Chapter 38: Treasure
’Why couldn’t I be so lucky...’
Rohan felt depressed.
Elane’s sudden departure left him not knowing what to do. Her timely escape back to the outside universe meant she wouldn’t have to die at the hands of the huge ant a few hundred metres ahead.
She wouldn’t have to endure a weakened state and wait a whole month to enter the Origin Realm once again! Rohan was so jealous...
’She gets to keep all her Origin Crystals she saved up as well.’
The Ant continued its approach forward, but as it shifted away from its original position in the far corner, something behind it was finally revealed.
At first, Rohan was too focused on the sudden disappearance of Elane to register what he was seeing. His eyes were darting absentmindedly between the monstrous bulk of the E rank Elite and the damp fabric on the floor below.
But then the beast moved another step. And another.
Until the protected point behind it came fully into view.
His eyes widened.
A single flower bloomed from a crack in the blackened floor, unlike anything he had ever seen before.
Its petals looked as though they had been sculpted from molten lava mid bloom, with a vivid mixture of deep red, burning orange, and glimmering gold all pooled together in a delicate mix of glowing layers.
Each petal seemed almost translucent at the edges, and faint wisps of heat shimmered off the flower in the same way they did from the Ant’s exoskeleton.
It was beautiful. Stunning, painfully beautiful.
Completely out of place in this hellish chamber.
Beneath it, the floor crack from which it grew spread out in branching lines like a root system into the stone.
More striking still was the way the glowing veins running through the walls, ceiling, and floor of the chamber all seemed to converge toward that one point beneath the flower.
Like rivers flowing into a single sea.
Rohan could see it clearly now.
Every vein he noticed outside the chamber, every molten line running through the beast nest, all of them led here.
"...So that’s it." He uttered, too stunned by the sight to not say a few words.
His face was beyond pale and thick with sweat by this point, but he still struggled those words out.
"The treasure..."
Nothing else could explain why something as terrifying as the E rank Elite would sit unmoving in this chamber, enduring the endless heat and isolation, simply waiting.
It was guarding that flower. A naturally formed treasure.
Rohan had heard of them through his incessant exploration of the Awakened forums the night before entering the Origin Realm, but every utterance of them spoke about them as if they were divine miracles gifted to the Earth by god himself.
Something born from the nest itself, or perhaps from the Origin Realm’s power concentrated into a single point over countless years.
Rohan guessed it was a mixture of both from how the pieces of the puzzle fit so well together. The Firestone Forest, littered with countless Firestone Ants and Ant nests. And then there was this lava flower situated at the heart of one such nest.
It was as if this whole forest was born to nurture a treasure like this.
All Rohan could do was stare.
Until he noticed a single point of movement in the far corner of his eyes, so small that he shouldn’t have noticed it.
But he did.
’What is that?’
Ignoring the huge Ant that was now in striking range of him, he shifted his gaze in the direction of that movement.
There, he spotted a narrow gap in the wall, so cleverly blended into the glowing veins and natural ridges that Rohan would never have noticed it if it weren’t for that bit of movement giving it away.
Out from that narrow gap, suddenly spat a figure.
A slim figure. One that was quick, silent, and darting at high speed in the direction of the lava flower.
’Sarah!?’
Rohan’s eyes widened so hard they hurt.
The E rank Elite continued advancing towards him, oblivious to the scene that just took place behind it.
’So that’s how they planned to do it...’
He finally understood how Rudith’s plan was coming to fruition.
They were never meant to enter the chamber behind he and Elane. Everything had been planned out long in advance. ’They dug a tunnel all the way around the chamber in preparation for a chance like this.’
The forethought and planning something like that would take were astounding and not something he could manage himself.
"L....ook! Behind... you!" Rohan shouted, desperately pointing at the lava flower sitting silently behind the ant’s back.
If there was one thing Rudith and her team of snakes didn’t account for in their plan, it was him!
Completely out of his mind, he tried communicating with the hulking Elite of a beast. It had to have some level of intelligence, far above any beast he’d encountered before.
But sadly, it seemed to either not care what the weakling in front of it was trying to communicate or he overestimated it.
’Hrrghh, fuck! Have it your way then!’
If communication wouldn’t work, then it was time for plan B!
Rohan suddenly entered a charge, darting off to his right and rapidly changing direction towards the lava flower after a few seconds.
His pain intensified tenfold from the movement, and he was barely able to hold himself together.
But it was the only gamble that had a chance of saving him.
The ant halted on the spot, watching curiously at the weakling that pathetically exerted so much effort for what? One last hurrah before it died out?
Until it turned to the side... catching sight of where he was heading.
Its aura compounded tenfold... a hundredfold in that instant. Any feeling of humour or curiosity was replaced by overwhelming anger.
The Ant wanted to squish Rohan into a pulp for his daring move and almost acted on that when it noticed a separate source of movement tugging at the lava flower in the distance.
Something was trying to tear the flower away from its grasp!
The Ant switched targets, leaping from its position and landing near the flower in one big jump.
’Haha... take that... you fuckers.’
Rohan passed out after getting a good look at Sarah’s terrified, appalled expression.