Seeing the path clear, Alan cautiously glanced at Karkaroff, then motioned towards the doorway—a silent command for the man to lead the way down.
Karkaroff's expression shifted into something deeply pained. *Why is it that no matter which side I'm on, the suicidal task of pathfinding always falls to me?* he thought bitterly.
Sensing the delay, Alan fixed him with a sharp glare. Karkaroff flinched, lowered his head, and reluctantly squeezed through the small door, inching his way down the stone steps with agonizing care.
"Move it! My light orbs are illuminating the stairs for you, aren't they?" Alan snapped impatiently. "Can't you see where you're going?"
Karkaroff scrambled to hasten his pace.
"Well? Are there any traps?" Alan called out from the threshold.
"No danger yet, Master. It looks like an ordinary basement," Karkaroff's voice echoed back, muffled by the stone.
Hearing no tremor of alarm in the man's tone, Alan relaxed. He ducked into the crawlway and descended. Upon reaching the bottom, he summoned several more globes of light, scattering them across the ceiling until the space was as bright as day.
The basement was surprisingly vast, spanning roughly the same area as the ground floor above. One half was an expansive, open-plan warehouse, while the other was partitioned into several rooms. The floor consisted of thick, meticulously leveled stone slabs. The air held a dry, clinical scent—like a hospital wing long after the smell of antiseptic has faded.
The warehouse section was lined with more than a dozen rows of heavy shelving. Alan scanned them, his eyebrows rising. They were stocked to the brim with alcohol, beverages, and preserved foods: several Tebo Warthog hams, traditional pork hams, bundles of sausages, rows of bacon, smoked meats, and wheels of cheese. He even spotted crates of various canned goods.
Other shelves held essential household supplies: boxes of candles, oil lamps, bundles of seasoned firewood, and high-quality cookware. Everything was kept in pristine condition, showing no signs of spoilage or dampness.
"Goodness, look at all this. Enough for a single person to live comfortably for years," Alan noted, invigorated by the haul. He immediately began inspecting the adjacent rooms.
One room was a fully equipped kitchen, complete with a specialized exhaust fan to pull fumes away—a rare luxury for a basement. Beside it was a washroom, scrubbed so clean it looked as though it had never been used.
The final room was a bedroom. A fireplace stood opposite the door, a fresh stack of wood waiting inside the grate. The hearth was spotless, without a speck of ash. To one side of the bed stood several large wooden wardrobes; a quick check revealed them to be packed with fresh linens, quilts, and spare sets of clothing.
On the other side of the room, bookshelves lined the wall. Most were empty, save for a dozen common titles and a few back-issues of newspapers. Between the shelves sat a heavy solid-wood desk, fully stocked with stationery and two thick stacks of parchment. A small wine cabinet and bar counter had been built beside the desk, though they remained unstocked. The entire setup spoke of a certain aristocratic foresight.
*This isn't just a basement; it's a Travers family safe house,* Alan thought. *Prepared so that someone could vanish down here for five, or even seven years if necessary. It's built for the end of the world.*
Alan began a meticulous search of the bedroom. Tucked away in a cabinet beneath the desk, he found it: a small, sturdy safe.
It bore no resemblance to a Muggle combination safe; there were no dials or keyholes, only a heavy handle set into a completely blank metal face. Alan placed a hand on the cold surface, sensing the air. A faint, rhythmic magical pulse hummed beneath his palm. A magic safe.
He didn't hesitate. He pulled out his No-Injury Hammer and began to strike the metal. Before long, the rhythmic thuds forced the hidden runes and protective lattice to shimmer into view.
Alan frowned at the complexity of the patterns. The warding here was far more intricate than the one at the basement entrance. It was a dense hodgepodge of enchantments: explosion-proof, poison-resistant, waterproof, and reinforced against general magic.
"I could crack it, but time is against me," Alan muttered, checking his watch. It was nearly midnight, and he still needed to stage the scene upstairs. Just as he considered a more violent approach, he caught a specific detail in the runic flow. His eyes sharpened.
"Bloodline lock. It only yields to a specific genetic signature. If that's the case, I don't need to break it."
Alan stood up, pulled a small syringe from his pouch, and tossed it to Karkaroff. "Go upstairs and draw some blood from Torquil. You know how to use that, don't you?"
"Yes, Master," Karkaroff replied, catching the syringe. *I didn't know before tonight, but after watching you do it to us, I've had a masterclass,* he thought privately.
"Hurry!" Alan barked.
Karkaroff scrambled back up the stairs. He found the four men on the second floor still unresponsive—some lost to the ether, some to shock, and others simply broken by the night's events. He tried not to look at their faces as he quickly filled the syringe and hurried back down.
Alan took the blood and dabbed a small amount onto the blank face of the safe. He drew his wand and whispered a focused incantation. The blood didn't smear; it seeped into the metal as if being absorbed by a sponge. A sharp *click* echoed through the room, and the heavy door swung open.
"Six months of studying Bloodline Magic finally pays off," Alan murmured, pulling the door wide.
The safe was divided into two compartments. The top shelf, surprisingly spacious, contained only two items: a heavy iron key and a single piece of folded parchment.