Dungeon of Trials (1)
Inside the infirmary after Aria's departure, silence hung heavy in the air. Stella, who had been engrossed in a stack of research books brought to pass the time, lifted her head from the pages and looked toward the bed.
"Aria...?"
The bed where Aria had been resting until just a moment ago was now completely empty. Under ordinary circumstances, Stella would have gasped in panic and dashed out to search the grounds immediately, but this time was different. Rising to her feet, she approached the desk where a slip of paper lay, lifting it with deliberate care.
The handwriting was far too crude and clumsy to belong to Aria. Besides, blind and deaf as she was, there was no way Aria could have learned the continental common script. After all, the only reason Aria—who was physically capable of vocalization—remained mute was simply because she had never been able to learn spoken language. In other words, someone else had written this note.
"She didn't take me with her this time either..."
Judging by Aria’s past behavior, she undoubtedly had her reasons for slipping away alone. Stella knew that well enough, yet she couldn't suppress the bitter twinge of regret that Aria still hadn't called on her, even in circumstances like these.
Not long had passed since entering the Academy, but Stella had already come to understand Aria's nature. Aria was not someone who could be dissuaded just because a friend clung to her sleeve. Furthermore, even when she desperately needed help, Aria instinctively sought to shield those around her—meaning she still viewed Stella as someone frail who needed protection. Stella hadn't stopped her when she noticed her leaving earlier, solely because she knew pleading with Aria would never have changed her mind.
Both last time and during this recent incident... in the end, it was always Stella who was protected, Stella who was saved by Aria.
She had sworn to become a mage formidable enough to stand at Aria's side on the journey to vanquish the Demon King. Yet, she hadn't even sensed when danger arose, leaving Aria unattended until she was driven to the brink of ruin. Even if she tried to console herself with the excuse that she wasn't an Archmage and couldn't possibly have perceived the hidden threat, it did not change the stark fact that she had failed to keep her promise.
That was why Stella had thrown herself feverishly into her magical research.
And perhaps her desperate desire to be of use to Aria had borne fruit: the first field Stella had mastered was none other than Spatial Magic. Her ultimate ambition was to become a mage who could appear at Aria's side to defend her before harm could ever strike. At the same time, she needed magic overwhelmingly potent enough to secure an absolute vantage in battle. In space, Stella found the foundation for her unique magic.
An Archmage who commands space itself.
That was her goal.
Curiously enough, the stepping stone toward her unique magic was the very first spell she had cast on Aria: marking a target. It was originally a simple spell designed to track the bearer’s location. Stella, however, sought to elevate it to a realm far beyond mere tracking. She aimed to transform those coordinates into an anchor for spatial displacement.
Fusing a marking spell with teleportation was an idea that no conventional mage had ever entertained. And understandably so.
By nature, mages preferred to gather mana and bombard foes from the safest possible distance. Their research had always revolved around wide-area bombardment or dueling other mages and swordsmen from afar. Why would any mage conceive of carving a mark onto someone only to teleport directly into their vicinity? Mages fought by shrouding themselves in mana and slinging spells from range; they were never meant for melee combat. Flitting directly beside a swordsman via a mark to launch a close-quarters assault was unthinkable to traditional spellcasters.
Yet Stella's drive—rooted in an instinctual desire to protect someone rather than unleash raw destruction—sparked a paradigm shift.
A spatial displacement spell combining tracking marks and teleportation: as long as an imprint of her mana lingered on a target, she could reach them whenever she wished. Not only did she move only herself, but jumping to a location anchored by a distinct physical medium drastically minimized the mana required for spatial transit. Normally, teleportation demanded astronomical quantities of mana, but using the mark as an anchor allowed her to cross immense distances relying solely on her own reserves. In terms of efficiency, it was revolutionary.
Because of this, Stella felt confident. The magic remained incomplete, meaning its mana consumption fluctuated wildly and its precision was somewhat erratic, but the ability to appear beside Aria wherever she went was an invaluable advantage. Moreover, jumping in from a distance allowed her to conceal her arrival if stealth was needed.
Stella tucked a sheet inscribed with Memorizing formulas into her coat and began weaving the spatial spell. Having to rely on paper inscribed with magic circles rather than holding the completed formula in her mind was a mild regret, but it would suffice.
However, Stella had overlooked one critical variable.
Her spell merely displaced her toward the coordinates designated by the mark. To a mage who could currently cast only Advanced-tier magic, complex spatial distortions and ancient barrier fields were entirely outside her calculations.
Inevitably, Stella's spatial jump missed its mark by a wide margin. Deflected by the heavily distorted barriers veiling the Academy's rear mountain, she materialized in—
"Huh...?"
An endless expanse of brilliant blue sky.
"Ah."
Before she could utter another word to process her predicament, gravity seized her. Stella plunged headfirst toward the earth.
"Aaaaaaaagh!"
Crash!
"I-I thought I was a goner..."
Hanging upside down from a thick tree branch, her clothes shredded into ragged strips, Stella whimpered in despair. She had come within a hair's breadth of being flattened like dried squid on the forest floor.
"Note to self... be much, much more careful next time I cast that..."
She sighed miserably at her own reflection, dangling precariously from the foliage after desperately burning through every scrap of utility magic in her arsenal to arrest her lethal descent.
I knew the layout of this dungeon inside and out from the game, but now that it was real life, I couldn't afford to place blind faith in gamer trivia. It was essential to remain hyper-vigilant of my surroundings so I could react to whatever popped out.
To outward eyes, of course, I must have looked like a dignified saint striding serenely into the depths.
"Where in the world... are we?" Evan murmured, looking around in awe.
[This is a dungeon of trials... built in an ancient era for the Hero who would face the Demon King.]
"Such a place exists...?"
"How did you...?"
Well, since explaining the whole truth to Evan was too much of a pain, I had casually passed it off as divine revelation. But Danas was well aware that a divine oracle hadn't guided me here, so I'd have to cook up a separate excuse for him.
Fortunately, I already had a plausible alibi lined up.
'They say the Academy's grand library has records on literally everything.'
Headmaster Arhen and the kids knew I had never set foot inside the forbidden archives, but Danas hadn't been stationed at the Academy all this time; he had no idea whether I'd visited the restricted section or not. On top of that, since this dungeon was situated right on the Academy's rear mountain, lore about it being tucked away in the forbidden archives sounded totally credible. Danas would definitely buy it.
It wasn't really a pressing concern.
Right now, rather than fretting over what excuse to give Danas...
[PROVE YOUR QUALIFICATIONS]
—Where on earth are we...? A place like this actually existed?!
Why didn't Estel, the Holy Sword herself, know anything about this place? That was the much bigger mystery I needed to explain away.
Honestly, I wished she would just play dumb and stay quiet, but our resident chatterbox Estel would never do that. I prayed that the thought wave echoing in my mind was some kind of mistake, but since it resonated directly from the Holy Sword, there was no chance someone like me—who relied entirely on telepathic thought resonance to communicate—could mishear it.
[Let us prove our qualifications first...]
This was the final screening gate meant to filter prospective heroes. A moment ago, the dungeon had measured the Holy Sword's divine power; now, it was time to verify whether the blade was the genuine article. Once the Holy Sword was sheathed into the stone plinth, the mechanism would authenticate it on its own.
Evan nodded at my direction and thrust the Holy Sword into the stone scabbard carved into the gate.
As the Holy Sword's radiant sacred power flooded into the pedestal, the dull, colorless gem embedded above began to glow with brilliant cerulean light. With a deep rumble, the heavy stone gate slowly ground open.
"Seeing how it responds directly to the Holy Sword, it is undoubtedly a trial dungeon constructed for the Hero, but..." Danas trailed off, turning toward me with a puzzled frown.
He was clearly bewildered by the fact that I knew about this place, whereas Estel—the sentient Holy Sword who by all rights should have known—was utterly clueless.
'He'll believe me... right?'
I really hoped my lie about digging it up in the forbidden archives would hold water.
Suddenly, an uneasy chill ran straight down my spine...