Kings Game

Chapter 121 - Forgotten Cities

All of these thoughts flooded my mind up until I hit the snow. It was deep powder and cushioned my fall well enough. It still hurt miserably, and snow managed to get into every one of my crevices, but I survived with little more than a bruised hip and a sprained ankle.

Digging myself out of the snow, I took some time to get my bearings. I had enough supplies to survive in the wilderness until my injuries stopped hurting, I just needed to find a place to hide from the elements. As I was scanning the mountainside for somewhere to set up camp, I noticed a thin column of smoke drifting up from between some crags and being carried away by the wind.

Naturally, I assumed that it must be other adventurers hoping to climb the mountain. The base of the smoke wasn't too far away so I began limping my way over. I expected to find a campfire and a couple of hardened travelers, easy marks for someone with my skills. What I found instead was a vent in the side of the mountain.

Someone had carved a vent directly through the stone to allow smoke to flow through. Feeling my way around the vent, I found a handful more that were laying cold and dormant. I had managed to stumble upon some form of ancient architecture. Naturally, my curiosity drove me to keep exploring.

Within another hour, I had worked my way through the area and found a cliff face that was a little too flat, a little too smooth. I began poking and prodding it. When that didn't work, I began tapping on it. When that didn't work, I picked up a nearby stone and began banging on the wall with all the strength I could muster.

That finally did the trick. There was a loud click, and part of the cliff opened up like a door. Nobody came out to greet me, so I took that as an invitation to go inside. The passageway was long and smooth, carved by a master's hands. At the end of the passageway was a city. It sounds strange to say, that I found a whole city inside a mountain, but I did.

It was large and spacious. A dome had been carved out of the mountain to make room for several buildings inside. The buildings were beautiful and complex. I got the impression that they were very intentional, that each and every detail was painstakingly carved. I can only imagine that someone capable of carving out that much of a mountain must have had a good reason to do so. I'm guessing that that reason was to preserve these buildings, at least, preserve their image and their architecture, like some sort of monument to a long forgotten kingdom.

I was a little disappointed when nobody greeted me. I felt awfully clever and full of myself for having discovered such a hidden treat and nobody was getting excited about it, either for good or ill.

Exploring a little further, I found out why.

(2)

The first people I met were a pair of pale and emaciated sentries. They wore simple robes and carried staves covered in glowing symbols. Neither of them could hardly move. When I said hello, they simply stared at me, then at each other.

"We're dying," one said. "Please help."

"Happy to," I told them. "Tell me how."

They explained to me how the city had been plagued by disease for several years. They had managed it as best they could but it was a losing battle. More than half of the city was dead. The ruling council was kept in strict isolation to prevent any of them from contracting the disease, while the rest of the populace did their best to keep the city moving, to keep food growing and the water running.

The illness, as best I could tell, was a type of fever. It caused the carriers to grow feverish, filled them with nausea, and robbed them of their strength. The illness would drag on for months, slowly draining the people of life before they finally succumbed to their fate.