Chapter 7 Castle exploration
Entering the central room of the castle Rohan looked around and took in the view. All walls were covered with some kind of art form, whether they were abstract painting, classical oil works, portraits of rich people, extensive landscape views of the sea and mountains. Many marble statues would line the pillar of the room, giving a hierarchical impression as all their ancestors were eternalized. Even the curtains had descriptions of past historical events and important meetings, such as the distribution of Duran city itself, obtaining the mountains for mining and won battles. None of the reputation damaging events would be shown. Hanging from the roof was a shining chandelier that was the size of a car and had many crystals, diamonds, gold, silver, almost every kind of shiny material to attract attention. This room was completely pristine and incomparable to the horror of before.
'It's like these rooms were intentionally spared from ravaging. Putting more worth in their own wealth than any person these 'nobles' are horrible.' But Rohan had not expected any less.
'I haven't seen any activity at all, not even an alarm going off.' Roaming through the castle Rohan noticed the absurd quietness, no sound could be heard. All the castle rooms were completely devoid of any life, only the entry room that had all dead people inside was different. Moving on to the second floor it was eerily similar as all the rooms were empty. No activity in the library, bedrooms, bathrooms, playing rooms, tv rooms whatever room they had thought of was empty. This continued for the 3rd floor and 4th floor all the way until he reached the center of the 4th floor. Light was shining through the spiral staircase down on the center of the room, coming closer Rohan felt an odd presence come from the tower.
'It feels warmer the closer I get to the stairs, even when I stop moving it feels like I'm starting to sweat.' Pulling my shortsword out I moved up the stairs, slowly step by step it felt as if I was climbing straight into the sun. It took three revolutions to reach the top of the staircase, sweat was dripping from my head as I entered the tower. Looking for the source of the light I found an old antique lamp above a table, not connected to any source of power whatsoever. The lamp case had black edges and a hook at the top that looked like combined feathers. It gave of a weird vibe as it hung on a chain from the roof, but the light it gave off was similar to a fire, orange and yellow with some small hints of red.
"Is this lightbulb providing its own energy? Or it might be chargeable.' Taking the lamp off its hook and putting it on the table I could feel the warmth coming from it. It felt like sitting in front of multiple infrared lights that would be used in cold winters. Unlocking the small door I put my hand inside and felt all the heat disappear, the inside was colder than the room. Taking a gamble I stretched my fingers and shortly touched the small round lightbulb, but it didn't emit any heat. Taking the lightbulb out, I couldn't look in it but it felt very small and round, like a small orb. Suddenly I felt a pull come from the orb as something in my body reacted to it.
"shit what is this"
The orb felt connected to my own body as I could suddenly feel different emotions, warmth of a fire, light, safety and hope. Just as it started disappearing, I heard another voice in my head.
[Skill Unlocked]
The orb had completely disappeared when the voice called out. Not only did the orb disappear, but it also got darker and noticeably colder. Calling out my status I looked at the only changed part, the Skills section.
[Status]
Name: [Rohan Hughen]
Species: [Human]
Realm: [Awakened]
Mana: [33/33]
Level: [3]
Experience: [56/76]
Skills: [Fire Infusion]
Feeling no change in my body like the previous time, I checked if there were any hints the system might give on the skill and it responded automatically to my request.
[Skill Fire Infusion: Allows the user to borrow a part of the fire to infuse whatever they might be holding. Consumes Mana actively while using]
'This seems simpler than I expected it to be.' Just hold anything in my hand and the skill would work, thinking about it I took my shortsword in my hand and squeezed hard to activate the skill. Not doing anything I released my grip. It seemed pretty logical, the system responded to most mental commands so the skills should do the same. Trying again I stimulated the system skill with my mind.
The shortsword started glowing orange as light started coming from it, the heat was pretty intense, like standing in front of a giant furnace. But the drain on my mana seemed even more intense as within 20 seconds more than half of my mana had disappeared. 'Status' I checked.
[Status]
Name: [Rohan Hughen]
Species: [Human]
Realm: [Awakened]
Mana: [12/33]
Level: [3]
Experience: [56/76]
Skills: [Fire Infusion]
Feeling the mental and mana drain I deactivated the skill as I felt the mental pressure disappear. Looking at the sword I noticed that it stayed warm for some time as I put it in its sheath. Satisfied I checked the remainder of the tower for any more of these weird orbs but luck wasn't on my side. Leaving the tower I was happy with the discovery.
'Seems that not only monster can use skills but we humans can use them as well, but gaining new ones seems to be a difficult task if luck is needed.' Heading back down to the 4th floor I could feel my mana slowly regenerate, as it went up by 2 after 2 minutes. 'I will need to be careful with mana use, I don't know what happens when it runs out, and shouldn't try to find out that quickly…. Well maybe I could try now instead of in a more dangerous situation.'
Rohan weight off his chances and decided to drain his mana now to figure out what would happen, it couldn't be too bad right? Sitting down on the floor Rohan took his shortsword out as he activated Fire Infusion. He could feel the mana being drained as he checked the progress, [9/33], [7/33], [4/33], [2/33], [1/33]. It took him 14 seconds before it was empty and the last thing he saw was [0/33] as he passed out.
He was out cold for a couple of minutes before he regained consciousness. Waking up he felt his head hurt. "Shit I shouldn't do that again, it hurts like shit…" I really shouldn't have done that but at least I know the effect. His mana had refilled a little bit as he stood up again, putting his shortsword back on he moved through the last couple of rooms on the 4th floor.
'It seems I've passed through all upper stories and only the basement should be left' Making my way down again I passed through the floors quickly and checked for any changes that might have happened while being in the tower… or when passed out.
Reaching the 2nd floor was the first place where parts were different, it looked empty. Many rooms were missing certain parts of their decorations, chandeliers, statues were missing and even some painting parts were gone. Taking out my sword I walked quietly to the previous room that still had all its decorative parts.
'It should be goblins, only those creatures would steal all the gold parts from the paintings, statues, and decorations. The chandeliers were even missing completely, it seems that they liked shiny things as much as the rich people did. Going back up to the third floor, Rohan was unsure if he should leave the castle as quickly as he could, or try to find the goblin and kill the goblin. He could gain experience and get stronger, goblins were often well known being one of the weakest monsters, only a real threat in large groups. That was his biggest problem, he didn't know if it was a group, or just a singular greedy goblin.
Goblins would often hoard all their items in a single place, which was likely to be the basement so that made it an absolute no go zone for Rohan. Making up his mind Rohan decided to punish the goblins for their greed, the punishment would be impalement.