Novel Full Chapter 2156 A Small Water Portal
Chapter 2156: Chapter 2156 A Small Water Portal
— Kat —
“Nope, nope, nope, nopenope nope,” said Lily as she grabbed Kat and Furen with her shadows and started to turn around.
“Why are you leaving now? I didn’t detect anything in the water or the surface and I feel like the core is somewhere nearby,” insisted Furen though she wasn’t struggling much in Lily’s grip.
“There is no core, or at least, the core isn’t here,” insisted Lily.
“But I can feel and immense amount of water being generated just around the corner,” Furen said as she pointed towards the corner in question. They’d actually found a somewhat sealed off area and while there was a door to access it, it was still around a few corners. The feeling of water was palpable even to Kat.
“Yeah and I don’t need to see it to know it’s not the core,” insisted Lily.
“We could still take a look,” offered Furen. “It seems to be right there,”
“Yeah and that’s the problem. This facility? It’s not generating water. Or well, parts of it is but not the important part. They aren’t using magic to generate water, instead, the mana is being used to maintain a portal that directly opens to a dimension filled with mana rich water,” insisted Lily.
“Ok… it’s just water though? So why are you concerned,” asked Furen.
“Because this is like… like… do you know what a bomb is?” asked Lily.
“The translation seems to have a bit of extra context but I’m guessing ’device that explodes with great force’ isn’t really telling me what has you so scared. Plenty of warriors can do the same,” commented Furen.
Lily shook her head, “Yeah doesn’t have the same impact. Though I guess neither do bombs here really… no um… ok. It’s like looking at an angry Rank 5. They aren’t angry at you, but you still don’t want to be anywhere nearby.”
“Oh… ok that IS bad,” agreed Furen as she paled slightly. Perhaps not understanding the full impact… but enough. Kat was just going along with it. She could feel the panic and the specifics through Lily’s mind and… well if Lily was actually brave enough to carry the conversation for once, Kat was going to let her.
Lily shot a glare Kat’s way as she picked up on that thought but Kat just did her best to shrug while still bound. Lily turned back to Furen. “Right so you understand then,” stated Lily with a nod.
“Yes… but also no,” countered Furen. “I get why you’d be scared of the example, but I still fail to see why a bunch of water would be a concern.”
*I also want to know if we could use it to escape the island.*
[No almost certainly not. It’s set up in such a way that only water can get through and reinforced by all of Thyme’s nonsense. I wouldn’t call it completely impossible but you’re far more likely to die in the attempt.]
“The problem is that it’s a giant hole in space that… it’s shockingly stable to look at but if someone broke it? The city wouldn’t just be flooded, the island would be. Perhaps the entire world. I don’t think I can properly convey just how much water a dimension full of it really contains. Even the massive amounts it must have siphoned off over the years to fill up the room and beyond is still nothing.
“I can already tell it’s not a small dimension filled with water… but how big? I can’t say. Once you get past a certain size it’s way outside of my ability to sense. Oh, and if the portal failed differently and it shut off? Then the resulting snap echoing through space would kill a bunch of people and quite possible destroy the city anyway,” added Lily.
Furen gave Lily a slow blink before asking. “It’s… it’s really that dangerous? Can we do anything about it?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I don’t even want to look at it much less touch it… but it DOES feel rather secure. It’s like… well I gave the example already. An angry Rank 5, perhaps Rank 6 or 7 but they’re not angry at you… they’re just angry. And hey, maybe it really is safe to be around them… but this place was already bothering me before and it’s a heck of a lot worse now,” grumbled Lily.
Furen nodded, “Alright… and you can confirm the core isn’t here?”
Lily paused to shrug before carefully setting the two down. They were far enough away from the portal anyway. “Yeah… pretty sure. It might have been needed to open the portal in the first place but it certainly isn’t necessary to maintain it. If that thing required constant energy to keep stable…” Lily shuddered “Yeah I have no idea what I’d do but I wouldn’t want to remove the core that’s for sure…”
“Wait, is that a risk?” asked Furen.
Lily shook her head. “No, the portal is self-sustaining now. It’s solid and messing with it would cause more harm then good. I don’t love the fact that it’s here… but it’s not going to be removed so easily. Heck, it might even count as a natural feature of the area now that it’s been around so long.”
Furen looked pensive at that for a few moments before shaking her head. Whatever comment she might have had lost to the moment. With the core determined not to be here, they made their way back to the exit of the room. Lily still glanced around occasionally, jumping at shadows when they looked like something more but Kat was never able to catch them herself and Furen didn’t notice most of them.
Still, with the exit firmly in view there was no reason to worry too much anymore. The group stepped through the door to the rest of the facility, and ensure that once they were through it was shut thoroughly. Well, as best they could manage anyway. Lily even put the little block back into the door to keep it shut. Sadly, there was now a clear hole in it.
“Hmm… how safe is this long term? Will the water just spill out of the room at some point?” asked Kat.
“I don’t know…” admitted Lily. “There might have been safety stuff around a long time ago, and some of it is clearly still working but a lot has broken down. Probably something to tell Steel about and get people to look at… but not directly our problem.”
With that settled they made their way back to the intersection, past the golem corpses that now seemed far more lifeless. Kat glanced at the hallway directly opposite them. It didn’t seem fancy… but… “Do you think core might be down there? Water and power generation together?”
“That makes sense from our perspective but I’m not sure…” Lily mumbled and glanced at Furen as she stretched out slightly and gave a light yawn. “I think I want to nap a bit. The gem keeping Furen safe has been glowing brightly for ages and now that my instincts aren’t screaming at me I feel a bit tired. I’ll just nap so… you guys can decide.”
Without waiting for an answer, Lily leapt at Kat, transforming mid-air into her Memphis form. Trusting that Kat would catch her. She did of course, and soon Lily was curled up in Kat’s arms. A moment after that, Kat deposited her girlfriend around her neck. Probably still best to keep both hands free. “So Furen, what do you think?” asked Kat.
Furen shrugged, “It’s not like I’m that familiar with structures like this. Usually, for all that us ’adventurers’ like to claim the title we’re mostly fighting through sewers and maintenance tunnels here in the city. Facilities like this are exceedingly rare because… well most of the important ones have either already been combed over or in active use so I’d have a map. I wouldn’t say it’s impossible the core is down that way… but I don’t know that I’d want to explore it first.”
“So deeper in? Actually… wait… do we want to trigger the golems first? Assuming there’s more on the other side?” asked Kat.
“That IS a good idea,” commented Furen. “That way the fires can burn down… hopefully anyway,”
Kat took a few steps forward and waited. As expected the golems dropped down… but it seems like they were the water models still. Kat didn’t know what that meant for the rest of the facility, but she could at least make sure these ones were destroyed. A little test was in order though. Kat moved forward and kicked the first golem hard enough to explode.
Lighting shot through her, holding her in place for a fraction of a second where it caused her muscles to seize… but it wasn’t all that painful. The main issue was the rest of the golems capitalising on the opportunity. They rushed in to attack, now in their supercharged state… but a quick mental nod to Lily and a number of shadow blobs were shooting out to destroy plenty of the remainder.
Even with the supercharging of the few that survived the first wave they just couldn’t do enough damage to Kat to truly bother her. All in all, she’d call it a win.