"Drip…drop…drip.."
The sound echoes throughout the small room.
Vanier's eyes weakly tremble before reluctantly parting,
His vision blurred and heavy until it settled at the rough expanse of rocks on the ceiling,
A dark liquid seeped through a small crack in between the rocky ceiling,
Looking down, a puddle of this liquid has settled and made its home in the conor of the room.
Vanier groggly mutters,
"Where the hell am I?...
Without giving much concern to the black liquid, Vanier turned his head towards where he felt a slight warmth from,
Then he saw them,
Bars.
Rusted, damaged and withered Iron bars behind which stood a lit wooden torch ,for a moment Vanier remained silent even a bit confused.
Then it hit him,
"...A jail cell.."
Then a silence followed.
Quickly interrupted by,
"Just great."
It does seem that the jail has only taken his sense of freedom
Vanier thinking to himself,
"Wait…"
His eyes narrowed at the bars of the jail cell
"What if this is the trail ... .Then escape might be the clear condition..."
Vanier Approaches the Iron bars, he grips two adjacent iron bars and pulls with all his might
No give.
"Well i really didn't expect it to be this easy but still i kinda hoped….
With his botched effort at trying to pry the iron bars apart with his bare hands behind him,
Vanier tries to take a thorough observation of his surroundings,
Bare,
Painfully bare.
No bed, no furniture, hell not even the courtesy of a floor- just rough stone all around.
"This place is even worse than the slums."
Vanier leaned his face against the against the rusted bars,
"HELLO? ANYONE THERE?"
His voice echoes outward, but his hopes are met with an oppressive silence.
Pulling back,
"This day can not get any better…
Thinking to himself,
"What to do?....what to do?.....
Then a sudden primal fear appears in his eyes,
Instinctively Vanier grabs his stomach, gripping it tightly.
Pain…. He vividly remembers the memory of pain gripping his entire body, a sharp pain that radiated out from this bleeding stomach.
But when he looked down,
Nothing,
No blood, no wound , no pain.
His fear struck fingers timidly pulls back his torn shirt,
He stared blankly,
Not even a scar was present.
A small sense of relief and happiness spreads through his body,
"Well at least I am not going to bleed to death….
He glances around,
"Might starve to death though…"
After a couple hours of trying and mainly thinking,with to no avail..
All that effort and thinking had made him thirsty,
He looked at the black liquid with both desperation of thirst and escape…
"Well I have heard of people consuming things in the rifts and being blessed with status effects like strength and speed…
And I mean the rifts are so very cruel and twisted, maybe this vile looking liquid is my way out of here…"
Vanier says to himself trying to justify what he is about to do…
Vanier kneels down, and cups a bit of the liquid in his hands and brings it to his mouth…
"At least it doesn't smell bad…
He pours the liquid into his mouth and quickly realizes that the absence of a putrid smell did not correlate to the absence of a putrid taste..
The taste was so revolting and putrid that he gagged immediately, but through pure will power he swallowed it.
He collapses to the side gagging…
Then an angelic voice cuts through the sounds of him gagging,
[You have acquired a temporary status effect…
Vanier's eyes glow with hope, a faint smile appearing on his face…
….STATUS EFFECT: POISONED]
"Fuck…
Vanier proceeds to violently vomit out the black liquid,
After some long exasperated gasping,
"Point to self, Don't drink random ass liquids .."
[Status effect has been cleared]
"Hm, I do feel better, but what if that liquid did something to me….
Eh, I will deal with that later.."
"Regardless, I have to focus on getting out of here.."
Vanier walks to the right side of the wall and stretches his hand between the iron bars,
He tries to feel something like a button or lever that would help him escape,
He lowers his hand ,
He feels something,
Something metallic.
He tries to feel it out,
'Huh? What is that it feels like smooth polished metal but also it has some irregular shape to it..
Then his hand touches something similar to skin,
To his horror its a human face,
Vanier composes himself and taps on the armor of the person,
"HEY WAKE UP, IF YOUR A PRISON GUARD, I WILL FOR SURE SEND A STRONGLY WORDED LETTER TO THE PRISON WARDEN!"
But his taunts are not given any response..
Vanier getting annoyed pulls the person… the person flops down in view of Vanier
The guard was a tall older gentleman. He was wearing just a shiny iron chestplate and the rest of his uniform was made of leather tunic.
The man had gray hair and a large scar on his right eye.But his most prominent feature was that he was .... Dead.
He looked so pale and lifeless that it would be more accurate to say that his soul was taken from his body before his death.
On the right side of his waist, a sheathed sword was proudly displaced,with the sheath having intricate engravings throughout.
Vanier peered at the sword with great exuberance…
Vanier reaches out and snatches the sword from the man,
[You have received RADULFUS' SWORD]
[ Item description:
A beautifully crafted sword made for a man of great conviction and virtue. ]
"I kind of expected a long description…
[ Weapon Ability:
Mighty Strike:
The sword will reach temperatures of intense heat and glow in a white radiance. A singular
Attack of immense devastation can be done.but after the use of the ability the sword must
Not be used again within a span of 10 minutes, if the sword is used again before it can cool
Down it will shatter. ]
Vanier look at the rusty iron bars again,
"Intense heat huh?....
Vanier removes the blade from its sheath, the blade itself quite simplistic in its design as compared to its sheath,
Only unique to its appearance is a gold midrib that runs till the end of the blade.
Vanier grips the sword and the sword begins to shine with a blinding light,
Using all his strength Vanier swings the blade with a parabolic curve perpendicular to the bars,
In its wake, a semi-circle is cut out with detached glowing red iron bars at the surface of the shape.
Vanier lifts the blade above his head and observes it,
"Damn.. it looks like i actually got something useful or maybe i could sell this for a lot of money….
Nah keeping this with me is a better idea.."
"Well time to clear this rift and get my rewards"
Vanier walks out through the jail cell and awaits the angelic voice..
Vanier original assumption that escaping the jail cell was the main goal of the rift was partially true,
It is true that sometimes very rarely the enlightenment rifts are not combat focused and requires a different clear condition,
Till this much, Vanier's chain of thought was accurate but however he did get one small detail wrong,
The fact that he had not gotten such a lucky break.