Life didn't get easier, even in another world

67 A man holding a torch

“Is that the place?”

Asa pointed somewhere with her hand.

Kairen narrowed his eyes and looked at where she was pointing. There, on the horizon, he could see a black pile of something. It was too far away to distinguish its shape and size, but it seemed to be a large pile of stones.

Asa asked that question with a tired and about-to-die expression. She looked at the team leader with pleading eyes as if asking him to let her rest for a moment.

Team leader Dains didn’t even bodge under the girl’s gaze.

“We have to walk a little bit more.”

Asa’s expression twisted even more, but she didn’t say anything and continued to walk silently. After walking a little bit more, they could see the place better.

“What are these?”

“They are scattered all over the place.”

.....

What caught their eyes first when they walked for a bit more was small and large pieces of stone. They were not regular pebbles but carved and shaped stones. From their smooth sides and size, it looked like they used to be part of a structure before.

As they walked more and more, the number of stones that they encountered increased. They also increased in size the more they walked forward.

“Look, there!”

Serria didn’t really need to point at that place as everyone could see that themselves.

A long wall could be seen in the middle of the vast and dry plain. The shape of the wall was truly weird though, it didn’t have any angles. It was only a single, circular-shaped wall.

The wall, not too short and not too high, was broken and damaged here and there. The damage was to the point that it was hard to even name the structure a “wall”. With numerous bid holes throughout the body, collapsed parts here and there, and the extremely dirty and dusty appearance, one could say for sure that this wall wasn’t built here recently.

The unit members approached the wall. It was easy to see the whole place where the wall was meant to surround. It was a circular space, a large circular area surrounded by a broken round wall.

There were some short and thick pillar-like things attached to the walls as well, maybe for the purpose of supporting the unstable structure. These pillars also were destroyed and only some parts of them remained.

“Why is there such a place in the middle of nowhere?”

Elsie said that as she kicked a pebble aside. She was right, it was weird for such a thing to be built on dry land.

It was obvious that it was built in the old times, at least hundreds of years ago. There were no water sources near this land and the soil wasn’t fertile. That was why there were no cities or villages around here. If so, why would someone build something here, and how?

Kairen was thinking about that while looking around as he walked into the round space. The structure didn’t have a ceiling, it only had walls all around. There was nothing else about it. Nothing special to point out at the first glance.

“Ah! I know this place!”

“You know?”

Kairen asked Serria who had suddenly said that she knew this place.

“I had to do some research about ancient ruins for a project for the academy a few years ago. I’ve read about this place back then. The article said that it was one of the numerous old, nameless, and ownerless ruins on the continent. The researchers weren’t able to find anything about the usage or purpose of this place. It seems to be just an ordinary building, built for who knows what purpose. Thought the fact that it is built here is kinda strange, but there isn’t anything else about it. As the number of people who visit this land is low, it isn’t really well known.”

“....”

‘You remember them all from an article you’ve read a few years ago?’

Kairen suddenly felt jealous of her memory.

‘Maybe, she has the right to call me stupid...’

Kairen shook his head.

‘Nah, man. Stop thinking about such things.’

He had to work. There was no time to be surprised by Serria’s memory. Kairen repeated that in his mind and looked around again.

She was right. There didn’t seem to be anything special about this place. Only some old walls and broken stones. No. There was actually something else.

There was a tall, platform-like thing in the center of the round place. The round, stone stand became narrower as it went higher and higher, and then suddenly become thinner again till it reached its tip, which was an octagonal flat platform. It was a little bit similar to an hourglass, except the top of it that was octagonal. The platform was about as tall as Serria and as thin as two muscular men standing side by side. ????????????????????????d. c????????

Like any other part of this place, the platform was damaged as well. It was cracked all over and was about to fall apart. There was a hole in the middle of it as well, as if something that was attached to it had been forcefully removed. One would wonder how could this thing still keep its form.

“Hmm?”

Kairen walked closer to the platform and bent down. He touched the body of the old platform with his fingers as carefully as he could. He didn’t want to damage it more so he made sure not to press it hard.

“What is it?”

Seeing him do that, Serria also came closer and bent down.

“I saw something here...”

“Something?”

Kairen’s hand stopped moving at one spot upon touching something. He moved his head closer and observed the side surface of the platform.

“Look, isn’t it a carved shape?”

Serria stuck her head closer and also looked at where Kairen’s hand was.

“It is a drawing?”

“I guess.”

The carved shape that Kairen was talking about was more like an unskilled drawing of a kid. The drawing wasn’t great, neither did it was detailed. In addition, it was damaged all over and cracks had spread throughout the whole shape. Even though, they could understand what it was to some extent.

“It’s a person.”

“Yeah.”

The drawing carved to the side of the platform showed a human. A man. A man holding something in his hand. It seemed like he was holding a torch in one hand, while his empty hand was stretched out.

Nothing else could be understood from the painting. You couldn’t expect such an old drawing to still contain its details after so much time. Actually, it was weird that this carved drawing wasn’t destroyed yet. It was exposed to sun and wind and every other kind of harm for a long, how come it was still safe and intact?

“Shouldn’t we show it to the others?”

“I guess we should. Maybe it is something important.”

“Hey guys, look here.”

Just when Serria was about to talk to their team leader, someone else called everyone. It was Carlson, the other swordsman of the unit besides Reyan. He was the same man that was busy playing with his phone yesterday.

“What is it?”

Once team leader Dains approached him, he placed his feet on a stone.

“Doesn’t it feel like there is something down here?”

He moved the stone away with his feet and then stomped the ground. He looked down on the ground as if he could feel something that the others couldn’t and then looked back at the team leader.

Team leader Dains frowned his brows and looked at the ground as well.

“Let me check it.”

Team leader Dains closed his eyes. He didn’t move nor did he say anything. He reopened his eyes a few seconds later, tapped the ground with the tip of his feet, and nodded his head.

“There is a small space down there.”

Kairen tilted his head while looking at him.

‘Did he use his power to see through the ground or something like that?’

Kairen had heard about team leader Dains’ power. His power was Space and his weapons were guns. His power was sade to be weak, but his ability in matching his power and weapon was unrivaled. He was also a good thinker and strategist, these were what had made him become one of the best team leaders despite having a weak power.

Team leader Dains turned around and talked to the unit members.

“Search the area for any underground entrances.”

Everyone was quick to follow his orders. The group of people who were wandering around the place aimlessly started to examine the whole area carefully.

“Umm, I’m not really sure about it... but I guess there is something there under that pile of stones.”

Rai said that hesitantly and where a huge amount of debris and broken pieces of the wall were piled up.

“Under them?”

Rai nodded his head.

“Yeah, I can feel an unnatural airflow around that place.”