Ch.37The Dwarven Mine

After enjoying a luxurious breakfast delivered to our room and some romantic time together, we leisurely showered and set out for the Blackforge Mine.

The road connecting Zemest to Blackforge Mine was wide and well-maintained, spacious enough for two carriages to pass each other with room to spare. Its alternating flat and sloped structure was designed to allow runaway carts from the mountain to stop easily—a glimpse into the expertise of locals who regularly transported stone and minerals.

“Didn’t they say road maintenance projects were indefinitely postponed because of the monster problem?”

“This area is fine. It’s less than six kilometers from Zemest to Blackforge Mine, and every house at the Karn Farm in between has a shotgun, so monsters and wild animals can’t easily approach.”

“A shotgun in every house? What’s so dangerous?”

“It’s to prepare for the swarms of giant locusts that sometimes come over the mountains. It gets especially bad during the transition from summer to autumn.”

“Pest control with shotguns—that’s a different scale altogether.”

After walking for about an hour and a half, admiring the terraced corn fields of Karn Farm spread across the mountainside, we arrived at the entrance to Blackforge Mine, home of the dwarven race.

The rectangular tunnel, about 5 meters wide and 3 meters high, had hemispherical lighting fixtures resembling CCTV cameras installed at regular intervals—giving it more of a science fiction feel than fantasy.

“What brings you here?”

“We were invited by a girl named Minarette Belghand. She said she had something to request personally.”

“Go into that waiting room over there and wait about ten minutes. Only dwarves are allowed inside the mine.”

The “waiting room” the guard pointed to was a large tent installed to the left of the entrance.

Inside the circus-like tent were a rectangular tea table, two elongated chairs, a coat rack, and small lanterns hanging from poles providing illumination.

After parking Ancestor beside the waiting room and sitting in the chairs for about 15 minutes, the one who pushed aside the tent entrance wasn’t Mina but a dignified-looking male dwarf.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. I’m Oppenbartel Belghand, representative of Blackforge Mine. Minarette is my daughter.”

My first impression of the dwarf extending his thick, solid hand for a handshake was “SD Guan Yu.”

True to his dwarven nature, he was only about 140 centimeters tall, but he had a robust physique with well-developed muscles. Above all, his black beard grown down to his waist and his reddish face—perhaps from alcohol—made him look like the Three Kingdoms’ Guan Yu compressed to half his size.

“Adventurer, William J. Kim.”

“Jessica Walter.”

“Elem Lu Seti.”

After exchanging names and shaking hands one by one, Oppenbartel sat down in the chair opposite us, bowed his head deeply, and spoke in a solemn voice.

“First, I want to express my deep gratitude for saving my daughter’s life. It’s utterly shameful that a dwarf would be buried in a landslide. I’ll make sure to give her a good scolding so we won’t trouble adventurers like this again.”

“Haha… don’t be too harsh on her. The collapse happened because of sudden rain.”

“And she was out there mining pyroxysite to make bombs for defeating the Mountain Troll.”

I almost mentioned that we had already defeated that Mountain Troll, making her efforts pointless, but I swallowed those words and covered it with a smile.

“I intend to reward you personally for this matter with the utmost sincerity, but first, let’s discuss the request.”

“About that request… there wasn’t anything specific posted at the Adventurers’ Guild in Zemest. Is it something that would be problematic if made public?”

“It’s more because the request involves investigating inside Blackforge Mine. Dwarven mines prohibit entry to other races due to confidentiality and black mana concentration issues, so we can’t publicly call for adventurers.”

Having said that, Oppenbartel took a map from the bag slung over his shoulder, unfolded it, and placed it on the table. It was a map of an underground facility with complex arrangements of branching paths and rooms.

“The destination for this investigation is Tunnel No. 13 marked here, specifically near the newly excavated area at the very end.”

“What’s there?”

“Recently, worm-type monsters have been emerging from this area, causing injuries to miners. The numbers have increased significantly in the past two weeks.”

“Eh? Worm-type monsters? But worms…”

As Jessica expressed surprise, Oppenbartel nodded and continued.

“As Jessica seems to know, worms are originally not monsters but wild annelids. Moreover, being subterranean creatures, they rarely transform into monsters even after death, since corpses buried underground don’t become monsters.”

Creatures that die within the influence of black mana have a low probability of transforming into monsters and reviving, but this can be prevented by burying or burning the corpse.

If you consider worm monsters as a type of giant earthworm, it would be extremely rare for subterranean creatures to transform into monsters unless they were deliberately dug up, killed, and left exposed.

“So you’re saying an unusually high number of these have been discovered over the past two weeks…”

“That’s strange. Even when left exposed after death, less than one in ten animals transforms into a monster.”

“Hmm… is there a possibility of a dungeon overflow occurring somewhere underground?”

“Dungeon overflow? What’s that?”

“It’s when monsters living inside a dungeon pour out. Dungeon entrances function like magic gates that prevent internal monsters from coming out, but dungeons left unattended for long periods can experience a kind of runaway phenomenon called overflow, releasing massive numbers of monsters through the entrance. The numbers can be in the hundreds, or in severe cases, four digits.”

“So what, there’s a hidden dungeon entrance somewhere underground, and hundreds or thousands of bugs are crawling out of it?”

“…No. I don’t think that’s possible.”

After listening to our conversation, Oppenbartel shook his head, denying the possibility of a dungeon overflow.

“Actually, a large cavity was recently detected underground, not far from Tunnel No. 13. If there were an undiscovered dungeon entrance, it would almost certainly be there. But if hundreds of worm monsters were released from such a place at once, the surrounding ground would be in shambles, with tunnel collapse accidents occurring frequently. Yet from a month ago when the first worm monster was discovered until now, there hasn’t been a single collapse or even signs of one.”

“You don’t know what’s inside that cavity yet? If dungeon overflow isn’t possible, couldn’t you just dig a path and investigate directly?”

“We dwarves naturally have low aptitude for magic and can’t imbue weapons with mana like beastfolk, so our combat abilities against monsters are weak. If there are large numbers of worm monsters or a more powerful monster controlling them inside the cavity, our chances of successful elimination would be very low.”

To summarize Oppenbartel’s explanation: something in the underground cavity of Blackforge Mine is transforming wild worms into monsters. The dwarves lack the combat ability to investigate it themselves, but they can’t let just any adventurer into the mine, so they’re entrusting the request to adventurers they can trust.

“So you think the cause of this monster mutation incident is the special ability of a mutant… a commander-type monster that’s settled in the cavity?”

“I’d say that’s a fifty-fifty possibility.”

“Then what’s the other possibility? There aren’t many things that can turn wild species into monsters besides a commander-type’s special ability.”

“Hmm… have any of you ever heard of a mineral called manatite?”

No one answered Oppenbartel’s question.

If even Jessica with her extensive adventuring experience doesn’t know about it, it must be a relatively unknown mineral, let alone me who came from Earth or Seti who is a native.

“Manatite is a mineral that, like crystal, absorbs surrounding mana and accumulates it internally. However, it’s fragile and easily broken, and when it breaks, it causes a mana explosion that sends fragments flying in all directions—a dangerous thing. Despite this, it doesn’t have many uses, and its transparency and luster aren’t exceptional, so it’s treated as just pretty garbage.”

“And this pretty garbage is one of the causes of the monster mutation phenomenon?”

“Ordinary manatite wouldn’t cause that. Manatite only absorbs mana energy, not the harmful components of black mana. But very occasionally, abnormally large manatite crystals undergo a change in properties and begin to absorb black mana itself. We dwarves call this ‘negatite.'”

“Negatite…”

“Negatite doesn’t stop absorbing black mana even when it reaches saturation. It expels highly concentrated black mana from within, equal to the amount of new black mana it tries to absorb. While normal corpses exposed to atmospheric black mana have less than a 10% chance of mutating into monsters, ‘concentrated black mana’ expelled by negatite almost certainly transforms wild creatures into monsters.”

In other words, if the cause of the mutation incident at Blackforge Mine isn’t a commander-type monster or dungeon overflow, then the culprit is this extremely dangerous, troublesome mineral called negatite.

“Assuming this negatite is sitting right there in the cavity, is there a risk we might instantly transform into monsters if we go in to investigate?”

“It’s not that dangerous unless you get very close or make contact with it. A dwarf will accompany you on the investigation, and if negatite is present, that dwarf will seal it on site. Your mission will be to escort the dwarf investigator and, if the cause of the mutation incident turns out to be a commander-type monster, to eliminate it.”

“Understood. What about compensation?”

“I’ve prepared goods worth 1,000 gold. Cash would be more convenient for you, but we don’t have much cash stored in the mine.”

“We can exchange it in Zemest, so that’s fine, but it’s quite a high amount considering the risk?”

“Consider it as including gratitude for saving Mina and hush money regarding negatite.”

After hearing the explanation, all three of us nodded in unison. We had no intention of spreading information about a dangerous mineral that could almost certainly transform living creatures into monsters.

Having accepted Oppenbartel’s request, we headed toward the dwarven mine to begin our underground investigation of the tunnels.