"Vane, come and help us!!" shouted Orechin. As Vane left the plushie back on the bed and turned around, he noticed Orechin trying to remove some of the debris. Darian, who had just reached him, tried to help him too as much as he could.
"Are we sure removing them will be the right choice?" asked Liro as he walked closer. Behind him, Vane rushed to the others and arrived to help them.
"Well, Tyel said that there would be a door bringing us directly to the secret laboratories…" said Orechin, remembering when Tyel said that he had used his power to look at what would have happened to him if he entered the sanctuary.
"Well, that is true…" Tyel scratched the back of his head while Vane and Darian removed a huge boulder with all their strength, "but this will just take too much time…" he pointed out, as Vane and Darian were breathing heavily after moving a boulder, which wasn't even the biggest one.
"Maybe he's right… like, how can you even remove this other one?" asked Syrmax as he pointed towards a huge rock literally blocking the path.
"Your power?" asked Orechin as he tilted his head to the side to look at Vane.
"Not my power," answered Vane as he tilted his head too.
"I could have tried to smash it with my power… but…" Darian glanced back to where he had left Snowy on the pink room's table and sighed.
"I guess our only path is actually the other one…" said Lily. Realizing that it was actually the only option, Darian went to pick up Snowy again.
"We don't know for how far this debris goes. Maybe the other path will be our safest pick?" said Martheel.
"But we simply don't know what's there…" said Orechin, who wanted to pick the safest path that Tyel had already taken.
"Remember that on the other path, Zrelekai came out of the door… not that we've got much choice," said Tyel as he got ready to reach the other path. Everyone else positioned themselves nearby or behind him.
Tyel glanced back, and realizing that everyone was ready, he nodded his head. "Okay everyone… we don't know what we might find there, but we can't back off now. Soon we will defeat Ashikunz and free the whole city… LET'S NOT BACK DOWN NOW!" shouted Tyel as he raised his fist in the air. Everyone else shouted happily and did the same.
In a few minutes, the group reached the other path, the one they never took because countless plushies always came out of it. 'We're entering there…' Tyel remained still for a moment at the entrance of the other section, gulping. As he glanced back, even though his friends were there, he clearly saw the scene of himself getting eaten alive by the plushies.
Tyel, snapping back to reality, shook his head as he felt the touch of Orechin on his shoulder. "Don't worry, Tyel, we're close to the conclusion," said Orechin with a reassuring tone.
'Right… soon I'll stop dying non-stop…' thought Tyel. As he nodded his head, he looked at the entrance with a decisive gaze.
As the group started to walk, everything soon began to change. The walls were no longer yellow, but they soon became an ink black. As Tyel glanced around, he recognized them almost immediately. 'These are the walls of the secret laboratories…' he pointed out. Tyel touched the walls and realized that they felt exactly the same.
"What is it, Tyel? Do you know them?" asked Lily. Tyel nodded his head. "These are the walls of the secret laboratories…" he whispered. Everyone else, hearing him, gasped in fear.
"The place where they're keeping Catripple…" As Orechin realized what this place was, his face soon turned from a scared one into an excited one. "We can't stop now, right?" he asked. Everyone else nodded their heads and kept walking.
"Hey guys, what's there?" asked Vane as he pointed towards a small room. Vane, who was currently walking in the last position of the group, made everyone stop. "What's there?" asked Darian, confused.
Vane entered this small room, followed by Darian and Liro. "We'd better remain here… there isn't much space for us," said Lily, and everyone else agreed with her.
"Are these… plushies?" pointed out Vane as they entered the room. In front of them, there was countless furniture, and each piece had countless plushies on it. "So that's where they came from…" said Liro as he touched one of the plushies and realized that they were softer than anything.
"Mhm, it reminds me a lot of a room in my old house," pointed out Darian.
"The one you used to live in with your grandmother?" asked Liro. Darian nodded his head.
"She loved plushies too… and she had a huge room with tons of plushies because she really liked them," said Darian as he walked in front of one of the plushies that was able to catch his attention. Darian, with Snowy resting in his hands, slowly left him on one of the tables and grabbed the plushie.
"This one is really similar to one of the plushies she had…" said Darian as he smiled warmly. Right when a tear was about to fall from his eyes, he shook his head. "I can't cry yet, I have to resist."
Darian then slowly left the plushie back in its position and grabbed Snowy again. Vane and Liro looked at him, smiling proudly, remembering when Darian had told them all about his past and about the promise he had made to his grandmother, Anny.
"What did you find there?" asked Lily curiously.
"Just countless plushies… it was where the Seamstress usually kept them," answered Vane.
"Oh, then that's where they were kept… this explains more," said Tyel. Soon enough, the group began to walk again.
"It's just an infinite hallway… when are we going to find something?" said Vane, slightly annoyed, as they had already spent ten minutes walking in this same place without seeing anything.
"Are we sure it actually brings us somewhere?" asked Martheel. The others all looked a bit unsure.
"They would have placed a wall if this didn't bring us somewhere… let's keep going. These surely are the walls of the secret laboratories; we will definitely end up somewhere," said Tyel with a reassuring tone. Everyone else nodded their heads and kept walking.
'Still, it's too dark… I can barely see what time it is now.' Tyel, before going into the sanctuary, had brought a small clock with himself so he would always know what time it was, but right now the light was extremely weak, so it was impossible for him to understand what time it was.
"Guys… but are we sure there aren't any cameras around?" pointed out Martheel. The group all glanced around and realized that they hadn't spotted them yet.
"I think that there are some cameras…" pointed out Tyel. 'I just need to remember that they had placed them in that hallway when we dived into the secret laboratories for the first time…'
"It's just too dark around for us to spot any of them…" said Darian, and the others agreed with him.
"And especially after what happened in the sanctuary, they surely know about our arrival," said Liro.
"Hey, there's some light there!" shouted Vane as he pointed with his finger at the end of the hallway. After twenty minutes, the group had finally spotted a different room, and a weird yellow light was coming from there.
"Let's go," said Tyel as he began to run, followed by the others. As soon as they arrived there, their breath was taken away by the thing they saw through the window in front of them: there were countless robots.
"What? Are these… robots?" pointed out Vane, as he didn't care about anything else in the room and simply focused on the robots.
Nearby the window, there was a huge desk with a big computer on it, which now was turned off, and there were some chairs all scattered around the room for absolutely no reason at all.
"What even is this room?" asked Liro as he glanced around, surprised.
"I don't know… but I can easily tell to whom it belongs." Tyel noticed something below the desk. As he kneeled down to grab it, he picked up a piece of the rind of a watermelon that had been recently eaten.
"Zrelekai…" said Darian, gritting his teeth. Tyel threw the watermelon back on the ground. "Gross… there was still some saliva." Tyel wiped his hand on the desk, trying to remove the weird liquid from the watermelon.
"Still… what are all these robots? Did he build them all by himself?" asked Vane as he couldn't believe his eyes. "There are at least one thousand…" said Lily as she gulped in fear.
Darian, who now looked back into the room with the robots, shook his head. "These robots are extremely old, just look at the ones in the back," said Darian as he pointed his finger toward the rear of the room. There, some robots had bodies that were extremely rusted, and they looked ancient.
"Then what does this mean?" asked Lily.
Darian, before answering, remained silent for a few seconds. "Remember when I told you that a huge war was fought in the desert?" asked Darian. Lily and Vane, next to him, nodded their heads.
"I was right when I suggested that Zrelekai might have found something related to the old war… then this is where he was able to gather and study all the robots," said Darian. The others next to him had horrified looks.
"But why hasn't he already released all these robots, then?" asked Lily, worried. Darian shook his head.
"I don't know… but I believe he's trying to repair them fir—" Darian couldn't finish his sentence before he was interrupted by Liro.
"Everyone… I might have found something important," said Liro. The others, who weren't listening to Darian's theory, had been searching around in the drawers for something important, and that's when Liro had found a small piece of paper.
"What's there?" asked Darian as he got closer, just like everybody else in the room.
"What's with your face, Liro?" asked Orechin, joking.
"Well… it's something related to Therya, so…" As he finished the sentence, Darian, Vane, and Lily all gasped in surprise.
"What do you mean, related to Therya?" asked Vane as he rushed towards Liro to read the paper.
"Do we need to get worried?" asked Lily. Liro looked into her eyes for a moment and made a sort of confused face.
"Well, not you directly, as you weren't there yet…" whispered Liro.
"Explain, Liro, what's on there?" asked Darian. Liro took a deep breath and began to read everything aloud.
"'Year 2585, as always I was minding my own business with my experiments… when suddenly, the moment I turned around, I felt a presence behind me… I still remember my body sweating hard. I couldn't even say anything before the person behind me started to speak.
"Don't move… just create a rifle for me," said this voice… I still remember these words, but I couldn't understand what they meant, like… who even was he? I was about to turn around and shout at him when suddenly I found myself trapped in this weird dirt room, and I understood immediately that he could use dirt magic.
Without even having the time to say anything after that, the voice now behind this wall spoke again: "Create the rifle… or I'm going to end you."
He spoke with such a threatening tone that… brr, I still get shivers every time I think about it.
I asked him these exact words: "So? Why might someone like you need a rifle?"
"I just need to assassinate someone… but it is in another city. I don't care about any of you here in Ardoris," answered the voice. The moment I had finished creating this white rifle, a small opening appeared in the wall. As I passed the rifle through, a hand made entirely of dirt grabbed it.
The voice then didn't say anything; he simply disappeared without giving me any warning,'" said Liro as he finished reading. Everyone felt a huge shiver run down their spine, but none more so than Vane and Darian, who felt it harder.
"It was exactly some days after you returned here, Darian…" pointed out Liro. Darian, now with a scared face, began to think.
"Yes… the rocket was planned to return on January 18th of 2585… when did Zrelekai receive this person?" he asked, confused.
"Wait, what are you even saying? I can't follow you," said Lily, as she couldn't understand anything because she had never heard anything about a rifle.
"You weren't with us yet… the old king of Therya was shot by a rifle… and we still can't find the real person guilty of the assassination…" said Liro.
"But now we know who commissioned this rifle… but—" Darian couldn't even finish his sentence before a voice coming from another room interrupted them.
"But when did it happen?" said this voice in a joking tone. As everyone turned around, they noticed Zrelekai wheeling Catripple in on a chair, with her hands, feet, and mouth bound. "I remember it well," he said while smirking. Now, finally, everyone else started to shake in fear at the sight of Zrelekai.