Alan closed his eyes and concentrated, quickly having Eve bring up an image of the girl, telling himself it was to figure out more about her, not just to look at her. A few details had escaped his initial glance. Upon closer inspection, the stave he had seen had a number of light blue glowing runes on it, making the girl a Psionic ability user. Additionally, the blood on her didn’t seem to stem from any obvious wound, making Alan suspect it was someone else’s. Finally, her ears were distinctly pointed, making her a space elf or something. Eve quickly brought up a list of about 20 humanoid species with pointed ears, which Alan closed.

Wondering what the girl had been up to, Alan began to think about the day so far. In the end, Alan felt a bit disappointed. Khersath was simply a city. A humongous, futuristic city, yes, but like any other city it was basically a collection of buildings and people, most of which Alan would never see the insides of or even know the use of. A hive of activity and experience that simply was. Everything felt chaotic, too many new variables being thrown after him one after the other. Alan shook his head, such thoughts were irrelevant now, he had a task to complete.

We should arrive soon, Eve sent. I advise entering into stealth mode, which is just sneaking about rather than an activated ability or mode, in case you were wondering. Prepare to activate the armor’s invisibility and run, depending upon what awaits us at the bottom.

Alan nodded, and hid in the corner opposite the entrance. Of course, it was the wall that he had his back to that opened a minute later.

Alan turned around, but all he saw was a dark tunnel, like the guide had said there would be. As he stepped into the tunnel, the door to the lift closed behind him and a new message appeared:

Shortly thereafter, Alan emerged from the tunnel into the Undercity, and froze. He’d expected maybe a seedy looking downtown area, or a ghetto slum. Instead, it was a fairly well lit, clean space, looking similar to the top level, with hundreds of people going about their business. The “sky” was a ceiling, about 100 stories upwards, providing artificial light similar to sunlight.

In front of Alan was a city gate, accompanied by numerous armed guards guiding people in and out, inspecting them carefully. Everything seemed quite neat, even orderly, with shops and compounds lined up along streets like city blocks within the Undercity’s walls. The first immediate, noticeable difference was the presence of armed guards everywhere, guarding merchants, stores, and lining the walls. Most of the guards above ground in the plaza had been carrying nonlethal weapons, stun batons and constraining weaponry. Everyone here carried weapons that were capable of deadly force. The second thing Alan noticed was the way most people were carrying themselves. Everyone was seemingly alert, constantly scanning their surroundings. Alan began to relax a little; there didn’t appear to be any immediate danger. Then, numerous red marks started to fill his vision.