Chapter 461: Secret construction
Chapter 461 – Secret Construction
A gradually approaching breath suddenly interrupted the topic at hand.
Agatha immediately retracted her fingers that were touching the mirror, “Someone is coming, a squire.”
“Understood, I won’t scare him,” the voice from the mirror came directly into her mind, “I’m right beside you, when you look carefully, you’ll find me.”
Agatha nodded, but just before the “she” in the mirror left, she then seemed to suddenly think of something and subconsciously spoke, “Are you …… cold over there?”
“…… It’s not cold now.”
The voice dissipated in her mind, and the feeling of being watched gradually faded, the other Agatha reflected in the mirror then returned to a normal mirror image – eyes covered by black cloth, wearing the robe and skirt of a priestess, standing quietly in front of the mirror.
Agatha hesitated for a moment, tentatively reached out to the mirror, touched only cold glass – even let a person suspect that everything that just happened is really just an illusion.
And almost at the same time, she heard footsteps had come to the door, while a soft knock sounded, “Archbishop, are you inside?”
The old guardsmen still customarily called her “Gatekeeper”, while the clergy in the church had begun to address her as “Archbishop”.
Agatha straightened her expression and turned around without moving, “I’m here, come in.”
The door opened, and a high-ranking church attendant wearing a short gray robe appeared in the doorway, saluting Agatha: “Archbishop, an urgent message has come from the city hall, requesting that you immediately make a trip to the South Harbor – General Tirion is already waiting for you there.”
“City Hall? Asking me to make a trip to Southport?” Agatha subconsciously frowned, feeling that there was something unusual about this news, “Any indication of what it is about?”
“No, it says it’s an emergency and not to be spread,” the high-ranking squire said with some hesitation in his tone, “but …… General Tirian sent a message, he said… …’the master of the fire may be interested’.”
The expression on Agatha’s face changed slightly for an instant.
“I see, go prepare the car, I’ll leave immediately.”
It didn’t take long for Agatha to have boarded the steamer heading to Southport, and considering the message from Tirian, she didn’t bring any of her entourage with her, but traveled alone.
And on the way to the harbor area, she was filled with an endless stream of speculation.
What had happened? What had happened to make that “General Tirian” react like this? In the previous battle, the South Harbor was once occupied by fake monsters, and the cleanup work is still in progress……. Could it be that they found something between the piles of ruins? Is it a blasphemous holy relic left behind by the Annihilationists, or is it a suspicious “sample” left over after the fake monsters have faded?
Either way, it shouldn’t have caused General Tirion to react this way.
With all of these thoughts, Agatha quickly made her way through the streets, which appeared to be cold and empty due to the state of martial law, and passed through a series of checkpoints and checkpoints, arriving at the southern port area, which was still in a state of total blockade.
Soldiers of the city-state guards guarded all the intersections, heavily armed church watchmen were patrolling, inspecting, and marking off contaminated areas waiting to be treated from one heavily damaged building to the next, there were priests collecting samples from those contaminated areas, and the occasional academy student dressed in heavy protective gear could be seen walking through the buildings under the guidance of their instructors – -They were civil engineering students, here today to check the state of the important harbor facilities and prepare for the repairs that would follow.
The car was parked in a clearing at the edge of the cordoned-off area, and Agatha was guided by two soldiers through a busy “work site” in a rather remote part of the harbor area.
They eventually stopped in front of a large building that looked like a warehouse.
“This is as far as we can take you,” the two lead soldiers turned to Agatha, apologizing slightly, “We don’t know exactly what’s going on down there – the General will explain it to you. ”
Down there?
Agatha noted this statement keenly, but she asked nothing, simply nodding her thanks gently to the two soldiers before stepping towards the warehouse that looked as if it had been sealed for a long time and still bore traces of battle on its exterior.
It wasn’t soldiers from the city-state guards that guarded the warehouse’s gates, but rather a group of undead sailors.
In Agatha’s eyes, the living were clear figures that were warm and emitting a faint glow, while the undead were empty and pale shells with smoke reminiscent of ashes rising from their blurred silhouettes – after noticing that the entire warehouse was guarded by undead, Agatha further realized that the situation here was anything but ordinary. For General Tirian clearly trusted his legions of undead more than the city-state guards.
“Ma’am,” one of the undead guarding the gate approached, his upper and lower body had been separated, with almost a quarter of his torso missing in the middle, and only some messy floating strips of cloth connecting the two halves of his body, whose upper body was clad in a new coat symbolizing the Frost Soldiers, but on the sleeves of the coat was another one representing the Queen’s Guard Cufflinks – this undead sailor came to Agatha and gave an unmistakable military salute despite his ghastly appearance, “Once inside you will be shown to the elevator, the General is already waiting for you in the underground facility.”
Agatha nodded, she was already certain that unless she arrived at the site herself, there was probably no one along the way who would reveal to her exactly what was underground.
Entering the warehouse, she was met by another group of undead sailors who had met her, and was led to the elevator that was hidden in the corner of the warehouse, seemingly dug out from behind a pile of camouflaged wall panels.
She then boarded the elevator and descended with the cage for several minutes before arriving at an underground facility that was buried deep underground and never appeared in any official records.
Stepping out of the car, she “saw” in the darkness and chaos of her vision an open hall, in which the “sludge” from the invasion of fakes was everywhere, and undead sailors were clearing it away, while a tall figure stood at the end of the hall, guarding a large door. A tall figure stood at the end of the hall, guarding a large door.
It was General Tirion – the new consul of the Frost City State.
Agatha stepped towards the figure.
“Oh, Lady Agatha, you’re finally here,” Tirian offered in greeting, “I thought you’d come straight from the Upper City Central District with a gust of wind, as rumor has it …… “
“I’m used to using the gray wind to catch up – but not so much that I had to come here by myself even half a city away,” Agatha said casually, and right after that, she raised her head and her gaze fell on the gate behind Tirian, “What exactly is the situation? Why is there such a facility underground in Southport ……?”
“You’re surprised, everyone’s surprised – this facility doesn’t exist in any official records, and we wouldn’t have found it if it wasn’t for the debris we’ve been clearing out of this place,” Tirian shook his head, “Guess what, we’re found something in this large facility that was hidden away?”
“Don’t sell me short, General,” Agatha sighed, while an eerie green firelight flickered where her eyes were covered in black cloth, “There are no outsiders here.”
Tirian laughed, then his expression finally became serious and he sidestepped slightly to the side, “See for yourself, it’s behind this door.”
Agatha turned her ‘eyes’ to the door.
Bloodstains could still be vaguely seen on the gate, as well as cratered dents left behind from the battle, so it was clear that during the previous Frost Defense Battle, there had also been an unknown battle in the depths of this uncharted facility.
Now, however, both the invaders and the guardians had disappeared in that battle.
She reached out her hand and, with a slight push, pushed the heavy door open a little.
The gate’s locking mechanism had been broken, and the heavy alloy doorway receded to the sides with a creaking sound, and a more spacious space, illuminated by gas and electric lights, appeared in Agatha’s perception.
The fishy, salty scent of seawater drilled into her nostrils along with it.
She stood at the entrance to the hall and stared in awe at the huge ellipsoidal dome-like machine fixed between the solid beams in her vision.
Below it, at the end of a long chute, was the source of the smell of sea water – a waterway, apparently, leading to the sea at the other end.
Standing in amazement for a long moment, Agatha broke the silence, “This is ……”
“It’s a deep-diver, ma’am,” Tirian exhaled softly, an indefinable complexity in his tone, “Built based on the blueprints of the last generation of deep-divers, applying many newer technologies than we used back in the day… . much more advanced.”
The suspicion in her head confirmed, Agatha couldn’t help but suck in her breath, then jerked her head around, “Who built this?”
“Possibly Consul Winston, and possibly a few past Consuls would have to be added to the list – we have not found detailed construction and approval records, so we cannot confirm exactly who gave the original order to build it,” Tirian said slowly. “Judging only from the little information we’ve found so far, the facility was operating in secret until at least two months ago.”
(End of chapter)