The shaft seemed ancient, like it was created centuries ago. It was barren and rough. There was nothing of the splendor above. Their armor clinked and clanked on the way down. At the bottom, they entered a dark chamber.
With
At the center was a small basin, surrounded by archaic carvings. Extending in all directions from the basing were grooves, cut in the stone floor. Following the grooves revealed the victims of the Ye Family.
"Shit..." Edward commented on the sight.
Along the rough stone walls were sets of cuffs and chains. Bodies were strapped to the walls. Old scars and welts, as well as fresh wounds and cuts oozing blood and puss spoke of a long time of torture and suffering.
Their blood made the ground slick. Most had flowed into the basin via the grooves. A couple of captives seemed lifeless, others had already turned into mindless undead under the effect of the Land of the Dead and were growling at them. Just how long had these people been... milked?
As she looked at them, she found the same inlays of
"Don't look up, Evee," Edward warned her was it was too late. The golden veins led to the high, vaulted ceiling of the stone chamber. It's dome centered right above the blood basin. Evee stared in shock.
The vaulted ceiling was covered in dismembered bodies. With all she had gone through and seen in the past, this would have been too big of a shock. But all bodies above them, chained to the walls or pierced on hooks, were too small for adults. They were the remains of children, directly drained into the bloody basin.
Currently, the victims were clearly people of the Continent, but it didn't take a genius to come to the conclusion that all those people from Y-City bought by the Ye Family had vanished after entering the estate. This was the fate they all suffered. Men, women, the elderly, and even children, tortured and bled out for weeks...
"Grk..." Her gauntlets made a crunching sound when she clenched her fist.
"Evee..." Edward called out to her, worry in his voice.
"I was still too nice," she stated coldly, her eyes scanning the structure of the stone chamber. Without warning, a couple of undead soldiers appeared in the chamber.
"They will be in the way. Get these people off the walls and bring them out. tend to their wounds," she commanded them sternly. The undead followed her command. They broke the chains and carried the unconscious people out through a second exit opposite the shaft they came from.
"In the way... Eve, what are you trying to do?" her brother asked, slightly confused. Meanwhile, Evee had started placing black candled on strategic places all over the bloody floor of the stone chamber.
"Even you probably realize what this place does, right? Even if we don't know how exactly it worked, we know what it does. These assholes think they got away," the chosen of Persephone said while lighting the candles.
Even if all the people who directly benefited from this place had already died in the battle above, there was no way they were the only ones in the know. No, those who benefited from this place the most were likely not even the ones involved in running it.
How many filthy rats had mixed among the refugees she allowed to escape? They thought they had gotten away? No. Right now, the Immortal Witch had no intention to let these people go. Anyone who knew of this and accepted it, she wanted them all to suffer.
"Edward, did you know that necromancy wasn't originally just about raising an undead army? It's actually a small aspect, which is getting a lot of attention because it is the most practical combat aspect of these powers. However, necromancy originally was the communication with the other side. It was to get information from the souls who passed on,"
"Okay, but why are you suddenly talking about that?" Edward asked, confused, while Evee started drawing mystic symbols with glowing chalk onto the bloodied floor.
"You asked what I'm trying to do. You won't understand it if I don't explain it. Although I don't know how this place was run or who ran it, the dead know. They not only know, but they also have an instinctive desire to haunt those who wronged them. I don't need to know or find who did this," she rambled on, while the drawings on the ground grew more and more complex.
"I just have to give the dead the chance to get their revenge. I'm cursing all the people involved in this. No matter where they run or hide, nobody will escape," she mumbled as the lines of white chalk slowly began exuding a dark violet light. She may not know the intricacies of this world's formations, but she had her own expertise in wards, witchcraft, and necromancy. Nobody could hide from the eyes of the dead.
She had considered placing a bloodline curse on the Ye Family, but there may have been people neither knowing nor benefiting from this. There would have been no point in her actions if she stopped making distinctions now.
This was not some puny spell with a curse effect often used in combat; this was a proper curse. She was opening a gap in the barrier between life and death to allow the wronged souls to come back and take revenge for their unjust death.
"A curse? " Edward asked, surprised. "You never used something like that, are you sure this will work?" he continued to ask doubtfully.
"hehe, as far as you know. The library of Minas Mar has a vast pool of magic knowledge that is not dependent on the system. I learned and adapted quite a bit of that stuff, do you think I never tested it?" the Chosen of Persephone asked with a self-satisfied smile.
"When-?" Edward halted as he sifted through his memories to find whether he ever seen her use something like this. There wasn't, but there had been a couple of instances during their journey across the Pathworks that had seemed suspicious at the time.
Once, they had killed the marauding soldiers of a noble. Although the villagers insisted the lord was a petty man who supported these actions and would get revenge on them, retribution never came. He had learned later that the lord died not long after that incident.
This was not the only time. Sometimes, trouble would simply sort itself out. A corrupt guild master that suddenly fell ill, a shady merchant that would have an accident... had all of those instances when luck was on their side, been actually his sisters' doing? This thought was squarely written on his face.
"Looks like you caught on. Now shut up, I have to chant," Evee said with a chuckle and began chanting in a quick, incomprehensible mumble. The chamber began filling with dark fog, illuminated by the violet light of the magic circle.
Twisted visages of lost souls could be seen playing in the dark fog, giving Edward goosebumps. As her chanting quickened, the light of the circle became brighter and brighter, while the dead grimaces became more corporeal.
Volume and light kept rising until it almost blinded Edward, before everything suddenly vanished. With a whoosh and a wind that froze his blood, everything fell silent, and darkness returned.
The necromancer unleashed the first arcane curse the XiGuang Province had ever witnessed nand consequences went further than she could have expected.