Chapter 55: A convincing idea
The oppressive atmosphere that weighed down on everyone for so long was instantly disturbed, dozens of eyes turning towards the source of the outburst all at once — alight with the hope that the solution could be found.
Rohan and Elane did the same.
Standing near the front of the crowd was a wiry man in dark leather gear, his hair dishevelled and his face lit up with a kind of frantic expression that made him look half-crazed.
He quickly stepped forward before anyone could interrupt him.
"The membrane’s too tough to break from the outside, right? Fine, we all know that. Then what if we don’t break the membrane?"
A few frowns formed in the gathering. Already the man’s words were starting to sound like any other desperate survivor doing anything to keep their hopes up.
The man pointed toward the huge spike covered formation with both hands.
"What if we break into the lair through another way!"
That instantly caused a stir. Two sides formed in the gathering of Awakened, one starting to become more and more intrigued with the crazed looking man’s ideas the more he spoke, the other side having already given up listening to him and gone back to their previous conversations and silent wallowing in the corner.
Rohan himself was in the middle. He neither trusted the mans words just yet, nor did he completely disregard them. The fact of that matter was that right now, any idea was better than no idea at all. The man offering something up at all meant he was doing more than 90% of the Awakened there.
The wiry man clearly senses the crowd’s attention hanging on him now, because his expression only grew more animated.
"Think about it! We’ve tried the obvious methods already. Breaking through the membrane? Impossible. Breaking through the walls of the lair from the outside? We’ve also found is impossible, or at least far too hard to be realistic before we all run out of food, energy or patience."
A few people nearest to him grimaced at that blunt memory, but nobody refuted him. They were some of the first Awakened to arrive who tried with all their pride and confidence on the line to break into the lair.
"So that only leaves one route nobody’s properly tried yet." His grin widened.
"Underneath."
The chatter around him dimmed for a second. Then picked up even louder than before. Some of the Awakened who’d abandoned the conversation before returned now.
"Underground?"
"You mean tunnel into it?"
"...From below the lair!?"
Rohan’s eyes narrowed slightly.
’The membrane’s already been reinforced, and the lair itself didn’t even need to since it’s already far too strong to break through. But the ground beneath our feet? Would whoever is behind this plot have overlooked that? Or has that already been taken care of as well?’
The wiry man was right; it really was one of the only options left that hadn’t been tried already.
Next to Rohan, Norm folded his arms, clearly thinking something similar.
However, opposing opinions also began to rise.
"And how do we know that’s even going to work? Does anyone here know how deep the formation goes underground, or if it’s not even closed off down there as well? For all we know, we could spend the remainder of our time left with food and water embarking on this plan, only to reach failure after it’s too late to try anything else."
The wiry man kept going before anyone else could seize control of the debate from him.
"The thing’s a lair, not a fortress built by some professional engineer. No matter how strong the front and sides are, there’s a decent chance the underside isn’t as reinforced."
There were a few words he omitted, though. The fact that the formation wasn’t naturally formed. The wiry man was more knowledgeable about this gate than most of the others in this place, as unbeknown to them all, he’d been running it for over five years now.
Back when he first started out, he’d heard from one of his seniors who happened to be on the first strike team that entered this gate when it appeared that the lair was actually expanding in size over time — and the cause was the Elite itself.
The Elite had far more control over its spike-launching ability than the Normal tier Spike Beasts everyone was so used to — to the point where it could reshape them and use them for different purposes, like construction, for example.
The Elite built its own lair, and for a beast with an intelligence comparable to a five-year-old human child, it was highly unlikely that it considered digging deep foundations into the ground when making this lair.
If anything, the lair might’ve sunk a dozen metres or so due to its own weight displacing the dirt and rock in the ground underneath it.
Elane frowned, still not quite believing the words of the dishevelled man. Everyone there wasn’t exactly at their peak in terms of appearance, but this man was on a whole other level.
She wouldn’t be surprised if he’d been there for twice as long as anyone else.
"But how would we know where to dig?" She asked.
The man pointed down at the dead, cracked ground beneath everyone’s feet.
"We don’t need to dig blindly. The lair’s shape is visible from the outside. We can start anywhere really, so long as it’s far enough from the entrances. The government wouldn’t have paid as much attention to reinforcing the lair in areas where it was already blocked off. We can use that to our advantage."
A broad-shouldered woman a few paces away snorted.
"And if you’re wrong?"
Everyone turned to look back at the wiry man at that. There was no ’we’ involved in this plan — the people had already decided that, should things go sideways, he was to blame.
He simply shrugged.
"Come back to me when we have a better plan then."
That short but concise reply shut everyone up. He was right — they were all far too quick to judge him based off his appearances and disposition alone.
He was the only one so far who had come up with what sounded like a viable plan.