The Legends of Anigma: Ethiel Archer | ONC 2023

PART L

On the other end of the short tunnel lined with frosty, thin ice was a grand circular hall made of stone bricks, wet with the cold humidity, softly glimmering. The grand arc designs lining the walls were messily patched by ice, sharp thin needles of it hanging down from the top edges. The ceiling was incredibly high, disappearing into the shadows where the light couldn't reach.

That was what the huge crystal tree harboured.

Large steps led down into an open area, at the centre of which, bordered by tall statues of winged knights, was a circular abyss.

"This doesn't look like a prison to me." Tifa hugged herself, shivering in the cold. "Maybe we have to go down into that abyss?"

"Hmm, let's see." Ethiel descended the steps, his bow and arrow ready just in case.

"I have wings, do you?" Red Wings asked them.

"I suppose they plan to ride on you, Red." Lord Veer teased him.

"I will gladly fall any height if that happens."

The abyss was deep, deeper than the ceiling maybe, a square stairwell spiralling down into the darkness that whispered death. Straight pathways connected the stairwell to the circular paths that ran round the abyss walls lined by metal doors behind which it was obvious that unpleasant, hostile things awaited with intentions that were beyond evil.

"The scroll did mention we have to go down the stairs, so I guess the Prison is at the bottom?" Ethiel looked at Lord Veer for confirmation.

"Perhaps." Lord Veer pursed his monkey lips and nodded.

"This feels like the Cave of Truth again." Tifa remarked.

"It does resemble, but I do not think what is ahead will be anything like that." Lord Veer commented, a frown over his deep eyes.

To see a frown on his face at such a time was disheartening for Ethiel. To him, if Lord Veer — the one he idolised as bold and brave — was alarmed and deemed something to be hazardous, it was more than just hazardous, it was disastrous. What he couldn't understand was why Lord Veer was saying that, but he already felt the answer when the hair on the back of his neck raised with a very discomfortable feeling.

Whatever was down there... it was the worst... it was evil incarnate... not much different from Rak Sharas maybe...

But what needed to be done, needed to be done. They had to go down and so they did.

Tifa threw her staff light around at the metal doors lining the abyss black stone wall, and when she did, the doors where her light reached trembled and shuddered with the gruesome growls and howls that bellowed from within.

"Let's not do that, shall we?" Ethiel politely held her small hand and pointed it back on the stairwell when he couldn't stand it anymore since his heart was already on edge, ready to leap out of his body.

It was a long stairwell that extended deep and deep till Ethiel started to wonder if it even had a bottom. As they went further below, the cold started to dissipate and a wave of heat started to surround them. They weren't shivering anymore, they were sweating.

The smothering air was suffocated with the smell of rusty iron and stones, stale and sickening. It became a work to breathe in that thick air.

After almost an hour or two of walking down the stairwell, surrounded by deadly growls from the prison cells around, Ethiel spotted a ground at the bottom, softly and faintly tainted by a very dull reddish orange.

The abyss stopped at one point and the stairwell emerged out of it, leading to the bottom, to an expanse of stone floor. The place was lit by red flames of the torches set on the tall walls.