had to try another route first. For all he knew it was sound that activated the constructs. Deciding on caution, he silently stepped backwards, not taking his eyes off them.
And it was then Cage bumped into something. He knew where he stepped was clear moments ago. Silently he dropped, planted his hands and mule kicked with both legs. The immovable connection sent Cage forward. Spinning along the way, he rolled into a low stance, stretching his arms out and took his most destructive stance. The ice axe in his right hand would add another foot to the attack.
Then suddenly he stopped as his eyes locked on nothing. The tingle of magic seemed to have lulled him for he came right to where he was touched and found a solid barrier stretching wall to wall. Then he ran right at it and ran up the wall for twelve feet to leap and slap the barrier as high as he could before landing. Even throwing rocks in random directions showed the way back was blocked and he had no way of doing so anymore.
Herded like cattle to the slaughter. He thought, but the barrier didn’t force him ahead. Just blocked the way back.
Realizing there was one final option to go ahead, Cage readied for it as best possible. He relieved both ends at the corner of the barrier, had a large drink and four apples.
An hour after resting and refueling Cage went about stretching every muscle. “One exit, thousands of golems, not one missing or broken. Here we go.” He said under his breath as adrenaline began clearing his mind and a grin began forming.
Slowly he crept out of the shadows. He wasn’t sure how the golems would activate so he made not a sound, stepping on the firm ground slowly so as to not trip pressure plates or move so slowly he was a statue moving a mile in six hours at this pace.
Twenty minutes and yards later he reached the first corpse, a woman by her pelvis, one who hadn’t had a baby by the looks of it. He stood clear, but close enough to move around, hoping whatever trap sprung hadn’t reset.
It wasn’t an hour later when a spike in magic tingled him. It vanished just as quickly, but in its place came a slippery, grinding sound. His sharp hearing allowed him to see three human golems turn their expressionless heads right at him. Two were male, the third an ancient carved woman.
“Oh shit.” He cursed. “So it was magic that set them off.”
/> The three gemstone golems threw off strong magic as they dropped as one to the ground and began walking. The target was located and they would be relentless.
Cage took off running, his long legs speeding past more golems and dead, but they didn’t activate as he feared. But as fast as Cage was and the hundred feet between them, they were far faster. Cage knew he’d be unable to reach the exit in time. His mind began sorting for the best plan.
Before they caught up Cage located the large green scale and threw the steel hard plate to the lead man. It reacted to the stimulus by hacking with the long crystal sword. Cage was impressed as the sword sliced the scale like butter. The test proved the sculptures had more magic than attack and chase. It had spells to cut through the toughest material without damaging the gem. If it weren’t, the scale would have been slapped aside, not cut. Likely they were magic breakers too.
“Only one way to test it.” He said as he laughed and jumped forward.
The first golem started with a hacking sword motion while attempting to knock Cage down. Sensing strong and dangerous magic, Cage’s black diamonds activated and put up a powerful shield. The sword connected, matched the warlock’s mana’s unique properties and forced it to buckle.
Shields defeated, Cage easily dodged the impact and following stab, and then the second tried. Hoping it worked, he diverted the woman’s blade with a forearm. It was a heavy blow no human could force, but the blade didn’t pierce his blackened flesh.
He then grabbed the tip when the cutting magic couldn’t pierce his arms and wrenched in passing. Cage tried to break the hand off, but only managed to painfully overextend his own arm before releasing. He now knew he couldn’t physically break them or outrun their inhuman speed, but he decided on another gamble, but needed time to set up the idea.
Changing tactics, Cage adapted a bit of Drunken Fist with Judo to dodge with the least wasted movement in their uniform attack. Three were seriously not enough and in fifteen seconds he read an exact pattern. Hack, hack, slash with the sword followed by an overhead bludgeon by the mace. The only different timing was by the shorter female golem who was marginally faster than the identical males. It was an effective tactic only a gifted martial artist and born fighter could dodge and see through, but only one would tire and it wouldn’t be them. Getting the timing down perfectly he twisted and leaned to the side. They reacted mindlessly as they struck.
Grinning, Cage watched as the males simultaneously pulverized the female to pieces. They were so programmed, they took out an ally, but the success had Cage do a back handspring before altering his momentum off a griffin’s wall platform like a springboard, diving straight between the charging pair.
As he passed the males hacked through one another, their blades lodged till they jerked, destroying each other in the same instant.
“Hell yeah!” He cheered as the piles lost their magic and went still.
His cheerfulness vanished as there came more grating of stone on stone. “You’ve got to be kidding!” he groaned as every human golem was activated when three fell. Worse yet, three dragons and a dozen more of each species began turning heads.
Not waiting to stick around where there was no more fun or reason to fight, Cage bolted for the exit. This time, with so many activating to completely crush the first challenger to figure out the secret, they got in one another’s way. Cage’s goal was ahead and he dodged, spun and flowed around them all. Crashing sounds became deafening as the stones tumbled into one another.
Just as Cage reached the tunnel something sharp bit into his right thigh and made him stumble and fall. Still the golems charged and he knew they were going to crush him so he rolled right into the tunnel’s wall.
Then he grimaced as he hit it along with a pile of griffin remains and looked in wonder as the golems ran into an invisible barrier, walling it up. The moment he passed the guardian chamber a shield stopped the horde. Cage watched as the mound began moving, pulling back and landing on their stands, retaking position. The only ones who didn’t were the three who broke themselves.
Pain in his leg had him look down and see blood flowing too fast. The femoral artery had been cut. Cage knew he had two minutes to stop it before passing out and dying. He pulled the sash to open his mending robe while shooting a hand down a pocket. “Surgical clamp, sewing needle, surgical thread and vodka!”
Items were right there as Cage accepted the pain and used it. He uncorked the vodka he fermented from potatoes and poured a generous helping of the clear liquid on the deep cut. The pain barely made a jaw muscle clench. With the clamp sanitized by the strong drink, he pushed his fingers in his leg, using pain to locate the severed artery. It took moments to find it and stop the gushing blood flow. Not slowing down because the first stages of lightheadedness began to set in. He began sewing the artery back together for the next ten minutes before bringing out an adhesive alchemy made to mimic surgical glue and surrounded the sewed artery, waited a minute for it to harden before releasing the clamp. He sighed when it held, not another drop seeped from the vein. With a hand he began lightly sewing his leg back together before starting a fire on a torch and heating the bar of the ice axe.
As it finally heated to a glow, Cage didn’t hesitate to slap it over his wound to cauterize it shut. Sizzling was instant before sulfur was replaced by burning flesh. He grunted as his body instinctively tensed from the scalding method. Only being in three years of constant pain, being tortured several times before and naturally high pain tolerance kept him from passing out, screaming or pulling the hot steel away too early.
After closing the wound completely and it scarred to the third degree did he stop and lean against the wall. Breathing ragged. He put everything away, but took out the water and downed a half gallon to increase blood pressure to counteract the loss. The wound was too great to get up and move for a time so he stripped and made a bed from sheets in storage. A stick pushed bones far away. Since nothing was coming after him at the moment and he heard nothing approach from the dark. He gauzed his injured leg tightly with linen before settling in for a necessary time of recovery, unable to go on without magic to instantly heal. He knew he could spare the time and relaxed while remaining alert, staying near the glow of the cave.
Six days of rest passed and rarely did he move. Most of the time he spent drawling the golem’s room in clear detail using charcoal as a core, wrapped in wood to act as a pencil. Glowing plants offered plenty of light to jot down the gruesome beauty of it. Pain from the seeming sword’s wound dulled, but screamed when moved. Bones from other skeletons showed their right leg also had been cut, but they didn’t survive. Sixteen died by the looks of it. The one bright side is the wound didn’t get infected. Redness without the fever surprised him. He rationed food and water, taking just enough to get by. Not moving much except to change position or do minimal therapy, didn’t mean he could waste anything. And still magic was beyond grasp.
Cage knew without a doubt his family knew he was alive thanks to Daku being his link to the outside world. So long as the griffin lived proved without a doubt that the warlock did as well.
But as he woke again he knew his wound was manageable. Cage changed the dressing, applying more healing salve Meeka mixed weeks ago and proved to be a powerful healing agent. It might not heal burns or dull pain, but it kept swelling and inflammation down.
Deciding to get moving, Cage lifted a walking stick he’d been whittling on and would act more as a crutch. Everything was put away, his bloody robe was put back on and he grunted, putting the stick just below his right arm to take pressure off the same leg that required emergency self surgery. A cloth under the arm acted as a cushion and rope bound the ice axe to the shaft to act as a handhold. In the other hand burned the first fire since the injury.
Limping, Cage pushed on ahead into darkness once again. The large tunnel went on and on. Two hours later he came to a stop when spotting something white. The bones of a dog size griffin lay curled up, but wasn’t stone in the i
nspection. For Cage this meant whatever petrifaction process either was gone or this was the freshest being to have died. The inspection also served as a rest for the cause of the griffin’s death was a clean cut through a wing and a nick from being hamstrung. Cage looked to his own leg and knew their injuries had been similar, but he had the skills, supplies and fortitude to not die from wounds. Another thing, the griffin proved he had managed to pass the room too, likely running or flying straight for the exit as fast as possible. Others would have had a similar idea after seeing all the bones too. Possibly someone had made it out though few ever had.
The rest was ended as he stood and went on ahead.
Just as he was about to stop for the day and the next torch was about to die, the tunnel forked for the first time. Both passages were similar and fewer claw markings than before on the ground showed both were identical and the markings showed one way wasn’t right, but ages passed and couldn’t be determined to the most traveled route. Both seemed to have been repeated.
Too tired from deciding a way to travel he went to bed down and looked up to notice the dirty glint of something reflective. It turned out to be a broken piece of glass behind a rock, but now that he was closer he found something buried beneath the sand. It was a decaying leather journal with few remaining pages, likely used to burn for light by how they were torn out. Only ten sheets remained, yellowed from centuries yet preserved by the dry dirt. He slowly opened it, careful not to ruin anything. He knew it was a valuable resource of information the moment he started reading a mage’s personal notes. The owner was sent to The Deep for killing three baby dragons before hatching, over three hundred human deaths just to see how unsuspecting people would turn out by splicing genetic material and a dozen more cruel things and sent here to die. The mage obviously showed no remorse and was quite the narcissist. It was the last page that really caught Cages attention.
Ascension of the Warlock (Book 4 of the Death Incarnate Saga) Page 32
