Dungeon Raider System

58  Dark rituals

"This mechanism seems to be designed to activate only when there's exactly one person on this side of the platform." Uriel observed as he leaned forward to study the altar closely, but its design was simple and there were no carvings on sight. "This is an amazing finding! It is known that this Cenote was used as a place of adoration where the ancient Mayans offered gold and precious gems to Xibalbá, but it seems they also performed dark rituals in here." He exclaimed in glee. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Dark rituals?" Nika scratched the back of her head.

"He means human sacrifices." Flanagan respectfully explained.

"That is correct." Uriel studied the altar from all sides with a dubious expression. "But something doesn't add up, I mean, human sacrifices were made a celebration and it was supposedly performed in front of everyone. Why would they put an altar in a place as secluded as this... it's almost like they were trying to hide something."

"Maybe this place was for special sacrifices." Nika said without a hint of interest or curiosity, she just wanted to get all of this boring research over with. To any sensible person, the finding of an ancient mechanism activating in such a mystical way could be considered the finding of the century, but to her it was nothing but nerd stuff and whenever she didn't have anything to fight against she was easily bored.

"Special offerings... Mayans usually offered warriors, maidens, even kids..." Uriel said.

"Wow! These guys weren't nice people."

"No, but they weren't necessarily bad people either. They were just scared by famine, sickness and all sorts of natural disasters. They needed to appease their gods somehow and... hang on, appease the gods! Why aren't there any sculptures or carvings portraying any gods in here?" Uriel asked to no one in particular.

"I don't know, maybe because this place wasn't meant for the gods." Nika replied.

"Miss Nika, perhaps if you let him work this could be over faster." Flanagan, who was almost as excited as Uriel, commented.

"No, wait, she might be on to something. I mean, this place is sacred so there must be some sort of god somewhere in here but it's not in a sculpture, then the only other alternative is... Xibalbá!"

"You know, Mister Sage, you always say stuff like that as if things are obvious, but none of us even know that dude."

"Xibalbá is not a dude, Nika, it's the underworld!" Uriel excitedly replied to Nika's remark. "That's why there aren't any god statues, sculptures, idols or whatever, because this is the place that leads to the underworld where all the gods are supposed to live, in other words, I believe we just found the entrance to the underground structure."

"So, how do we go in there? Do we need to take a swim?" Nika asked, now a bit reluctant to dive into the stagnant waters.

"I don't know, there's nothing else to go with... I just hope we don't need to sacrifice someone."

"If that were the case, that wouldn't be a problem at all. I could ask the world government for an inmate with a death sentence and..."

"Wow! seems like you're one to judge Mayans about morals." Uriel glared at Nika, yet she remained completely unfazed. "But sacrificing someone to open a door doesn't seem like a good idea. Even if this is a sacred place, opening a door by sacrificing someone is too inefficient. Besides, this mechanism only activated after I was left alone on this side of the platform. That would mean that whoever wants to open the door needs to sacrifice himself..."

"But this is an altar, the whole purpose of altars is to either place an offering or an idol." Flanagan, who had some basic knowledge of archaeology stated.

"That's true, we could try to find an idol that might work, but this place is odd in so many ways. A place for secret rituals, far from the ruins, there's no statues or sculptures and yet this is obviously an entrance. Mayans believed that being sacrificed wasn't a punishment but a true honor, why is there no place for a public then? Unless... this isn't actually a sacrificial place but something entirely different."

"Like what?" Nika asked just so Uriel could continue speaking.

"What is related to the other world, but not to sacrifices?"

"A tomb?"

"Precisely! Chichén Itzá has always been translated as 'Well of the water warlock' But what if the proper word isn't 'well', but 'tomb'? We might be in the final resting place of the water warlock himself!" Uriel spoke in an increasingly louder voice that echoed into a disfigured voice.

"Yeah, sounds great and all but, why the altar then?"

"You're missing the point," Uriel said as he made his swiss army knife appear on his hand.  "In the old Mayan religion the gods attempted to create humans out of clay, corn, even wood, but the ones made with clay were stupid, those made of corn were too frail and the wooden ones lacked emotion, in the end the gods settled with something different... they made men from blood." He spoke solemnly and then proceeded to cut the palm of his hand with the knife spilling his blood on the altar.

The cut was deep and the copious amount of blood that should have started pooling on the stone surface of the altar was absorbed instead. Then, as if by magic, the top of the altar moved to the side revealing that the altar was actually a tomb. Instead of a corpse, though, what they found was much more alluring.

There was a huge treasure inside the tomb, it was almost filled to the brim with some old looking coins with a figure of the sun in one side and a human face on the other, there was also a dagger, some vases, cups and even a very rich jeweled bracelet. All of the items inside the tomb had one thing in common, they were all made of a strange metal similar to copper but a lot heavier.

"Is this the same strange metal the POI's are made from?" Nika said after rushing over to admire the treasure.

"I don't think so, it looks very different but it certainly possess certain similarities." The female engineer who acted as a bodyguard stated, then she activated her trait. Her eyes glimmered in the darkness of the cave and she took her time assessing the materials. "I'm sure now, this isn't the same material the buildings are made of, all of this is made of pure orichalchum."

Everyone cheered in excitement after the amazing find but this time it was Uriel's turn to be left in awe as he was the only one surprised by her statement.