Chapter 47: What’s behind door number…!
Moments after the Zhen Clan team entered the main vault area, portal after portal began to open. A dozen or so other teams began to enter the wandering ruins from various points that dotted the internal cavern.
“BWAH! That was awful!”
“Look at the size of this place!”
“Ah shit! Somebody grab me before I fall in!”
It made for a rather chaotic scene, seeing all of these young warriors fall in one after the other and scrambling to find whatever treasures was worth stealing.
But of course, there were exceptions.
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“That shitty cheating mongrel! Once I get my hands on him, I’m going to inject my personal cocktail of venom directly into his family jewels!”
“Of course milady.”
Gianna Corrada none other than the daughter of Madam Telana Corrada and it showed. Beautiful looks, venomous tongue and a whip smart personality, it would be hard for people not to connect the two as being mother and daughter, especially when it came to matters of revenge.
“Any idea on his whereabouts?,” she asked one of her teammates/subordinates. The Corrada family wasn’t large in terms of descendants, but they did have many loyal and powerful subordinate families under their wings.
“Apologies milady, but the teleportation appears to be randomized. But it appears that the others are converging on that strange building in the center. It’s safe to assume that they’re heading there as well.”
Dozens upon dozens of young warriors were currently making their way into the strange obsidian building that decorated the center of the cavern. Several others however were waiting off on the periphery, watching the others. Seeing the sight made Gianna click her tongue in disapproval.
“Hmm. It appears some of them are hoping to steal their prizes from the more proactive teams. A smart move, but utterly cowardly. Let’s be quick, I want whatever secrets hidden in this ruins ours!”
“You sure about that, Miss Corrada? You could follow suit and take out the ones who steal from the other teams,” the team’s assigned Digger suggested. Gianna just shot him a dirty look.
“The Corrada Family does not stoop to such low life tactics. Now move!”
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“Wall Drag, now!”
The sound of metal scrapping against stone reverberated in the Wolfe Family team’s bodies as they used their weapons to slam into the cavern walls and slow their descent.
Luckily or unluckily, the Wolfe Family team’s entrance was located near the very top of the wandering ruins’ cavern. They didn’t even have a moment’s respite before being forced into a free fall.
The Wolfe Family team eventually came to a stop on their downward trek, giving them a perfect view over the turmoil below.
“Those fucking insects. Look at them all, scrambling over our treasure…no matter. Once we secure the ‘heart’ of this place, all the goods that they dug up for us will go directly into the family coffers and I’ll get all the credit.” Donovan let out an ugly laugh as he imagined the look on everyone’s faces as he brought up “that” from the inner sanctum of the ruins.
“The secret entrance is over there, let’s move!”
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“Damn, those are some impressive statues.”
Zhen Hai, Zhen Liu, Zhen Yue and Sullivan made their way pass the Vault’s entrance and had now entered what they assumed to be the main “lobby”.
The lobby was a large circular room that had, including the one that the Zhen family entered, four door ways all flanked by a pair of matching statues. Each of the statue pairs looked to be made of different materials and done in drastically different styles.
‘Huh…wonder if…’
‘Figures.’
“Okay, so there are three paths for us to take and we have no idea where to go. I say we go through that one,” Zhen Hai said while pointing straight ahead, “I have a good feeling about that one.”
Coincidentally, that doorway was flanked by a pair of warrior statues that reminded Zhen Liu of fish-people from a certain Lovecraftian short horror story. Didn’t take too long for Zhen Liu to figure out why his cousin wanted to go that way.
‘Seriously cuz? You’re banking on this place having an aquatic aether beast core that bad?’
Zhen Yue however disagreed.
“I say we go that way,” she said while pointing to the left. The states flanking that entrance reminded Zhen Liu of ents.
“I recognize that style of statue as belonging to the Golden Lotus continent. It’s home to many rare medicinal aether plants. I bet you that there’s probably a rare and valuable medicine that way. One that’s probably worth more than most of the treasures in this vault.”
“Really? A plant? Come on Zhen Yue, you know that a bonafide treasure or aether weapon is worth way more than some measly plant. I say we go straight.”
“Zhen Hai, how can you be so sure that whatever you think could be found that hasn’t been already taken? Wandering ruins aren’t called that for no reason. It’s very possible that someone else could’ve taken the treasures on that direction way before any of us had even gotten close to here,” Zhen Yue protested, “If the previous explorers thought the same as you did, they’d probably have ignored going left, meaning that it’s still up for grabs.”
Zhen Hai looked at his cousin like she was stupid. “That logic is stupid.”
“You’re stupid!”
“Excuse me,” Zhen Liu tried to chime in.
“What?!,” Zhen Hai and Zhen Yue shouted in unison.
“Sullivan just bailed on us.”
“What?”
As the two cousins stopped arguing with one another, they finally noticed that their digger, Sullivan, was no longer with them.
“Ah shit,” Zhen Hai cursed,”We’re gonna be in a lot of trouble if we lose our Digger during this thing. Which way did he go?”
Zhen Liu was about to lie about now knowing, when the sound of explosions and battle noises echoed from the rightmost hall.
“And he got himself into trouble, let’s move!”
