Chapter 12 Shelter
"Follow me, the mall part is used as vantage point and the underground shelter is where all the other survivors stay. Follin will talk you up on current state. We have one entrance point, the others are blocked from the inside and outside, which is on the southern side of the mall just past the entry gates." Brady explained as Rohan listened.
"We have 31 total people at the shelter all divided in different groups. Follin will walk you through those as well." Brady told as they reached the southern side of the mall. The staircase for the shelter was placed next to the bathrooms and looked similar to the emergency exits in other buildings. One door was opened by a person who was standing on the inside of the corridor.
"Lynn lead him down the stairs and introduce him to Follin." Brady said to the person standing behind the door. She had a very sharp look and nodded to Brady. Lynn walked down the staircase as she nodded back at Rohan for him to follow her.
The doors led to a dimly lit staircase that was made from reenforced concrete and metal handrails. The air was slightly musky but nothing unbearable. After three sets of stairs they stopped and ended in another pair of doors, also locked from inside as Lynn knocked in a certain rhythm on the left door.
Rohan felt the a cool breeze slip past him as the door creaked open and Lynn suddenly shoved him through the door. "Follin" was the only thing he heard coming from Lynn as she quickly turned around and left again back up the stairs.
Entering through the doors Rohan could see the inside of the shelter, it was not so different from what he had imagined. The first part was a small hallway that led to an open center space that had a small 3D blueprint of the shelter embedded on the central table. All the walls were smooth concrete with slight yellowish LED lights at the top that gave strong light, as if he was outside.
Following the person that stood next to the door they arrived at the central table.
"Well I suppose an introduction is necessary, my name is Nidea and I'm in charge of handling the shelter door, most of the time that is, well when my shift is that is."
She sighed loudly as she took another breath and extended her hand towards Rohan.
"Your name is…?"
Taking her hand Rohan introduced himself "I'm Rohan, I just arrived here and need to speak to Follin."
"Well nice to meet you Rohan! It's been some time since we saw a new face, it's been a pretty hard week" Lynn responded, the happy emotions draining from her face when she said that last part. Everyone had a struggle to get here. "I will show you around a bit through the shelter before I hand you over to Follin" Lynn continued in her more happy voice but the pain in her eyes was still noticeable.
"Most of the shelters organization and structure are handled by Brady and Follin, mainly Brady keeping everyone on their feet. He is the backbone of the group, keeping it all together, just so you know." She gave me a short side eye before continuing with the 'tour' of the shelter.
The shelter had a total of 7 areas, all except 1 were accessible to everyone, and a total of 4 entry points at the north, east, south and west area. From the southern entry that was the only accessible point for now the first rooms to the left and right were used as storage, containing, water, food, blankets and those materials.
The rooms at 3 and 9 o'clock were reached via hallways, first they would pass nest to the bathroom areas, the shelter had two very simple showers at the east and west side. After passing the restroom areas the hallway would end at the common area were some people were staying and the sleeping area was next to the common area. The eastern and western exit were past the common rooms and not in use.
The northeastern and northwestern rooms were used both as storage and utility rooms. They served as meeting area and they had even installed a practice range. Lynn explained to Rohan that Follin had organized the most in the shelter, from food rations to tasks outside the shelter. Yes they would go outside in small teams to; look for other survivors; find provisions and equipment that could be useful; find more out about the state of Duran and the northern continent.
The main northern room that was not accessible except for Brady and Follin and whoever they allowed to be there. Lynn told that the main use for it was for planning of important thing or storing whatever they wanted. Lynn sounded very dissatisfied with the planning but she didn't make a further point out of it. So Rohan didn't press on and kept listening.
"Soo that is the short round trip of the shelter, I will drop you off to Follin, hopefully you will get a sleeping place. By the way did you come here through the city? What was it like?" Lynn asked with a spark of curiosity in her eyes. The days in the shelter made her
"No I traveled on through the eastern forest mainly, but did come through the castle area. That was deserted from the gates to the castle, and even the castles seemed to be effected somehow."
"interesting…. Make sure you mention that to Follin. He keeps a log of what has happened in the city. Well here we are." Lynn said as she pointed to a person hanging over a map of what seemed to be the city all with notes pasted, lines drawn, markings, red crosses all over it. The guy, who Rohan quickly thought to be Follin, was very ordinary, just a bit shorter than himself. Follin had short black hair all combed to one side, and his skin tone was very light, unhealthy so. His clothes consisted of simple black shoes, black jogging pants and a black hoody. Although the posture gave a different vibe his face had very sharp features and his eyes were sparkling blue.
"Follin… hey Follin!" Lynn called to him as he didn't respond until she screamed in his ear.
"sorry he goes into his zone when he gets rather focused so its hard to get him out of it. Follin meet Rohan, and Rohan this is Follin as you should have guessed."
Rohan extended his hand and greeted Follin "Nice meeting you"
"Could have been under better circumstances" Follin responded dry as he shook Rohan's hand. He had yet to show any emotion on his face as he looked at Rohan.
"I've got a couple important questions about Duran first then I'll find you a place and role you can take. First fill me in on what you happened since the shockwave, were you where, what you saw, encountered and how you got there, take your time and give details.
Rohan started telling him about his departure to Mt Horn and his subsequent 'adventure' through the eastern forest, the castles and his route to the shelter. Not forgetting the round orb he got the skill from and the sword he obtained.
"Interesting, as far as we know the main force that attacked the city consisted of animal like enemies, often having some human form remaining er they can even look like multiple animals combined. If you need it we compiled a list of the enemies, or should I say monster encountered. But you need to know, this list was made only possible by people surviving them so there might be way more out there than we know."
"Then your shortsword you got, around functional quality and shouldn't have problems with goblins, but any armor and it will break, it has endured a lot of heat… did you fight lava or something?" Follin told Rohan while he was going through some notes, only giving a side-eye when he asked anything.
Rohan couldn't tell when Follin was even making anything close to a joke. "No it's the skill I got from the crystal orb in the castle."
"Yes, it seems that it doesn't include any fire resistance in the object, possibly only your hands as they are still attached. If you want to experiment feel free to do so in the practice room. But don't go overboard, there is no spare or repair stuff available." Follin responded dry without any change in tone.
"I have no interest in experimenting at all" Rohan responded quickly as he thought to himself 'What is he even thinking about, shouldn't we have other priorities than training like saving other people or escaping the city in the first place.'
"Then lastly the so called "crystal orb" you found are indeed used to obtain skills, I have chosen to name them Orb Formed Mana Supplying Crystal Skill Cores, or just Cores in short." Follin shortly looked over at Rohan to see any reaction to his astonishing name choice, but his reaction was rather lacking. Or the reaction didn't even occur. "But we did find out a little bit about the Cores in general, I had also obtained one myself. First the main thing is most are crystal or glass like allowing you to look in them but not really through it efficiently as they aren't perfectly round but more ragged orb formed. Secondly, size can differ, but we have not seen any substantial changes when it was smaller or larger. Third, they are for the most part indestructible, but damage can appear on the outside. We did not find a limit yet or what happens when they break. Lastly, and the most important part, the color of the Core is equal to the characteristics of the skill, in your case the Core was orange colored which is Fire category. So brown would mean Earth and so on. But…. there is an extra remark for this point, when the skill has an effect, such as your Fire Infusion, the Core will emit the same effect. Again, in your case it was heat and a bit of light. Not that hard." Follin kept on going about the skills.
"But my skill doesn't give off any light when I use it…" Rohan asked confused.
"No indeed because you aren't warming it up enough, why do you think the light bulbs used to be so hot? Does fire give light but no warmth or only warmth and no light? Well anyways let's wrap this up."
Feeling stupid by his own comment Rohan had to mentally recover from Follin's jab, he was just called stupid in a roundabout way. He looked at Follin slightly sad "What is your skill?"
Sighing, Follin responded "It allows me to give physical form to my thoughts and ideas as well as allowing these forms to persist indefinitely in however form I prefer."