29 The Crater

The trio once again woke up with the rising sun and quickly got ready for the day. They headed out of their tent and met up outside of the leaders tent per his instructions and didn't have to wait long for the rest of their team to arrive.

About 10 minutes after the trio had walked over the last few members arrived along with some combatants who were carrying a few boxes. Upon looking inside the boxes they saw that they were the suits that would supposedly protect them from the dark mana.

They were each handed one and instructed on how to put them on so they followed the instructions and were quickly wearing them.

The first observation the trio made was that the suits really did look quite similar to hazmat suits, apart from being tighter on the body, having a solid helmet with clear view of the face due to the translucent mask, and also being lined with what looked like armour made out of mystic ore that was giving off a slightly holy vibe. The second observation was, due to them having mystic armour attached to them, they weren't light, however this didn't bother any of the people participating as they were used to wearing heavy attire and with the benefits from the system it wasn't tiring for them at all.

Once everyone had put on their suits the leader spoke a few words to them. "Be careful in your expedition and make sure you are aware of how long you stay down there for as if the enchantment runs out then the dark energy will slowly start to seep into the suit. Due to the nature of the suit you'll still probably have a few hours before you need to start worrying but it's better to be safe than sorry. Also, if the suit gets torn through for whatever reason then that person must immediately head back as the energy can seep through the tear, that being said, never travel solo and always try to stay in a group. If one of you has to come back consider everyone coming back or at the very least send a few people with them. Now, get going and good luck."

With that concluding speech the participants picked up whatever they needed and attached it to their belts or backs before turning towards the crater and heading out.

They started walking while observing the surrounding area. "This place honestly looks like the life was drained from everything, even the ground looks slightly dead." Commented Joey.

"Probably due to the dark mana that gathered here and exploded, dark mana probably has the capacity to drain the vitality from things it interacts with." Guessed John.

After walking for a while longer the group finally saw the edge of the crater and upon arriving they all had the same thought; 'Oh, my, god.'

Ahead of them was an enormous crater that stretched on for many kilometres with a 'hard to describe' darkness hovering over everything. It was as if as soon as they entered the edge of the crater the world got a bit duller and darker.

"Well then, let's go guys." Called out one of the exploration members cheerfully as the group started walking down the incline into the enormous crater.

As they were walking all of them started taking simple notes about everything they saw but there truly wasn't much to document apart from the rocks that had turned black and the absence of all forms of life.

"I feel like I'm exploring an irradiated site with this attire and the charred look of everything." Michael commented as they were travelling.

"This place is eerily quiet, even more so than the place we set up camp." Said Michael as he picked up a rock from the ground and inspected it closer to see if he could spot any abnormalities, but there were none.

The group kept going deeper into the crater at a slow pace as they were looking at everything and writing down any small discovery and due to this, night soon fell without them getting far, so they set up a small and very simple camp with the supplies that each of them were carrying and then they took turns with the combatants for night watch.

The night was dead silent with no stars or moon in sight and this put the explorers on edge as they were in the open in this unknown environment so none of them got a good night's sleep.

Once it started getting lighter due to the sun creeping over the horizon, the exploration group got up and skipped breakfast as they couldn't afford to take off their suits to eat or drink and kept going a bit further. The group then turned around and started heading back at a much quicker pace so they got back to camp before nightfall.

Once arriving back at camp they gave a quick briefing to the leader who wrote down all of their discoveries and then they all parted ways before meeting up again and heading out the next day.

The following day the group travelled at a much quicker pace as they had already documented everything of note in the first part of the crater so they made much better time than they did previously.

"Do you guys notice it? As we keep going further into the crater it seems to be putting a strain of sorts onto the suits. You can feel them pulsing and fluctuating." One of the expedition members said.

"Yeah, I can feel it too. However I'm not a mage so I expect you can detect it easier than me." One of the combatants replied.

"Mage? YOU'RE A MAGE?!" Cried Michael in shock.

Mage was a prestigious job that was highly sought after back at the base and there were very few of them, so to have a mage in this group was very unlikely.

"Yeah." The mage replied. "I'm here to study the behaviour of the mana in this area."

"Well what have you found?" John asked curiously while glancing at the mage as the group continued forwards.

"What I've found is quite interesting actually, as you well know, ever since the collapse of society due to the apocalypse, mana has then resided everywhere and is constantly replenished through whatever source it comes from, meaning that no matter what experiments one might carry out by using the ambient mana from the surrounding area, the mana will always come back. Also if one was to channel ambient mana to create a light attribute effect, then that area would have residual light attribute mana depending on the strength of the effect, that's why churches constantly have light mana residing in them, because of all the priests constantly using it. Judging by this discovery, due to the nature of the explosion being a mass collection of dark mana there should be dark energy residing in this place which should grow in amount the closer we got to the centre, however, this isn't the case. There was only a small amount of dark mana residing around the edge of the crater and the further we go down, the less dark mana there is. Which doesn't make sense."

"Huh, I wonder what could cause that, but doesn't that mean then that our suits' enchantments would last indefinitely because they aren't repelling any dark mana?."

"That should be the case, but as I've already stated, the suits are working to keep something out, but I don't know what, as the amount of dark mana that is present where we are now has dropped to abysmally low levels. I still feel like I'm missing something though. Hmm."

"Ok, well if you notice anything let us know."

The group continued walking for another few hours and had started to slow down their pace, as they had travelled much further than the first time they went into the crater, when they suddenly were encompassed by a thin fog that came out of nowhere.

Slightly curious by the sudden fog the group started moving again when they saw that the fog appeared to get denser further ahead but as they started travelling further into it the mage suddenly called out.

"STOP!"

"What? Why?" Asked one of the exploration members that was closer to the denser fog.

"Something is wrong. Something is very wrong!" Cried out the mage, starting to look panicked.

Slightly perturbed by the mage's extreme reaction the group stopped and turned to look at him, before John said, "Take a deep breath, and tell us what's wrong."

"Ok... Ok, ok, ok," Taking a deep breath the mage continued, "I figured out what it was that I was missing earlier. Usually, in any location, there is always an equal amount of mana permeating the atmosphere unless we are in a mana rich area to which there is more but never less. However, in our current location, there is NO mana here apart from dark mana."

"Ok, and?" enquired the same member as earlier.

"Please use your head a little." The mage said as he then continued while starting to talk faster as the sentence progressed, "That means, that normal mana should be filling the gaps left by the absence of dark mana, however, there is NO normal mana, only the dwindling amount of dark mana. THIS IS A MANA DEFICIENT ZONE!"

"And I repeat what I said previously, so what? Why don't we keep going further?"

"Think of it like a vacuum, where there is nothing, something will rush to fill it, in this case where there is no mana, more mana will take its place. But the fact that it isn't… must mean that there is something other than mana here. And that's what our suits are fighting against…"

"So the previous signs of decay and death weren't due to the abundance of dark mana, but more because of the lack of mana in general." Deduced John, as he started to understand why the mage had such an extreme reaction.

"That's correct, and that's why we need to head back immediately, as the estimates for our suit's performance were made for if they repelled dark mana, not for repelling whatever is here."

"I don't see what the problem is, the suits are working, so let's keep going.." Claimed the member that was talking to the mage earlier as he started jogging further into the dense fog.

"What? No, WAIT!" Cried out the mage but the man didn't stop. "Idiot." Cursed the mage as the group started heading in after him.