Marcus stretched his body and let his eyes wander over the impressive architecture in front of him. The base of the temple area was massive and got smaller with increasing height, culminating into several towers. The ruins consisted of many layers with different thickness, most of them seemed to be in range of a good Burst jump. For a start Marcus wanted to climb the highest "tower" and take a look around. The dark stone of the ruins was stable and highly dense, the perfect condition for his Burst jump. Marcus quickly climbed several of the layers and already could see over the tree tops and into the distance. He looked up and started to realize how tall this construction really was, and how much taller it must have been before it became a ruin. This was the work of a highly advanced society. In spite of the heat, and heavy rains of the local climate, the dark stone under Marcus' feet was barely eroded. The ruins had lost what ever fancy finish it once had but the fundamental building blocks of the construction withstood the test of time.

For half an hour, Marcus climbed higher, jumping from terrace to terrace. And even so his progress was swift he had only reached half the height to the peak. By now the sun was touching his back with her warm rays and he could see all the way to the horizon. He took a deep breath and continued his journey upwards. Compared to the cliffs it was easy, with stable ground and more than enough space to make big jumps. Only towards the end he had to go slower and be more strategic were he went. The last bit to the top, he took in one big leap and landed between some rogue plants that had somehow managed to find root in the rubble on top. "JUHUUUU!" Marcus shouted and turned 360° taking it all in.

He could see from horizon to horizon, he was the king of the world! In one direction perfect blue sky, in another giant cloud towers brought rain to distant parts of the jungle. He saw mountains he had not known about in the farthest distance, and in the opposite direction the jungle ended into a large body of water. An ocean?! Marcus was blown away by the view.

He walked to the edge of his lookout and peered down to get a better feeling for the full size of the ruins. It consisted of several main bodies that merged towards the ground. He could see differences in the basic architecture, as if they had been designed with different purposes in mind.

Marcus let his eyes wander, over the ruins and over the nearby cliffs. There was something very wrong with this picture. Until now Marcus had just accepted that the land in this area was broken and jagged, he was not a geologist after all. But now standing up here, he could clearly see that this kind of landscape only existed maybe ten or twenty kilometers around the ruins and then vanished. More than that, now that he saw it from an aerial perspective it looked far less like a natural phenomenon and more like the result of force.

Marcus could clearly see straight lines carved into the ground in a brutal and destructive way. The cliffs and gorges, the whole area, was the result of terrifying power. Weapons that could change the shape of a landscape. And in the middle of it was the temple. Marcus felt a cold wave run over his back as he realized that this place had been attacked by some power far beyond human capabilities. And yet, the temple, or what ever it really had been, had endured. Now he wanted to explore the ruins even more than before, learn about the people who had created this and maybe what happened to them.

Marcus took one last look around and descended the main tower until he found an opening to the interior structure. The inside was, as he expected, mainly in ruins. Empty rooms with various amounts of dirt and plant life. Small insects fluttered in the rays of the sun or played in small water puddles from the last rain. Marcus moved further down by stairs or sometimes through deep shafts that might once have been elevators. Carapace allowed him to easily fall 50 meters or more and he went deeper and deeper. About 100 meters above the ground level, the structure had widened into a small city. Marcus explored dozens of rooms, some of the size of a small apartment and others large enough to park a few jumbo jets inside.

This was now the third ruin he had explored and he had gained some insight over the time. The devastation of time that was everywhere, was not the only source of damage to the building. Marcus found a lot of evidence of battle damage and given how tough the material here was, the weapons had to be… A growl from behind him made Marcus step away from the damaged wall he inspected, and turn towards the sound. A particular large ape monster stuck its head through a doorway and bared his fangs and charged right at Marcus. Only one? Marcus was not impressed. He went into his basic stance and held his left arm in the path of the large beast. Like he had predicted, the monster followed its basic instinct and bit into his arm to tear it off with its large fangs and powerful jaw muscles. Marcus did not even blink and planted his index finger between the furious eyes of the monster. A concentrated Impulse Hammer shattered the skull of the ape thing and killed it in an instant. The heavy, stinking body fell to the ground and Marcus freed his arm from the teeth of the beast. He watched the superficial wounds vanish. With over 60 vitality this level of attack was nothing to Marcus.

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Noise and roaring quickly grew closer and several of the lizard monsters rushed through the large hallway towards Marcus. Five, no six, of them Marcus counted and backed up into the door of a small room. The monsters made a lot of noise and snapped their sharp teeth and claws at Marcus but it was really just him farming these basic monsters. He controlled the fight through the terrain and killed one after the other with one precise attack. After the last fell Marcus waited a bit to hear if more were coming but the ruins stayed silent. With him being a high level class holder now, basic monsters like these would give him barely any EXP anymore. A fact that had been discovered very early on by Kim, of course. You could not farm basic monsters to get to high levels, the whole setup forces you to seek out stronger and stronger enemies to gain power. Marcus left the torn corpses behind and moved further down the ruins.

He should have expected it but only after he descended further and further he realized that the ruins went underground, deep underground. The further he went the more intact the rooms and hallways were. With less influence from the elements the damage from the battle became more obvious. It also became clear to Marcus that somebody had actually cleaned out the rooms, there was not enough rubble and garbage left in the large rooms. Who ever assaulted this place had not only killed the defenders but also made it their mission to destroy all objects inside the ruins. What kind of fear or hatred made somebody do something like that? Marcus was excited and worried at the same time. What would he give to have Carmen here right now, she and her team would be able to find clues Marcus surely missed. But he had to continue on his own.

Very little light was left down here and he used the electrical torches he had brought for that exact reason. They were still unused after all this time and Marcus saw no reason to preserve them now.

Marcus must have gone 200 meters underground and finally he found some half destroyed symbols and writing on some walls and the remnants of a sculpture in a large room. There was a strong sense of aesthetic and refinement in both, which made Marcus speculate about the original inhabitants of the ruins. Not much later he found a smaller room were several sentences were readable on the wall, most likely overlooked by the enemy. He pushed on and entered a large hall that on the first look made his heart beat faster. It was huge and had a very special design that focused on the one thing in the middle of the hall. There was a throne on a pedestal. Both the throne and the stairs leading to it were made out of white stone with bright green inserts that reflected the light even after eons.

Marcus carefully walked closer to the throne and up the stairs. His heart beat like a drum and his eyes were transfixed on the throne. Upon the white stone sat the remnants of a person. Not even a skeleton was left, more an echo, an imprint of the person who once died here. The outline of the dead body was still visible and there was more. Unusual dark, metal clamps were on the arm rests and around the legs. Rough, sharp edged symbols were carved into the pristine throne, they looked very different from the writing Marcus had seen before and the way they reflected the light of his torch felt eerie and abnormal. He felt a growing terror in his stomach as he looked at the whole situation. Marcus saw signs of scraping on the arm rests...like fingers scratching. Marcus leaned forward and looked at the echo of the skull and there too were thin metal bands anchored in the white stone. Following a primal instinct, Marcus reached out to touch the metal and centimeters before his finger tips touched the ominous material, he felt a sudden pain rushing through his body and everything went dark.

Marcus opened his eyes and found himself on the floor, at the bottom of the stairs. He blinked and looked at the light next to him. His torch was still going but was close to dying. He must have been out of it for several hours. Marcus pushed himself up and decided to never ever tell Kou what he just did. OF COURSE, there was a trap! This whole thing screamed ancient curse or magical mind melt trap. Indiana Jones taught him better!

Most likely, his regeneration had saved Marcus' life once again. He could not believe how stupid he had been. Why would he try and touch that horrible torture device? Marcus did not need to be an archaeologist to understand what happened here. Who ever got imprisoned on that throne was meant to suffer horribly and who ever put them there was a cruel monster. Marcus shook his head, he still felt dizzy, and he hated the thought that he nearly had died here because of stupidity.

His interest in spelunking was truly dead and he made his way out of the ruins (which was harder than you would think) and back to his shelter. The whole excursion had left him with dark thoughts. He understood now that he lived right next to the remnants of a horrible massacre. A terrible force had wiped out everything and everybody who lived here and went so far as to torture people to death. The fact that there still was some kind of remnant of the person on the throne left, made Marcus think they might have found ways to extend the suffering of that person for a very long time. He knew class holders could live for centuries... how long did it take for that poor bastard to die?

Marcus pushed those thoughts away and returned to his shelter. He decided to never go to the ruins again. Maybe he should move his base of operation further away, now that he knew that other parts of the jungle were more hospitable, he saw no reason to stay. Starting tomorrow he would look for a new base of operation.

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