They followed Karissa down a bunch of alleys again, many of which led to dead ends. This ‘labyrinth’ had clearly been built without a clear plan. New buildings had been erected as needed. Some of them were so tall that they could’ve easily competed with skyscrapers back on Earth.
Hadjar wondered what was being stored in them. He noticed a trio of people in pink caftans and yellow turbans once. Whispering, they hurried to one of the stone buildings, going straight... through the walls. Hadjar had to rub his eyes and look around to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating.
“I saw them too,” Einen whispered.
Passing several deserted squares and a dilapidated bridge over a dry canal, Karissa led them to an oval building. For the first time, Hadjar saw something that resembled ordinary floors and glass windows so much it pained him.
“What the fuck?” The islander swore. For him, the glass was still something that was way too abnormal.
The witch walked over to a door made from the same stone as everything else around them. She ran her fingers over her book, symbols flashed, hieroglyphs spun in the air, and the door soon opened. The corridors smelled of something bitter. They rarely came across other people. They were hurrying along, tending to their own business, nodding to the witch and ignoring the foreigners.
After going up and down several times, Karissa brought the men to a door on the lower level. That was what the sign above the entrance read. All of this got on Hadjar’s nerves slightly because it resembled the layout of earthly buildings and contrasted sharply with a world where gunpowder still hadn’t reached all the corners of the vast lands.
“Wait for them to call your name,” the witch instructed shortly. “There will be bars. When your name is called, stand up and go. You’ll get further instructions when you enter the Pit. May the Evening Stars illuminate your path.”
Opening the door in the same, strange magical way as before, she turned around and disappeared. She didn’t even check whether the two ‘guinea pigs’ had really gone down the curved spiral staircase. She didn’t have to. They had no choice.
Out of curiosity, Hadjar decided to count the steps as they went down. After he made a mistake around three hundred, he realized that they were descending really deep down, even without being able to assess the thickness of the walls. The atmosphere they created made them feel like they were being held captive in stone.
Almost a quarter of an hour later, they arrived at a small room with benches attached to the walls. There was only a lantern, swaying grimly over the ventilation, and a small pipe, which was probably how they’d be called on.
Sitting down, Einen immediately closed his eyes and plunged into meditation. Hadjar stood next to the bars. He wanted to chat and laugh, but the silent islander wasn’t suitable for such things. His hand involuntarily reached for the leather wallet with the two bracelets.
“Northerner,” a muffled voice came from the pipe.
With a heavy creak, the bars rose, revealing a passage into a long, dark corridor. Without looking back, Hadjar went inside. After about a hundred yards, he heard the bars lower back down. Another hundred yards later, he listened to the second set of bars rising in front of him.
Unsheathing his blade, he boldly walked forward. The darkness didn’t scare him. He had already seen a darkness that was hundreds of times worse than the absence of light could ever be.
Soon, a bright light appeared at the end of the tunnel. Hadjar grinned at this metaphor. The humor of the situation calmed his soul, and his hand moved away from the wallet.
Entering the place where the light was coming from, Hadjar closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them, he saw that he was in a kind of arena. It was a huge, sandy place with a diameter of at least two hundred and twenty yards. It had thick walls that smoothly curved into a dome, the center of which had a huge hieroglyph, emitting light, circling around it.
The heavy bars lowered behind him. Runes and magic symbols flashed across them immediately.
“Listen carefully, Northerner,” the voice seemed to emanate from everywhere at once, “since it’s your first time, your task is very simple. We’ll release a beast, and you need to defeat it. Nothing that any other practitioner couldn’t handle.”
No further explanation was given. What was the point of this? What did they gain from it? When was lunch? All the answers remained behind the stone walls and within the heads of the local researchers.
Ahead of him, the shutters rose slowly. The entrance was large enough that the huge beast, which Nero and Hadjar had killed during the war with ‘The Black Gates’ sect, could’ve easily passed through it.
Hadjar assumed a low fighting stance and prepared to meet whatever enemy fate decided to send against him.
With a roar, without waiting for the shutters to open completely, a huge, 25ft creature jumped into the arena. Waves of sand surged up when it roared. Its fangs were capable of tearing apart steel armor, and its claws could’ve cut through a battering ram.
However, Hadjar just smiled. The gods really had a good sense of humor. It was an emerald wolf. The very first monster that Hadjar had ever defeated. This time, the beast was in the middle of the King Stage, which was equivalent to a strong Heaven Soldier.
“Let’s do this.” Hadjar took a deep breath and grabbed his sword tighter. If they wanted him to fight, he would fight so hard that this damned Pit would be left in ruins!
Chapter 342
The beast’s fur fluttered slightly, as if ruffled by a nonexistent wind. Shifting from paw to paw, the emerald wolf lowered its face to the ground and sniffed. Its green gemstone-eyes gazed steadily into the blue eyes of the human standing before it. Then it growled menacingly.
Hadjar lowered his blade, pointing the tip toward the ground. He stood in a relaxed and calm stance. The wolf, still growling, moved around him in a wide arc. Its huge paws, despite supporting several tons of meat and bones, didn’t leave any tracks in the sand, just a thin, emerald fog.
The beast growled even louder. In the wake of its breath, thin emerald needles sprouted from the sand, immediately scattering into dust that sparkled in the light. Hadjar remained still. Moreover, there was no whirlwind of energy around him; power didn’t flow across the ground, and no Sword Spirit could be felt, as if Hadjar was sleeping while standing and with his eyes still open.
The wolf didn’t dare pounce. The beast had once run free through endless forests and had gotten accustomed to even the most dangerous of predators scattering before it. For thousands of years, it had fought for the right to become stronger. And now it was strong. It was at the King Stage and possessed a mind comparable to a human child’s. It simply didn’t understand what was going on. It saw only a small bug standing there, one that it could crush with a single swipe of its claws.
Nevertheless, its instincts stopped it from charging in and sticking its fangs into its enemy’s body. Those same instincts screamed about the danger emanating from the creature which had the scent of the north wind about it.
Green light flashed across the beast’s back. Its mouth opened, and, with a roar, a green mist burst out from it. Surging forward in a wide cone, it covered the sand of the arena, leaving behind an emerald crust.
Hadjar stood still. The nearby pipe rattled, but no warning or order came from it.