The ghost system

2: levers

Rhys was somewhat comforted as he stepped out of the portal into a forest. He had half expected to walk straight into a fiery pit since it was a black portal, so just a normal forest was so relieving.

However, as he turned to look at Barrow's men, he realised that they did not have the same looks of relief on their faces. In fact, they were on high alert and looked quite frightened. They each had their weapons out and were crouched low as if ready for an assault.

Rhys frantically turned around. He did not have the power of a core so he did not have any kind of superhuman ability, nor could he sense power or aura like the people who had absorbed cores. All he could do was try to stick as close to Barrow's group as possible and squint through the darkness hoping to see whatever was out there before it attacked him.

Barrow had been planning this raid for a while. For years he had been stuck with raiding green portals where he could only hunt common monsters and trade in really cheap gems. It had been his dream to raid an orange or red portal, where he could get his hands on some valuable monster hides and untouched gems. He had been searching on the dark web for any poached portals that he could take his team to when he suddenly struck gold. Someone was selling a stolen black portal.

Although the price was expensive, Barrow knew he could not turn an opportunity like this down. Besides he was sure that the treasure trove he would find inside a black portal would be enough to cover its cost. It was an untouched, unraided world after all, so there were definitely things inside that could make him wealthier than his wildest dreams. Since he spent all of his savings to buy the portal, he didn't have enough money to buy a gem evaluator so he got hold of the next best thing. In district twenty, many gem traders knew about Rhys since he was good at identifying gems, and he was much cheaper than an evaluator, so Barrow decided to bring the kid along with him. Since he had limited time in the portal, Barrow didn't want to waste time picking up common gems, he needed the kid to direct him and tell him which were the good ones so his team didn't waste valuable time on the cheap stuff.

Barrow had been thrilled when he had stepped through the gate, however, his mood instantly dropped once he breathed in the air of the dark forest he found himself in. This place, the world beyond the portal reeked of bone-chilling darkness. The aura about this place was menacing, and for the first time since Barrow thought up this scheme, he began to doubt himself.

The core Barrow had absorbed when he was young was a common core that enhanced his physical traits as well as his senses. In short, he was stronger and could hear and see much better than the average person. In the distance, at the very edge of the forest, he could hear them. Their spindly legs beating against the floor of the forest. Their steps getting closer by the second, a whole legion of what seemed like monsters coming towards them.

"Men we have to move!" He shouted to all his troops. Immediately they all began to run wildly through the forest, in the opposite direction of the footsteps.

Rhys was the weakest member of the group since he didn't have an infused core, and yet they had decided to give all the bags and extra weaponry to Rhys for him to carry. As the group all ran off ahead of him, Rhys struggled to keep up with them. Before long he was panting and getting dizzy. Having spent most of his time in a quiet script store and doing minimal physical activity, the run was excruciating.

Rhys was pretty much powerless and couldn't hear the hundreds of footsteps at the back of the forest making their way towards him. But out of instinct he followed the group.

Finally, Barrow came to a stop. The forest that they had run through came to an end at the mouth of a massive black lake. Looking across the lake, Barrow's worries slipped away and his eyes lit up greedily. In the middle of the lake was a giant stone castle. It looked like a castle that could be found in old horror movies or some of the countries that used to make up Europe. There was no doubt in Barrow's mind that he would find his treasure there. The only problem was the lake, he had no way to tell if there were monsters swimming around in there ready to eat them if they tried to get to the castle.