Chapter 403

Chapter 403: The Depleted Truth

Leading a small team of fully armed Guardians, Agatha left the forward base that the Church troops had built. They passed through several makeshift fences made from simple works and firing positions. Then they went through a junction lit by gas lamps and finally reached the far end of a side corridor.

The gas lamps set into the walls gave off a soft hiss. The old pipe system fed them unevenly, so their light flickered and dimmed. In that unsteady light, they could see a thick, black alloy gate standing silently at the end of the hall.

The sound of the Gatekeeper’s cane and her heels striking the floor echoed hollowly along the corridor. Agatha stopped before the gate. Maybe too much time had passed, because the seal on this door had already failed. There was a narrow gap between the two leaves. The lead seal that had once hung on the latch looked as if it had suffered some unknown impact. Clear stretch and tear marks showed in the middle.

On a plaque at the side of the door, they could see the steel stamp of Frostholm City Hall.

This was what the explorers had found in these depths. It was the strange door in the center of the Second Waterway that she had told Governor Winston about.

City Hall had sealed this place, yet the governor himself knew nothing about the door. All records about it had vanished. It might date back to the chaotic years just after the end of the Queen’s age. The turmoil of that time had let the door and the secret behind it slip out of people’s memories.

Was this the nest where the Annihilators hid? Or was it the riddle that Frostholm’s Queen Ray Nora had left for the world?

Agatha reached out and gently touched the rough, heavy alloy panel. For some reason, her fingertips felt dull and numb. Only the chill under her skin was sharply clear.

“Are we opening this door?” A black-clad guard stepped forward half a pace. “The governor’s permission has already come down…”

“Mr. Winston did give permission, but you can’t just throw open a door that has sat sealed in the dark for years,” Agatha said, shaking her head slightly. “There might be something dangerous locked behind it. I will go over first and check the situation.”

The nearby Guardians understood their commander at once and stepped back.

Agatha lifted her head and looked at the crack between the two leaves. Then she reached forward.

Nothing happened. She frowned in puzzlement.

A black-clad guard glanced over with curiosity. “Is something wrong?”

“…No. Nothing.” Agatha shook her head, then focused again.

At last, a gust of wind stirred in the open space. Her figure turned into a swirl of gray-white mist. The Ashen Wind circled twice before the gate, then slipped into the narrow gap.

“Hold position and keep watch. Wait for the Gatekeeper to return.”

The captain of the black-clad guards let out a quiet breath when he saw Agatha pass through the door. Then he began ordering the squad members to set up firing positions along the corridor.

On the far side, the gray-white whirl of wind passed through the gap and entered a dim space. The wind spun for a moment, and Agatha’s body took shape again out of it.

The Gatekeeper looked back at the gate she had come through, then lowered her head to check herself. She frowned without thinking.

Why did the divine magic she used every day feel so stiff today? Even her body’s own response seemed a bit slower.

After a moment of confusion, Agatha shook her head and pushed her attention back to the task at hand.

She looked around. The consecrated lantern at her waist cast a dim yellow glow that drove back the darkness around her. It seemed many restless things were hiding in the shadows on all sides, but when she focused her will, the dark quieted again.

She stood in a damp, gloomy passage. Bare earth and stones with a metallic sheen showed everywhere. In the weak light of the consecrated lantern she could also see the beams and supports that held up the tunnel, and some scattered odds and ends lying by piles of rock.

Agatha frowned. This did not look like any part of the Second Waterway. A normal sewer corridor did not have this structure. The space behind this gate… looked more like a mine tunnel that had been abandoned for a long time.

A mine tunnel?

Agatha lifted her head and stared thoughtfully at the damp, dark rock ceiling above. Her gaze seemed to go straight through the thick rock and earth, up and up through layers of passages, shafts, machines, and ramps.

The Boiling Gold mine.

This section of the Second Waterway lay under the center of the city-state. Its underground branches crisscrossed around the Boiling Gold mine. Quite a few sewer lines had even been part of the mine’s drainage system in the Queen’s era. In some of these, the distance between sewer and mine tunnel really might be only a single door.

She walked slowly along the tunnel, and more and more questions rose in her mind.

This was only a mine tunnel. It did not even seem fully swallowed and twisted by darkness yet. Boiling Gold itself was a holy metal. The tiny traces of Boiling Gold in the rock and soil were enough to resist corruption, like lamps and steam. Why, then, had they gone to such lengths to seal a tunnel like this behind a grand door?

It was locked away underground. Even the current governor did not know it existed. If the order to seal it had really come from the first City Hall after the Queen’s age, then what was so special about this place that it had made them so nervous?

And this tunnel had clearly been abandoned. Why? It plainly had not been corrupted. There were no monsters here, no illusions, and no…

Boiling Gold.

Agatha suddenly stopped. Her eyes swept over the working levels dug into the sides of the tunnel. At last she began to understand the source of the wrongness she had felt all along.

There was no Boiling Gold here.

…

At City Hall, on the top floor of the old Queen’s palace, in a domed office, the plump governor Winston, dressed in a blue coat, slowly toyed with a delicate machine in his hands.

The brass model made a soft clicking in his grip. Gears and linkages turned. Every bite and rotation carried a cold, precise beauty.

A creation of wisdom. A crystallization of engineering. A fruit of civilization. The turning of gears was the medal and ribbon of mortal civilization.

Winston set the model down in front of him. He casually used the decorative ribbon on his coat to wipe a smear of oil near the base. After cleaning it off, he nodded slightly, his face full of quiet delight, like a man admiring a work of art.

“Boiling Gold is Frostholm’s blood. The mining machines are the hearts that pump that blood…”

Winston muttered softly as he flicked the tiny brass gears with his fingers. It sounded half like talking to himself and half like speaking to the little machine.

“Fifty years… like a dream, gone in a blink…”

He slowly rose and paced over to the window.

Outside the wide glass panes, thick fog filled the whole city. In the swirling mist, every building and street blurred at the edges, as if they were about to melt into the city itself. Even the lofty Cathedral across the plaza became only a vague shadow in the fog. The many towers and spires looked like giants choking and dying in the haze.

Winston looked calmly at the fog outside the window. He could hear the alarm bells from across the plaza. He could also hear the Guard Corps of City Hall and the Constable units gathering and taking orders on the square below.

Fog this heavy and this strange was bound to draw City Hall’s attention. Even without an order from the governor, the city’s Guard forces would follow their set procedures and move first. But keeping order in the fog might turn out to be the easiest part of what came next.

Winston stood at the window for a while, then turned toward a spot not far away.

A small round table stood near the window. Thin strands of fog seeped through the cracks and drifted around it. In the smoke-like haze, he saw two things lying on the tabletop.

One was a stack of papers, already yellowed and brittle. The other was a finely made revolver.

The documents were written and prepared in an old formal style. The edges of the fine paper had ornate printed patterns, carrying that special elegance of the Queen’s era.

“Boiling Gold Mine Exhaustion Warning.” “Investigation Report on the Anomaly Shaft.” “Analysis of the Extracted Ore Samples”…

Most of the signatures and dates on the files ran from 1840 to 1845.

The reader and signer at the bottom was Ray Nora.

The revolver was Governor Winston’s personal collection, a classic model from twelve years ago. It was still solid and reliable even now. Its well-kept grip and frame shone with oil. It looked as if it could serve another twelve years—or longer.

Winston’s gaze moved off the papers and came to rest on the revolver.

He reached out and picked up the heavy steel, feeling its cold weight. He opened the cylinder to check the rounds, then snapped it shut.

His right hand slowly rose. The barrel, once carefully maintained by a Master, pressed against his temple.

A few seconds later, he lowered the gun.

“This pose is not bad. I’ll use this pose when the time comes,” Winston said softly. Then he checked the safety and slid the revolver neatly into the holster at his waist.

Hurried footsteps sounded in the corridor.

“Governor, the fog in the city is getting worse…”

“I know. I’m coming.”