Chapter 396: Fire In The Hole

The portrait was large by goblin standards and depicted a crowned male in heavy ceremonial clothing. Beside him stood a female wearing enough jewels to bankrupt a merchant, with several smaller goblins arranged around them.

The royal family.

"So you’re the king," Kael murmured, examining the crowned figure.

That confirmed what sort of building he had entered and suggested that the target upstairs might be royalty as well. More immediately, it gave him something to investigate.

He expanded the map and found that the concealed passage descended into a network beneath the palace. Narrow routes connected different wings, including the bedrooms and administrative areas, while several converged farther underground.

"Escape tunnels. Of course."

If the palace fell, assassins entered, or a coup became inconvenient, the royal family could disappear beneath the walls. The whole arrangement resembled a rat nest built by people who considered betrayal a routine part of governance.

Kael respected the preparation, even if he would have appreciated a larger entrance.

He found a small indentation behind the lower edge of the frame and pressed it. A quiet click sounded before the portrait shifted outward. Kael caught the frame, preventing it from striking anything, then slipped into the opening and pulled it closed behind him.

Small embedded stones illuminated one after another along the passage. Their light revealed a ceiling far too low for him to stand beneath.

Kael ducked and began moving. After twenty steps, he lowered himself into a crouch. Another thirty convinced him that dignity was a resource he could no longer afford, and he dropped onto his hands and knees.

His shoulders nearly touched both walls. The coat dragged behind him, though Darkness kept its softened edges from catching against the rough stone.

"Master makes me climb cliffs, and the Tower makes me crawl through goblin holes." He dragged himself another meter forward. "Somehow, I’m progressing backward."

Eventually, the tunnel widened enough for him to reach an opening. He lowered himself through it, dropped onto the stone below, and straightened gratefully.

A broad underground passage stretched in both directions. Several concealed doors connected to it, and the map updated as soon as he entered. One route led almost directly toward the orange marker.

Kael followed it until the air changed.

Cold dampness settled against his skin, carrying a smell that grew stronger with every step. Old blood lay beneath the waste and rot. He slowed when the first iron door appeared, then continued until he could see the bars set into the next.

These were cells.

The corridor opened into a larger chamber, and Kael stopped at its entrance.

Human bodies occupied several of the enclosures. Some had been dead long enough for there to be no uncertainty, while others looked as though they had died more recently. Men and women lay upon filthy bedding or directly against the stone, bearing wounds that had never received treatment.

Chains had been fixed into the walls. Stained tables stood between the cells, surrounded by restraints and broken implements discarded where someone had finished using them. A staircase rose at the far end of the chamber, leading back toward the palace above.

Kael looked toward the living prisoners.

Several women remained conscious, although barely. Bruises marked exposed skin, torn clothing hung from starved bodies, and old injuries lay beneath newer ones. Their condition told him enough without requiring a closer examination. These were sexually abused and tortured. Along with every women here. They were used like they were toilets by goblins and left to rot. Thrown like garbage when they died and then moved to the next vitime.

Kael’s stomach convulsed from the horrible state these people are in. They aren’t climbers. And definitely not living people, this is a stage in the tower in a floor. Taken from a recorded scene in a universe, in a place and in a time that had long since went by.

Yet still, it made his body rage for how cruel some beings could get.

One noticed something moving within the darkness and recoiled into her corner. She could barely lift herself, yet still tried to put more stone between them.

Kael stopped.

For the first time since entering the city, remaining unnoticed felt like something he should be ashamed of.

He released Presence while keeping Darkness around his equipment. The nearest prisoner looked directly at him, and whatever little movement she possessed ceased as she took in the helmet and the shadows shifting across his frame.

He did not know what to say. He did not know whether she spoke a language he understood, and announcing that he had come to murder someone upstairs hardly seemed comforting.

His gaze moved across the other cells. Missing fingers, scars around wrists, and bodies left beside people who were still alive filled the spaces between the bars.

The mission’s performance conditions lingered at the edge of his vision.

Number of unnecessary casualties.

Kael pressed his teeth together.

The person upstairs had been nothing more than a red marker a few minutes ago. If whoever owned this palace knew what existed beneath it, Kael no longer needed a contract to justify killing him.

The orange marker pulsed again, almost directly ahead.

He forced himself to breathe slowly and followed it past three cells.

There was no pedestal, chest, weapon, or anything else that resembled a Legendary item. The marker stopped beside an enclosure containing only a body.

Kael checked the map, then looked toward the woman lying against the far wall.

She was an elf. One ear extended well beyond human proportions, while the other had been badly mutilated. Metallic silver hair fell across her shoulders and chest, strangely untouched by the filth surrounding her.

The orange marker hovered directly over her.

Kael gripped the lock and twisted until the mechanism cracked. He opened the door and entered while the living prisoner in the neighboring cell watched without making a sound.

Nothing upon the elf looked valuable enough to explain the marker. She had no armor, magical weapon, or jewelry that immediately caught his attention. Her body was heavily damaged, burn marks, scaring, injuries all around her private areas and scars deep enough to make a grown man shudder.

She seems to have had the worst of it.

Then he noticed something beneath one hand.

Kael crouched and eased the small object free. At first, he could not distinguish its shape beneath the grime. Once he brushed some away, a silver leaf emerged, elegant despite its condition, with a single emerald set near the center.

A brooch.

"This is what you brought me down here for?"

The orange marker remained fixed upon it. Kael turned the leaf carefully between his fingers and activated Inspect.

====================

[ITEM STATUS SCREEN]

Item Name: Ornamental Brooch of House Vaeloryn

Rarity: Unclassified

Category: Elven Heirloom / Spatial Artifact

Condition: Heavily Tarnished

[KNOWN PROPERTY: SPATIAL STORAGE]

Contains an independent spatial compartment sealed through Ancient Elven Magic.

[ACCESS STATUS: LOCKED]

[WARNING]

The internal space is protected by an ancient blood-bound Elven seal.

Conventional access methods will fail.

Forced spatial intrusion, destructive dispelling, or physical damage to the brooch may collapse the contained space.

All stored contents will be permanently lost.

======================

Kael looked between the description and the orange marker.

"So you aren’t Legendary. You’re carrying something that is."

He attempted to access the storage normally. The system responded before anything opened.

[Access Denied.]

[Ancient Elven Seal detected.]

[Unauthorized forced access may result in complete spatial collapse.]

Kael stopped immediately.

"Fine. You can stay locked."

He had enough experience with expensive things breaking because he did not understand them. For once, curiosity lost the argument without requiring an explosion first.

He placed the brooch inside his inventory, and the orange marker vanished.

Whatever Legendary object it contained was now technically in his possession. He still had no idea what it was or how to reach it, but neither problem needed solving inside a torture chamber.

Kael stood, and the brief satisfaction disappeared.

The dead remained against the walls. The living remained behind the bars. Above them, the palace continued its orderly existence, with disciplined guards, well-maintained windows, and someone waiting upstairs whom Kael had been hired to kill.

The woman in the neighboring cell watched him. Her shoulders were thin enough for every bone to show beneath the skin, and she flinched when his gaze moved toward her lock.

He looked from the cells to the passage through which he had entered.

He had crossed an entire city unseen, scaled two walls, avoided the traps, and reached his target without a single confirmed alarm. If he left now, killed the person upstairs, and escaped quietly, the Floor might reward him very generously.

Kael closed his hand around the nearest lock.

"No. We’re changing the plan."

The mechanism cracked beneath his grip. He opened the door and moved to the next cell, breaking its lock before continuing along the row. Metal snapped in quick succession as he freed every enclosure containing someone alive.

Nobody rushed out.

Most could barely stand, and some had watched him open their doors without appearing to understand what it meant.

Kael pointed toward the passage behind him. "You need to get out of here."

Blank looks answered him.

"Can you understand me? I’m opening the cells so you can leave."

Several heads turned toward him immediately. The woman nearest the first open door nodded, her fingers still clamped around the bars.

"Can you walk?" Kael asked. "Anyone who can needs to help the others. There’s a hidden tunnel beyond that passage."

Some nodded. Others looked toward their legs or the people lying beside them.

Kael examined the room again. He could not carry everyone through the tunnels and complete the assassination simultaneously, but he could give them time. More importantly, he could give the guards above something more urgent to worry about than escaped prisoners.

He turned toward the staircase.

Wooden supports reinforced sections of the approach, and storage rooms stood nearby. Old furniture, cloth, and oil lamps occupied the open doorway of the nearest one.

The woman followed his gaze. "You said there’s a tunnel. Where does it go?"

"Away from here." Kael pointed toward the passage he had used. "Take anyone who can move and keep them together. Help the others to the entrance."

"What about the ones we can’t carry?"

"Get them ready for me. I can move them, but I need the guards looking somewhere else first."

She hesitated, then looked toward the other prisoners. Someone farther down the row had begun trying to lift a man from the floor.

Kael watched long enough to make sure they understood the direction, then crossed toward the storage rooms on the palace side of the chamber.

"What are you going to do?" the woman asked.

"I need to create a distraction."

Darkness shifted softly across his coat as he called Fire into his gauntlet. Warmth gathered around his fingers, bright enough for the woman to see even through the shadows.

Her eyes widened. "What sort of distraction?"

Kael pressed his palm against the first wooden support.

Fire caught slowly, spreading through the dry surface before climbing toward the ceiling. He moved to the next support, then to the old cloth stacked beside the storeroom wall. Heat began gathering around him as the first smoke curled upward.

His original plan had been simple. Enter the palace, kill one person, and leave. The Tower had even promised better rewards if he handled it discreetly.

Behind him, the prisoners began moving toward the tunnel.

Kael watched the flames crawl higher, then looked toward the staircase leading into the palace.

"Apparently," he muttered, "this calls for the large kind."