Adventure of Krennios, brother's of hell

The red gothic motorbike glides through the lower entry of Krennios's towering apartment spires, its hovering wheels whispering above black stone. Skulls worked into the fairing catch the hell-red light.

It settles onto a broad landing without alarms, guards, or curious onlookers. Beyond the entry, elevators and narrow stairways climb into the mountain, vanishing toward the unseen upper floors.

The engine ticks as it cools, red reflections crawling over the apartment's iron ribs. The Cape of Nightmares stirs faintly behind Krennios, while Excul remains secured at his side.

No one challenges the arrival. The lower entry remains still except for distant machinery, muted music from somewhere above, and the deep vibration of the mountain's immense foundations.

Several elevator indicators glow across the landing, their numbers rising beyond sight. The nearest lift waits with its doors closed, offering no clue which resident or level lies above.

Krennios steps from the motorbike into the lower entry, letting the mountain's vibrations and distant music separate themselves beneath the machinery's constant drone.

He follows the strongest thread of sound toward the nearest elevator. Its doors open onto a silent metal car, and he enters as the music thins into a directionless murmur.

Krennios listens harder, but the foundations swallow the useful details. The machinery's pulse repeats through every shaft, while the distant melody rebounds from unseen walls.

The elevator rises without revealing its destination. Floor indicators climb past one another in red light, their sequence impossible to match to the fading sound.

When the lift stops, its doors open on another identical landing. The music is gone here, leaving only a low vibration and several numbered corridors branching into the mountain.

His hearing has carried him upward, but not toward a recoverable source. The elevator behind him closes, removing the lower entry's sound from immediate reach.

Krennios keeps listening. Beneath the mountain's mechanical pulse, one melody repeats with deliberate intervals, each echo returning from the same upper corridor.

The warped music sharpens into organ notes and a faint electrical crackle. It is not traveling randomly; it is leaking from a sealed black door marked 407.

The voice comes through the door, close enough to place precisely. The melody stops, leaving only the speaker's low, rough amusement and the apartment's steady vibration.

A red indicator beside apartment 407 changes to green. The lock disengages with a heavy metallic click, and warm light spills beneath the door.

Krennios raises Excul, its red-black frame settling into a steady firing position. He crosses the threshold with the rifle ready, boots entering the warm light beyond apartment 407.

The apartment opens into a compact studio of black metal, exposed conduits, and old speakers. Organ hardware crowds one wall, its indicator lamps pulsing with the melody's vanished rhythm.

The Violator stands beside the organ, framed by warm circuitry and thin coils of electrical light. His attention stays on Excul, then shifts back to Krennios.

A deeper note rolls through the floor beneath them. The organ answers without being touched, and several apartment indicators outside flicker in the same red sequence.

The declaration leaves Krennios's throat steady, but the mountain's answering note presses through his composure. For one exposed moment, the strain shows in his rigid grip on Excul.

The Violator turns from the organ and places one hand against its black casing. The circuitry brightens, exposing a live map of the mountain's lower levels.

A vertical red line appears beneath the apartment, descending through layers of the mountain toward a pulsing mark far below. The organ begins matching that pulse.

Krennios turns toward the apartment's rear wall as the map expands. A concealed service door unlocks, revealing a descending maintenance shaft lit by pulsing red strips.

The Cape of Nightmares trails through the opening while Excul remains ready. Heat rises from below, carrying the vibration of the broadcast through Krennios's armored frame.

Krennios descends into the shaft. The red line on the organ's map follows him, then collapses into a single bright point as he reaches a sealed platform deep below.

Beyond the platform's reinforced doors, the tuning chamber is already there: coils, speakers, and a black control core beating in time with the mountain.

Krennios approaches the reinforced doors. Their black surfaces tremble with each pulse from the tuning chamber, and thin red seams brighten around the frame.

As he reaches the threshold, the locking bars withdraw into the platform with heavy mechanical clacks. Heat rolls over him, carrying ozone, dust, and the low resonance of amplified organ notes.

The doors part onto a vast cylindrical chamber descending through the mountain. Coils ring the walls, speakers hang from gantries, and the black control core floats above a grated central dais.

Red energy travels from the core into cables thick as tree trunks, then vanishes downward through the foundation. Every pulse makes the chamber's metal framework shiver.

A narrow maintenance bridge extends from the doorway toward the dais. Its guide lights awaken one by one, forming a straight red path through the machinery.

Krennios raises Excul and fires at the nearest trunk-thick cable. The shot cracks through the chamber, striking its armored sheath just below the floating control core.

The cable jerks violently but does not snap. Red energy spills through the split sheath, and the loosened line tears sideways from its mounting bracket.

The cable whips across the grated dais and slams into a waist-high service housing. Its impact buckles the panel, exposing compact controls beneath layers of dust and warning symbols.

The damaged line still feeds the chamber, but its exposed inner conductors pulse visibly beside a large red isolation lever. The guide lights flicker, and the maintenance bridge begins retracting section by section.

The opening remains within reach on the dais, while the unstable cable drags sparks toward the control core. The direct shot has failed, but the service housing now offers a way to interrupt the signal manually.