Chapter 321:A little hope.
A faint scratching sound came from somewhere ahead. Silver slowly crouched.
[Spatial Sense Lv2 Activated]
The tunnel expanded into a small cavern twenty meters ahead. He noticed that something small was inside moving around.
Silver waited.
The creature eventually appeared at the edge of his spatial awareness. It had four legs and roughly the size of a rabbit.
Silver remained still.
A small cave beast eventually wandered into sight, sniffed the ground, then froze when it noticed him.
Silver aimed.
The suppressor was ready but before he could fire, the creature turned around and ran.
Silver lowered the gun.
"Smart."
He waited several minutes before continuing. If something larger had been hunting it, he didn’t want to walk directly into the predator.
He moved again.
Another hour passed. His body began complaining forcing him to stop periodically to drink water, eat part of his third meal and rest for ten minutes before continuing.
He couldn’t afford to exhaust himself again. But every time he considered resting for longer, his thoughts returned to Ravenna.
He pictured her face when he’d told her to leave and the reactions afterwards.
Silver sighed.
"You better have gone to Alpha Three."
He knew she couldn’t hear him but talking helped anyway.
"Antony better have taken you there."
Silver walked around another bend.
"And if you tried going back into that cave..."
He shook his head.
Who am I kidding?
Of course she had. Ravenna had probably tried digging through the collapsed entrance with her bare hands. Silver could practically see it, and the thought hurt.
He quickened his pace.
Then immediately slowed again when his ribs protested.
"Right. Alive first."
He continued.
The tunnel gradually changed. He noticed more moisture along the walls. At first he thought it was imaginary, then he touched the stone, finding it wet.
Silver looked at his fingers.
Water, condensation, perhaps or groundwater. Either way, it was something.
He continued following the passage. The air became cooler with each step.
Another hour passed.
Silver stopped at another intersection and activated Spatial Sense. One passage climbed and the other descended.
Silver almost immediately chose the climbing route, then he stopped himself.
Don’t guess.
He searched farther. The climbing route narrowed, possibly impassable but the descending route remained wide.
He frowned.
He hated going deeper but a passage was better than a dead end. He marked the wall, then took the descending route.
Twenty minutes later, he nearly turned around. The tunnel continued downward.
Silver was beginning to suspect he’d made the wrong choice, then he heard something. He stopped, gun raised, but what followed was silence.
He frowned.
He had definitely heard it; a faint sound.
He waited for a few seconds before it came again. Silver’s eyes widened slightly because he recognised the sound.
Water.
He remained still not sure if it was a hallucination on his part, but the sound came again. It was faint and distant but unmistakably flowing water.
For the first time in hours, genuine excitement entered Silver’s expression.
"A river?"
An underground river could be exactly what he needed.
Water had to go somewhere.
If he could find a current and follow it, there was at least a chance it would lead toward another cavern system, an opening, or eventually somewhere closer to the surface.
He tightened his grip on the handgun. Hope was useful but getting careless because of it wasn’t. He activated Spatial Sense, finding nothing dangerous within range.
The tunnel continued toward the sound.
Silver deactivated the skill, then started walking; faster this time. Even with the excitement, he still maintained caution. The sound gradually became clearer. It was definitely water.
He followed it deeper into the darkness, ignoring the ache spreading through his legs as one thought remained fixed inside his mind.
He had been missing for more than a day. Ravenna didn’t know he was alive. Every hour he spent beneath this mountain was another hour she had to believe the worst.
Silver wasn’t staying down here. One way or another, he was getting out.
The sound of water became clearer the farther he followed the passage.
At first it had been little more than a faint disturbance somewhere beneath the silence of the tunnels, so weak that he had stopped several times just to make certain he wasn’t imagining it. Now there was no question.
Water was somewhere ahead, occasionally accompanied by the hollow echo of droplets striking stone, and with every step Silver took, a small amount of hope began growing despite his efforts to keep his expectations under control.
An underground river would change everything.
Silver didn’t know enough about the geology beneath Death Row Valley to confidently say where such a river might lead, but water moved, and movement meant there had to be somewhere for it to go.
Even if it didn’t lead directly outside, following the flow might bring him into a larger cavern system, perhaps closer to the surface, or at the very least somewhere connected to another part of the mountain.
Anything was better than wandering through tunnels and choosing directions based on which one looked slightly less terrible than the others.
Silver moved faster.
He still stopped whenever the passage curved sharply, still listened before entering unfamiliar areas, and still activated Spatial Sense whenever the darkness ahead became impossible to judge.
His handgun remained in his right hand with the newly purchased suppressor attached, while his sword hung comfortably within reach.
The moisture along the tunnel walls increased. Water occasionally dripped from the ceiling.
Silver touched one section of stone as he passed and felt the cold moisture against his fingertips.
"Definitely close."
He continued. Several minutes later, the passage began widening.
Silver slowed.
The sound of water was much louder now. He activated Spatial Sense.
[Spatial Sense Lv2 Activated.]
His awareness expanded. The narrow tunnel opened into a cavern ahead.
Silver immediately searched for movement but found nothing. He pushed farther, still nothing.
After a few more minutes, the sound of water became more distinctive as he approached a larger entry.