The Underground Tunnel is a passage at the heart of the cave and catacomb system beneath the castle of Balacan, running from the cavern to the village and from the village into the depths. Its rule is that no one draws a sword inside.
| Type | Place (tunnel) |
| Location | Beneath the castle of Balacan |
| Spanish entry | Túnel subterráneo |
Description
The rock is a soft limestone, which made the digging possible. The air is damp and warm. The known axis runs more than a kilometer and opens to the outside facing northeast (fixed by the rising sun, not by compass). It “has two ways, up or down”: at the break between ascent and descent lies a real landing, a point to stop and choose.
The northern branch is about a meter and a half wide. It is passed two at a time, in single file and crouching, with no room to draw a sword; the full crossing takes at least twenty minutes. Another stretch of cavern is described as a tunnel “twenty feet high”.
The floor bears fresh traces of muddy people who used the tunnel recently. It is used by the creatures that dug it and by these unnamed travelers; there is no sign that the surface knows it exists.
Role
The tunnel is the vertical link of Balacan: from the village surface to the cavern, and from the cavern to deeper levels with different factions and planes—at the very bottom, probably, access to Hell. Whoever controls it controls covert access to the village and the chance of theft from below.
Conflicting accounts
- One account calls it “a natural tunnel”.
- Another says it was dug “to reach the village, the outside part” by kobold-like creatures skilled at mining.
Open questions
- Whether the 20-foot-high stretch and the narrow branch are different sections or two measures of the same place is unclear.
- How the incursion axis connects to the deep chambers is not stated.
- The exact position of the landing, and where the descending branch leads, are not fixed.
- The outer mouth is not described.
- Light, sound and smell inside are not recorded.
- Who the muddy travelers were, and where they went, is unknown.