Chương 26: It’s a lab.

"Wait, is this what I think it is?" A Flicker. The holographic display appeared. TECHNOLOGY LOG ANALYSIS COMPLETE: RESEARCH LAB AGE: 845 YEARS.

"A lab?" The words suddenly left my mouth as I stood there confused and surprised at the same time. My mind started filling up with doubts of its existence.

"Do you know this place, Nova?" Aeris asked.

"No… Not really, I saw something similar once. From back where I was." Everything until now had made no sense, whether it was the log or dinosaurs and now this lab now. There are still things that I had no clue about, and the only way to find that out was to enter the lab and find more about it.

"What's going on?" Eli asked. Aeris and I looked at each other.

"It's fine — you can trust him. He won't tell anyone." Aeris said"Tell what?" he asked. She looked at him and exhaled.

"Okay, here's the thing. Nova is not a noble." She paused.

"What then who is she, and how —""I am not finished, Eli. Just listen to me first." She said, he quickly got quiet all of the sudden, maybe he was intimidated by Aeris. She is really scary.

"Nova is not from this world." Then Aeris told him everything that we had talked about yesterday. One day, sooner or later, everyone would find out. After Aeris had spoken everything, Eli began to walk around. Maybe, he was trying to take all of it in. For some people it was still unbelievable, then he stopped.

"Wait, since you know this place… So, does that mean that you have faced the curse before?" he said.

"No, I still have no idea what the curse really is. There was no such thing as a curse in our world. The lab which was back there was used for research purposes and studying purposes."

"Reasearch?" Eli looked confused.

"Studying?" Aeris looked confused as well. Both of them had a clueless expression on their faces, like they didn't understand a single word.

"Not important, but the real question is how is it here in the first place?" I said.

"We can think about that later, all we know is this lab or whatever you said, is cursed. And we should go and find the cure." Aeris started walking. I stopped her by extending my arms forward, blocking her way and shaking my head.

"If this place really is cursed, we can't just barge in there."

"So what are we supposed to do just stand here?"

"No, I did not say that, what I meant was that we need to find out what's inside the lab first. Then come up with a plan."

"But how are we supposed to do that, without going inside?" Eli said. I walked forward inside the lab parameter, so the Log would analyse the lab properly.

"Leave that to me."

"Activate advanced structural analysis." A flicker. The holographic display appeared.

"What is that?" Eli's voice came from back as he saw the log for the very first time. TECHNOLOGY LOG ADVANCED STRUCTURE ANALYSIS: ACTIVATED ANALYSING… MATERIAL FOUND MYTHRAL PASSAGE ONE FOUND PHYSICIST ROOM FOUND PASSAGE TWO FOUND CHEMIST ROOM FOUND PASSAGE THREE FOUND BIOLOGIST ROOM FOUND ANALYSIS COMPLETE: STRUCTURE BLUEPRINT AVAILABLE.

"Open the blueprint." The display changed. TECHNOLOGY LOG RESEARCH LAB BLUEPRINT The blueprint opened into detailed lab structure, like a map of the lab inside. Revealing every pathway and every room there was.

"Wait, is this the inside of this cursed lab?" Eli said. The log wrote everything in english, there was no way he could understand the language. Yet only one look at the blueprint he had already figured out that the blueprint was of the lab.

"Yes, it's the map of the lab." I said.

"But it's — it's floating. In the air."

"Yes, my map does that a lot."

"Amazing, your magic can give a floating map of places that are unknown." The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Usually he was shy when talking but now he became excited all of the sudden, he started staring at the display hard. Aeris stood beside me.

"Okay, so we have the map. But did you find where the cure is?" I took a closer look at the blueprint, searching for a clue and despite looking at everything, there was no sign of curse or anything that resembled it. It simply looked like a normal research lab.

"No, there is nothing that tells or shows anything about the curse or the cure."

"So, what's the plan now? How are we supposed to find the cure?" She was right to question that, even after advance structural analysis we hadn't found anything in particular that looked like a curse, I had hoped that the blueprint would get some idea about the existence of the curse and yet there was nothing.

"We still have this map, maybe we could find it somewhere… According to this map the passage should be right at the end of the hall, so let's just go there." Eli started walking towards the entrance of the research lab.

"Wait, we still need a plan." I said.

"We will figure that out on the way" He opened the door and took a step inside.

"So let's —" The land beneath his feet opened and in an instant he was gone.

"Eli… No." Aeris shouted.

"Help me!" The voice began to fade away as he was dropping down in the dark, the floor shut and went back to exactly where it was before. Aeris began to run towards him. She was about to enter the lab, before she could step in, I grabbed Aeris forearm and shook my head.

"You can't go in, Aeris."

"What, we can't leave him there, Nova. He needs us." I knew there was something off about the lab, but I didn't expect it to be a trap.

"We can't go in like that Aeris, we just have to trust him that he is alright."

"But what if he gets cursed or worse, dies." She started pulling her arms.

"I have to save him."

"No, listen to me, Aeris. If you go without a plan, you will be dragged in too. I know you care about him, but we can't just risk our lives like that, we need to figure a way so we do not get trapped. Once that's done, we can go and save him. Do you understand?" She calmed herself down and stopped resisting me.

"Yes, you're right, we all knew what we were getting into from the very start. It was going to be dangerous. So what do we do now, Nova? We have to do something?"

"I know, Aeris. I know… let me think for a second." She did not let her fear come on to her face, but I already felt her hands shaking as I was pulling. She was willing to risk everything in that moment.

"So far this much is clear, whatever is inside this lab, someone did not want it to be discovered."

"So, you mean someone did that to Eli on purpose?"

"I can't say for sure, but the trap was set up at the doorstep of the lab, so as soon as we enter the lab — we would get trapped. So, I won't deny that there is a possibility of someone setting up this trap for us."

"Arghh, what are we supposed to do now?" Frustration started showing on her face. My eyes went to the pouch that Aeris had been carrying with her. Stones of different sizes were inside it. She was a slinger so it made sense for her to carry the pouch full of stones.

"Aeris, can I borrow one of the stones from your pouch?"

"Stone, why?"

"Just give one, I'll explain later." She took a stone from her pouch and handed it to me. Now this will tell me the answer I am looking for. I threw it at the spot where Eli was dropped in the dark.

"What are you doing?" The stone had landed on the same place where the trap was triggered. But, nothing happened. The land was flat like it was before, the trap did not trigger.

"I was right."

"What, did you find something?" Aeris asked.

"The passage has a hidden pressure plate. Why didn't I think that before?"

"A what?" She asked.

"If you step onto the pressure plate the weight of your body triggers the plate and activates the trap mechanism."

"Mecha... — what?" She did not understand anything again. Her expression was clueless.

"What are you saying, Nova?"

"What I am saying is to watch where you put your foot, or else you will be trapped, like Eli did."

"Why didn't you just say that?" She paused.

"Okay, but I have a question. How do we figure out which one is right and where to step?" I crouched down to see the gaps on the land surface, to find out if there was an irregularity and luckily, I had found the gap between them, a piece of land was higher than other pieces. I got up and turned to Aeris.

"Now listen to me very carefully. I am going to figure out the right pressure plate, and you will follow me. Wherever I step, you only step there, okay?" She nodded. Okay let's see, If I am right about it before… Then this land, right here, should be safe. I took the first step inside the door, and entered the lab, the first step was safe. I became more confident about my analysis.

"Aeris, step here beside me, and avoid that land." She took a step beside me and nothing happened.

"Looks like you were right, you have figured it out." As per the blueprint, the passage was hundred meters long, there was a staircase at the end of the passage which was going down, that's where we had to go.

"Now where?" She asked. This time I couldn't crouch down and see the gap, if it was a trap we could fall into it. I had to think of something that could tell me which was the right one.

"Let me think…" I know this much that the pressure plate has tiny gap between them, they are usually a little above the ground level, but now I cannot crouch how would I — Something clicked in my mind.

"Aeris, just hold my hand tighter, I am sure this would work but if something goes wrong and I fell, I want you to pull me up okay."

"Yeah, I got you." I grabbed her palms tightly and slowly started dragging my feet on the ground, brushing it off the land. Because Aeris agreed to give me support I was able to shift all my body weight towards the direction of Aeris, which allowed my other foot to have less weight on it.

I had remembered when I threw a stone at the pressure plate nothing got triggered, so when I dragged my boots on the ground I was checking for irregular patterns, luckily I found it, the irregular land piece were just a little above the ground level, as the edge of the pressure plate, it touched my sole of the boot. My foot stopped there, I knew where the next pressure plate was and carefully, stepped forward while avoiding it. Aeris made sure to follow my lead.

After thirty metres I was at a spot where the pressure plate had surrounded me. To move forward I had to skip over and determine which was the right spot to step on, but the only problem was… There was no way to identify it by foot. If I did, I'd be stepping on it with more pressure, I had to find another way.

"Nova, why did you stop, is something wrong?" She asked. Think… there has to be something else I could use to help me in this situation. I run every detail at the back of my mind, trying to analyse what I had known so far. Then it clicked me. I turned back to Aeris and extended my hand.

"Aeris give me some stones."

"Okay, here take it." If I am right about this, the sound should help me identify which one is correct. I dropped one stone at the pressure plate in front of me. The sound echoed for a few seconds. I dropped on where I was standing and the sound did not echo and disappear just in a second. I was right the land was not a pressure plate, it was a hollow from inside, if the weight is more than the hollow land it opens, if it's less than the weight of its own, nothing happens.

In this case the stone weight is likely to be less, for it to open. I threw a stone ahead of the hollow land and the sound echoed, then I threw it diagonally towards left, the sound disappeared like the last time. I instantly knew where I must step, and I carefully skipped over it. I picked up the stone carefully from the hollow land and threw it on next, until we reached the staircase leading down.

"Finally, we did it. Let's hurry."

"Aeris, wait." She hurried down the stairs and stood there frozen. Luckily there were no traps on the staircase, so I followed. My eyes widened, a powerful rotten smell rushed through the air. There were skeletons everywhere, these were the people who were trapped in this place and were not able to make it out of here.

"What is this a graveyard?" Aeris said. As we walked through the passage, we found Eli. He was sitting, and terrified. As we walked through the passage, we found Eli. He was sitting, and terrified. The silence down there must have been the worst part. No light, no sense of how much time had passed, just him between those skeletons. When we found him he flinched at the sound of our footsteps before he even saw it was us.

"Eli…" Aeris rushed to him.

"Aeris...?"

"Oh my god, are you okay?" She asked, he shook his head and pointed to the pile of skeletons in front of him.

"It's okay, we will make it out of here, don't worry." His lips quivered, "Aeris, they all were cursed. They all died here." No, I don't think that they were cursed, I think they were likely trapped here. These people tried to go out of the lab, but the pressure plate just triggered and trapped them here until they died.

"I know, but we will be fine, I promise." She said,"I think he is shaken pretty badly." I paused.

"I think we should let him stay here and let him rest. What do you think?"

"No please, don't leave me here, I'll come too." He said.

"But are you sure Eli?" Aeris asked and he nodded,"Okay, then follow us." I looked for the room on the display which we were supposed to head to. But there was no door, nothing.

"What are we supposed to do? I couldn't find the next room, I think we are lost." I said. Eli stepped forward and pointed out at the wall.

"It's there." The wall looked like the rest of it; there was no door yet we passed through it like it was a door. It was a hidden door, of course it was a research lab after all. I was surprised he was able to spot it. The room was so bright and white, for a second it had blinded my eye.

"What is this place? It's too white." Aeris said. It was unusual that a white room existed here in the eight fifty years old ruin. And there is this light, it has turned on automatically, but there is no electricity or no magic user who can turn the light on. The door behind me shut automatically. It slammed so hard that it made a loud echoed noise.

"It must be the wind." Aeris said. But there was no wind blowing, ever since we were here. Eli tried to push open, but it didn't open.

"This door is not budging. What's happening?" Something wasn't right, I had this weird familiar feeling like this was all happening on purpose. Like I had experienced it before. My heart stopped in those seconds. …

"It was not the wind." I said out loud. … Aeris looked confused.

"Then what was it? I had just figured out what was happening —but before we could step out. It was too late. … A flicker. The display appeared. MYSTERY LOG: QUEST: PROVE YOUR MIGHT