Angel turned his arm over. It responded seamlessly. He ran it through a series of mobility tests. As far as he could tell, it was fully functional. The dull glow of the energy containers and the red tubes near his shoulder was slightly annoying, but his arm was working again.

“Well, would you look at that,” Angel murmured to himself. He examined the power source, where the relic was surrounded by a halo of faint purple and red energy. Shimmering lines of power ran out of the artifact and into his arm. Its glow hadn’t dimmed in the slightest, which was good.

Artifacts generally didn’t run out of energy so long as they had time to recharge, so he was hopeful that the relic would be the same. Angel snapped the cover closed, concealing the veritable fortune within his arm.

With the arm fixed, he took stock of the situation. He had four canisters, a pile of worthless spare parts, a small amount of supplies, and a hoverboard that might have been damaged during his fall.

Wherever he was, he was almost certain that he was no longer in the catacomb, or at least any part of it he was meant to be in. He’d been here for too long without getting bothered by something, and the catacomb wouldn’t have just left a relic out for grabs.

Angel took the remaining canisters and filled them all with magic – two with lightning, one with earth, and one with ice. He attached them to his arm and grabbed a strip of jerky out of his bag, chewing on it thoughtfully.

Vanessa and Cowl were probably safe – from the catacomb, at least. He was pretty sure it had been after the relic, so now that it was gone, it was likely that the two would have stumbled across the path to an exit before they could loot or further damage the catacomb.

Cowl’s goals still worried Angel, but he had no choice but to trust the man for the time being. Angel dragged his thoughts back to the present and started through the rubble, his eyepiece scanning the room as he went.

He found the edge of the room without too much difficulty. The strange mesh traveled up the walls and disappeared into the darkness above him. “Yup. Definitely manmade.”

Goosebumps ran across his skin as Angel followed the wall. It was cold, and a faint wind brushed past his face. That was particularly unsettling, as there shouldn’t have been any wind underground.

It didn’t take him long to locate the exit – and the source of the wind. A rectangular opening had been carved into the wall. It led into a tunnel made of the same mesh material. Faint red lights so dim that he had to squint to see them trimmed the ground.

There wasn’t much else for him to do, so Angel stepped into the tunnel. No matter how hard he tried to walk silently, each step echoed down the hall. He walked for a short while, turning down a bend and coming before another rectangular opening.

The light coming from Angel’s arm lit up the surrounding area, but the room before him was so huge that it was like a candle in space. There was nothing but darkness and what appeared to be an endless floor. At least there weren’t any traps.

Angel stepped out onto it. The wind buffeting him picked up speed and he heard fans roar to life in the distance. A dull hum picked up, growing louder and louder. Sparks raced across the walls as what must have been hundreds of machines churned to life at once.

A brilliant flash of artificial yellow light lit up the room, forcing him to flinch and cover his eyes. The light faded slightly, but it was still only a step below blinding. Angel’s eyes widened in shock.

He hadn’t escaped the catacomb at all. He’d found the center of it. Or perhaps it had found him. Angel stood in the largest room he’d ever been in. It towered so high into the air that the lights covering the ceiling felt like brilliant stars in the distance.

Massive bronze and silver machines covered the walls. The constant motion from the gears and pistons made them slightly uncomfortable to watch. Faint stacks of steam rose up from valves, giving the room artificial clouds.

The floor continued onwards for quite a distance before reaching a massive metal staircase that led up to a large cube suspended in the air by hundreds of iron chains the thickness of Angel’s torso. It was made of multicolored black and bronze metal, with lines of Old World magic covering it.

Angel swallowed. The catacomb’s core. He couldn’t think of anyone who’d actually managed to locate one before – or at least, nobody that had found one and lived to tell the tale. He squinted, trying to see if there was a door somewhere in the room, but the ever shifting walls and incredible distance made identifying anything a significant problem.

There was nowhere to go but up the stairs, but why would a core be so unprotected? He didn’t know as much about catacomb cores as he would have liked, but he was pretty certain that they were the central brain of the construct. The catacomb should have done everything in its power to keep him out of this room. If he damaged the core, it would die.

A thought struck Angel and his face paled. The only reason a core would have let him near it is if he posed absolutely no threat whatsoever, and it just wanted the relic as close to it as possible.

“Buried gods. I got baited here,” Angel cursed. The cube didn’t respond, which was something of a relief. At least it couldn’t gloat at him.

The Seeker squinted at the stairs. They were suspicious, but it wasn’t like he had anything else to do. He climbed up them, which took considerably longer than he’d expected it to. The temperature rose considerably as he got closer.

By the time he reached it, Angel was sweating profusely. The power humming off the core was enough to make his bones hum like the world’s most uncomfortable instrument.

“Well?” Angel asked. “What now? Are you just going to sit around and ignore me?”

The core ignored him. He pursed his lips and lowered his eyepiece, scanning the massive cube.

Great Catacomb Core

????

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“Ah,” Angel said, moving the artifact out of the way. “Helpful. Very helpful.”

He considered kicking the cube, but that just felt childish. After a moment, he did it anyways and promptly regretted his decision, hopping around on the top of the stairs for a moment and cursing at his aching foot.

“I am going to take a massive shit on your stairs,” Angel informed the core. “The next group of Seekers that show up are going to laugh so hard at you.”

The core offered no response. Angel sighed and sat down. “Tough crowd.”

He ran a hand through his hair. He hadn’t quite given up yet, but the day’s exhaustion had finally started to catch up with him. Angel dug through his travel pack and found the sentry artifact.

It hummed to life as he activated it. With a yawn, he tossed it into the air and laid down, resting his head against his uncomfortable pack and closing his eyes. There was no point banging his head against the wall or trying to escape when he couldn’t think straight.

Angel’s rest passed uneventfully, further confirming his suspicions that the core decided that it already had the relic and that there was no point trying to deal with him. He would just starve to death in a few weeks, and what was that to an ageless entity?

He wiped the sleep out of his eyes and sat cross legged, examining the core. For a giant hunk of metal, it felt annoyingly smug. Angel narrowed his eyes. If the core had been watching them, it should have realized that the Star Fragment in his arm didn’t take well to most Old World magic.

Even if the risk was low, there was no way it would have brought him straight to its heart with something that destroyed magic. Of course, that was only true if the core could actually see him. If it could just detect their presence…

A slow grin crossed Angel’s face. They were countless feet beneath the surface, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t take the catacomb along with him if he died.

“You’re going to pay for being a cocky little bastard,” Angel informed the core. He flexed his mechanical fingers and pressed them against the cube.