Chapter 221: The Royal City Sewers

"It's honey." Only a thin layer remained, nearly dried and stuck to the pottery shard, with a sugary texture resembling fine sand grains. It had been here for a long time, but not more than half a year.

"A mark? Who left it?"

"I suppose so; hardly anyone would come here to make honey tea."

An exhilarating discovery. Though different from what was initially said, it strongly confirmed the hypothesis. One could feel the shift in everyone's mindset, like a progress bar appearing halfway through a long wait, showing that their previous efforts were not in vain and that a goal awaited them ahead.

Green's reaction was less obvious, but his short, chaotic breathing betrayed his inner turmoil; finally, he let out a long sigh.

The mystery that had troubled them for months finally showed substantial progress; an elusive shadow revealed a corner, one that could be traced. This made him feel much better, and his attitude shifted as well. He waited for Kraft to carefully examine the pottery shard, then stepped closer and asked:

"Is it the professor you mentioned?"

"Not certain, but highly likely." Conversely, Kraft did not feel things were becoming clearer.

Obscure guidance, a shattered honey jar, and now this... rock fissure. It was a winding, lightning-bolt-shaped crack. In the deep, lightless recesses lay jagged square shadows, making observers think of the uneven rows of teeth embedded in jawbones, inserted into neatly cut quarry caves.

This made people, upon realizing it was an artificial creation, instinctively feel it was as old and dead as bones, buried at depths where it would not normally see the light of day again.

The quarry's expansion had reached this underground space. It seemed the discoverer had no intention of entering to explore, even abandoning mining in this direction.

Piles of rock beside the semi-finished product stone chamber door showed they had once sealed this area, but after abandoning it, they dug it open again to bury the dead.

The buriers hastily placed the remains and funerary items on the ground, as if fearing to carve a stone niche under the gaze of the fissure, afraid the sound of hammering would carry into the dark, vast space on the other side.

I'll go first. Brother Wading, you follow behind. The rest of you wait for my order. Green hung the lantern back on his waist, drew his sword, assessed the width of the fissure, then sheathed it and picked up a spare short sword instead.

"Won't you prepare a bit more? How long have we been going down?" Seeing the priest already had one foot planted in the rock fissure, inhaling and drawing in his belly to crawl inside, Kraft thought it better to be safe.

"This place is a bit far from the surface. If something unexpected happens, it won't be easy to handle. Why not consider mapping the route first and making some preparations before entering?"

Green's hand, gripping a protruding rock, paused for a moment, then continued his action without accepting the suggestion. "No, we must hurry. If the heretics are active nearby, they might notice we've been here. Miss this chance, and the next time we might not get another opportunity to catch them."

"Besides, do you really think we can't handle the cockroaches in the corner?" He pointed to the weapons on the professor's person. Probably no one could deal with two people working together in the dark.

"Be careful." Kraft poured a small amount of water from his flask to clean his fingers, put on gloves, followed behind Brother Wading, and waited for Green to report the situation on the other side.

The lantern moved forward through the fissure, illuminating the rugged, undulating interior. After a moment of swaying and jolting, it stabilized, lifted up to illuminate the bricks and stones at the end, where the smooth surface reflected a dark, oily sheen.

The light source swept around. After a moment of silence, Green's voice came from the other side. "Come over; there's no problem."

Kraft followed Brother Wading through the fissure, nearly stepping into empty space at a half-person-high drop. His feet slipped, he stumbled, and grabbed the wall, noticing it too was coated with damp, slippery moisture.

Standing firm and looking around, the lantern's light was enough to clearly reveal their surroundings: a tunnel wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

Dark-green square bricks rose from the tightly fitted ground along the side walls, closing overhead into a rounded arch. A thin layer of shallow water flowed slowly beneath their feet, soaking the sand and dirt accumulated in the stone cracks.

Kraft had already suspected, but he still wanted to confirm: "What place is this?"

"A sewer." Green lowered his arm, bringing the lantern close to the water, revealing the murky, discolored flow within. "We are in a sewer. Fortunately, there hasn't been heavy rain recently."

"Was it built so deep to drain into hell?" The massive scale and exquisite craftsmanship could be explained, but such a deep sewer was unlikely to be explained merely by soil accumulation or burying ruins.

Brother Wading shrugged. "If I could, I'd be glad to add a little extra to the heads of those who deserve to go to hell."

"Now the question arises: do we go down, go up, or... split up?"

Green made no sound, but looked at Kraft, hoping he could continue providing clues to guide their search direction.

The latter only shook his head helplessly. Reaching this point based on Kalman's instructions was already difficult; no matter how capable the professor was, he couldn't possibly provide full navigation service inside a sewer.

"The decision is yours, priest. I have no knowledge of these underground thoroughfares called sewers."

After much consideration, Green decided to send two people back to the surface to report, while the rest would search downward.

"Any reason? I didn't see you flip a coin."

"I feel we haven't gone very deep yet." He glanced back; the water flowed from the endless tunnel behind them into the equally endless depths below. "Probably less than four church floors below the surface."

"Many people in the past were interested in these passages, including a few within the Church. Even a bishop once considered thoroughly cleaning them, but all related records ended up on shelves no one ever touched."

"They didn't fail to reach such depths; some even saw reservoirs, circular loops, and the like, but none ever wrote about seeing these things. So I think... it's not deep enough, unless that symbol is unique to this spot, or it can only be seen even deeper down."

It sounded reasonable. To pursue heretics fleeing through the sewers, Green had indeed put in considerable effort; now it was time to listen to the expert's opinion.

Kraft readily agreed and followed downward. Several Inquisition monks lit torches, making the space slightly brighter, facilitating the inspection of the stone brick surfaces during the descent to search for possible carved decorations.

However, the entire tunnel seemed truly built for purely functional purposes, without any inscriptions or carvings.

The water layer swirled downward between mounds of sediment, emitting a foul stench brought from the surface, though not too strong. Perhaps the Tem River's flow and groundwater merged somewhere, diluting the components.

Each step stirred up a faint splashing sound; shoe soles sank into the soft mud brought down by the water flow. These soft, muddy substances were shallow, only able to remain when the water flow was not too rapid.

Despite the lingering, unpleasant odor, this path was much easier to traverse than a tomb. To put it bluntly, it was better than ninety percent of the road conditions on the surface, at least having a hard surface and natural water flow for cleaning.

Some shadowy hollows on the side walls caught Kraft's attention. At first, he thought they might be troublesome branch passages, but upon approaching, he found they were merely recessed wall niches, their corners filled with sediment rich in black humus.

"By the way, are there animals here? Rats, insects, that sort of thing?"

"What would they eat?"

"Things washed down from above, I suppose. I see quite a lot of them."

"That would be too harsh." Even large mushrooms wouldn't seem to want to grow in such an environment.

A certain faint, tinnitus-like background sound gradually became clearer as they descended, strengthening into a rumbling noise coming from ahead, drowning out the footsteps of the group.

When the continuous, water-like sound grew loud enough to require adjusting their conversation volume, they finally realized what it was—it was water, a vast amount falling from above, the roar produced when it struck the liquid surface.

The slope increased, the water flow grew increasingly rapid, as if attracted, rushing forward, subtly pushing their feet to slide down the incline.

The brick-and-stone tunnel ended ahead; the torrent burst out of the opening, scattering and dissolving into the suddenly expanding dark space. The ground beneath their feet descended step by step like theater stairs, leading toward the direction of the deafening roar.

Spread out on both sides were tunnel exits identical to the one they had emerged from. The water converged into a waterfall within the sharp, interlaced wide grooves on the steps, plunging down from the cliff in the center of the arena, unseen by the light.

The group stopped here, their breath catching in their throats.

Kraft lit a torch and walked along the edge of the vast space. Kup hurried to follow, noticing the ground was exceptionally slippery; moss grew within the accumulated grime, prying open the stone cracks and spreading outward in all directions.

The grooves cutting through the rock were distributed without pattern, their cross-sections triangular and wedge-shaped. They did not appear intentionally cut or constructed, yet their edges were too sharp, varying in size, extending wildly across the arena like a giant axe splitting through ointment.

The wider sections were no less than irrigation channels, often blocking the way, requiring caution against slipping while carefully crossing them.

After walking dozens of steps and passing rows of openings, the wall turned at an obtuse angle that felt strangely familiar, continuing to extend into the darkness. This gave him an ominous suspicion, and he quickened his pace around the perimeter.

The torchlight shrunk to a small cluster in his field of vision, growing farther and farther away, as he returned from the other side to the group waiting at the entrance.

Outlining the edges did nothing to dispel the breathless retreat from the unknown space rushing toward them; on the contrary, every step the light source took away from the boundary made the atmosphere colder and more silent.

Even when they saw the torch return, they instinctively widened their eyes to observe the face, as if subconsciously believing the distant darkness would swallow those who ventured deep and transform them into something else.

"Any discoveries?" Green stepped forward, breaking the stiff atmosphere; he increasingly felt Kraft had anticipated this.

Kraft offered no explanation, but raised the torch in his hand and hurled it toward the center of the grounds—the flaming arc illuminated, in passing, the shrieking, endless-water-devouring vocal aperture, revealing its full form.

The hexagonal deep well resembled an inverted tower, radiating countless fissures that tore through the surrounding stone steps.