Chapter 1516: Ancient Ruins
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Silvia and Justicio ran across the frozen bridge, reaching the rocky cliff at the other side, and the entering through the whole that Aquarina had opened a bit more using her bare hands. The place seemed very tight, barely fitting Aquarina inside. The other two had to sneak inside by pretty much kneeling and walking on all fours. Eventually, however, they managed to reach the other end of the path, arriving on a much wider area.
The area was slightly illuminated by the sunlight coming from the cracks above, there were a couple of small holes leading to the top of the rocky cliff, mostly littered with the Sky Eels nests and all their waste, although the sunlight that entered made the place barely bearable for people to see what was inside.
"Woah, this place's wide, where are we now?" wondered Silvia.
"Inside the rocky cliff, duh," said Justicio, yawning. "But… Hm, what's that?"
Although the area seemed mostly empty, with a couple of red and yellow spirit stones here and there, and some mushrooms and moss, Justicio quickly noticed something.
Aquarina and Silvia, who were admiring the surroundings also set their eyes on what he had pointed.
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"Some sort of door?" Aquarina wondered. "Yeah it looks like a door…"
It was a door, made completely out of some golden metal, which was sticking out of the rocky floor. It seemed to be leading to another place underground, perhaps the entrance to some ruins.
"It's there!" said Khepri, pointing there with her tiny bug legs. "I can sense it! My ornament! Down there! Open the door and we can find it!"
"Okay, okay, calm the hell down first!" sighed Aquarina. "Let me see if we can open this door first."
Aquarina tried opening the door by first punching it.
BAAAM!
However, it didn't even changed shape after she punched it, and her hand hurt a little.
"Shit… This is Orichalcum, as I feared," she sighed. "It could melt at very high temperatures, but I don't think I can produce them, only Sylphy or her dad could. Or maybe… maybe Lara with her Fire Spirits."
"Orichalcum?!" Silvia asked. "You mean the metal of the Gods?! The indestructible metal of the gods?!"
"It's not indestructible I mean…" said Aquarina. "It can be destroyed… maybe. At least I've seen it being melted. Also did you know this metal originated from the blood of people from another planet?"
"E-Eh? Huh?"
"Wha…?"
Silvia and Justicio were too confused, they probably didn't even knew what the word "planet" even meant, so Aquarian decided to just not say more about it.
"I think I could try opening it, if your punches don't work…"
Khepri floated in front of the door and then touched it, she infused her spiritual energies inside, as Aquarina noticed how it coursed through every circuit within the door.
Slowly…
CLAAANK!
The door opened up, completely to Khepri's request, to her control!
Aquarina had only seen that once before, when they used keys to open a door.
This most likely meant Khepri had great authority among the gods, to be let inside some of their ruins through spiritual energy recognition.
"I've never seen someone doing this unless they used a key…" Aquarina said. "How did you even do this, Khepri? Just who were you before losing your memories? Are you somehow related to the Gods?"
"I-I can't really remember anything, I swear," said Khepri, sighing. "I wish I could remember! But at the same time, after I've heard some pretty awful things from them, I'm kind of afraid of remembering too."
"Hmm…" Silvia nodded. "Well you said you would be my friend, right? And we'll be friends forever no matter what, so don't sweat the details!"
"Hah, Silvia you're a bit too innocent sometimes," Khepri said. "But okay! I want my ornament! Let's go! Hurry!"
"Okay, okay…" Aquarina nodded, stepping inside of the door.
Justicio followed the two girls closely as the trio entered, finding some stairs leading down.
Aquarina stopped them from giving another step.
"Wait."
She grabbed a stone from outside and sent it down.
The stone slowly hit the stairs one after another, and then…
BOOOM!
Somehow, a small red laser beam hit it and it exploded.
"Uwaah?! There are traps!" said Silvia.
"No way! But didn't Khepri opened it easily?!" asked Justicio. "Why are there traps if we were granted access?"
"Maybe because the ruins were made only for spirits like her to enter…" said Aquarina. "Physical living beings like us are likely not welcomed."
"No waaay! How are we getting down there then?!" Silvia cried, grabbing her head.
"C-Calm down Silvia, we can find a way somehow…" said Justicio. "Hey! How about we disable the traps? Is it possible?"
"I don't know how to do that myself…" said Khepri. "Maybe I can check them, wait here."
The scarab-like spirit flew around, checking the walls, ceiling, and stairs, detecting various rare contraptions and creating a whole 3D map within her red colored mirror.
"Okay I got it!" she said. "There's a total of eleven traps down there… I don't know how to disable them but I'll try. If that doesn't work, I could try something different, like exposing them so you break them."
She flew back down, beginning to do the deed, it took a while, but everyone heard Khepri's groans and a lot of zapping sounds everywhere.
"Phew…" she returned, exhausted. "I disabled half of them, but the others are weird, and I can't, I've exposed them though, so Aquarina should be able to destroy them. They aren't made of Orichalcum."
"Gotcha! Leave it to me!" said Aquarina. "Give me that shield, Justicio."
"Sure, here!" Justicio nodded.
Aquarina stepped down wielding the shield and covering her body with her powerful black scales, as the beams started coming.
She blocked them with the shield infused with a bit of Orichalcum, reflecting the lasers and then destroying the exposed traps with her punches, kicks, or by throwing her daggers at them.
Eventually, once all traps were destroyed, the stairs were finally safe!
Aquarina stepped down, looking around the room that came afterwards, it was completely dark, the Orichalcum's faint glow barely illuminating anything.
"I can't sense any Aura or Living Being here… Is it safe?"
RUMBLE!
As Aquarina was wondering that, suddenly, she realized it wasn't safe.
"INTRUDERS DETECTED. CARBON-BASED ORGANISMS NOT ALLOWED TO ENTER EXPERIMENTAL FACILITY NUMBER 0193. INITIATING EXTERMINATION PROTOCOL."
A giant golem rose up, glaring at Aquarina with its glowing, red eyes.
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