I only encountered a few more slimes of varying color. The crystals lined the walls and acted as the cavern's primary,and only,source of light.
The cavern stretched onward in a hush broken only by the soft percussion of water.
For a while I have been hearing the sound of faraway water. But I still haven't encountered a water source.
Drip....drip...drip..
Each drop echoed a little louder as I continued to walk forward, the sound swelling until it became a steady heartbeat guiding me through the twisting stone cavern.
The path narrowed further, crystals thickening along the walls like frozen lightning. Their pale radiance painted the air in shades of silver-blue. The scent of damp moss and faint mineral tang grew sharper. Ahead, a soft glow pulsed as though the cave itself were breathing.
I stepped into a wide hollow and halted.
A river cut the cavern floor, its current patient and eternal. Centuries of erosion had carved a smooth, serpentine channel through the rock.
The water glimmered with an almost unearthly light. The light reflected the dense clusters of luminous crystals of varying colors and sizes that crowded the walls around it.
Mana thrummed in every ripple; it was almost a song. A grim,yet graceful song.
"The mana is the most dense here," I said.
As I looked at the flowing river my throat ached evermore.
"Safe?" I whispered to no one.
The word dissolved in the cool air and I was left with only myself.
I knelt and dipped a gauntleted hand. The water shimmered against the metal like liquid moonlight. For a long moment I hesitated, remembering only that the world outside my tomb was a stranger. But thirst was relentless. I raised a handful to my lips.
Cool. Pure. A faint, sweet note of mana lingered on my tongue, a taste both alien and achingly familiar.
I leaned over the surface and froze.
A reflection gazed back. My reflection. The reflection I had not seen in over a thousand years.
Black hair fell in soft, uneven strands to the line of my jaw, faintly tousled as if sleep still clung to it. Eyes as dark as obsidian stared from beneath a furrowed brow—steady, but edged with wonder. My face… young. Unscarred. I had expected a stranger of ancient years, but this was the countenance of a man barely grown, caught somewhere between boyhood and eternity.
For the first time since awakening, my breath caught. Heat stung my eyes. Not physical heat but emotional. Longing and hurtful nostalgia of a life I could not remember.
Tears blurred the image of my face, silvering the water with each teardrop.
After more than a millennia of silence and stone, to see myself—to know I still existed—was almost unbearable.
I drew a slow breath, voice barely above the water's murmur.
"So…this is me."
A pause.
"Untouched by time… while everything else moved on."
The surface rippled under a falling tear.
"I don't even remember the man who wore this face."
My hand tightened on the river's edge.
"But if this is what was preserved… there must be a reason."
Another heartbeat of silence passed.
"Very well."
I exhaled, steady now.
"If the world still waits, I'll meet it as I am. A wanderer."
I bowed my head, letting the quiet river bear witness until the tremor in my chest eased. When I finally rose, I drank deeply, enough to fill the emptiness of ages. Without a vessel, I could take nothing with me but the memory of that taste.
The tunnel beyond the river sloped upward. Crystals thinned, shadows gathered.
There, slumped against a jagged wall, rested another knight of a bygone age. Armor mottled with rust encased a skeleton bleached by time. Empty sockets stared at nothing, and in its bony grasp lay a small, dust-choked notebook bound with cracked leather.
I knelt and placed a hand on the corroded breastplate.
"Rest well," I murmured. "Your watch is over."
Gently, I eased the notebook free. Its weight felt heavy with secrets.
Perhaps it holds the world I have lost.
I flipped a page.
"I...don't understand anything," I said with a sigh.
The script was elegant, flowing… and incomprehensible. Loops and slashes formed words I almost recognized, but not enough to read a single line. Centuries had twisted my own language beyond my own understanding.
A sigh escaped me. I touched the cover once more in silent thanks, then willed it into the inner void where my spear slept. The book dissolved into a faint shimmer and vanished.
After that, I encountered various other creatures.
There was a bat with fanged wings dripping with poison.
A spider with the emblem of a skull etched into its body. And various smaller creatures. Some seemed frightenined, others angry.
The cave widened again until the ceiling disappeared into blackness. My footsteps fell into a silence so deep it seemed to swallow sound itself.
And then I saw it.
A door, if such a thing could still be called a door, towered before me.
Its height rivaled the cavern's own ceiling, a colossal slab of black stone veined with silver. Ancient draconic sigils sprawled across its surface in intricate relief: coiled serpents with wings of fire, talons clutching stars, eyes of onyx set into spiraling patterns. The sheer scale dwarfed every hall of man I could faintly remember.
"Wow...that is simply brilliant," I said in wonder.
I stepped closer, craning my neck. "How… am I to open thi—"
Before I could speak it aloud,a guttural roar cut the question short.
The sound rolled through the cavern like a storm, it was deep enough to rattle the stone beneath my feet. I turned back and looked at the shadows that seemed to almost aproach me menacingly.
Two crimson lights burned in the darkness behind me.
A figure emerged.
It was titanic, armored in black iron slick with decay. It had long limbs covered in rusty steel. A tattered red cape hung from it's back, its edges seemed decayed.
It's most likely rotted face was covered by a full-faced helm with a wing-like crest, giving a regal and imposing look even while undead.
A massive,oversized lance scraped the floor as it dragged the weapon behind, sparks hissing from rusted steel. The creature's helm caught the crystal glow.
Its armour was designed with various dragon symbols.
From the shadows around it came more.
Clink. Clatter. Clink.
Dozens of shapes stepped into the faint light: undead knights in corroded steel, empty sockets flaring red. Their weapons rasped against the rock, a chorus of steel and bone.
I tightened my grip on the spear as it flared into existence, black steel humming with quiet menace.
I spun it behind me. A crescent flash of black followed it.
My helm formed out of drifting shadows
The cavern filled with the hush before a storm.