Frostfire Legacy

Aster saw everyone's faces and smiled. Of course, he anticipated that nobody would prepare against radiation at all.

"Don't worry, I got a Geiger counter with me." He declared as he pulled out a small device from his Spatial Fanny Pack. "Though I only have one anti-radiation suit, so if there's heavy contamination, only I can go in."

"Then let's just pray there's no leaks," Helvetica muttered, sounding a little bit resigned. "So? How do we go down to the 10th floor?"

They already checked, and the stairs leading down were completely blocked with debris that fell from higher floors. It would take quite some time to clear all those up, so they quickly gave up on that idea.

"Easy, we just make a new passage." Aster declared while tapping his feet on the ground.

"You mean... through the floor?" Kali muttered in disbelief. "This is an old ruin, and you think it's stable enough to not collapse after we dug a hole through it? Are you an idiot?"

"I agree with Star's idea, though..." Cassy, on the other hand, supported Aster's idea. "It would take hours to open the emergency staircase buried in dirt and mud. A day if we try clearing the main staircase. But drilling a hole will end in minutes~!"

Of course, both their words were true. Digging a hole through the floor was a lot faster, but it would also jeopardize the stability of the building itself. Furthermore, they can't say that there would be no radiation coming out if they dug a hole, adding more risk to this plan.

"We don't really have time on our hands, so we have no choice," Mistelle commented. "Where should I open a path?"

"Then... Over here."

Aster could still recall the structure of the 10th floor, and quickly estimated which part was "safe" relatively compared to the rest. He chose the furthest corner he could from the reactor and asked Mistelle to dig through there.

She quickly nodded her head, before taking out a spear out of nowhere. Then, she took a deep breath while holding the spear with both hands, its tip facing down, and thrust it hard.

"Spear Skill: Screw Pierce!"

As she cast her skill, the spear went through the ground while rotating. The floor, which should be three meters thick, suddenly had a large, clean, circular hole dug through it, exposing a few wires and steel bars peeking from the edges.

Without delay, Aster pointed the Geiger counter toward the hole and waited. However, the device didn't show any changes in its values even after a minute passed.

"Phew... Looks like the worst-case scenario hadn't occurred." He sighed in relief.

Of course, he still couldn't be sure about it, as the radiation might've simply stuck to the walls and furniture on the 10th floor. As such, to make sure, he tied a rope to the Geiger counter and let it dangle until it hit the floor of the tenth floor. Then, they waited another minute, before gathering the device and checking the reading history.

Aster saw this and nodded with a confident smile. "There's no spike in radiation, so it seems like it'll be safe to descend from here. Just in case, I'll go first with the anti-radiation suit."

Of course, although it was a little iffy to let their protection target be the one to test for dangers, the suit was made to fit his body, so nobody else present could wear it.

The anti-radiation suit was a simple yellow-colored suit that fit the skin tightly. It had a gold-plated visor to block any neutron and gamma radiation, making it safe to see what was in front of him without worry.

After Aster wore it over his clothes, he was then lowered slowly toward the tenth floor with Mistelle's help, using vines that moved to her will.

As he went down, the scenery on the tenth floor welcomed him. The place was mostly the same as he remembered it, other than the large silo of radioactive fuel for the core near the other end of the wall. Looking around, other than the vicinity of where they punched a hole through, not even a speck of dust could be seen anywhere else.

"Amazing. I guess the 10th floor's airtight and radiation-proof as a safety measure, but to think it's to this extent..."

Thinking normally, everything couldn't stay as it was 2500 years ago. Seeing this, Aster started to suspect that it wasn't only advanced preservation techniques or technology that achieved this.

As he was going down, he carefully checked the Geiger counter and the reading of the air in the room. The oxygen level was normal, along with the absence of any harmful gases around. There's also no radiation whatsoever, making him frown a little.

"With how the reactor's water barrier remained unchanged for thousands of years, it wouldn't be weird if some radiation leaked by now... But nothing at all?"

"Star! Are you alright?!"

Right as he was getting lost in the labyrinth of his thoughts, Cassy's voice echoed from above. Aster looked up, seeing four worried faces peeking through the hole about 15 meters above him. Stay connected with m-v l|e'm,p| y- r

Aster waved his hand, before showing an OK signal, indicating that there was no problem and the rest could follow him in.

One after another, they went down with Mistelle's help and landed on the 10th underground floor.

"Woah... Is that what a working Nuclear reactor looks like? I've only seen it in history books!" Cassy commented after seeing the large glass tube using a three-meter-thick, anti-radiation protective glass.

In the very middle of the glass tube, there's a five-meter-diameter metal sphere with long wires connected to it, looking like a water mine with spikes here and there. Directly on top of the sphere was the mechanism used to exchange used-up fuel rods for new ones, allowing the continuous run of the nuclear reactor without any human intervention for extended periods.

"It's pretty in here..."

Furthermore, thanks to the Cherenkov radiation from the reactor's water barrier, the entire floor was covered in a gentle blue light.

*CLAP!*

"Alright, everyone. There's no time to just stare around. Let's finish our tasks quickly and return!" Officer Helvetica announced after attracting everyone's attention.

"First, we should reconnect the electronic systems of all floors to the reactor!"