Awakening in the Heart of the Tomb
Consciousness did not return like a flame illuminating the darkness, but like a miserable spark born in a cold, painful void. The first thing Arion felt was not light or sound — it was pain. Sharp, deep, all-consuming pain, as if every bone in his body had been shattered and reassembled wrong.
Then came the cold. The chill of damp stone pressing into his cheek and back.
And finally, the darkness. Absolute and total darkness — the kind the eye could never adjust to, because there was no light at all.
"Where… am I?" he whispered, but his voice came out as a dry rasp. "Am I dead? Is this hell? …How disappointingly dull."
With enormous effort, he raised his trembling hand before his face. Nothing. He summoned the system window — the first time he had ever been grateful for its existence.
Ding~
The faint blue window appeared, its glow like a sun in this endless dark. It lit his immediate surroundings. He was wedged in a narrow stone crack, barely wide enough to fit his body. The walls were wet and sharp; the ceiling just endless black.
His first action: check his status.
> [Current Status]
HP: 15 / 300
MP: 112 / 180
Condition: Severe internal bleeding, multiple fractures, extreme exhaustion.
"Fifteen HP?" He let out a desperate laugh. "One good sneeze would kill me now."
He had to heal himself. He began with his weakest, most pitiful healing skill.
[Minor Heal]
He felt a faint, almost mocking prick of warmth.
HP: 15 / 300 → 24 / 300
It was like trying to put out a house fire with a leaky bucket. Each cast drained his mana while his health barely moved.
"At this rate, I'll bleed out before I hit half…"
Then, deep in his despair, he remembered. Valerius' gift — the potion he'd saved for a 'bad day'. This wasn't just a bad day. This was the end of the world.
He pulled it from his inventory. [Superior Healing Elixir]. The vial glowed with a warm silver light in the dark.
Without hesitation, he uncorked it and downed it in one go.
The effect was violent. Not gentle healing — an explosion of life. He felt raw magic surge through him, mending broken bones with audible pops, stitching torn tissue, pushing out tiny shards of rock from his wounds. It hurt — and it soothed him.
In seconds, his HP bar was full.
> HP: 300 / 300
Condition: All physical injuries healed. (Note: Mental and spiritual fatigue remains.)
Arion exhaled a deep, shuddering sigh. He'd survived immediate death. Now came the next problem: surviving this tomb.
---
Echoes from Another World
Thinking clearly again, he activated his one sensory skill.
[Vibration Sense]
He closed his eyes, focused, and began "listening" to the earth.
He felt two different things, both terrifying.
The first was far above, near the surface he'd fallen from — violent, chaotic tremors. BOOM! CRACK! The tremors of a battle of mythic scale. He couldn't tell what was happening exactly, but his mind painted an image of two mountain-sized beasts clashing, every blow triggering a quake. Whatever's going on up there… I'm very glad I'm not part of it, he thought grimly.
The second was closer, far deeper below. A slow, steady beat. Doom… doom… doom…
The same sound he'd sensed in the carriage. Not a battle — but the pulse of some giant machine. Or… a heart. A stone heart, beating in the bowels of the earth.
Arion realized he was trapped between two incomprehensible threats.
---
Journey into the Unknown
There was no way back up — the collapse had sealed everything. His only path was deeper, following the crack that had swallowed him.
He walked through the dark, using the system window as a makeshift lantern. The tunnels were narrow and twisted. Sometimes, he had to crawl on his belly to squeeze through.
Strange minerals glowed faintly when his window-light passed them. He saw skeletons of creatures he didn't recognize — some dwarf-sized, others enormous and reptilian. This was a graveyard of history.
After what felt like forever, he heard running water. The tunnel widened suddenly — and he found himself in a vast, breathtaking cavern.
---
The Heart of the Mountain
It was an entire city.
Colossal pillars carved with masterful detail stretched up into a ceiling lost in shadow. Stone homes, empty and silent, lined paved streets. A forgotten dwarven city, preserved beneath the earth.
And at its center, in the main plaza, was the source of the sound.
A massive device. A spherical construction of copper and black obsidian, several stories tall. Huge pipes and conduits branched from it throughout the city, and giant gears turned with each slow beat.
Doom… A gear shifted.
Doom… A rune flickered on its surface.
Doom… The whole device pulsed with a dim bronze glow.
A mechanical heart — alive, but barely.
Arion stepped closer, awestruck. He used his skill one last time that cursed day.
> [Seeker's Glimpse]
[Data: Heart of the Mountain (Dormant)]
Type: Dwarven Relic / Primary Energy Core
Status: Critically low power. Requires compatible energy source for full reactivation.
Warning: External energy signature detected… [Ghoul Emperor's Aura]. Relic is being slowly corrupted.
Arion stared at the window. He understood immediately — this device was the source of the pulses. The Ghoul Emperor wasn't just hiding here — he was corrupting this heart, likely to drain or weaponize it.
He'd escaped death only to find himself at the center of a crisis that could doom an entire kingdom. Alone. Trapped. Deep in his enemy's lair.
"Perfect," Arion muttered darkly to himself. "Things just keep getting better."