"I'm glad you three chose to come back when you found this. It gives us an idea as to what they've been up to... We can never assume that HoN Co. is lying low, or relaxing; this chamber is proof that they never stop, nor will they ever! We need to find out if this is a one-of-a-kind thing, or if there are more... If there are, then Amie is right. We need to put a stop to it, at the source..."
If what Amie had said about HoN Co. being able to farm their own obsidian was true, then that was definitely the first port of call! I knew roughly the process required to make it, but like Amie had said, it's resource intensive and slow. Not to mention incredibly dangerous for all of those involved! But as it was a slow process, they were likely producing it on a mass scale. The amount of obsidian in that chamber had been massive, and according to Amie, they had only perfected portal replication a month or so ago... They moved quick. Too quick!
"We'll wait for the others to rise before briefing you on the next stage. I don't think I need to tell you that all of those portals are going, for a start! Then, we'll decide on what to do, so it's best if you return to base."
I asked about the progress made with the tunnel connecting the base to the portal, and he just shook his head. This discovery came at a bad time in terms of advancement, but better now than later, before it's too late...
Once everyone was awake, we settled in the discussion room. What Amie had said had stuck with all of us, and showed us how far HoN Co. were willing to go. And who better to know that than someone who had worked within the higher echelons of the company itself! OROTHO was convinced that Amie was right; how else would they be able to procure so much obsidian? We had to act fast; find the site, remove the threat and deal with any locations that were replicas of this new chamber. Afterwards, it might be an idea to attempt to sink the chamber; if it was left as it was, HoN Co. may re-purpose it, and start all over. Hopefully, if we find and destroy this site, we can find where the obsidian is being taken to, and hopefully locate more of these chambers. Let's just hope that this one is the only one, although I'm not wrong in saying that we all had our doubts...
"What you three found brings to light a very serious matter. Something we didn't expect HoN Co. to do... We initially thought that the secondary portals were the main target. But in light of this... Disturbing evidence, we can obviously see that they're expanding their operations. Each one of these chambers is equivalent to a secondary portal, only worse. The time taken to destroy these is far longer than an secondary portal, and so, we need to put a stop to them making any more! We will remove this threat as we know where it is, and the risk it possesses. But from there, we must cut off the threat from the source. As Amie said, it is likely that HoN CO. have gone to the weighty lengths of 'farming' their own obsidian, potentially possessing unlimited reserves, and having the ability to create a limitless number of portals... We have managed to extract more stones for use in destroying this current threat more quickly, but as for the source, we have yet to find it. Whilst you three are removing this one, we will be examining the map in detail, and trying to determine where such a place might be. If we are unsuccessful, then another journey to the conducting tower will be necessary..."
Amie took over, informing us that we were likely to find something linked to these chambers within the portal data room.
"If you specific search strings, you should be able to find something that can help you, but if not then we'll have to formulate another plan."
We discussed the plan a little further, designating each person with a role; me, THEROS and UOPETA would destroy the forty four portals within the chamber, and return to the base. Hopefully in that time, AMPHIS and Amie will have found the most likely places to establish such an area, however that would only be used in the event that an expedition to the tower pulls up no new evidence... With that settled, we followed COLUS, Amie and OROTHO back to the lab to retrieve the stones.
Six stones... They had managed to extract six stones so far from the large glowing stone clump. It was impressive, but I had to ask a question that had been annoying me since we had returned. The stone was capable of pulling in all matter that originated from the Nether into the rift, destroyed completely... So why wouldn't a single portal being exposed to the stone cause each portal to be sucked into it...? Amie fielded this one quite well, and unlike OROTHO, she put it in a manner in which I understood!
"I assume you understand the relationship established between the portal frame and the rift when one is activated? The energy of one feeds the other and vice versa. Introducing the stone to this breaks this relationship in some way, and creates an opposite effect whereby, the field is disrupted and the rift requires more power to be maintained. As a result, the frame is crushed and pulled into the rift. With the rift no longer receiving any energy from the frame at all, it collapses. As the stone is only interrupting the energy connection between one portal and it's respective rift, the other remain unaffected. I hope that helps?"
I nodded, saying that it had done. I actually understood what she was saying, despite my lack of qualifications in anything needed to normally understand it... At least from OROTHO's point of view anyway... We picked up two stones each and went to leave the lab. Before going, COLUS gave us one last message:
"Be careful of the guards in there; don't administer more than a single dose of the sedative at a time. We don't want to sink to HoN Co.'s level..."
No we didn't...
Syeonyx signing off
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