Chapter 556 Finding the entrance to the ruins
Karna walked out on the streets of Purplehaze city without having a plan in his mind , as he fiddled with the orb key that was supposed to lead to the entrance to the ancient ruins.
He only had two ideas at the moment regarding finding the potential entrance and that was to
1) Talk to old foggie NPC's trying to figure out what is the oldest part of the city and then scouring that area for hints.
2) Taking a map of Purplehaze city and circling the places where common players cannot generally reach and scouring those places for hints.
Both methods had very less chances of success , however Karna felt like trying , as his gut feeling told him that he could find the entrance somehow , and the guild needed him to find them as soon as possible.
Hence Karna started his campaign talking to old NPC's about what would be the oldest constructed part of the city and if they know about some ancient ruins , and noted his conversations with them down in a notebook.
He spent 6 hours talking to 40 different NPC before circling down to two places , The Knights hall and Brit the Baker's bakery.
According to the NPC's the knights training hall was the oldest structure that existed even before the city was constructed , as the very first Won Knight of Hazelgroove kingdom was a passout of that very training hall.
The second place was the bakery called Brit The Bakers in 7th Street of sector 3. It is said to be the longest standing structure in Purplehaze city dating back over 300 years and 7 generation of bakers.
Karna knew for sure that Brit the Baker's could not be the place , as 300 years would not cut out the ancient ruins , which only left the knight's training hall as a potential place where the ruins entrance could be , however he was not a knight hence not welcomed in there.
However lucky for Karna he knew a very capable knight who also happened to be the king of the country , hence Karna called on Rudra to go and knock on the doors of the knights training hall together.
The moment Karna mentioned that he suspected the knights training hall to be the place that had the entrance to the ancient ruins , Rudra face-slapped himself as he remembered the Purplehaze mist in his tier 3 promotion test.
It could most definitely be the knights training hall , and he had completely forgotten about it.
Hence he did not waste any time as the two rode on their direwolf mounts and sped straight towards the knights training hall.
The senior knight was very respectful of Rudra as his presence was celebrated amongst the knights present inside as they saw in him an extremely pormising seedling who could bring the knight class many glories.
Hence his request to scour the place for a potential entrance to ancient ruins was instantly granted , and not only that but the moment he showed the knights present the potential key , they instantly knew where to lead him too.
The senior knight said " There is a cave in our training hall , where there is this same inscription written on its walls and the cave is also the source of the Purplehaze mist , as every few days during the night time there is a steady outflow of the Purplehaze mist from that cave . It is a very peculiar phenomenon , maybe it is related to the mystery you are looking for my king ".
Karna's eyebrows twitched throughout the conversation as he found the respected knights to be nothing more than bootlickers who wanted to please Rudra left and right.
Not once did anyone even spare a glance at him since he had entered nor bothered with his presence as Rudra hogged a 110% of their attention.
However his shock would be nothing compared to dronacharya's shock when he would find out that the elites figured out the mystery of the ancient ruins so fast.
In his timeline it took the guild from Nineclouds 17 months of continuous scouring for clues to get the slightest hint about the location of the ruins , and then the knights resisted their entry and a fight broke out.
Getting into the ancient ruins was the hardest job they had ever done , as even inside the knights training hall , the place was incredibly huge and mysterious , hence finding a desolate corner with the same inscription inside a cave took many more weeks to be located.
Yet all Karna did to find the location of the ruins was simply ask around in the streets a bit and then Rudra was personally escorted by the staff to the cave where the entrance was.
All these events would have made dronacharya vomit blood should he have found out , however the panic he would have gotten if he found out that Rudra had already figured out the entrance to the ancient ruins would have been otherworldly as the secret of the ancient ruins far surpassed only having the tombs of the ancient , as there were weapons and treasures buried in those sands of time , that if uncovered could turn the modern world upside down.
Coming infront of the entrance , Rudra saw a sort of porous and hollow rock , however no matter how he pushed the rock , it would not budge at all .
However on the rock was the same inscription as the key , and there was a circular hole on the wall that exactly replicated the size of the hole.
Rudra was about to place the orb inside that key slot when Karna suddenly stopped him and said " Wait ! What if the entrance only opens for a limited time , shouldn't we call the others first and be ready? Also you still have 2 hours till your debuffs go away , so chill for now ".
Rudra looked at Karna and nodded , he had became too excited for no reason , Karna was right , he needed to wait and call the others first and only after his debuff time was over should he enter the ruins.
Which only left the question of whom to take ? , Rudra had no idea on how long the expedition would take and he could not leave the guild undefended , hence he could not take the full force of the guild with him. Two main elders had to stay outside and hold things down from ground 0 .
Rudra asked karna for advice as he said " Except the two of us , who is the most stable guy to lead the guild? ".
This was a very hard question as Karna thought about it for a minute and said
" Err , we can count Neatwit out , he is a child ".
Rudra replied without hesitation " Agreed ".
" Medivh is too shy and cannot boss around the newbies properly , if he is put incharge our authority as a whole will be undermined ". Karna said and Rudra nodded as if it made sense.
Had Medivh been here he would have sulked in a corner after hearing this analysis .
" SMG is too aloof, can't talk to people properly ".
Rudra nodded it was true.
" Fatty can stay , he is useless to bring , however useless in defending the city as well ".
Rudra nodded , it was true , the blacksmith was only the boss in the forges.
" Sir Jhonny can be trusted , but he is the best we have got and his ability to become air is just amazing , i could only clear the event dungeon because of him being the bait ". Karna said as Rudra agreed wholeheartedly , he could not leave sir Jhonny .
This meant that they has noone that could be left behind to take care of the place as the two nervously looked at each other and said in unison " Medivh it is ".
It was settled , Medivh was the best of the bad choices hence he was messaged about the fact that he was second in command and responsible for defending the city from his mage tower in the absence of the bigboys as Rudra put Amelia incharge overall to save face.
Except that Rudra called all Neatwit , SMG , Naomi , Yua , Jhonny and Yume , Skyla and Bo alongside him and Karna to make a 10 man group to enter the ruins .
Typing out a month's worth of instructions for Amelia to follow , Rudra put the guild in preparation mode for the war as two hours later with everyone assembled and his debuff period finally being over as strength returned to his body.
Rudra placed the orb within the slot as the porus wall suddenly moved back 2 feet releasing a lot of Purplehaze mist in the process as with the wall receding a dark tunnel leading to the unknown was revealed .
Neatwit being the first one to jump shouted " Into the rabbit hole we go ". As the rest of the elites followed suit.
With this jump the Elites entered the ancient ruins to find the solution to their impending crisis!
It was a 3 minute long fall , as at one point the elites felt their gear starting to catch fire , however thankfully their landing was slowed down as when they neared the end a strong burst of purplemist moving upwards towards the cave entrance broke their fall speed as the elites stacked over each other before tumbling towards the floor as a system notification greeted them.
System Notification : Congratulations you have entered the ancient ruins of Harappa and became the first explorers of this hidden land.
Dangers and opportunities beyond your wildest dreams exist in this lost land .
You have 30 days to find the return crystal and exit the ancient ruins or you will be stuck forever in this lost land
Good luck adventures !
Time left : 29 Days 23 hours 59 minutes 59 seconds
/// Today will be a mass release day with about 3-5 chapters being on the release schedule.
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