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Enormous stalactites hung down from above, fervently living up to the name of Gray Rock. He couldn’t tell how large the cave was from this angle, but it certainly wasn’t small, and it seemed to extend around the castle.

‘There,’ said Garovel. ‘See that rock ledge?’

He did. It wasn’t very far, just slightly below him. He made a bridging staircase for himself and descended. His light illuminated an extremely steep drop off as he walked, and when he reached the ledge, he looked back toward the castle, finally seeing it from the outside. Or part of it, anyway.

It almost seemed like the tower was upside down. Wide at the top, it became incrementally thinner in rivets toward the bottom, where it found support from a mound of natural rock. But even now, Hector still couldn’t quite see the bottom because of the rocks in the way. Additionally, the hole that he’d exited from was even larger than he’d thought, and it now granted him a view into several different rooms and hallways. A whole chunk of the tower was missing, he realized.

‘That’s a little suspicious-looking,’ said Garovel.

“Is it?”

‘The center of that hole is about even with the ledge you’re standing on now.’

“Hmm.”

‘I’m wondering if it was really caused by an earthquake. It’s fairly symmetrical, too. Makes me think it could’ve been made by an explosive.’

“You think someone attacked this place?”

‘That’s often why castles are built, so maybe this is just an old wound that was never repaired. But y’know, I just think the whole earthquake story is strange. I imagine that someone skilled enough to build a place like this would know better than to choose a location that has an earthquake problem.’

“It’s really old, though. Maybe the builders just didn’t have that kind of... uh... surveying technology? Or something?”

‘Maybe. Let’s go see what’s on the other side of this tower.’

Hector considered his options. The rocks below looked rather perilous, so he figured that materializing a staircase on top of them would be annoying. Instead, he made a single giant platform and jumped to it. The force of his landing caused it to fall forward, but that was as planned.