Chapter: 344
“What’s that sound?!”
“What is this… the floor…?”
As the floor opened up, the exploration squad members, who had been searching the area, started gathering near the opening one by one.
Most of the exploration team was flustered by the sudden opening of the floor.
But the person who was more shocked than them was none other than Jessie, the one who had opened the floor.
“Eh…?”
Hundreds of years ago, buried underground and lost forever, a place holding the legends of the ancestors.
Jessie must have been eagerly anticipating the sight of such a place.
However, the sight of the forge that awaited her was completely different from what she had imagined.
“A forge…”
It was clearly a large forge that must have been filled with a hot blaze year-round as countless blacksmiths crafted all sorts of items in the past.
But none of that glorious past could be found in this place.
What remained were only rusty, broken scraps of metal and an eerily cold air.
“This can’t be….”
Looking at the forge that was so different from her expectations, Jessie entered the ruined interior of the forge with a sad expression.
Seeing Jessie’s gloomy mood, I quietly followed her inside with the other exploration members.
Upon entering and lighting the torches, the dark interior of the forge became a little clearer.
The inside of the forge, littered with rusty anvils and tools that had long been neglected, seemed no different from what we had seen outside. Yet, something particularly caught our attention.
“Hammers….”
It was a line of hammers neatly lined up in one place.
Each of those rusty hammers had names inscribed on their surfaces.
– Karmos, son of Kalin
– Yuna, daughter of Igram
And behind those names were the same phrase written.
– They leave for eternal rest, but their souls will remain with us.
As we were observing them, Jessie, who had been slowly inspecting the inside of the forge, approached us.
“…It’s a grave marker. In the Dwarven tradition. They inscribe names on the tools they used and leave them behind to honor the deceased.”
“A grave marker? But there’s no tomb?”
“…I heard this from my grandfather, but when Dwarves die, they don’t bury their corpses in the ground; they all get cremated. They believed the flame burning the corpse holds the soul of the deceased, and if they melt metal with that flame to create tools, the infused soul would protect the descendants. So, for the Dwarves, the forge isn’t just a place for making items; it’s a sacred site for divine ceremonies. Oh, wait. What does it say here?”
While examining the place where the hammers were lined up, Jessie discovered an inscription carved into the wall and began to read it aloud.
“‘─I activated the device. Now, the once-glorious kingdom will be buried beneath the earth along with history. With our lives. The only way to protect this forge, infused with the spirits and souls of countless ancestors, from that wicked witch is this method. Yet, there is no regret. Even if we die, the flames of the everlasting furnace will burn eternally with the will of us Dwarves.’ – It’s written here.”
What she had read to us was a will.
A noble and glorious farewell left by the Dwarves who buried their kingdom underground, trying to prevent the witch from invading the forge.
Upon hearing the contents, the people expressed their realization.
“…So the Dwarves buried themselves with their kingdom for that reason. To protect their sacred site from the witch. They weren’t just a crazy race after all.”
“To think there was such a reason… I used to think Dwarves were just foolish extremists who would go as far as to self-destruct because they felt they would lose…”
Jessie shot a glance at the people, who made remarks that seemed excessive from a Dwarven perspective, but then shook her head and sighed heavily.
“Ugh… Still, I can’t deny that the Dwarves did something foolish. The forge they fought to protect has ended up like this… Ugh, what the heck… The forge is a mess, and the everlasting furnace has gone cold. What did they protect all this for…?”
Jessie grumbled as she looked at the completely ruined forge, both disappointed and saddened.
And then, it happened.
“Eh?!”
As Jessie was mumbling, she suddenly turned her head sharply towards somewhere.
“That sound again. The sound of a hammer….”
She said that and glanced at us.
But, obviously, we had no reaction.
We hadn’t heard any sound, contrary to what she had said.
So, looking at her with confusion, Jessie yelled out, as if flustered by our reaction.
“Wh-What’s wrong with you all? Didn’t you hear that?! That sound! Definitely from over here…!”
Jessie shouted in frustration as she ran towards one of the walls of the forge.
There, a large door covered in soot and rust was installed, blending in so much that it would be easy to miss if one didn’t look closely.
Jessie, as if determined that sound came from inside, grunted while trying to open the large door.
“The sound…?”
And what lay behind that door was,
“This is….”
A flame.
To be precise, it would be more accurate to call it a spark, as it was a tiny flame small enough to seem almost insignificant.
A small flame shining in a bluish hue, burning alone within the already ruined forge.
In that moment, everyone must have thought the same thing.
“Th-That…!”
Everyone stared in fascination at the large iron door that Jessie had just opened and began to scrutinize the structure of the wall the door was attached to.
Why hadn’t we noticed sooner?
Looking at it again now, it was,
“…a furnace!”
Yes, it had the form that could be called a ‘furnace.’
The name of the sacred relic we were searching for, the Everlasting Furnace.
However, contrary to its name, the furnace seemed like an ordinary structure.
It was definitely not something worthy of being called a sacred relic.
So then, what was it that made the furnace sacred?
“…everlasting!”
It was certainly something that kept the furnace from going out.
Like that flame, which somehow kept burning even after being neglected for hundreds of years.
That flame was indeed the sacred relic we had been searching for.
At last, we had found the sacred relic.
However, there was a problem.
“…It looks like it might go out!”
While the flame looked like it would extinguish at any moment, even though it was called the everlasting flame, it was in a precarious state.
“Wh-What?! What’s going on with this?! Has it been neglected for too long?!”
“W-Wait! Don’t make any loud noises…! What if your breath puts it out…!”
As everyone was fretting over the state of the sacred relic that looked far from okay, it was then.
As I looked at the trembling flame, I instinctively felt something.
‘Is it… afraid?’
That the flame was scared of something.
I didn’t know how I knew that.
Perhaps it was because I had the ability to manipulate flames, or maybe it was some other reason.
But whatever the reason was, it didn’t matter at the moment, so I cautiously asked the flame.
– What are you afraid of?
As I asked that, the flame slowly flickered and pointed towards me.
Afraid? Me?
No, that wasn’t it.
I focused my mind more and listened to the voice of the flame, and eventually, I understood what it was afraid of.
After realizing that, I paused for a moment before calling over Jessie, who was beside me.
“Hey, Jessie.”
“Wh-What is it, Scarlet?”
“About this forge and the road we saw on the way here. What was it like?”
“Huh? Suddenly? Well, it was completely wrecked. Eroded and rusty.”
“Right. I thought it was like that too, but it wasn’t.”
“Huh? Not like that?”
“Yep. It wasn’t a wreck. Because….”
I said to Jessie while recalling the scenery we saw after descending underground.
The forge, and the other places we had seen along the way.
Even if they had been buried for hundreds of years, eroded and rusted, creating a desolate appearance.
There was still,
“…there were no demonic beasts.”
“Huh? Now that you mention it… How come?”
When I said there were no demonic beasts, Jessie realized it and exclaimed in surprise.
She couldn’t help but be astonished.
Hundreds of years. It had been that long since the Dwarven underground kingdom had collapsed and been left abandoned.
Yet, despite that, there wasn’t a single demonic beast wandering around here.
Under normal circumstances, it would be natural for miasma to build up and demonic beasts to spawn.
That was impossible.
Unless someone or something was preventing it.
It was impossible.
Therefore, I conveyed to Jessie.
“…Jessie, you said the Dwarves did something foolish, but it seems they did indeed manage to protect something. What they dearly wanted to keep safe with their lives. That’s why this place hasn’t been ravaged by the demonic beasts and has remained as it is.”
The tales of a flame that had treated the long-gone Dwarves like friends.
Having not forgotten that they had tried to protect her, it had done its utmost to resist the miasma for hundreds of years, keeping this place filled with memories of the Dwarves.
I shared that story with her, and Jessie muttered with a voice almost on the verge of tears.
“Th-Then this flame was protecting against the miasma…?”
“Yup, it seems it has exhausted its energy purifying the miasma.”
What the flame was afraid of wasn’t me, but the miasma emitted by witches like me.
It seemed that now, it had grown weak and was probably worried about this place, once shared with the Dwarves, being destroyed.
After revealing that fact, Jessie spoke with a quivering voice.
“…Ugh, then is there no way to restore this flame to its original state?”
“Don’t worry.”
And with that, I said, raising flames from my body.
Flames that burn away the miasma.
A flame that wasn’t hot, enveloped the surroundings, incinerating the miasma in the vicinity.
Including the miasma, which had been suppressing the everlasting flame.
“Oh, the flame…!”
As the miasma that had restrained itself vanished, the flame seemed to grow in excitement.
The cold furnace grew hot, and the once-ruined forge filled with warmth.
And as the forge, which had been so cold, became heated, we heard,
—Hahaha!
—Clang! Clang!
Perhaps it was the souls of the Dwarves contained within the flames.
We all heard the sound.
The sound of countless Dwarves laughing and hammering away in the forge.
Jessie turned wide-eyed, as if asking if we had heard it too.
This time, we all nodded and smiled at her, confirming we had heard the sound clearly.
And I looked at that scene, smiling.
One ear felt a bit muffled, but the ringing sound of hammers was crystal clear.
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