The wind died first.
One moment it was screaming… tearing across the plateau with enough force to flay skin from bone… and the next, nothing. Absolute silence.
The kind that made your ears ring and your brain second-guess whether you'd gone deaf.
"What's going on?" Amanda inquired. She almost stumbled… was the storm dying? No it didn't seem like that… the storm was ever present… no it had gotten worse… but around the cohort, and the statue… it had completely died.
"What the fuck…" Danisque whispered.
Nobody told him to watch his language. He spoke for them all.
The structure loomed ahead. Up close, it wasn't black so much as absent like someone had cut a hole in reality and filled it with something that barely qualified as matter.
The towers rose into the fog, vanishing points that seemed to go on forever. The arches between them could have swallowed starships whole.
Vesper's hand drifted to his pocket. The egg was beginning to heat up now.
'Why now of all times??'
The young vamp really could not understand.
'Does this place have a connection to Lysbelle?'
If it did, Vesper was curious about the connection. The egg was beginning to grow hotter. Not burning, but close. He could feel it against his thigh like a second heartbeat.
"Adam." Jimeneus's voice was steady, but it had a tightness. "Tell me you're getting something. Anything."
The navigator stared at his ring. His face was pale beneath the fog-damp hair.
"I'm getting... interference. Like before. But it's not jamming. It's like something's overwriting the readings."
He looked up with a hint of excitement
"Captain, I don't think this place is abandoned."
Knoncan spoke for the first time again in hours.
"Then what's inside?"
Adam frowned a little whereas Vesper contemplated.
"There were footsteps. I traced them. Military boots. Definitely from our batch. I have reason to believe that they may be inside, exploring."
Jimeneus was silent for a few minutes. Nobody spoke. Finally, Adam broke the silence.
"They may be inside for a few extra credits. Anyway… this is a simulation. Maybe this is a secret test. If we pass it… Maybe we could get extra honours."
Vesper was silent. Personally, he wanted to explore but… true to his heart. Exploring alone was scary. The statue itself looked ominous.
Jimeneus spoke, his words were slow and solemn.
"I doubt we should be hasty. This entire structure is a variable. We have no clue as to what dangers lie inside."
Adam fell silent. In normal circumstances, the cohort leader would be correct.
It would be a better idea to go by the safe route, there was no need for exploration however…
Adam knew the truth. The safe route had ended here. There was none remaining… the moment this looming variable appeared.
A sigh escaped his lips instead.
He didn't possess the heart to say it out loud though. Adam was sure someone else would notice.
"We don't know what's out there either," Vesper whispered as he glanced at the storm that howled at the plateau's edge… unable to cross some invisible boundary.
"…And the storm out there is getting terribly worse."
Jimeneus considered Vesper's words. The storm was indeed getting worse. And it would mostly get even more terrifying.
Amanda whispered.
"Well if there's a cohort inside already, maybe we could find them and join numbers. That would increase our rate of survival as well"
'Hmmm…' Jimeneus was silent, he was thinking. Everyone had valid points. Knoncan too spoke, his voice a little gruff.
"Maybe if we cross this… architecture… we could reach the other side. It doesn't seem like we can go further ahead without entering it… just look at how massive it is and how far it stretches."
Adam glanced at Knoncan, who spoke the hidden words in his heart. The muscular tank looked like a dumb giant but he was rather sharp and observant.
"That's true," Jimeneus whispered, his conviction faltering slightly. Even if they went back and made a turnabout… simply doing that would take at least a week at full speed.
The cohort barely had two and a half days.
'Maybe there really is no option.'
It was the only choice the cohort had if they wanted to reach the vantage point.
A sliver of hope rose in Jimeneus's heart. Could they survive until the end?
Maybe they could join forces with the cohort inside and traverse the dangers. Honestly, taking care of the other cadets and having lost so many was taking a psychological toll.
All the cohort leader wanted to do was rest his mind a little. Shaking his head, Jimeneus pinched his nose slightly in deep contemplation.
Everybody stared at him. Waiting for his decision. He was the cohort leader and a smart one at that, they'd follow him no matter what.
Maybe not Vesper though.
He seemed as if he had already made up his mind to go inside.
Finally, a few moments later, Jimeneus nodded.
"Formation. Same as before. Vesper takes point. Adam stays close to me. Everyone watch your sightlines and do not wander."
The entrance wasn't a door. It was a gap between two of the black towers, wide enough for ten men to walk abreast.
The ground beneath their feet had changed no more frozen gravel, no more snow. Just smooth, dark stone that seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it.
Vesper's gaze lingered on the statue a second longer before leading the cohort ahead toward the entrance.
Frost seemed like it was starting to melt as the cohort moved ahead toward the entrance. It was a bit of a stretch. A long walk but the party had decided not to spend energy running.
Instead, they were all sucking on some of confectioneries that Amanda had plundered and gobbling down the nutrition paste.
Danique glanced at Vesper and offered.
"Bro, don't you want nutrition paste?"
The young vamp shook his head, "I hate the taste."
Danisque nodded but he replied immediately.
"It'd do you good to have some. The party can't move on an empty stomach. We don't know the dangers inside."
Vesper smiled, politely declining.
"I think better on an empty stomach."
Danique rolled his eyes and threw a nutrition paste that the Vamp caught midair.
"Oh quit your whining. That's not very rockstar."
Vesper stared at the nutrition paste in his hand and then at Danisque. Then he sighed.
The main reason he declined was that it was a waste for him to consume it but sensing the good intentions of the Palend Bastard… it didn't seem like he could say no.
Jimeneus nodded. "He's right. Eat it up. Even if you think better empty, it'll give us some peace of mind."
Vesper stared at the leader and then at the other cohort members, then rolled his eyes but a small smile couldn't help but form on his face.
"Alright. If all of you insist."
He looked at the nutrition paste. It did look kind of appetizing… in its own way… well, if he were a kid who enjoyed eating mint ice cream.
Vesper took a small bite and immediately swallowed his tongue instinctively, resisting the urge to throw up.
'Gods… this tastes like SHIT!'
The cohort members chuckled staring at Vesper's scrunched face. It was a brief moment of bliss, some calm before whatever storm they'd face inside.
Soon the cohort entered the entrance. The gap between two of the black towers.
They stepped into it. A leap of hope… and as the cohort moved, the shadows grew darker… the storm outside devoured the invisible boundary and ahead… a perfectly still silence whispered to them.
'Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.'