Chapter 76: Horrifying Ruin

Standing before him was an ancient door towering at least ten meters into the air.

Its surface pitch black, darker than anything Declan had ever seen to the point that it seemed to cast shadows upon the world around him.

Across its surface, glowed intricate blue lines glowed, faintly illuminating he surrounding area, their light reflecting across each of their faces.

"This..."

It was grand, almost impossibly perfect, resembling something that could only have been crafted by hands far beyond human understanding.

"This is... alien architecture!?"

It was Declan’s first time standing before something that had not been made by human hands and, more importantly, his first real glimpse of the possibility that humanity truly was not alone in the universe.

The moment of awe was broken when the world around them suddenly rippled with waves of light, causing a group of people to appear in the nearby space as though they had materialized from thin air.

About a dozen people stood gathered around several tents, and Declan quickly recognized them as the NCEG group, apparently having concealed themselves beneath an invisible dome until now.

"X-Guard is finally here. Early as ever," one of the men said as he walked toward them.

"Don’t waste their time," another voice ordered from the side, belonging to an older man with gray hair. "Begin implantation of the cameras and send them in," he commanded.

Moments later, three women from the group stepped forward, each holding a syringe filled with drifting nanoparticles.

"This is the camera," one of them explained. "It will enter your bloodstream and naturally attach itself to your eyes, and don’t worry, it won’t affect your vision and will dissolve naturally after a week."

Declan didn’t resist, since Sir Lycanthrope had already briefed them about the procedure, so he simply stretched out his arm as the syringe was gently inserted into his wrist and the liquid passed into his veins, traveling straight through his bloodstream.

The moment it entered his body, the system panel blinked before him.

[Invasion of Foreign Element Detected.]

[Does Host Wish to Block the Foreign Element?]

’Temporarily allow access. Be prepared to cut it off on order.’

Declan responded mentally.

[Access Temporarily Granted.]

[Access Denial Feature Online.]

He nodded in satisfaction as a strange sensation briefly passed through his eyes before fading just as quickly.

Turning toward the side, Declan noticed the NCEG personnel standing beside several enormous monitoring devices, mainly large-screen TVs and projections, while one of the operators working behind the equipment raised a thumb in their direction, likely signaling that the visuals were being received successfully.

"That will be all, X-Guards."

"With the implantation complete, we’ll be able to send audio messages occasionally, but for now, move around and explore as much as possible,"

The old man instructed before leading them toward the gate.

As they reached it, he turned toward the white-haired young man, who was the tallest member of the team.

"You must be the one called Emiris. It’s an honor to meet someone from the mighty Emrisial family," he said respectfully. "Mind giving us a hand?"

Without hesitation, Emiris stepped forward and pressed his palm against the gate, causing the blue lights covering its surface to flare brilliantly as a powerful gust of wind erupted around them, whipping against their faces and sending their hair flying backward.

GRRRRUUUUUUUUM!

The heavy sound of the ancient door opening echoed loudly through the area as the massive structure slowly parted, revealing a swirling, pitch-black vortex waiting on the other side.

Emiris turned back and extended his hand toward one of the second-years.

She grasped it, and the others followed, joining hands one by one until the last person, Declan, completed the circle.

"We wish you all success," the old man said as his final words.

Then they jumped together into the vortex.

***

The sensation was similar to teleportation, except it lasted far longer.

All Declan felt was creeping silence and cold darkness for what seemed like an eternity before the world suddenly returned.

When he opened his eyes and took in the sight before him, his heart nearly stopped.

"Just... where is this!?"

It was an ancient battlefield, stretching before Declan as a desolate realm frozen in eternal ruin.

The golden ground beneath his feet was cracked and barren, and all around him lay endless mounds of bones, broken blades, and shattered armor, half-buried in the earth.

Jagged spears and axes pierced the ground like gravestones, while enormous skeletal remains of beings that had once been divine loomed over the horizon.

Wisps of faint, shimmering mist drifted through the air, and amidst the decay, tufts of golden grass swayed silently in scattered patches across the battlefield.

The breeze was harsh against his skin, though there was no dust. 𝑓𝑟ℯℴ𝓂

He turned his head and looked up at the sky, finding a golden expanse with three cracks running across its surface, pitch-black voids that stretched deep into the unknown.

There was a sun shining upon the battlefield, yet, just like the sky itself, it was covered in dark cracks.

"The others..."

He mused as he turned to look around, finding nobody nearby.

"Did we separate, or did I let go of them at the last moment?" Declan wondered.

"Remain calm, Declan. Though it might seem you’ve been separated from the rest, you’re safe."

The voice came through his ears, confirming that he had indeed been isolated from the others.

But then...

"We can see through you."

Declan now knew who was talking. It was the NCEG personnel sending him audio messages.

"Turn around. Can you see a door that leads out of that place?"

Declan turned around, but his heart sank slightly when he saw nothing but the same cracked golden earth.

"There’s no portal back. That’s still okay. More than likely, you’ll find one at the end. For now, just take a deep breath and focus," the voice said.

Declan exhaled, calming his slowly rising heartbeat.

"What should I do?" he asked.

"Good. Why don’t you try picking up one of the broken weapons?" the voice asked, prompting Declan to turn toward the scattered weapons on the ground.

Grabbing what seemed to be a large axe with a half-broken handle, his expression changed slightly.

Though he tried to move it, it remained completely unmoving.

"What the!? It’s so heavy!"

He said aloud, his second hand reaching out and grabbing the weapon as he tried to pull it from the ground, but he paused when the voice echoed again.

"No need to lift it. We only need data on the weapon’s material. Just keep your hands on it for about a minute," the voice instructed, and Declan stopped pulling.

Still, his mind reeled as he unconsciously tried to lift it again, yet the axe refused to budge. He was more than seven times stronger than an average human right now, yet he couldn’t lift an axe.

’Then just how strong had the ones who once wielded these weapons been?’

And speaking of that, he turned around, noticing the countless bones scattered across the battlefield.

A minute later...

"Good. We’ve gotten the data."

The voice came through, and Declan let go of the axe before walking toward an especially eye-catching bone on the battlefield.

It was the shape of what seemed to have been a set of ribs, half-buried beneath the earth.

His hands reached forward, rubbing over its surface.

The second he did, he backed away instantly as sudden lines of darkness gleamed across the surface of the bone.

They glimmered for a couple of seconds before dimming, and right before his eyes, Declan watched as the bones faded away into dark ashes.

Yet even afterward, he remained rooted to the spot, his hand frozen mid-air and his mouth slightly agape.

’Did I just hear... a song?’

"Hey, Declan, are you okay?"

The voice came from the other side, and he snapped out of his stupor, giving a quick nod.

"Yes. Did you capture that?" he asked.

"Yes. It faded too quickly for us to perform any scans, though."

Declan walked toward the nearest bone and touched its surface with his hand.

Just like before, dark runic lines seethed across it, but Declan didn’t step back this time.

He waited silently, and then he heard the voices, not in his ears, but in his heart.

A war song that went:

"We came from the Cliffs and the Broken Coasts,"

"The Winds that are at max, no songs, no moist,"

"We ride with the rust, and we ride with wrath,"

"No Gods. No Kings. No songs we own,"

"Just the oath we swore,By Blade, By Bone!"

It ended at that point, and Declan’s eyes refocused as he watched the light dim from the bones, which soon turned into ashes as well.

"We’ve got the scans. You can forget about them. Just keep walking on..." the voice instructed, and he rose to his feet, silently walking through the battlefield.

The deeper he walked, the more numerous the bones became, along with the increasingly massive piles of broken weapons that filled the ground.

"So this... this is war?"

Declan muttered, his heart thumping.

The thought that each of these bones had once belonged to a living soul and that each of these hundreds of thousands of weapons had once had a master of its own, yet all of it had been reduced to such desolation, petrified him.

’How long ago was this? What kind of enemies did they fight to be reduced to such a state?’

He wondered, but though he was petrified, he continued forward.

He walked and walked for hours he couldn’t count before finally coming to a stop at the end of the wide expanse.

A large mountain, no, two mountains stood side by side, with a narrow path between them.

Naturally, he ought to continue through that open path, but there was a problem.