The burning of the scroll couldn’t stop Liam for too long. His hunt might have succeeded, but he was far from free, so he didn’t dwell on whatever transformation his mindset was facing.
Liam put the brazier down, finally taking a good look at the hall. He had never really noticed it, but he could now see the many corridors branching from it.
However, upon inspecting those twelve corridors, Liam returned to the hall empty-handed. Each one of those passages was short and ended in a solid wall, leaving him trapped.
Of course, Liam knew the truth. Those walls were actually stone doors. After all, one of them had belonged to his room, and he had seen it open multiple times.
Yet, pressing and even pushing on those walls had caused no reactions, forcing Liam to reconsider his approach. The hall hopefully had something that could help, and he knew where he might find it.
The jailer’s headless corpse was still where Liam had left it, a puddle of blood now expanding from his severed neck. Liam kneeled toward it, not caring about the stains on his black robe as he began undressing the man.
Liam didn’t spare the underwear, leaving the headless corpse naked, exposing its many scars, but not bothering to inspect them. He only cared about what those clothes hid, which wasn’t much. Actually, Liam only found two items.
One item was a small, square ceramic container featuring something Liam knew very well. A pale-white ointment rested inside that lidless case, which was the brainwashing drug Liam seemed to have become immune to.
Instead, the other item was a fist-sized, vaguely triangular wooden tablet with a symbol Liam didn’t recognize inscribed into it. The mark didn’t glow or anything, but it came from the jailer, so it had to be important.
If Liam had to be honest, after seeing or hearing paper talk, he was ready to believe anything.
The issue was that Liam hadn’t seen anything on the walls. Those smooth surfaces featured no holes or odd details, but that didn’t stop Liam from bringing the tablet to one of those.
Liam wasn’t sure what to expect. He approached the wall with the tablet in hand, but nothing happened. Yet, awkwardly waving it before that surface caused a familiar reaction.
The wall rumbled before moving, opening outward to turn into a stone door, revealing a room Liam knew far too well. He had tested the tablet in his habitation’s corridor, and the item seemed to work.
Of course, Liam’s habitation had nothing of value, so he returned to the hall to move to another corridor, stopping when he heard rumbling again. The stone door he had previously opened was closing on its own.
Liam only lingered for a second in that strange development before continuing his inspection. He checked every corridor, mostly discovering identical rooms, but finding two exceptions.
The wall in a corridor opened into a rising staircase seemingly carved into stone. Its steps and surfaces were perfectly smooth, but Liam couldn’t see any light when peeking above.
Meanwhile, the other exception came in the shape of another room three times as big as the others and featuring actual items. For some reason, it had no stone bed, but a handful of tall barrels stood next to a wall.
Liam went for the barrels first, checking each one, finding much of value. One had water, another featured supplies. The third had sets of black robes, while the fourth had weapons and other useful items.
As for the fifth barrel, it was the only one that was almost empty, but Liam only had to reach for its bottom to scrape away some transparent ointment. That container was for the drug.
’This thing might be useful,’ Liam thought while wiping his fingers on the barrel’s side, not wasting any more time.
Liam undressed and washed himself, careful not to pollute the water with the blood he was removing. Afterward, he donned a clean black robe, even wearing a pair of the leather shoes the barrel contained.
The other barrels came next. Liam couldn’t find bows, but there were plenty of blades, and he opted for a pair of long knives. He also found an ample leather pouch, which he filled with a full flask of water, hard bread, cheese, and salted meat.
Of course, Liam also stored the square container with the drug inside his robe, which ended his preparations.
All the corridors stretched from the hall, so Liam returned to it to get to the passage with the stairs. He didn’t even look at the headless corpse, but the still-dazed kids claimed his gaze, even if only to summon a sad realization.
’Right, Glen died, too,’ Liam thought, unable to find the other boy from his village among those four dazed faces.
Still, that was it. Liam felt some bitterness, but that emotion didn’t halt his steps. He went for his targeted corridor, using the wooden tablet to expose the stairs, before climbing them.
Liam rose through the darkness, which grew deeper with each step he took. Luckily, the training in that dim environment had improved his eyes even further, allowing him to notice how the path suddenly stopped.
The stairs seemed to end in a ceiling, but pressing on it revealed its smooth nature, so Liam awkwardly waved the wooden tablet at it, unable to hold his breath in expectation when it started to move.
The ceiling rumbled and slid away, opening a window into a light that Liam’s eyes saw as blinding. He half-covered them with a hand, wearing a battle stance with the other, but his vision quickly grew accustomed to that illumination, revealing a shocking scene.
A white world expanded in Liam’s eyes. Cold, fresh air blew on his face and entered his nostrils. Muffled, natural sounds filled his ears, and snowflakes fell on his head.
’How long have I been down there?’ Liam couldn’t help but wonder. He was still in a forest, but snow had covered the ground and the trees’ leafless branches.
Liam had left Krosstoen’s mountain before the winter could begin, but the cold season wasn’t only there. He looked deep inside it now, meaning that he had been trapped for at least two months.
The shock didn’t wane, but Liam left the stairs anyway, even taking a few steps into the snow. He inspected his surroundings, failing to recognize them, his gaze eventually going full circle and ending on the trapdoor he had just come out of.
Somehow, the Divine Cult had carved that vast structure underground, and its trapdoor was none other than a huge boulder. The big, heavy rock even began to move on its own while Liam lingered in the snow, sliding back toward the passage, and he heard the door at the stairs’ bottom doing the same.
Liam considered his options during that small window. The underground place had more supplies, which could be useful during winter.
Yet, if Liam had to be honest, he never wanted to see the place again, so he threw the wooden tablet at the stairs, watching it cross the closing door at their bottom, before the boulder hid them and came to a complete stop, perfectly blending with the environment.