Chapter 1854 1854. A Silver Lining
Where things were still off though were the things that Walker found himself thinking when he was moving with Midnight and Onyx toward a sloping path that would have run whatever waste and water that was in the city toward whatever the final destination was.
He found himself thinking about the entire process that had brought the city to its end. The fact that some madman had been enough to orchestrate all of this. It was something from an evil villain fairytale. No one would expect that one person could cause all of this.
Yet, the one person being powerful was the key. Many of the kingdoms back him had powerful individuals. Taking Barry as one of them as an example proved that point. He was able to leave the human city and venture off toward any monster wave or outbreak or anything. He could handle it with minimal effort then return to his home.
This had made many people respect him for protecting their farms. In turn, it also had been able to save many of these farms, a source of food. Therefore, the one person in this situation was very important to keeping the entire kingdom and its people alive.
If the situations were reversed and Barry had lost his mind, it would have spelled an end to many people. They would not be able to resist him going completely berserk with his skills and level of power. The comparison helped Walker make the pieces of this puzzle fit together. He just didn\'t have the exact details of how it had all fone. But he might find more down here.
"There are some paintings and scrapes on the walls. I think they were made by children." Walker mumbled as he caught some faint colors on the walls. It looked like they had been done with dyes and stones. Specifically, some different stones that had been laying on the ground here and there. Placed down and not touched for many years.
There was almost a sadness to the way that the stones had been just left behind at some point. That a child had to use little rocks as toys since their entire home had been taken over by corrupted evil. Both Midnight and Onyx felt the same as they all remained silent for a moment before they kept moving.
"More things here." Midnight stopped again just a few steps ahead. She had found soem pieces of metal tools.
\'Rusted rake…
Rusted shovel…
Rusted trowel…\'
Walker used the all around appraisal to figure out what they had been once upon a time. "Farming tools. Those are what\'s left of the farming tools that I am sure the people tried to escape down here with. They believed in a harvest goddess before. It makes sense that they would want to maintain some closeness with that ideal."
"What about that brother?" Onyx had spotted a different thing. One thing that was slightly larger but still seemed to be made of leather.
"That\'s armor. It was apparently partially made of leather but that\'s long gone. I guess they dropped it while fleeing. That storage area was cleaned out. I would bet that whatever was in it was taken away quickly. So maybe the undead were startled when it was cleared out. They could sense some living things. That\'s how they attacked in a way, right?" Walker\'s theory seemed to hold water as they kept moving.
They left all the random rusted tools and armors behind. These random parts were heavy and would have stopped anyone from fleeing faster. It was much wiser to maintain light when traveling fast. That would allow the person running to keep up their stamina. Especially if here were children to protect that could not run as fast and would need to be carried.
"This must be the main chamber for all the water and waste to flow. We should be in the middle of the city by now." Judging from Walker\'s estimate and how long they had been walking, they would be directly in the center. The things above them would be the flame dominator dragon ruins, the massive pyramid, and the large streets.
"I expected there to be some caves connected above, but it seems that the race that was here had ignored the flame dominator ruins. They must have thought they couldn\'t go near them. They also might have just had a large open square without that massive pyramid. That entire thing seemed to have been made by the mummified pharaoh before it was, mummified."
The large open space connected to a natural cave. Clearly formed by the flow of water and pressure on sand over time. But there was also evidence that the stones made by this race had been operated to hold the space together at some point. They may or may not have known about the dragon ruins slightly above this space, but they knew of the caves.
This meant that there was a much higher chance that something of this previous race might survive. Whether it was good or bad didn\'t matter. Walker could explore these caves because the way that nature had carved them was very straight forward.
"Once the first rain comes here, this will most likely flood. We should see what we can find while we are here or else the path could be lost forever." The idea had come to him with a little stress. This meant that anything living down here or any remains would eventually be washed away.
The more that Walker. Onyx and Midnight moved toward the sandstone caves, the more they felt that they were able to relax. It wasn\'t anything in particular, But Walker noticed the mana around was calm. It didn\'t seem to be tense or unbalanced. This could have been from the curse around the desert being removed. This area was deeper underground and had been able to return to the normal flow much easier because it had a high amount of earth mana naturally.
More signs that living beings had been here once appeared. Crumbling bones from what had been monsters but nothing that appeared to have been a race. The cave also seemed to twist and turn less and less as Walker and Midnight found themselves standing in a rather dusty area.
\'Underground dried river bed
This is a dried riverbed of the great sandstone cavern. It used to flow through the mountains and in to the desert before falling deep underground. It would then wash out to the saltwater of the ocean.
It has been dry for generations and will easily flood during a large rainstorm. If it returns, it will nourish multiple oasis as it used to. The silt is ideal for mixing with clay to create very good hardening cement used to create buildings.\'
The all around appraisal gave Walker what he needed. It proved this was a river bed and also that there was something that helped the race that lived here before. The fact that the silt from this deep underground river could be used for building meant that it had been used before.
The fact that it once was used to hold many things together probably inspired unique building methods that brought the city above to be. Yet, this was just part of the knowledge Walker took from this.
"This river used to run all the way to the ocean. That means the race that fled this way escaped to the ocean." Walker smiled slightly. He thought he would find a lot of dusty and crumbling bones. Maybe some runes that had been scrapped on the walls. Instead, the fleeing people had escaped here through waste and fear. They had pushed for their lives and escaped to the ocean.
"I guess we are going back up to tell the story. We might be able to follow this all the way to where the race went. We might be finding a part dragon race different from lizardmen and dragonkin still alive. They might be different now though." Walker felt a lot more positive. As did Onyx and Midnight as they seemed to be playing a guessing game of what the race would be called nowadays.
"I am really glad we walked all the way down here. And eventually, this palace will be back to the way nature made it." Walker hummed slightly as he walked ahead of Midnight and Onyx. now he looked at the odd drawings here and there with a smile. A silver lining for all of this darkness.
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