Chapter 12: Undergound

Kael moved up further and further ahead. The occasional groan of the electric line around him, a low animal sound that rolled along the tunnel skin, slowly added to the tension he was feeling, but that didn’t stop him from treading his way ahead. The hum wasn’t constant; it rose and fell in wary tremors, like breath drawn through clenched teeth.

From time to time the cables crackled faintly, shedding a bitter scent of heated dust and old insulation. The floor beneath his boots was slick with a fine sweat of condensation, and the air carried a cold metallic taste that clung to the tongue. He kept his steps light, counting each one without meaning to, trying not to imagine the power latent in those lines brushing past him like unseen serpents.

The corridor narrowed and widened without warning, and each bend felt like the throat of something that might close on him if he hesitated. His chest tightened and eased in cycles that matched the faraway thrum. His mind, though, refused to sit still.

While moving, he thought about what to do and the situation he was in.

’Most climbers are experienced. Have already climbed many floors and know the gist of things, the only problem is I’m unaware of most tricks that they use. Not to mention,’ he stared at his status screen, the pale text hovering with patient indifference, ’I can’t level up or increase my power with just killing monsters like the others in the normal tower. Can it be a bug?’ He blinked, as if the act of closing and reopening his eyes would refresh the world into sense.

The thought was all too real, after all, in the Tower of Trials other climbers would passively level up whenever they killed a monster, while Kael already killed four and no luck so far on going up to level two. The memory of each kill flashed by in brief, grim strokes, the snap of bone, the jump of his hammer in his palms, the hot splash that cooled quickly on his skin, yet his level remained stubbornly still. All he had to show for it were four crystal orbs. Which were his lifeline for now. He shifted them in his mind as one might count coins while eyeing a locked door. They held promise and nothing else.

“If Leveling up isn’t possible with simply killing monsters… then maybe quests? Or a different condition altogether…” The words slipped out under his breath, part mutter, part prayer.

The thoughts kept his mind active and at the same time pushed away the stress of the situation. He let them spin, let them occupy the corners where fear gathered, and in that quiet arithmetic he walked on until he reached what looked like the end of this grid after what felt like a couple hours of walking in a relatively safe area.

His sense of time had thinned; minutes stretched long, then snapped short, as if the tunnel itself decided the length of them. Unlike before where he had to climb down, the end this time was a metallic door.

Most of the wires were coming right from underneath the door leading beyond it, like roots burrowing under a stone, so he opened it, slowly and carefully to look at what was going on. The hinges protested with a tired breath, and he pressed his shoulder to the metal to keep it from clanging. Light was almost nonexistent here, aside from a faraway corner of where he was. The light behind him allowed him however to understand where he was. This was an underground metro station. The shapes of platform and tracks took form first as darker shadows against dark, then resolved into edges and planes as his eyes drank the faint glow.

It felt empty, far too empty for how large it was, and as if a sixth sense had awakened in Kael, he felt that there had to be a reason why this place is so empty. The air had that peculiar stillness of rooms that have been emptied in a hurry. No debris scattered by years, no junk left to rot, only wide bare space and the faint echo of his own breath returning to him with a delay.

This whole place felt like a setup…. Like an arena of sort for a grand battle. A scary thought to be had right now.

Still, without any other way to go, Kael decided to investigate, so far he could withdraw to the door whenever he wanted in case of a problem. He tested the door once, weight, swing, the way the handle caught, and memorized the feel of it in his palm. An exit mattered more than anything.

Slowly Kael walked on the ledge next to the door after closing it, and began moving up toward the lit area of the metro, there should be a metro station he can go up to the surface again from. His boots grated lightly on gritty concrete. The rail lines ran parallel below like the dark ribs of a sleeping thing.

He kept his shoulder to the wall, gloved fingers grazing cold tile every few steps as if touch alone could keep him anchored. He moved up through the dark and toward the light, slowly and carefully making sure to remember the exact number of steps he took from the door, just in case he needed to run back to it. He heard himself counting in silence, the numbers clicking into place like rungs on a ladder he might have to descend blind.

Once he arrived to the lit area he climbed up on the higher ledge, and he was right, it was a station, the only unfortunate part, though it had light, it was completely closed off, the only path leading up had been broken down and torn, as if an entire building had crumbled upon it.

The wreckage rose in a chaotic tangle of rebar and shattered stone, a mouth clogged with its own teeth. He could smell the dry chalk of powdered concrete, and the way sound dulled here told him the blockage was deep. This was not a place he could leave from. He let the fact settle, flat and cold, then let it go, nothing to be done with a wall.

He could only move forward. But even that thought felt distant as an echo in the deep ahead rumbled both his heart and mind at the same time…

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