“When was that?” Cowl asked curiously.

“A few days ago, right before I took this job.”

“Ah. I forget that Seekers live such eventful lives. Taking more than one job every few months fills me with distaste,” Cowl said.

“Well, we can’t all be rich,” Angel replied, examining the room. There were no lines of old magic or any clear indications of traps, so he slowly led them down the hall. He stopped at the first door, wrapping his hand in an oilcloth before tugging on the handle.

It turned easily. Angel quickly closed it again and took a step back, his frown deepening. “Great. More doors.”

“I take it the big, scary looking one over there is bad news?” Vanessa guessed, nodding at the door at the far end of the room.

“It’s where the catacomb wants us to go,” Angel replied. “It’s not necessarily bad news, but it is dangerous. It’s probably a dangerous fight or trap coupled with some nice reward if we manage to survive. It depends.”

“On what?”

“Well, it’s too early for this to be a deep portion of the catacomb,” Angel explained. “That means we haven’t reached what the catacomb is trying to protect. There might be something there, but most of it will be from the adventurers that died before us.”

“That’s… really morbid,” Vanessa said, her face tightening. “Shouldn’t that stuff be returned to the families of the dead Seekers?”

“Newsflash,” Angel replied with a grim smile. “Seekers are all grave robbers. I’d rob the Buried gods blind if I could find out where they were.”

“It’s not as barbaric as you think,” Cowl told Vanessa. “Death is not as taboo to the Seekers as it is to you. It is a fact of life, and the tools they can find in a catacomb are too valuable to leave behind or return. Perhaps when you become the Magistrate you can make a better way of living for people so that they don’t have to Seek.”

Vanessa grunted, reluctantly nodding her understanding. “So, what should we do?”

“Well, we’re not trying to get deeper into the catacomb,” Angel said. “We want to escape. As much as I’d love to delve deeper, the entrance guards were twice my level. The best case scenario for us might actually just be doing what the catacomb wants.”

“Dying?” Cowl asked.

“Well, not everything,” Angel amended. “Just a little. I hope you’ve still got some juice in you, because we’re going into the spooky door.”

Cowl shrugged, drawing his sword and holding it ready at his side as they made their way across the long hallway. Angel kept a close eye on the doors as they passed, but none of them moved.

When they reached the large door, Angel peered through the crack. The room behind it was about as large as a tavern, with a towering ceiling and iron grates at the far end of it. The walls were covered with massive churning gears and tubes full of crackling energy poked out from the gaps between the bronze.

The floor was plain metal, without any indication of traps. If anything, that just set Angel even more on edge. He slipped inside the door with a grimace, then slowly started towards the center of the room with Cowl and Vanessa close behind him.

Wind trickled past his face, ruffling his hair and chilling his clothes. It was largely stale, but there was the smallest hint of outside air that gave him hope.

“Where’s the monster?” Cowl asked, adjusting his grip on the sword.

“No idea,” Angel replied. “I hate to say it, but this is new to me. I’ve never seen a catacomb room like this. We’re totally at its mercy right now.”

He approached one of the glowing tubes. What looked like a miniature bolt of red lightning crackled within the glass, arcing from one bronze end to the other. It was mesmerizing.

Angel examined the back end of the tube, but it seemed to be connected to the wall by nothing more than a bronze bar.

He grabbed the support with his mechanical arm and snapped it with a sharp movement. The tube popped off the wall with a hiss. The light within it faded as he ripped it free, revealing several thick wires emerging from the back.

“Whoops,” Angel said, not sounding particularly apologetic as he placed the tube within his pack.

“What is that?” Vanessa asked.

“No clue. That’s why I’m taking it,” Angel replied, ripping a second one off the wall. “Unknown means expensive.”

“Or dangerous,” Cowl said, his tone indicating that he was frowning.

Angel shrugged in response, liberating a third tube. “The catacomb wanted us to come in here. If it wanted to keep its fancy glowing tubes, then it should have hidden them.”

The iron grates at the far end of the room rattled. The three of them didn’t even have a chance to react before the floor dropped out from beneath them.

Vanessa let out a short scream that ended in an embarrassed grunt as she hit the ground once again. It had shifted no more than a few feet downwards, but the rumbling hadn’t stopped. The ceiling was growing farther and farther away from them.

“Buried gods,” Angel cursed. “We’re getting deeper. Why are we getting deeper?”

“Maybe the dungeon really hates us,” Vanessa said, rubbing her back with a pained grimace. “I thought you said the catacomb wants to get rid of us?”

“Well, it also wants our artifacts,” Angel said, squinting up at the receding light above them. “But it shouldn’t want them bad enough to bring us deeper. The challenges on the surface are usually what it tries to kill people with, but the deeper we get, the closer we are to its inner sanctum.”

“What does that mean?” Vanessa asked.

“It means somebody has a very fancy artifact that it’s willing to risk a lot to get its hands on,” Cowl said. “Right then. Who’s got it?”

“All I have are my skates,” Vanessa said. “And my bed.”

“I don’t have anything worth more than a few Vei,” Cowl said. “My gear is good, but the fanciest piece of equipment I’ve got are the wings.”

“Well, I don’t have anything that rare either,” Angel said. The relic in the wooden box within his bag felt like it was going to burn a hole through it. “My arm is Old World magic, but it’s not something that rare. It’s pretty simple, actually. So what could –”

Angel trailed off as his left palm throbbed. The purple orb. His paling face gave his secret away almost instantly.

“What do you have, Seeker?” Cowl asked.

“I had a minor altercation in a catacomb a few days ago,” Angel admitted, thankful for an excuse to avoid talking about the relic. Friendly or not, men had been killed over much less. “The same one that tried to bury me alive, I might add.”

“Answers, not a story,” Cowl growled.

“A foreign object inserted itself into my palm,” Angel said, shrugging. “It hasn’t killed me, so I’ve been ignoring it.”

He showed Cowl his hand. The purple splotch chose that exact moment to reveal itself, shimmering like brilliant quartz for an instant before fading away once again.

“You’re a moron. Why would you not attempt to figure out what was in you? It could be dangerous,” Cowl snapped.

“Lots of things are dangerous,” Angel replied. “And I got a big job. I didn’t exactly have the time. It’s yet to kill me so far, so it can’t be that bad.”

“It might be about to get us all killed,” Cowl said. “And there’s nothing else you’ve got?”

“Nothing,” Angel lied. Cowl was a little too interested in his belongings, and the strange message from the Hunter’s Guild wasn’t doing him any favors.

The light continued to fade as they sank deeper into the earth. All that remained of it was a faint red dot in the distance. Angel and Vanessa both brought sparks of magic to life in their hands, filling the dark shaft with a dim glow.