Good Friends (10)

“Hm?”

When the hero realized something was strange, he had already moved to an empty open space. Somehow, the path the hero had been following had separated him from the other party members. The hero placed his hand on the sword hilt and looked around. He carefully moved his steps, trying to catch any movement in the darkness.

“Hero!”

Startled by the sudden voice from behind, the hero almost jumped up on his toes before catching his breath and lowering his stance. When he turned his head, he couldn’t see Mille, but he could sense her voice and presence.

The hero sighed in relief and smiled.

“M-Mille? Thank goodness. I thought we had all been separated.”

Mille spoke from the darkness.

“This cave is strange. I was following you, but the path suddenly twisted weirdly, you know? It looked like you were going between walls, so I hurriedly followed. And here we are.”

“Mille, can you see in the dark?”

“Not super clearly, but I can see you in front of me.”

The elf’s superhuman senses were functioning even in the darkness. The hero felt reassured just by having Mille nearby. Looking around, the hero asked:

“Mille. Are there any enemies around?”

“Hmm… I’m not sure? I don’t sense anything at the moment.”

“Really? Then just a moment…”

The hero drew his sword and took a stance. He closed his eyes tightly, regulated his breathing, and channeled strength throughout his body.

“Ha!”

With a flash of light, sword aura rose. The dazzling golden sword aura became a torch illuminating the cave, clearly showing the open space. The hero narrowed his eyes and looked around, checking if anyone was there. A few odds and ends were scattered about, and stalactites grown at regular intervals could be seen.

The hero readjusted his grip on the sword with one hand, then lightly swung it around to examine the surroundings. Mille moved to the opposite side of the sword-wielding hand, in case she got caught in the sword aura. The hero said to Mille:

“I can’t maintain this for long, so could you quickly look around? There should be some clue to get out of here.”

“…There’s a seam here.”

As soon as the hero finished speaking, Mille stretched out her finger. The hero turned his body in the direction Mille was pointing. A straight seam was visible between the stalactites that surrounded the open space like a fence and the open area itself. A structure full of incongruity that couldn’t be seen in the darkness, the hero reached out towards the stalactites. The crumbling stones were real stalactites.

“Could you step back for a moment?”

“Okay!”

He heard Mille retreating. The hero took a deep breath, and with his sword now free of aura, he struck down hard in the direction of the stalactites.

The hero’s strength and swordsmanship combined to cut through the stalactites as if they were sponge, and then…

Clang!

With a sound like hitting a metal plate, the impact traveled up to his wrist. Sparks flew lightly, illuminating a thin groove between the stalactites. Mille said to the hero:

“What? What did you do?”

The hero shook his wrist and raised his head. There must be a ceiling in the darkness.

“This cave. It’s artificially made. Just a moment.”

The hero’s sword once again emitted a golden sword aura. This time, seemingly not intending to use it as a light source, the hero immediately raised the sword and slashed upwards. The glowing energy shot towards the ceiling like reverse lightning, and a boom echoed.

Bang!

Mille ducked in surprise, and the hero deflected the falling rocks by instinct before manifesting the sword aura again. The brilliant golden sword aura had diminished to a faint light by the time it reached the ceiling, but this much light was enough for the elf.

The hero asked:

“Mille. Could you look at the ceiling?”

“Huh? Oh? There’s a hole! But, there’s a strange passage in the ceiling?”

“Can you climb up?”

“Just a moment…”

Mille took out a rope from her waist and tied it to the arrow’s tail. The hero wiped the sweat from his forehead and swept the ground with his foot. After confirming it was tightly tied, Mille tied the other end of the rope around her waist.

The hero was staring blankly, wondering what Mille was doing.

Seeing the hero staring, Mille tilted her head, then nocked the arrow to the bowstring and lowered her stance. The hero frowned and asked:

“No, just because you do that, it won’t fly…”

“Here I go!”

As Mille shot the arrow, her body was pulled along and flew with it. The hero blinked as Mille suddenly disappeared from before his eyes, then shook his head. He rubbed his eyes and looked around again.

The reason he wasn’t looking at the ceiling was probably because his common sense refused to understand the skill just demonstrated.

“Hero! Grab the rope!”

But making the hero’s doubt look foolish, Mille was sitting on the hole in the ceiling, lowering the rope for the hero. The hero stopped manifesting the sword aura, then awkwardly nodded and grabbed the rope.

“I’ll pull you up!”

“O-okay.”

The hero felt strange.

---

If the cave was full of mechanical devices, there would likely be separate passages for someone to come and go in the ceiling or underground.

The fact that the interior was manipulated by mechanical devices meant that there was a demon controlling the situation from a central location. Since it was unknown what had happened to the other companions, the hero’s job was not to wait for someone to rescue him from here, but to attack the central area and find a way out.

The hero’s prediction was spot on, and the place they emerged through the ceiling passage was a room with complex mechanical devices and levers. Unlike the pitch-black cave, light was leaking in, allowing them to grasp the structure of the room with the naked eye. The room’s owner was nowhere to be seen, but two guards were standing in front of the door holding weapons.

“Wh-who…!”

“Ugh…!”

Of course, they were men who had once been guarding this place. Now, in front of the door lay a headless corpse and another with an arrow stuck in it, fallen in different directions. The hero pushed aside the arm of the corpse blocking the door with his foot, then opened the door and entered.

A design blueprint of the cave’s interior devices was hanging on the side, and a manual to help with the complex operation was placed next to it. The hero scratched his head and said:

“I’m not good at this kind of thing…”

“The hero can do it!”

Hearing Mille’s encouragement, the hero gave a bitter smile. But there was no time to hesitate saying he couldn’t do it. Even if they didn’t know how the internal situation was unfolding, it was right to operate this device to open a way out. No matter how much they had built inside, the cave was real. If they just broke through walls randomly, the bedrock might collapse and kill them all.

The hero picked up and read the fallen booklets around, nodding his head.

“…This is easier to understand than I thought? The person who wrote this must have been really smart.”

Mille reached out saying she wanted to read it, and the hero handed the book to her. Then he carefully pulled the lever.

---

Lena sat down on the floor, lost in thought. She had succeeded in defeating the enemy, but she didn’t know where or how to get out. She couldn’t dig through each stalactite one by one, and she couldn’t move easily because she didn’t know where the real traps might be.

Lena decided to try opening the wall for Ashuria, who would be on the other side.

The lever that Parsus had used was intact because it hadn’t been involved in the battle.

“Hm?”

Then Lena’s ears caught a sound that echoed throughout the cave. It wasn’t just an auditory hallucination. The cave floor was actually shaking, and the scenery was changing. Light began to leak in from parts that were thought to be walls. A straight white shadow filled the cave densely, then turned crimson again, revealing the previous view.

She could see monsters standing and murmuring, and Ashuria in the middle of them.

Ashuria wasn’t in a fighting stance, and the monsters were surrounding her in various poses, some with their mouths open, some sitting on the ground.

Lena reflexively started to throw her weapon, but realizing it wasn’t a fighting atmosphere, she put her dagger back. Ashuria also noticed the door opening behind her and turned around, then made eye contact with Lena and awkwardly averted her gaze.

“Uh…”

“Um…”

It’s awkward.

She had thought about apologizing first when they met, but meeting so unexpectedly, she didn’t know how to start.

Lena scratched her head and said:

“So… Who are those people behind you?”

She felt like she should ask “The demons?”, but even at a glance, these people seemed to have complicated circumstances, so Lena unconsciously used polite speech. The people who had turned to the demon side were intimidated by the appearance of a new hero party member and were either trembling or looking around nervously.

Ashuria said:

“Ah, everyone, don’t worry. This is Lena. She’s a companion.”

Then Ashuria spoke to Lena again.

“Lena, let me introduce you. These are people we’ll be taking to the capital.”

Lena, who had been awkwardly observing the other party, forgot that she and Ashuria were in an awkward situation and asked back:

“…Huh?”

And then, behind Ashuria, walls began to open one after another, letting bright light leak in.

Like a halo.

Lena felt dumbfounded.