Kael Cor: A Vampire's Awakening Chapter 225 The Sealing Array V : Breaking The Final Enchantment, Skeletons!

In the end I still chose go first, moving slowly and picking my steps as I walked into the hallway. Unlike the other tunnels, the hallway after the enchantment was made of concrete, and there were steel beams lining the walls as some sort of support.
The second enchantment was almost a hundred meters away, and the sheer distance of that one from the first, made me suspect that this hallway was probably lined with traps. So without a doubt, caution was advised.
I used soul sight again, and what I saw almost scared the crap out of me: because underneath the ground, within the walls and the ceiling, I could see spikes with serrated edges, and each of those edges seemed to be coated with silver.
Sure this place seems to be booby trapped against intruders of the vampiric nature, but any other person would also be skewered and sliced apart by those spikes. This was not a pretty sight, not one bit.
The floor had tiles on it, but to the normal eyes, all that could be seen was just a concrete floor, without any demarcation to give off the impression of tiles that may or may not be booby trapped. It was a false floor, something that was covered by another enchantment.
But traps underneath the ground and within the walls were the least of our worries, before the final enchantment at the end of the hall, there were numerous others, placed all over, and hidden just as well as the first, and since I understood nothing of enchantments, I couldn't exactly tell what it was for.
[This hall is filled with traps, apart from the enchantments I can see, I can feel hundreds of others, and none of them gives me a good feeling. You have to use the same method to disable them, or have the traps activate themselves with everyone a safe distance away.]
That was sound advice, and it was my intention to do the same thing here, as last time. However activating the traps would be stupid, because this place could cave in, and we would loose our chances of finding the sealing array. So the only other option was to use my soul energy and destroy the wardstones or in this case the big ass wardstone powering all the enchantments.
I didn't notice it before due to the criss cross of power lines and the plethora of enchantments, but there was a really huge wardstone the size of a car underneath the floor. And while I felt the need to destroy it, I also felt as if, it was possible for it to become an important resource. I know Malek would like to run all sort of tests and experiments on it.
So this time rather than destroy the wardstone, I could just disconnect it from the wards of enchantment, reliving them of their power source should have the sake effect as destroying it. But just to be on the safe side, I had to know what lay on the other side of the final barrier enchantment.
The ability of my soul sight gave me the ability to see past the material plane. I could see souls mainly, but everything physical, or magical could be stripped away to allow me access to something deeper and unobscured. With it, walls were no longer a imitation, not even bodies or steel. But there was a price for using this skill: just like weaving, soul sight incurred nature's backlash. Though it was on a smaller scale than weaving, it's damage was constant. Which makes it really hard to focus and think when your head is pounding to the sound of your heartbeat.

The final enchantment was quite a surprise to me. My soul sight could pierce through it and look at the other side, but it could not go any farther than ten meters. Almost as if there was something restricting the ability and stopping it from reaching it's full potential. I felt as if there was a wall blocking my sight, but even then, what I could see was more than enough.
Just ten meters was not enough roof to get a clear picture of what lay ahead, but I could tell it was another cavern, and this one sloped downwards. The ten meters that I could see, came to a stop over a ledge, but even then it felt really weird. I felt as if the ten meter distance was longer than what I thought it was, and something was just diverting my gaze, pushing it forward and hiding what was in between and what was ahead.
I felt worried by such a outcome since this meant there was another factor at play here. But coming here was already a risk, and we can't expect to know everything, or have a counter for everything we might see or experience. We just had to go with the flow, and make do with what we have. So in that regard, I released my soul energy and let it seep into the floor.
The wardstone was big, and the energy it gave seemed to cause a little interference with my soul energy as it released pulses that dispersed it. But this was not enough to deter as I renewed my approach, and used a thicker and more stronger strand of soul energy to wrap around the wardstone.
I had this distinct feeling that the wardstone was not normal, seeing as apart from Ionite, it was the only other physical material that could affect and influence my soul energy in one way or another, even if it's just a little. But whatever it was, it was in the way, and I had to remove it!
My soul energy wrapped around the wardstone, and in the placed where all of it's numerous power lines were connected to it, I broke them. This time; unlike the first time, there was a release of power, a sound of multiple rope snapping and fizzling out was heard, and a wave of yellow energy was released.
The energy wave made me feel nauseous, but that feeling only lasted for a moment. I turned back to see that some of the vampires who was caught in the blast radius of the wave, had rather severe reactions. Most of them bent over and puked the guts and previous meal out, others suddenly had their hair falling off. Of course their hair grew back seconds later, but still this wardstone was really weird, because it felt.....corrosive.
But without power from the wardstone, the enchantments all began to fade away, disappearing into the air with vapor like movements, as they broke into motes of golden light. The final enchantment fell, and blast of stale air was released.
It was really bad, as the air carried with it a stench that was almost too powerful for a Vampire's superior senses. But it was only a matter of getting it under control, before a tunnel was revealed.
I didn't see this, in fact for some reason my soul sight completely skipped going through the tunnel and got all the way to the very end of it. And this was problematic for me, very problematic because I was not just looking at one tunnel, I was looking at hundreds.
With this many paths to our goals, and no idea which was the true path, we would have to split our forces. But every horror movie ever made has made one thing clear. The moment the group separates, that's when the monster goes around killing them, one by one. Bottom line is, we could not afford to be separated from each other.
We have no idea what we will he facing down these tunnels, and some groups would not be strong enough to face some challenges without help. We might be vampires, and not your average breed of explorers, but so far everything we've destroyed was specifically tailored to make vampires suffer and die in the most painful way imaginable. I don't expect these tunnels to be any different.
"Lord Kael which is the right path?" Bien said to me as she moved closer, Sousa right on her heels.
The two bloodline elders had worried looks on their faces, and so did the thousands of vampires behind us that could see what lay ahead. But I couldn't assuage their doubt's, because quite frankly I really had no idea which way to go too. I was just as clueless as they were.
[There's an enchantment on this tunnels, and a mental echo lingering within one of them. I think I know the right path to take.] Gus said to me as his voice fumbled through my mind.
"I don't understand how that works?" I said to him, hoping he could give a clearer explanation than this.
[There's an attraction enchantment on the tunnels, well on one of them really. As if it's supposed to lead someone or something through, like a magnet or a compass. And from that dame tunnel, I can feel a mental echo, like the lingering thoughts or feelings of somebody or a lot of people. Based on the invariable fact that an enchantment like this would only be put on the right tunnel to lead someone with the compass to the right location, and mental or psychic echoes can only be left by either a living or dead person. That means that tunnel has the most activity, and weird vibe, which makes it the right one.] Gus explained.
"But what about the other tunnels, don't you feel anything from them?" I asked, just to be sure we were not ignoring anything else in favor of the tunnel that had the most vibe.
Gus shifted his head back in the direction of the tunnels, and looked around, focused and serious. He knew what was at stake here, and we couldn't afford to make any mistakes. After a few more minutes, he turned to me and said.
[Most of the other tunnels have the same mental echoes, but at a lesser degree than the main one I found. I think the echoes are from people who died in here, they must have taken a wrong turn in their attempt to find what lays beyond. Master Kael, some of these echo's are old, and really ancient. People have been dying in this tunnels for a lot longer than we might think, and and a few of them are vampires.]
I raised my eyebrows in surprise at that. Things just kept getting weirder, as it seems this tunnels, or the entire dancing caves of Noxis Nyx as a whole, is just one big secret. It sent shivers down my spine as I realized that the vampires had a more complicated history than I expected, because this place! This mine! This tunnels. Were right in the territory of the old vampire civilization, but why does it feel like apart from the sealing array being hidden here, nothing about this tunnels was connected to the vampires, apart from the fact that it's supposed to keep them out.
[And one more thing Lord Kael, only one tunnel has the attracting enchantment, and taking a closer look at it, I found that it's tailored to a specific device, a device we don't have or even know what it's like. But I can follow the trail of energy and the echoes just fine, I think it would lead us to where we're supposed to go.]
I gave Gus a simple nod as confirmation and he took the lead, heading to a tunnel that at a closer glance looked even more ordinary and unassuming as the others. I turned to the others and waved my hand at them, that was enough sign to tell them to keep up.
With Gus leading, I was hoping this journey would be a lot smoother and not have as much troubles as I'm expecting it to have. The kid was smart, and I was sure he knew how steer clear of trouble rather than march towards it.
The tunnel looked like it hewn and polished meticulously over the years by hand. It was black, and quite wide, almost twenty meters wide or more, giving people a lot of room to walk in. Of course we had a long file of vampires behind us, so movement would not be as easy for the people behind. The tunnel looked it was excavated out of a marble mountain, as it's surface looked like glass, and if it wasn't so dark, I'm sure I would have been able to see my face reflected off of it.
But one thing I really hated about our walk through this tunnel was the stench. It was the smell of death like I've never experienced before, and it was driving my sinuses and brain crazy. It didn't take long for us to reach the first sign of death: forty minutes into our march in the tunnel, we came to an area where the tunnel seemed to get wider, and littered on the ground were bones, hundreds and thousands off them.
And then things got weirder as the bones began to vibrate and shake, and then an invisible wind seemed to wrap around them and raise them up, putting them back together again. This went on for about thirty seconds until what was standing in front of us, was an army of seven foot tall skeletons, each wearing armors and weapons made and crafter from bone. But they looked dead, lifeless.
VOOOOP!
Green flames lit up within their eye sockets, eerie and chilling. It was as if our very presence had activated them and brought them back to life. The flames in their eyes burned brighter, and the first Skeleton began to move forward, taking one slow step after another until he was standing three meters away from Gus.
"Theeeee Livingnnnnnnn Musttttt notttttttt passsssssss!"
the skeleton's voice was grating and chilling beyond words. I was sure I could smash this chunk of bones into dust if I wanted too, but I just couldn't help being a little afraid. This was the dead on a whole other level, something that was completely different to vampires, more sinister. And then I heard Gus's words rumble across the tunnel, almost as if the tunnels itself was amplifying his telepathic abilities!
[Well then that means we're in luck, because you see Mr. Skeleton...…..I'm not alive either]
And then he jumped and stuck his fangs right through the skeleton's skull. And under my shocked gaze, Gus fed on it!

Chapter end