Vol 8 Chapter 6

Hearing the advice from the two who had solved these quests to the point of exhaustion like himself, Kapros frowned and began tracing his past memories to see if he had missed something. But no matter how much he thought about it, there didn't seem to be anything.

'I just did what Kor told me to do and came to the right location marked on the map, so what could I have missed here?'

After letting out a big sigh, Kapros decided to try changing his thought direction slightly.

'So... this time we need to find dwarves...'

Had he heard any information related to dwarves in the past, or not? This too was such a minor detail that he couldn't remember well.

'Whew. My head is killing me.'

While beating his throbbing head, Kapros thought of Flame Dragon Kor, the root cause of all this worry and discord.

'There must be something that could be a hint among what he said. Let me think.'

While recalling his meeting with Kor, Kapros remembered that Kor had called the dwarf craftsman by a different title.

'He said to seek the opinion of the dark blue iron craftsman, the dwarf master...'

Dark blue iron craftsman. Iron craftsman...

Though it might have been his imagination, somehow he felt a slight sense of déjà vu, as if he had heard similar words somewhere whenever he recited that part.

'It's not a very familiar phrase. Have I heard something similar before? Where was it?'

"[ ...If you enter the visible path, you shall gain the chance to challenge the legacy of the great iron race. If you enter the invisible path, you shall meet the covenant that waits after crossing death's fire. Though none may see light when meeting the master of the mountains, the covenant's name, if you are the promised one, do not hesitate at all. ]"

While desperately trying to recall, Superior's low voice faintly revived from the depths of memory. It was the meaning of the magical text engraved in the cavern inside the cave in the Orgen Mountains, before entering Kor's cave.

'Iron race. ...Iron craftsman. ...Iron race...!'

This was it. This was exactly it. Kapros finally realized like a bolt of lightning what he had been missing.

Kor had called Ilumine the daughter of the forest. Similarly, if iron craftsman was also a metaphorical title with a similar meaning, there was every possibility that the iron race meant dwarves.

'To think the answer was in Kor's cave that I just passed by without paying any attention, thinking it was nothing...'

Kapros turned to look at Kion-hyung and Lucrecian with a deflated feeling.

"I think... I found something."

"Huh? You figured it out?"

"I think so... Going to check it out first."

"Doing something when you've got a feel for it is best. Which way? Let's go!"

Thanks to Kion-hyung who stepped forward more enthusiastically than himself to help, Kapros felt like he was hitting fewer walls while doing quests than before. He nodded and led the way back toward Kor's cave.

"Huh? Isn't this where we came before?"

"Not 'isn't it' but it is where we came before. Hyung must have his reasons."

"This bastard's pretending to think hard like Kar. I know too, you know?"

Though his thinking amounted to nothing more than planning to follow the side path behind the cavern they hadn't tried before based on similar words... Somehow it felt a bit burdensome.

Finally, after reaching the cavern with ancient magical text engraved and the path behind it again, Kapros glanced back at Kion-hyung and Lucrecian who were following.

"...We'll keep going this way."

"That way?"

Though Kion-hyung showed an expression of increasingly not understanding his intentions, explaining would take too long so Kapros just entered that path first. The side path, barely wide enough for one adult man to pass through, was smooth and of consistent height as if someone had deliberately dug it that way.

"This feels like an ant tunnel."

As Lucrecian said, Kapros too was thinking that this consistently winding path felt more like an ant tunnel than a human path the further they went.

'I hope this isn't a waste of effort.'

The magical text written on the cavern wall was probably written by the past Superior, according to what Superior in his staff had said. If the iron race mentioned by the past Superior was indeed the dwarves, it made quite a lot of sense to meet dwarves while doing Kor's request quest linked to the current Superior quest.

After about an hour of proceeding this way and that while touching the wall... Just when enough time had passed to wonder what the person who made this tunnel was thinking when digging it, suddenly the path started getting darker, and finally something like a large rock blocked the way forward, making it impossible to proceed.

'A dead end...'

Was his guess that they could gain something by going this way wrong? While he was bewildered, Lucrecian who had come right up behind him placed his hand firmly on Kapros's shoulder.

"..."

"Aw. You're not surprised."

Would anyone be surprised by something done while clearly showing their presence? When Kapros turned back with suspicious eyes, Lucrecian looked at the rock blocking their path while grinning.

"Is this the end?"

"No. This is..."

"Hey, I can't see anything in front because this fraud is blocking the way. Kar, what's up ahead?"

Just then Kion-hyung's grumbling voice could be heard, apparently having come right behind Lucrecian.

"The path suddenly got dark, how could anything be visible."

"There's something like a rock blocking the way... We can't go further."

"A rock? If it's not too hard we can just break it."

Hearing hyung's firm and concise answer, Kapros thought that made no sense, but soon changed his mind thinking it would be better to try breaking the rock than turning back here with nothing accomplished.

'But how can we break it safely in this narrow space?'

Magic powerful enough to break rocks all had strong aftereffects, making them difficult to use carelessly in such a narrow space. Magic was a perfectly suitable means for dealing with multiple enemies simultaneously in a wide area, but conversely, it was quite tricky when having to face an enemy one-on-one in a narrow space.