Chapter 772: Mariet Hister’s Heritage Site (2)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 772: Mariet Hister’s Heritage Site (2)
Whooooosh—!
The wind of mana Valeria conjured gently enveloped them both. Landing gracefully on the floor, they dusted themselves off.
“Starting the heritage site’s traps by shoving us down a hole… That guardian was an interesting monster. Your ancestor Mariet seems like quite the character.”
Valeria nodded and placed her hand against the wall, a quiet desire to connect with the legacy her ancestor had left behind.
The wall was made of a crystal-clear ore, with a faint current of mana flowing within. The Valeria of the past, or even the Valeria of today had she come alone, would never have dared to do such a thing. She wouldn’t have known what kind of trap might be triggered by a single touch.
But now, with Jin by her side, she felt that no matter what happened, it would be all right.
Jin sensed her thoughts and couldn't help but feel a little pleased.
“The atmosphere here is a bit different from the other heritage sites we’ve found.”
“How so?”
“The previous sites usually had a sacred aura that made you feel solemn the moment you entered. But here… I feel like someone is playfully watching me.”
“Really? For a heritage site with such a vicious reputation, it sounds like Mariet might have been a pleasant person.”
In his past life, Jin had never heard Valeria mention the name Mariet. In other words, this was a heritage site that the Valeria of his previous life had failed to find.
I hope there’s more than just the communication device Zen Rootber supposedly made. Something that can be of great help to her. There will likely be records or magic left behind by Mariet herself.
Looking around, they saw a short path that ended in a fork.
“A fork in the road right from the start. Which way should we go?”
Valeria lightly waved her Silver Pine Staff, forming a record window. She intended to check the records to see which path was correct. However, the last record left in this space was over three hundred years old, and some form of interference was scrambling the information.
“It seems Ancestor Mariet took measures to prevent the records from being easily viewed.”
“That means we have to guess.”
“Let’s try the left first.”
The moment they stepped through the left entrance, an ominous rumble echoed from the distance. It was the sound and vibration of something massive and metallic rolling toward them at high speed.
Rumble, rumble—!
An iron ball, roughly the size of a young dragon’s torso, hurtled down the passage. For anyone with just enough power to barely defeat Honka, the only option would have been to turn and flee.
Jin instinctively clenched his fist to shatter it but then recalled Honka’s words. Instead of destroying the trap, he opened his palm and simply stopped it.
Thud—!
The iron ball ceased its movement with a heavy, grinding halt.
“The slope the ball rolled down is quite steep. This feels like a mechanism designed to force people toward the right entrance,” Jin remarked.
Valeria was thinking the same thing.
Leaving the iron ball where it was, they went back and entered the right passage. As expected, a much lower-level trap was triggered—a few stones shooting from the walls was the extent of it.
“I agree. If they’re intentionally making one side easier, the other is more likely to be the real path.”
They returned to the left path to continue forward.
Jin used his raw strength to push the massive iron ball back up the slope, clearing the way. When they reached the midpoint of the passage, they discovered a hole in the floor. It was too small for the iron ball to fall through, but a person could easily fit.
“Looks like a shortcut, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah, probably.”
As they dropped through the hole, a vast cavern immediately opened up before them. The two instantly recognized it as a battlefield. The floor, walls, and even the ceiling were scarred with countless traces of combat. There were deep sword gashes, marks from stray magic, and scratches that looked like they were made by giant claws.
[Guh, uuh… Intruder… arrival… 3 minutes… 24 seconds. New record… set. Average… 78 hours 13 minutes… excessively… fast. Superhuman-class or higher… powerhouse…]
This time, it was definitely a golem.
Jin and Valeria turned toward the source of the voice. A humanoid golem, similar in stature to Jin, was moving awkwardly, its yellow eyes flashing.
Seventy-eight hours? Does that mean it usually takes that long if you can’t find the shortcut? More importantly, it doesn't look like a bio-golem, yet it has this level of intelligence and judgment?
Neither in his past life nor his current one had Jin ever heard of such a golem.
[Honka… survival… confirmed. Heritage site damage… none. Red… hair… Complete Mana Body. Hister… confirmed. Top-tier armament… 1st-Class Hostility… not applied.]
The golem spoke in a slurred, slow monotone.
Zzzzzzt—!
Suddenly, rune characters flared to life across the golem’s entire body, and an immense amount of mana began to discharge from it.
Jin was more surprised by the golem’s intelligence than its mana output.
[Successor… the final… test… begins. If you feel… you will die… shout… surrender.]
Immediately after the golem finished speaking, a barrage of modified spells—in forms they had never seen before—erupted from it.
Jin and Valeria simultaneously formed shields, not because they feared injury, but to better observe the golem’s magic. The fact that a mere golem could use such high-level spells was fascinating.
The golem had told them to surrender if they felt their lives were in danger, but the two of them simply watched the display from within their shields, completely relaxed. This was a luxury only afforded to them because Jin was present. An 8-star knight or mage would have struggled desperately and likely been defeated.
“Your ancestor was an incredible person.”
“I’m in shock myself.”
Honka had said Mariet considered the traps in her heritage site to be works of art. This golem was undoubtedly her masterpiece.
“Is this magic… a variation of Hell Wind? The flow is perfectly altered. The timing of the mana eruption is particularly impressive.”
“The way it’s set to cast alongside rapid-fire Flame Orbs is also striking. And its casting speed rivals someone with Ultra-Simultaneous Casting, so it must be firing spells stored within those runes.”
“Storing magic in rune characters… It’s theoretically possible, but to store this many high-level spells?”
“It’s impossible with the methods general mages use. I think it’s a variation of Record Magic. She must have imbued the records with a storage attribute.”
Just as Valeria deduced, all the spells the golem used were those Mariet had wielded in life. Mariet had ‘record-stored’ her own magic into the golem.
“Recording and storage… If we could turn this into a technology for the Alliance, every knight under our banner could fight like a magic swordsman. Even someone without 1-star mana could just activate the stored magic at the right moment.”
Surprisingly, it was Valeria who said that, not Jin.
He looked at her profile, his eyes wide. For a fleeting moment, a memory surfaced of how much he had enjoyed that same view in his past life.
“Of course, it wouldn’t compare to a true magic swordsman like you,” she continued, “but the combat capabilities of all knights would increase drastically. If we can study this, it will be a discovery as great as the communication device we came here to find.”
They conversed inside the shield for about ten minutes. By then, the golem seemed to have exhausted its stored magic, as its firepower had noticeably weakened.
[10 minutes 32 seconds… elapsed. Spells consumed… 871. Effective… hits… 0. Test… is over… Successor.]
The golem spoke as the light in its eyes faded.
When Jin and Valeria deactivated their shields, the golem placed its left hand over its chest and bowed.
[Follow… me. It is time… to see… the Master’s… world.]
Jin and Valeria followed, unable to take their eyes off the golem’s back. Up close, its sophisticated and complex craftsmanship was even more apparent.
A few minutes later, a massive door that reached the ceiling appeared before them.
[I inform… you… in advance.]
“Of what? Is it a warning?”
[Inside… there are… the dead… who recorded… and overlaid themselves… onto the heritage site. They are… previous… qualifiers. Their state… is unstable… but they are harmless… so you may… be at ease. Also… they are not… your future. Unless… you make… the same choice… as them.]
“Is one of them a person named Zen Rootber?” Valeria asked.
The golem nodded. So, the letter hadn’t been a metaphor; it was literal.
[That is correct. And… Teben… Hister.]
“Teben Hister… so that was the name of the ancestor who wrote the letter. I understand. By the way, what is your name?”
Rumble…!
The golem did not answer. Instead, it pressed its palm into a groove in the center of the door. A mana reaction spread across the entire surface, erupting in a brilliant light. As the door slowly began to open, the end of the heritage site was revealed.
It was a vast, open space reminiscent of the sea on a sunny day, with hundreds of blue dots floating within it. Each of those dots was a record window. They were the essence of the records left by Mariet—what the golem had truly meant by ‘Mariet Hister’s World.’
Valeria was instantly struck by a sense of reverence, but before she could fully process the emotion, new voices rang out.
[O-Oh! People! Living people! And new ones at that!]
[A descendant has finally arrived…!]
They were the voices of Teben and Zen. Though they appeared as faint as ghosts, their expressions were so excited they could be recognized even from a distance.
Valeria bowed to them first. Having become quite accustomed to meeting the dead recently, she wasn't particularly flustered.
“It is an honor to meet you, Ancestors. I am Valeria Hister.”
“I am Jin Runcandel.”
Teben and Zen replied with broad grins and immediately fired a question at them.
[You guys!]
[When you came in here, did you have to do the elephant trunk and all those other weird things too?!]
It wasn't exactly the question one expected to hear from ancestors one was meeting after three hundred and fifty years, but it seemed to be a matter of grave importance to Zen and Teben.
The golem watched them for a moment before pressing a hand to its own forehead.