The Mountain's War
Elsid pointed at the three doors with his finger and asked the others, "So, which one should we go through first?"
"The green one." "The green door." "Green it is."
The choice was unanimous. Compared to red and yellow, the green door simply looked the safest, so picking it felt natural. Elsid stepped forward without hesitation and pushed open the leftmost door. With a creak, it swung inward easily, as though people had been passing through it recently. Just like the artificial stairs they had seen on the way down, this dungeon was full of mysteries.
They stepped through cautiously. Was this the wrong choice? Or had none of the three doors ever been safe to begin with?
"Destroy..."
They came face to face with a grotesque being unlike anything they had ever seen.
"Uwooooor!!"
Elsid studied the creature roaring loud enough to shake the cavern. Its upper body had four arms—two flesh-colored and two brown—each gripping a vicious steel axe. The head of a horned bull only added to its ferocity. Its lower body was that of a horse, four powerful legs promising terrifying speed.
"A centaur...?" Rain muttered from behind.
Elsid had thought the same at first. But this was no ordinary centaur from the western regions. The upper body of a bull-man fused to the lower body of a horse—it looked like someone had forcibly stitched together mythical beasts and monstrous races. If it needed a name, "Minocentaur" seemed fitting.
"Who... who could create such a vile, life-defiling abomination...?" Arke whispered, her voice trembling.
"Damn it. Think we can take it?" Robin muttered, already nocking an arrow as he gauged the chimera's strength.
"Uwooooor!"
The creature had noticed them. With another earth-shaking roar, it charged, hooves pounding madly. Crimson eyes blazing with madness, it bore down on them. Elsid tightened his grip on his swords and drew them in a sharp clash. Chaeng!
Four axes came swinging at once. The force was immense. Elsid found himself forced down onto one knee. Had he taken the blows head-on instead of deflecting them, he would have been driven to both knees—or worse.
"Aim for the right leg only!" he shouted.
The axes came down again, this time augmented by the horse's speed. Elsid dodged rather than block. Kwaang! The ground shattered where he had stood. Seizing the opening, he struck at the Minocentaur's right leg. Chwaaak! His blade left only a shallow cut, even with aura wrapped around it. But that was enough.
"I don't know why, but the right leg it is!"
Piyung! Puhk! Robin's arrow buried itself in the same leg Elsid had wounded.
"Leave it to me!" Rain charged in and swung his greatsword at the same spot. The Minocentaur raised an axe to intercept, but Elsid was already there.
"Not a chance."
He knocked the axe aside. Without the momentum of a charge, the blow was easy to deflect.
"Thanks, Elsid!" Rain called, then resumed hammering at the right leg with his greatsword. While he and Robin focused their attacks, Elsid kept the creature's attention on himself, parrying axes and drawing its fury so the others could strike freely.
"About time," Elsid murmured, sensing the moment had come.
Crack.
A sickening sound of breaking bone echoed through the cavern. The right leg, pushed beyond its limit, finally gave out. The Minocentaur's massive body collapsed.
"Uwooooor!"
It crashed to the ground with a thunderous kudangtangtang, howling in agony.
"So that's why you said to target only the right leg." "I figured it out halfway through, but it actually worked."
Rain and Robin each offered a comment as they stared at the fallen beast. Its mobility was sealed, and with only its upper body left to fight, its strength had clearly diminished.
"Let's finish this," Elsid said, stepping forward.
"Uwooooor!"
The Minocentaur snarled and flailed its four axes wildly with its remaining strength. Puhuk!
"What a mess," Elsid muttered, weaving between the clumsy swings. He drove his wooden sword, wrapped in aura, into the creature's neck, then followed with a clean slash from his arming sword. No blood flowed—perhaps it had never been truly alive. The massive body toppled, both halves now grotesque and still.
"We actually beat it." It had been a difficult opponent. Powerful, yet mindless, capable only of simple attacks. If it had possessed the intelligence of the Orc Captain Gore they had once fought...
Elsid exhaled, tension draining from his shoulders. Then—
"Th... thank... you..."
To everyone's shock, the words came from the Minocentaur's severed head. A moment later, its remains crumbled into black dust and scattered on the wind. Where the body had lain, something remained: an old, worn brown book with a flame emblem on its cover.
"A book? Here?" Robin said. The others didn't speak, but they shared the same thought. A single book now sat alone on the cavern floor.
Tyren was the Mountain God, beloved and respected by every creature that lived upon the mountain. His breath turned foes to ash, and his tusks had never once failed to bring down prey. Yet he never wielded that immense power lightly. He used it only to protect and to save.
Under the Mountain God's mighty strength and gentle heart, the mountain enjoyed a long peace. He even rescued lost travelers from time to time.
Then one day, an uninvited guest arrived. His name was Tyeg. He was no mere lost wanderer, but a villain who had come with clear malice. A vile necromancer who mocked the dead and used them as tools, and a chimera creator who stitched together corpses to make new abominations. His atrocities were countless. He turned the bodies of dead animals into his servants and slaughtered dozens of living creatures every day under the absurd pretext of using them as experimental material. It was as if living beings existed only for his amusement.
If left unchecked, the sorrow and suffering he would bring—not only to the beasts of the mountain, but to the people below and the entire continent of Carnea—would be immeasurable. War was inevitable.
The battle lasted over a week. Tyren led the animals of the mountain against Tyeg's death legion, an army that knew no pain. The necromancer raised the corpses of his own kin and violated the living. In response, Tyren burned the forcibly enslaved dead with flames born of his own breath, granting them peace at last. It looked like holy fire purifying evil.
In the end, victory was theirs. Tyren slew the wicked necromancer and chimera creator with his tusks and reduced him to nothing with his breath. But the price was far too high.
In his final moments, Tyeg placed a curse upon Tyren: the Curse of Rampant Transformation. Over time, the victim would grow ever more savage, lose their sense of self, and eventually become a monster that existed only to slaughter all living things.
Tyren came to me at the end and made one request. He asked me to kill him—not as a monster, but while he was still himself. I could not refuse my dear friend's plea. With these powerless hands, I drove a sword into the heart of my friend Tyren. Even then, he comforted me, saying it was not my fault, and drew his last breath.
To never forget my own weakness and mistake, I, the Swordsman of the Eastern Continent, leave this book here. If anyone should read these words in the future, I beg you—do not desecrate my friend's grave.
— Y.D
The book told the story of a single war and its tragic end upon this mountain. They did not know who had written it, but one phrase in particular caught Elsid's eye and refused to let go.
Why was the name he had been searching for—"the Swordsman of the Eastern Continent"—written so plainly in this book?