Chapter 139
Chapter 139
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 139
Chapter Title: Into the Darkness
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Beyond the Eldarin River was practically a separate world from the other side they'd come from, yet the ecosystem wasn't all that different.
Common magic beasts like Sheep Horn Wolves, which could be found anywhere in the world, were here too.
They even took down a single Lightning Deer, reminiscing about the time they'd met Rino in the past, and there was that fox magic beast covered head to toe in rotting pus, just like the one they'd seen before.
The real difference was the environment.
A land stretched out beneath a pitch-black galaxy, blanketed in evergreen coniferous forests that stayed blue through all four seasons.
Unlike the broadleaf trees that dominated beyond the river, this side was mostly conifers.
Because of that, the weather was much cooler too.
And it rained a ton. Nearly half the day seemed to be soaked in downpours, with such heavy rainfall that an ordinary person would feel pain just standing in it bare-skinned.
"Whew, it's really pouring like hell."
"What can we do? That's just how it is around here."
Crossing just one river and having the climate change like this was damn hard to wrap your head around.
In this world, though, they'd gotten used to calling it normal.
At least their group had plenty of mages, making it relatively easy to cope.
The mages cast waterproof spells on themselves, the knights endured with their sturdy bodies, and while the regular soldiers had it rough, their long training let them hold up decently enough.
Two days after crossing the river, they took shelter from the rain in the shadow of some rocks.
During that time, they unrolled the map from Baltales, compared it to Maroon's, and plotted their route.
"Should we swing by the fortress?"
"No need, I think. If we push a bit today, we can reach the ruins straight away..."
Their marching pace wasn't all that fast.
If anything, it was leisurely, thanks to Arsen's insistence that they needed to stay cautious in this new environment beyond the river, where unknown dangers might lurk.
Even though they'd already gotten environmental info on the area from Baltales, a few thought he was being overly cautious, but no one raised any objections.
During that slowed march, Arsen had been focused on something else. Something pretty important.
For the past few days, he'd been working on it in secret, day and night, and now the results were finally starting to show.
No one else knew, of course.
[Hey.]
[Hmm...]
[Wake up, Barkran. Can you hear me?]
[Ugh... Huh? What is it? Where am I?]
'Success.'
After diligently applying the methods he'd learned, Arsen had finally succeeded in acquiring the Spirit Speech ability.
Once confirmed, he'd been talking nonstop to the orb containing Barkran.
And now, he'd finally managed to wake him up again.
[You're across the Eldarin River. We crossed while you were out.]
[For real?! Wait, what about the floating island tour?]
Arsen inwardly sighed at the casual remark.
[You're joking around at a time like this...? There wasn't much worth seeing there anyway, and the situation wasn't exactly tourist-friendly. With people dying from parasites, what was there to sightsee?]
[Ah...]
Barkran went quiet for a moment, as if recalling that nightmarish scene.
A bit later, he asked in a gloomy voice.
[...It was horrific. You guys live seeing shit like that every day? In this era?]
[It's not every day for us. Even Maroon Knight... Oh, you passed out before seeing it? Some people couldn't even enter properly 'cause they were puking. We're all the same. It's just about whether you hold it in or not.]
He wasn't sure if that comforted him. Since he couldn't see Barkran's face directly.
But the dejected tone in Barkran's returning voice made it clear it hadn't helped much.
[Even if I get a new body later and come back, I don't know if I could live well in this era.]
[If they develop tech to make that possible, the environment will probably be way better than now.]
[Yeah... You're right? It probably will be.]
A weak chuckle came through, then Barkran spoke as if amused.
[Well, whatever. Truth be told, our era wasn't all sunshine either! Companies got busted for illegal human experiments back then too. Life's the same everywhere.
[Illegal human experiments?]
[Yeah. People tried all sorts of crazy shit to live longer, but gene editing on humans was illegal, so most human experiments were off the books. Come to think of it, that's what got me into this mess too.]
[What about that immortality procedure you mentioned?]
Arsen still remembered it vividly: inside the ruins, combat dolls moving actively even after hundreds or thousands of years—enough time to mummify a human.
Aside from the blue smoke-like mana flowing in place of blood, they were practically alive.
[The immortality procedure tanks your intelligence. In extreme terms, you end up like an insect, driven purely by instinct. Nobody'd call that eternal life or want it. You need constant high-concentration mana, so you can't even leave special facilities.]
[Ah.]
[Well, there were stories of rich folks forcing it on loved ones who died, to keep 'em alive... Not sure if it's true, and I'm not into it anyway...]
One fun bit of info Barkran had shared before was the power source keeping countless ancient ruins running.
Apparently, mana veins flowed beneath this world's land, and connecting directly to them let you draw near-infinite mana.
The immortality test subjects were probably sustained that way too, via the ruins.
From what he'd heard, the ancient ruins era used mana veins limitedly, while Barkran's era had succeeded in storing that mana, allowing free use.
Like generating electricity on Earth and storing it in batteries everywhere.
Arsen briefly imagined the steel giants from the Wigon ruins rampaging freely across the land. If those existed, they'd form an army without equal.
[Anyway, they tried everything. 'Immortality procedures' like time-reversal magic to rewind bodies, soul extraction and transfer like what happened to me, and they even researched reincarnation, which caused a huge uproar.]
At that moment, Arsen barely suppressed the Spirit Speech bubbling up.
He calmed himself, striving for a steady tone—maybe with a hint of interest.
[Reincarnation?]
[Yeah. They tried gene-editing newborn babies and implanting the spiritual origin of the dead to retrieve their memories.]
[Did it fail?]
[Big time. They didn't understand the principles, so who knows why, but they couldn't target specific souls' memories. The subjects ended up with insect or plant memories...]
[So they acted like insects or plants?]
[Nah, not that. They remembered being insects or plants in past lives. Like memories of hopping around eating smaller bugs, or just standing endlessly in sunlight.]
Barkran added, sounding amused.
[It sparked a lot of talk back then. Maybe animals and plants have souls too? Some even recalled seeing different environments on this planet—or maybe other planets—and folks said it could be glimpses of ancestors' memories left on their homeworld.]
[Interesting stuff... But isn't that kind of experiment a major secret? You know way more than I'd expect.]
Barkran answered Arsen's question nonchalantly.
[One of the experiment leads fled with the test subject kids and leaked everything to newspapers and broadcasters. Remember I told you about those? It was such a massive scandal, details spread across the whole planet. Anyone from my era would've known. I looked into it more 'cause I found it fascinating.]
[The kids?]
[They vanished without a trace. Gene-editing pure humans was illegal, so they were probably euthanized... Can't just release them into society if that reincarnation ability gets hereditary.]
A hypothesis flashed in his mind.
A highly plausible one, at that.
He pushed it down for now and changed the subject. More pressing issues were at hand.
[Anyway, reason I woke you: I need your help.]
[With what?]
[We'll soon fight combat dolls—er, what you call controlled knights. Any advice? As a history buff, you must know old combat doll weaknesses.]
* * *
"We've arrived!"
That night, the ruins greeted them. More precisely, Maroon stood at the ruins' entrance, arms raised high in welcome.
Awl Mountains.
True to the name, there were thin, sharp, grotesque peaks like awls. Or rather, a mountain range since there were several.
Over ten awls pierced the sky, enough to make you wonder how much it'd hurt if a giant kilometers tall toppled there.
In the small space between awls, a small iron door marked the ruins' entrance.
Without prior info that it was between the fifth and sixth awls, searching the area would've taken forever.
As they approached, Maroon—who'd been splashing ahead eagerly—froze, face stiff.
Up close, the reason was clear: an ancient metal door, unrustable even after ages, half-crumpled and shattered.
Big enough for a hefty magic beast to squeeze through.
"What the hell could have done this?"
"No clue... But ruins doors breaking like this?"
"Some materials do shatter. Rare, though."
"Really? How come I never heard?"
A mage who knew ruins well chimed in from behind with the explanation.
Maroon snapping back if there really was such a thing dented the credibility a bit, but since he was the one asking, everyone shrugged it off. In a way, it meant he was trusted.
Nodding, Arsen carefully brushed the shattered edge.
It bore subtle marks of weathering.
"Not broken yesterday or today. No idea what might be living inside."
[You really gotta go in? Places like this always end with deaths.]
"Shall we fall back and regroup?"
Barkran's ominous grumbling oddly overlapped with Maroon's scared voice.
Arsen shook his head, rejecting both, and spoke firmly.
"Better to go in. Won't change anything knowing what's inside or not, and regrouping won't help when we're clueless. We took it slow, so we're not that drained anyway."
"Hmm... Fair point, but..."
Maroon agreed reluctantly, looking uneasy.
Arsen ordered the group to prepare for immediate combat, then took point into the ruins.
Everyone followed.
Already late at night, the interior was pitch black. No mana lights remaining? Or had some unknown intruder smashed even those?
Arsen's eyes glowed brightly, activating a knight's night vision.
"It's dark..."
"Yeah."
Maroon agreed, nocking an arrow, bow ready to fire.
The corridor ahead was spacious enough in the gloom.
Arsen ordered a formation suited for safe advance in darkness.
"Bazkal on left front, Knight Anun on right front, Rino and Knight Maroon on rear left and right flanks."
"Got it!"
Confirming the knights scatter to cover all directions like eyes, Arsen advanced at the lead.
The ruins' darkness swallowed them.