'It's a bit farfetched, but it's the only explanation I can think of,' Nick thought. 'They might have lowered the ground just to create a new city above the ruins.'
'The hole is not perfectly angular. The ground near the middle of the ruins is almost 50 meters lower than the ground near the edge. Of course, I'm only talking about the lowest levels of ruins.'
'The ruins of the Enlightened Ones are level.'
'I assume they made it like this to avoid the Sun's perception.'
'Maybe, back then, the Sun wasn't as peculiar about its identity. Maybe it was normal to avoid the Sun's light. After all, without the Nightmare, darkness doesn't sound like a bad thing.'
'If I am right, the layer of the Ancient Ones is basically useless since it's mostly made of residential and commercial buildings.'
'The layer of the Recovering Ones is useless anyway since their technological achievements are unremarkable.'
'The layer of the Suffering Ones is just as bad.'
'That only leaves the layer of the Enlightened Ones, but most likely, the actual value should be in the secret ruin to the north.'
Nick went past the ruins of the Recovering Ones, which didn't even support any other layer since the Enlightened Ones had built all the support themselves.
The layer of the Enlightened Ones was made of high-quality Zephyx materials.
The entire layer was made of materials that were even harder than the materials of the megastructure.
'Only Heroes can break through this material, and it's also not that easy.'
Back when the Crimson Sea had broken free, the old Governor had attacked the ruins below Crimson City.
His attacks had decimated almost the entire layer of the Suffering Ones, but he had only created individual holes in the layer of the Enlightened Ones.
For the next 30 minutes, Nick looked at the layer of the Enlightened Ones.
'At first glance, this also looks like a standard city with residences and shops.'
'However, there are a couple of things that are different.'
'First of all, why is everything made of such powerful materials? Even the houses and the sheds are made of materials that could resist the attack of Fanatics. I know that the Enlightened Ones had amazing achievements in Zephology and technology, but this couldn't have possibly been cheap.'
'Second of all, despite there being a big cluster of ruins and a presumed underground city, the bottom was completely isolated until the Crimson Sea incident.'
This was not something that everyone would notice.
Sure, there were several holes in the ground now, but those had been created by the former Governor.
Nick remembered that the Governor had attacked the ruins to create holes in them so that the Crimson Sea would stop rising.
And, sure enough, the Crimson Sea had sunk quite a bit, which meant that millions of cubic meters of free space had become available to the Crimson Sea. ř
Naturally, the Crimson Sea had been a liquid, and it had acted like a liquid.
If there had been any kind of hole in the layer of the Enlightened Ones, it would have been below that layer from the get-go.
But it hadn't.
It had only started lowering after the Governor's attacks.
'Why would you completely isolate your big underground city to such an insane degree that not even a single drop of millions of liters of water would get through?'
'If this were just a random residential area, why would you go to such lengths?'
'Well, I can only think of one thing.'
By now, it had become obvious to Nick that the Enlightened Ones wanted to desperately keep everything secret from the Sun.
After all, light also wouldn't be able to reach the underground city.
'Things make much more sense now.'
'This place used to be a standard town for the Ancient Ones. The Recovering Ones also used this as a normal town. But then, the Enlightened Ones turned this into a secret research facility.'
'Sadly, after their demise, the Suffering Ones couldn't make use of the ruins and simply built another town above this one.'
'The Suffering Ones probably didn't have any way to create light that kept the Nightmare at bay.'
'Among other things…'
The more Nick learned, the clearer the image became.
'If I view all of human history as a form of experiment, I can see the clear changing of parameters and ratios of the experiment.'
'The Ancient Ones used to be free and unbothered. Then, something happened. They died, and this entire experiment, machine, factory, or whatever has been created.'
'The Recovering Ones lived for a long time, but they barely got anywhere. There isn't even evidence of anyone that reached the seventh or eighth layer.'
'That means they stagnated for a very long time and never truly managed to advance.'
'This means that the suppression factor of the experiment was too high.'
'So, the Recovering Ones were scrapped, and the suppression factor was lowered.'
'Everything seemed fine for a long time until suddenly powerful humans with incredible technology burst out of the ground and attacked the bottle.'
'The bottle almost got destroyed, but the experiment was controlled again, and the Enlightened Ones were eradicated.'
'After that, the suppression factor was cranked to the maximum again, but with different levels of suppression.'
'The Corruptors were introduced. The Trio of Destruction and Death appeared. The Nightmare was introduced. The Maw was introduced.'
'And even worse, this probably wouldn't even have been everything.'
'Most likely, the Suffering Ones had to contend with even more powerful Specters than us.'
'It might be possible that there used to be another Eternal during the last era. Maybe even two more.'
'Otherwise, I couldn't explain why the last era would remain this weak for such a long time. It's not like the current era has some kind of genetic superiority or whatever. All of us are and have been human.'
'But in the end, the Suffering Ones also stagnated, just like the Recovering Ones.'
'So, the Suffering Ones were eradicated, and the suppression factor was lowered.'
'And now, we are in the current era.'
'The suppression factor is almost certainly not as low as in the era of the Enlightened Ones, but it is also not as bad as in the eras of the Recovering Ones and the Suffering Ones.'
'From the viewpoint of the Sun, we are approaching a sweet spot.'
'We are strong enough to produce Shields and have over a hundred Protectors, but we are not strong enough to deal with a random Eternal.'
'This era might be humanity's last chance to escape the Sun's grip.'
'In fact, humanity might not even be able to escape anymore without outside help.'
'The Maw also acts as a sort of power meter and locator. With the Maw present, there can't be any hidden level nine Extractors.'
'Even if Aegis catches Death and uses it to create a level nine Extractor, the Sun will still know what was going on, and if it becomes too dangerous, it will reset the era again.'
'The old Champion hoped that I would be able to stay hidden due to the Null's power, but that sounds naïve and farfetched.'
'Luckily, I just so happened to become a Specter, giving me the perfect disguise.'
'While Death and its servants care about a Specter that works for humanity, the Sun most likely doesn't.'
'In the end, I am just another Specter. I'm just another one of its servants.'
'As long as I don't act like I truly want to destroy the Sun or know about its deepest secrets, it will ignore me.'
'I just have to keep my head down and become more powerful.'
Nick stopped looking at the ruins of the Enlightened Ones.
He was sure that he had basically solved the mystery of these ruins.
The only truly interesting part was the secret ruins to the north, which was where all of the research should have happened.
But something still didn't seem to make sense.
Sadly, Nick wasn't sure what it was.
There was just this general feeling of something not fitting together.
'I should go to the lower layers,' Nick thought.
Just as Nick approached one of the holes, he realized what hadn't made sense.
'Right!' Nick thought. 'If there were no holes, how would I get to the lower layers?'
'The Enlightened Ones created a secret laboratory in a lower layer, but everything was so isolated that not even a drop of water could get through.'
'So, how did they get there?'
'I have not found any entrances in any of the buildings.'
'But there had to be an entrance somewhere.'
Nick looked around again.
'I've basically been everywhere, and I'm also confident in my perception. If there truly is an entrance here, I would have seen it.'
'Sure, there's a chance that one of the holes just so happens to overlap with the location of the sole entrance, but the chances are pretty low.'
Then, Nick looked at something.
The gigantic pillar in the center.
The pillar that supported the megastructure.
There was no entrance leading into the pillar.
'But what if there actually is one?'
'There might be something here that Crimson City hasn't found yet.'