The heavy smell of ozone and vaporized sludge slowly began to fade, replaced once again by the cold, stagnant draft of the deep earth. I navigated through the shattered remains of the smelting floor, my lone jade-green eye scanning the debris for anything useful.
That was when the swinging amber glow of the lantern illuminated a thick, dark glass bottle nestled safely inside an overturned iron crate. I knelt and picked it up with my right hand. It was a pristine, tightly sealed bottle of high-grade mining kerosene, likely dropped by one of the miners right before the hive-mind claimed the sector.
I checked the brass lantern strapped to my right thigh, the flame was beginning to sputter and shrink, the oil chamber running dangerously low. With a quick, practiced motion, I uncorked the bottle and carefully poured a generous handful of the kerosene straight into the lantern's reservoir.
Fwhoosh!
The wick drank the fresh fuel instantly. The dim, dying amber glow erupted into a brilliant, radiant golden light, cutting through the thick sulfur mist of the copper mines and sharply illuminating the jagged rock faces for meters around us. Satisfied with the clarity, I firmly popped the cork back into the glass bottle and slid the remaining kerosene safely into the deep pockets of my goat-hide purse, right next to the surveyor's map.
I stood back up and followed the rusted iron tracks until they curved sharply around a massive pillar of raw copper ore. There, the terrain fractured once more. A steep, dizzying downhill tunnel yawned open before me, plunging straight into the pitch-black abyss of The Silver Mines… the Third Mineshaft.
But right at the absolute precipice of the steep incline sat a perfectly intact, heavy iron minecart. It was piled high with chunks of unrefined, glinting copper ore, left abandoned on the tracks six years ago.
I paused, staring at the heavy metal cart. I wasn't physically exhausted, and the cold, murderous fire of vengeance was still burning hot in my chest... but looking at that steep, straight-shot rollercoaster track leading into the dark, a rare, volatile spark of dark whimsy hit me.
"Why walk when I can ride?" I thought
I stepped up to the back of the heavy vehicle. Channeling a brief, localized surge of my physical strength, I delivered a brutal, precise kick to the rear iron plate. The rusty brake levers snapped, and the heavy wheels gave a loud, metallic screech as the cart began to roll forward, instantly gathering momentum on the steep downward slope.
Before it could escape me, I leaped into the air, my heavy traveler's cloak billowing behind me, and landed squarely inside the basket, burying my boots directly into the pile of raw copper chunks.
The minecart tore down the tracks at breakneck speed, plunging headfirst into the freezing wind of the third tier. The golden light from my thigh-strapped lantern cast wild, strobing shadows against the cavern walls as the stone blurred past.
As the wind whipped violently against my heavy merchant hood, a bizarre, detached sensation overcame my grim executioner's mindset. With my scarred mouth completely hidden beneath the canvas mask… and the raw, jagged edges of my Glasgow smile twitching upward… I let out a flat, deadpan, yet incredibly amused sound from the back of my throat.
"Wee… weeee." I mumbled quietly through the thick cloth, my non-existent tongue making the word sound like a strange, low animal noise.
I crouched low in the rushing metal cart, my right hand firmly gripping the cold barrel of the Death Chant Shotgun strapped to my back. I was hurtling straight into the silver mines at sixty miles an hour, making muffled, animalistic joy-noises in the dark, perfectly ready to plow right into whatever horrors were waiting at the bottom of the track.
The wind rushed past my canvas mask as the heavy iron minecart rattled violently down the steep incline, my muffled, animalistic "weeee" completely swallowed by the roaring darkness. For a few fleeting seconds, I was just a rider in the dark, disconnected from the heavy mantle of my vengeance.
But the abyss didn't tolerate fun for long.
BOOM!!!
Without a single shred of warning, a colossal, earth-shattering shockwave ripped through the structural columns of the descending shaft. The sheer kinetic force of the blast tore through the narrow tunnel, hitting the speeding minecart like a physical wall. The heavy iron wheels violently jumped the tracks, sparking blindingly before the entire cart overturned, throwing me headfirst into the jagged stone wall.
I crashed hard against the cold bedrock, rolling several meters across the damp cobblestones. The brutal impact instantly unbuttoned the heavy, reinforced brass clasps of my layered traveler's cloak. With the restrictive fabric torn open and the physical trauma triggering my survival instincts, my massive, blood-red wings violently unfurled, snapping into the midnight air of the cavern to stabilize my momentum.
I skidded to a halt on my stomach, my crimson feathers scraping against the rocky floor. I quickly pushed myself up with my right hand, my lone jade-green eye scanning the darkness with predatory sharpness. A dark, irritated hiss escaped my throat. My small bit of fun was completely ruined. But as I checked the perimeter, my posture relaxed just a fraction… there wasn't a single human soul in sight. The tunnel was dead silent, save for the distant, wet squelching of the hive-mind. My identity as the winged demon was entirely safe, there were only monsters down here to witness it.
I stood up, shaking the black dust from my clothes. My Death Chant Shotgun was still securely strapped to my back, its silver-etched runes humming with quiet, blood-red malice. I reached down to the rocky floor, picking up the brass lantern. Thanks to the high-grade kerosene I had just poured into the reservoir, the flame hadn't died, it flickered rapidly before settling back into a brilliant, radiant golden glow.
I tightly strapped the lantern back onto my right thigh, the bright light instantly illuminating the surrounding rock faces.
The walls of this chamber were entirely different from the previous levels. The dark coal and green-tinted copper veins had vanished, replaced by dazzling, heavy webs of pure, gleaming silver ore that webbed through the stone like frozen lightning.
I was officially in The Silver Mines… the Third Mineshaft.
Looking at the vast, yawning cavern, a heavy, suffocating grimness settled over my chest. According to the surveyor's map and Nautilus's historical files, this specific tier was the absolute farthest boundary the Royal Capital Knights could ever reach six years ago before the sheer toxicity, acid density, and overwhelming numbers of the A-rank bio slimes forced a total, panicked military retreat. It was the absolute edge of their defensive line… the place where the kingdom's forces had made their final, desperate stand before abandoning the lower depths entirely.
That meant only one thing. This tier wasn't just a mine, it was a mass grave.
The bodies of the veteran knights who had fallen over six years ago had never been recovered. They had been left behind in the pitch-black cold, rotting in the silver dust. And if the upper levels had taught me anything, it was that the intelligent bio slimes never let a perfectly good shell go to waste.
I reached behind my shoulder, my right hand firmly gripping the cold, etched steel handle of the Death Chant Shotgun. I unhitched the weapon, holding it ready across my chest as I closed my eye to channel a fresh wave of my blood magic into the chamber.
"No monsters Eirene, I'm sure you're safe. I think the monsters fled because of you." Plasma said through my thoughts
I moved quietly through the silver mines, my boots making no sound against the rocky floor. The glittering veins of raw silver ore webbed across the walls, completely untamed, illuminated only by the patches of blue-green bioluminescent slime scattered along the tracks.
The immediate tunnels were dead silent. There were no skittering wolves, no hissing goblins, and no sign of the immediate horde I had anticipated. But the air was incredibly heavy, thick with the stench of stagnant water and decaying marrow.
Following the curve of the old rail line, I stumbled upon a massive, natural cave passage breaking off from the main structural tunnels. This wasn't a man-made mineshaft dug out by machines, it was a colossal subterranean cavern, a jagged hollow in the mountain's bedrock. Intrigued and cautious, I stepped through the opening.
The moment I entered, the sheer scale of the nightmare before me made me freeze.
"Oh, I thought they left, but they're actually piling up in this cave."
The entire cavern was lit by an intense, ghostly blue-green glow radiating from massive clusters of bio slime pulsing along the ceiling. Beneath that sickly light stood a silent legion. It was a horde of at least fifty undead knights, the fallen royal soldiers deployed over the past six years. They stood perfectly still, packed shoulder-to-shoulder, their heads bowed downward in a horrific, catatonic trance. Their armor was rusted, their flesh translucent, and their eyes glowed with the parasite's light.
But they weren't the real threat in the room.
Right at the center of the undead legion sat a grotesque, towering monstrosity. It was a giant, easily three times the size of any of the undead knights surrounding it. Its massive, bloated torso was horribly mangled, its chest cavity torn wide open to reveal a jagged cage of exposed, slime-coated ribs. Right in the center of those ribs, its glowing core pulsed violently like a sickening, exposed heart.
The giant was hunched over, its massive hands tearing apart one of the dead knights. It was munching on the corpse, deliberately draining the concentrated bio slimes from the fallen soldier's flesh to fuel its own evolutionary growth, making its massive frame even stronger.
I didn't move a single muscle. My instincts flared with extreme warning. Fifty high-tier undead knights and a colossal mutant giant were too much to handle in a head-on, single-handed brawl. I am an executioner, but I am not stupid.
Keeping my blood-red wings tightly compressed against my spine and my unbuttoned cloak draped low to mask my silhouette, I began to slowly sneak along the jagged outer edges of the cavern. I kept to the deep shadows, my single jade-green eye locked onto the opposite side of the cave. There, just past the edge of the horde, I spotted a yawning, dark opening… another mineshaft plunging sharply downhill. It was the entrance to the Fourth Mineshaft, the Gold Mines. The gateway to my mother's final resting place.
I was only a few meters away from the threshold. I took one careful step forward.
Snap.
My heavy boot pressed down on a brittle, calcified tree root that had broken through the cavern ceiling. In the absolute, suffocating silence of the cave, the sharp crack sounded like a gunshot.
The giant instantly stopped chewing.
A deafening silence fell over the room as the massive creature slowly turned its bloated, faceless head. Its glowing eyes locked directly onto my hooded figure hiding in the shadows of the ledge.
Before I could even raise the Death Chant Shotgun, the giant opened its massive jaw and let out a silent, earth-shattering roar. A visible, colossal shockwave of pure kinetic energy erupted from its chest, ripping through the cavern air.
It was the exact same shockwave that had violently flipped my minecart on the tracks above. The wall of pressurized air slammed directly into me, threatening to blast me off my feet and throw me right into the center of the waking horde.
"Eirene, run!"