Chapter 26: The Escape Hatch

The toxic green sulfur gas poured out of the air vents in heavy, choking clouds.

"Cover your mouth!" I yelled, ripping two strips of cloth from the bedroom curtains and dousing them with clean water from a stone pitcher on the desk.

I shoved one wet rag into Seraphina’s hands and pressed the second against Isolde’s face.

Isolde coughed violently, her purple eyes watering as the bitter gas stung her eyes and lungs. "The entrance hall is completely flooded with smoke! We can’t reach the upper vent stairs!"

"We aren’t going up," I said, grabbing the parchment trade map from the desk and shoving it into my coat. "We’re taking the lower tunnel."

BOOM!

The keep’s heavy iron gate slammed open into the hallway outside. The sound of dozens of armored boots, shouting soldiers, and iron shields echoed down the stone corridor.

"Clear every chamber!" a commander’s voice bellowed through the hall. "Lord Tristan wants Cassian’s head and both women dead! Leave no one breathing!"

"Cassian," Seraphina said, her golden eyes blazing as she stood firmly on her own two feet.

Her legs were completely responsive now after the nerve rehabilitation.

She picked up a broad shortsword from the room’s weapon rack and tested its weight.

"They’re right outside the door."

"Hold the doorway for thirty seconds," I told her. "I’m opening the floor hatch."

I ran to the back of the bedroom where the wide oak study desk stood.

The tactical trade map had marked the subterranean entrance right beneath the master desk.

I shoved my hands under the thick dark wood desk and exerted the full force of my Abyssal Caretaker physique.

With a loud groan of breaking wood, I flipped the three-hundred-pound desk onto its side.

Beneath where the desk had stood was a square iron hatch set flush into the flagstones, sealed by a rusted turn-wheel lock.

CRACK!

The bedroom door shattered into splinters. Two heavy Voss infantrymen clad in iron plate armor surged into the room, their longswords drawn and dripping with dark oil.

"There they are! Kill them!" the first soldier roared.

Before the soldier could step past the threshold, Isolde raised her hand.

A thick ribbon of solid shadow mana erupted from her palm, wrapping tightly around the soldier’s neck.

She yanked her arm back with cold fury, snapping his neck with a wet crunch.

His heavy body crashed backward into his comrade.

The second soldier pushed the corpse aside and lunged for Isolde.

Seraphina stepped in front of her.

She ducked under the soldier’s blade, pivoted on her healed right leg, and drove her shortsword straight through the armor seam at his throat.

Blood spurted over the stone floor as she ripped the blade sideways, dropping the soldier where he stood.

"Nice movement, Princess," Isolde said, a quick smirk touching her lips despite the choking green smoke.

"My legs work fine now," Seraphina replied sharply, wiping blood off her blade. "Focus on the hallway!"

Behind them, I grabbed the iron turn-wheel on the floor hatch. I channeled Abyssal mana into my arms and twisted it counterclockwise. The rusted iron groaned, rusted metal teeth snapped, and the heavy hatch swung open with a bang.

A dark, narrow stone staircase led steep down into the mountain rock below. The air coming up from the passage was cold, dry, and completely free of sulfur gas.

"In! Now!" I ordered.

Isolde grabbed Seraphina’s hand and dropped into the opening first, her boots hitting the stone steps below. Seraphina followed immediately, keeping her sword raised to cover the opening.

I turned back to the bedroom door. Three more Voss soldiers were squeezing through the ruined doorway, holding iron tower shields and long spears.

"Die, bastard!" the lead spearman thrust his weapon at my face.

I activated my system skill.

Abyssal Flame Blade Coating!

Black, silent fire exploded along the length of my shortsword.

I swung my blade upward in a rising diagonal arc.

The dark flame sliced cleanly through the shaft of his iron spear and sheared through his iron tower shield like wet parchment.

The dark fire hit his chest, instantly burning through his leather tunic and flesh.

The spearman shrieked as he fell backward into the hallway, his armor melting from the dark heat.

I didn’t give them time to recover. I grabbed a heavy iron brazier filled with burning coals and hurled it straight into the doorway, scattering hot embers and blinding smoke into the narrow hallway.

I jumped backward into the floor hatch, grabbed the heavy iron cover from the inside, and slammed it shut. I threw the internal iron locking bar into place with a heavy clang.

THUD! THUD! THUD!

Heavy boots slammed against the top of the iron hatch above us, followed by muffled curses and sword hilts beating against the metal plate.

"They locked it from inside!" a soldier yelled from above. "Get the heavy hammers!"

"Let them hit it," I said, catching my breath in the dark. "This hatch is three inches of dwarf-forged iron. It’ll take them an hour to break through."

I pulled a white light-stone from my pouch and struck it against the stone wall. Soft, bright light filled the subterranean passage, illuminating the wet granite walls and the narrow steps descending into the dark.

Isolde stood on the step below me, her violet eyes tracking my face. "Are you alright?"

"I’m fine," I said.

She stepped up and wrapped her arms around my neck, pressing her soft body against mine in the narrow space. Her breath was warm against my chin. "You were fast back there. That dark flame on your blade... I’ve never seen mana like that."

"It’s a technique I mastered," I said plainly.

Seraphina walked over, her golden eyes fixed on us. She grabbed my arm, her fingers tightening around my biceps with a possessive grip. "We’re sealed in this tunnel now, Cassian. Where does this passage lead?"

I pulled out the parchment trade map and held it under the light-stone.

"This tunnel runs three miles south under the mountain ridge," I said, pointing at the red ink line. "It bypasses all of Duke Reynard’s tax posts and emerges inside the ruined cellar of the grain mill at Oakhaven village."

Isolde’s eyes lit up. "Oakhaven is where Tristan’s main supply camp is located."

"Exactly," I said.

"Tristan brought a hundred heavy infantrymen to hunt us in the mountain.

But to feed a hundred armored men, he had to set up a central supply depot.

All his grain wagons, weapon crates, and spare horses are stored right in Oakhaven village."

Seraphina smiled, a cold, regal expression settling on her face. "He put his entire army’s throat right in our hands. If we burn his grain and kill his guards while he’s busy hammering on that iron door above, his men will panic."

"And the commoners in Oakhaven are starving," I added. "House Voss has been taxing them into bankruptcy for two years. If we take Tristan’s grain and distribute it to the commoners, we gain an entire village of allies."

A blue system window flared before my eyes.

[Wife Investment System: Investment Logged]

Target: Seraphina Aldric & Isolde Draven

Action: Direct tactical extraction under fire, joint combat coordination, and securing long-term strategic counter-attack plan.

Grade: A

Reward Granted: ’Subterranean Stealth Movement’ (Passive) & 1,500 System Points.

Current Balance: 9,500 System Points

I closed the system window and looked down the long, dark corridor. "Keep your weapons ready. The trade route has been abandoned for decades. There might be cave beasts or traps ahead."

We moved quickly down the stone passage.

The air grew cooler as we descended deeper beneath the mountain base. The tunnel was wide enough for two men to walk side by side, built with solid stone arches that supported the heavy mountain rock above.

After forty minutes of fast walking, the stone corridor began to slant upward. The smooth flagstones gave way to rough-hewn rock steps carved into dirt and clay.

At the top of the incline stood a thick dark wood cellar door sealed with an iron padlock. Faint cracks between the wooden planks allowed thin rays of moonlight and the smell of dry straw to filter through.

I held up my hand, signaling them to stop.

I pressed my ear against the wooden planks and listened closely.

From the other side of the cellar door, I heard low, rough voices speaking over the crackle of a campfire.

"Lord Tristan is an idiot," a man grumbled in a coarse border accent. "Sending eighty men up the mountain in the middle of the night to smoke out a disinherited bastard and two cripples."

"Shut your mouth, Garick," a second soldier spat. "If Captain Varek catches you trash-talking the Duke’s son, he’ll slice your tongue out."

"I don’t care," Garick argued, spit flying from his lips.

"We’ve been standing guard over these three grain wagons for twelve hours without warm broth.

The commoners in this filthy village are glaring at us like they want to eat our spleens, and we’re guarding food meant for horses!"

"Lord Tristan said no commoner touches a single sack of wheat until the bastard Cassian’s head is brought down from the peak," the second soldier replied. "Now keep your eyes on the road."

I looked back at Seraphina and Isolde.

Isolde’s lips curved into a dark, predatory smile. Her hands overflowed with black shadow mana. Seraphina tightened her grip on her shortsword, her golden aura humming softly around her body.

"Two guards right above the hatch," I whispered. "We take them quietly before they can raise an alarm."

I gripped the iron padlock on the cellar door with both hands. I channeled Abyssal mana into my palms, crushing the rusted iron tumbler until it snapped without a sound.

I slowly pushed the thick dark wood cellar door open.

Moonlight flooded into the dark opening, revealing the interior of an abandoned grain mill filled with broken barrels and sacks of straw.

Sitting around a small campfire ten feet away were two Voss guard soldiers, their helmets resting on the ground and their spears leaning against a wooden pillar.

Before either guard could turn around, Isolde slid out of the hatch like a ghost.

Two thin needles of solid shadow shot from her fingers, driving straight through the throats of both soldiers. The men gasped, clutching their necks in shock, but could not let out a single scream.

Seraphina vaulted out of the cellar opening, her shortsword flashing in the moonlight as she drove her blade through the first guard’s chest to make sure he was dead, while I grabbed the second guard and snapped his neck.

Both bodies dropped silently into the straw floor.

I stepped over the corpses and looked through the open mill shutters into Oakhaven village square.

Parked in the center of the muddy square were three massive wooden supply wagons loaded with hundreds of heavy sacks of grain, crates of iron weapons, and barrels of salted meat.

Standing around the square were twenty tired, poorly armored Voss guards, shouting at a group of shivering, starving commoners who were begging for food.

"Back off, trash!" a Voss sergeant shouted, kicking a starving old man into the mud. "This grain belongs to House Voss! Touch a sack and I’ll hang you from the mill tree!"

Seraphina’s eyes flared with white-hot anger as she watched the sergeant draw his whip.

"Cassian," Seraphina whispered, her voice cold and unyielding. "Kill the guards. Give the commoners the food."

I drew my sword, black Abyssal fire igniting along the steel edge. "Let’s take Oakhaven."