Saintess Summons Skeletons

“That should have been the last of the stragglers,” Sofia noted, watching a dozen of her skeletal grayskins tear a live one the rats had found into pieces.

“Hmm. At least now we can relax a bit. It should be night soon, so we better stay here until daybreak anyway. Is the thing your rats found still far?” Sonia asked Bookie.

“Not far! We just need to climb the stairs here!” Bookie answered, pointing at a dark gateway at the end of the corridor.

“We’ve been going up a lot. So this was the deepest level of this place. I guess if there is a vault for those keys that’s got to be it,” Sofia commented.

“Climbed so much we’re almost out of the forbidden layer,” Sonia added, “And still not a clue as to what this place was for or what the people who built it even looked like.”

“Is it often like that?” Sofia asked.

“Not really. Often I can at least guess what a ruin used to be. For this one to be in such a decent condition and still look so foreign… The people who built this and our own civilisations must have almost nothing in common.”

“Interesting how we can have more in common with people on completely different planets compared to the people of Veliadren’s past…”

“Right?” Sonia said, head turning back to look at Sofia who walked behind her, “Honestly almost makes me want to just stay at this level forever and continue exploring the forbidden layer. Learn more about the past and all the crazy things people did before us.”

“Do you think it’s possible to explore it all?” Bookie asked.

“I don’t think so. Even if you were to forget the dangers. It’s just too big. Can you imagine? Just exploring the entire surface of the world would take a while, but the forbidden layer is hundreds of kilometers tall in addition to that.”

“Hmm… I’m sure Anna could do it!” Bookie said.

“Do you mean the admin goddess?” Sonia asked, “Yeah, maybe. If she was still properly alive. The people of my group have been looking into a way to bring her back, but it honestly looks hopeless.”

“Your group is working with Nex?” Sofia asked.

“No, though we know he’s looking into it as well now. We sold our research to Life and Creation, actually.”

“Hmm. Still not going to tell us your group’s name?”

“We don’t actually have one,” Sonia said with a shrug, “told you, we’re like thirty people, and most usually act alone, like me those past few years. It’s nothing grandiose, really, just people working toward a shared goal.”

“Got it. I just have another question, is Cecless part of your group?”

“The dust dragon? I don’t think that one is part of any group at all aside from the Dragon council. But I don’t know much about her really, sometimes Eternal Mountain goes to her planet and he always looks dead on the inside for months when he returns.”

Dust dragon? First time I hear someone call her that. It’s true that she had that planet near the sun named after her…

The random discussion died down as the group finally made their way up the last slope, entering a wide, completely empty hall with a large round structure embedded in the back wall.

“Dragon scales,” Sonia said right away, shooting up a slow-moving arrow that brightly illuminated the room.

The structure on the back wall looked like a round gate made of overlapping dragon scales clamped together in an asterite frame.

“That definitely does look like a vault door,” Sofia noted, observing the twelve overlapping green dragon scales, “I don’t see a hole for our key anywhere, though. Should we try just breaking through?”

“Better not if we can avoid it,” Sonia rebuked instantly, “If our guess is right and this is a research facility, there’s a good chance of whatever is protected by those doors being set to self-destruct if the vault is breached. Talking from experience.”

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“Let’s see if we can find the proper way to open it, then…”

The dragon scales the door was made of were surprisingly sturdy, almost as much as Sofia’s armguard, she could barely leave scratches on the surface with the armguard’s claws.

Too bad they’re too big to bring out. This is good stuff.

While Sofia observed the front and the skeletons checked the room’s walls for hidden triggers, Sonia actually found something first, on the sides of the gate’s asterite frame.

“Found keyholes I think,” she shared, “small, six of them. Three on each side. Too narrow for the mithril sticks we have.”

“The rats would have brought them if they’d found anything that remotely looks like a key,” Sofia said, “I guess we’ll have to break through.”

Without a word, Pareth passed by Sofia, shaking his skull, he dug into his skull from below with his right hand, pulling out a thin mithrium key and pushed into one of the six keyholes while staring at Sofia.

With a simple half turn to the right, something clicked, and the sound of heavy machinery echoed from beyond the gate, six heavy locks opening one after the other, shaking the ruins. The dragon scale gate slid open.

“Right… The penthouse key could also do that…” Sofia mumbled, too embarrassed to look into Pareth’s flaming eyes.

“That’s what that key you got does?!” Sonia asked, flabbergasted.

“Yeah… Opens any door is what the description says, but to think it extends even to something from another epoch and technology altogether…”

Sonia was lost for words for a second. “You did have to fight against an entire planet to get it… You wouldn’t want to sell it perchance?”

“It’s Pareth’s,” Sofia answered, glancing into the door beyond the door. There were multiple layers of dragon scale gates, slowly opening one by one. So many scales…

Pareth firmly refused, stashing the key back into his skull.

“Understood, won’t ask again. Still. Closed doors I couldn’t open… There are a few… We’ll have a talk about this later.”

Pareth nodded and moved to Sofia’s side, watching the doors open one by one.

“Entire dragon is door,” Pestle commented, “Very precious inside.”

“At least as precious as that many Dragon scales,” Sofia agreed.

“Don’t get your hopes up too fast, precious for whoever built this might not be precious for us. Had my share of letdowns, from relics too old to function properly to things worthless for our races,” Sonia commented, clearly less enthusiastic than the rest of them.

“You’re making it sound like we shouldn’t have bothered with the ruin at all.”

“I’m just keeping your expectations in check, don’t want a failure to demoralize my teammates so early in the expedition.”

“Don’t worry about that, just the skeletons made this worthwhile for us already.”

As the last layer of doors opened, a ray of bright light escaping from inside of the sealed chamber, everyone readied their spells. Although they had never discussed the possibility of there being some dangerous immemorial creature behind the doors, they all knew there were two things advanced civilisations liked to put behind locked doors. Precious things, and dangerous ones.

The interior of the vault was relatively small. An orb of white energy, about a meter large, floated in the middle of a glass pillar at the center. The orb was surrounded by floating rings of unknown alloys spinning around it with a lazy hum.

All around the glass pillar were incomprehensible mechanical contraptions that reminded Sofia of the machinery in Sun’s orbital temple.

The group entered, lowering their weapons.

“Any idea about what we are looking at?” Sofia asked first.

“Not in the slightest,” Sonia answered, “But look there, that looks like our keys,” she continued, pointing out a small mithril ball that stuck out of the top of one of the machines surrounding the pillar.

“You’re right… Still, this energy ball worries me a bit.”

Sonia nodded, “Whatever it is, it probably feeds on the ambient mana that must have been seeping through the doors. Doesn’t look alive at least. Maybe some kind of golem core? I’m not even sure if the shining white part is mana or not.”

“It mana,” Pestle confirmed with a nod, “Not live. Much be stable. Pesle think is energy storage.”

“It seems almost solid. For it to look like this… Trillions of mana? Maybe more?” Sofia estimated.

“That certainly is a lot to keep in such a small space. But assuming it’s a big mana storage, it doesn’t explain all the machines around it.”

“Maybe it bomb?” Pestle guessed.

“Our own little sundial? I could see that.”

“I don’t think that’s it,” Sonia chimed in, “you wouldn’t keep an explosive weapon at the bottom of a research facility with no way to quickly get it to the surface to use it, right? Besides, could this really be of any help to a group capable of killing dragons to make doors out of?”

“You have a point. Maybe we’ll understand more if we use the keys? There might be slots for them if there’s already one inside.”

The group looked at each other, all still standing near the open gate, none too eager to step up to the weird machines first.