Ch.71Thriller Night

“Grrrr…”

“Urrrgh…”

As midnight approaches, ominous and evil monsters prowl hidden in the darkness.

Even if you try to scream, fear prevents your voice from coming out, and when your eyes meet theirs, your entire body freezes stiff.

After reloading while recalling lyrics from a world-famous pop singer, I unleashed red magic bullets at the two skeletons pursuing me from behind.

‘Bang! Bang!’

“They really keep crawling out endlessly…”

“Tell me about it. Flame Lance!”

The skeletons that had been rolling on the ground with their ankles shattered by my revolver turned to ashes with a single Flame Lance.

We hadn’t even been climbing Mount Evernight for a full hour, yet the number of monsters we’d taken down already exceeded 30.

Most were zombies with nothing remarkable except their toughness, and occasionally skeletons swinging rusty swords, but the pressure of not knowing how many might jump out from where kept us from relaxing despite our overwhelming advantage.

“Five skeletons! Coming in from the right path!”

“Tch, no choice. I’ll use magic!”

While Seti was dealing with three zombies approaching from the front and Jessica and I were shaking off two pursuing skeletons, a squad of five more skeletons suddenly joined the fray.

Phyllis, who had been restraining her magic use to maintain combat endurance, seemed to realize she had no choice this time and pointed her rifle toward the skeletons charging from a distance.

“Fire Ball {Incendiary Grenade}!!”

A large, round fireball shot from the muzzle, illuminating the surroundings before colliding with the center of the skeleton group, creating a massive explosion.

While the Lightning Bolt she had shown several times before was a lethal strike against a single enemy, the Fireball was a powerful area attack capable of annihilating grouped enemies.

Its disadvantage was that it couldn’t be used in wooded areas due to fire hazards, but in terrain like this that resembled a barren mountain, there was nothing to hold it back.

‘BOOM-!’

“Wow, as expected of Phyllis. Your destructive power in a single strike is the strongest in our party.”

“If only I could fire those continuously, I could sweep away all these zombies and whatever else.”

“If that became possible, I would want for nothing… Mina, please!”

“Got it!”

Phyllis handed her rifle, its barrel marked with red lines, to Mina and received a single-shot pistol in return, immediately moving to support Seti.

‘BANG!’

“Ugh!? What kind of pistol recoil is…!”

“Mina’s pistol may look ordinary, but its power exceeds a rifle! Stand at an angle with your right foot back and wrap your left hand around your right.”

“L-like this?”

‘BANG!’

Though momentarily surprised by the pistol’s power and recoil far exceeding her expectations, after learning the two-handed grip, Phyllis somehow managed to control the recoil and successfully blow a zombie’s head off.

Meanwhile, Mina broke open the body of Phyllis’s rifle, removed the magic bullet, and inserted a 30-centimeter silver rod into the barrel.

After confirming that something like a mist of light was seeping out from the exposed end of the rod, Mina looked toward Phyllis and called out loudly.

“120 seconds from now! I’ll let you know when there’s 10 seconds left!”

“Understood!”

The silver rod Mina had inserted into the barrel was a prototype tool for gun maintenance, specifically designed to discharge residual magical energy accumulated in firearms.

It was Mina’s ambitious creation to minimize the downtime of Phyllis’s rifle after using magic.

“Hah!”

‘Slash!’

Seti, who had been engaged in close combat with two zombies until just now, cut them down with a wide swing and kicked away the last one that was flailing without its head, sending it tumbling down the slope.

The continuous close combat with zombies possessing formidable endurance and monstrous strength was taking a heavy toll on Seti.

Since maintaining distance or trying to check zombies that neither defended nor dodged was meaningless, he had to rely on brute strength to some extent.

“Phew…”

“Good work, Seti. Here’s some water.”

“Thanks.”

As Seti gulped down the water, I was looking at the silhouettes of two pointed rocks visible in the distance.

The ancient ruins, our destination, should be beyond them, but crossing just this one ridge was proving so difficult…

While I was thinking this, Phyllis, who had been surveying the surroundings, pointed to a rocky corner off the mountain path.

“Will, Jessica. There’s a cave over there. What shall we do?”

“A cave… I’m worried we might go in and get cornered with zombies popping up everywhere.”

“That’s certainly possible, but if we’re lucky, it might go through to the other side of the mountain. If so, it could significantly shorten our distance to the ruins.”

“It’s all or nothing. Hmm~”

“About the zombie problem, I think it’ll be fine? From what I’ve observed, zombies only emerge from soft ground. They never came up through solid rock.”

“Really? I suppose even undead monsters can’t burst through rock.”

In most cases, cave floors are made of stone or hardened ground.

If, as Mina said, zombies can only emerge through soft ground, the worst-case scenario wouldn’t happen, so it might be worth checking if the cave could take us to the other side of the mountain.

“Alright. Lead the way to the cave. It’s better than running around frantically in open areas, afraid of being surrounded by zombies.”

“Understood. This way… the slope is steep, so be careful.”

Having decided to investigate the cave, we began to detour from the steep mountain path under Phyllis’s guidance.

From a certain point, the slope became so steep that it was difficult for Ancestor to pass through, but we somehow managed. During our approach to the cave, no zombies or skeletons emerged from the ground.

“We’re almost there.”

“Ah, I see it too. It’s quite a large cave.”

“…I hear flapping. There must be bats.”

“A bat den. Makes sense.”

“Phyllis, you know not to use Fireball inside the cave, right?”

“Of course. I strictly train my subordinates never to use it in places where there’s a risk of cave-ins.”

Phyllis, having retrieved her rifle from Mina, began to slowly approach the large cave entrance while keeping it in her sights.

Seti followed closely behind, ready to charge forward quickly if needed, with Mina, Jessica, me, and Ancestor following in that order in a single-file formation.

“There they are. Two bats flying, three hanging from the ceiling.”

“Only you can see inside the cave, Phyllis, so attack first. We’ll handle any bats that fly out.”

“Understood.”

‘Bang!’

Phyllis stood at an angle in the narrow passage and fired her rifle.

Jessica and Seti were watching carefully for any bats flying out of the cave, while Mina and I kept watch for undead monsters approaching from other directions.

When the sound of flapping wings came from about 30 meters inside the cave entrance, Phyllis fired a second shot.

‘Bang!’

“I’ve taken care of the two closest ones. The rest will come out of the cave soon.”

“Got it. Will and Mina, keep watching our surroundings.”

“OK, Jessica.”

Just as the flapping sound grew closer, three bat silhouettes emerged from the pitch-black cave.

Phyllis, who had already prepared for her next shot, checked which direction Jessica was extending her hand to cast magic, then aimed at the bat furthest from Jessica’s target.

‘Bang!’

“Flame Lance!”

‘Whoosh!’

The reason Jessica kept using Flame Lance instead of Stone Bullet, which was superior in terms of speed and mana efficiency, was to secure visibility with the light from the flames attached to the enemy’s body.

Phyllis, with her night vision ability, could hit targets accurately without the light from fire magic, so the actual beneficiaries of the illumination effect were just Mina and me.

‘Bang-bang-bang!’

After shooting down the remaining bat with three red magic bullets, we remained vigilant for a moment, but only silence surrounded the cave.

If no other bats remained in the cave, our immediate safety seemed secured.

“I don’t sense any other monsters approaching. What about inside the cave?”

“No monsters visible within my range of sight.”

“It’s a cave with stalactites and stalagmites. The floor is a bit slippery, so let’s enter carefully.”

After emerging from the narrow slope, we reorganized our formation and entered the large cave entrance.

After about ten steps in, the lantern light, which had been dimmed by Mount Evernight’s magic until now, began to perform at its original capacity.

“Huh? The lantern light doesn’t seem to weaken inside this cave.”

“That’s fortunate. I hope this cave isn’t a dead end…”

“We’ll just have to go as far as we can.”

Even if it were a dead end, this cave with its solid floor where undead monsters couldn’t emerge would be a decent place to rest for a while.

If Jessica or Phyllis ran out of mana or needed rest due to physical fatigue, deploying a Repellation Field here wouldn’t be a bad idea… or so I was thinking when:

{Those who have set foot on the forbidden mountain…}

“Huh?”

“Mm!?”

{Ascending this mountain is not permitted to anyone. Turn back and descend immediately.}

The mysterious voice echoing throughout the cave was undoubtedly using Arcane Word.

The proof was that only Phyllis and I reacted to the voice; the other three were looking at us with expressions that seemed to ask what was happening.

Just like written Arcane Word, this voice seemed to be audible only to those who could recognize Arcane Word.

{Those who ignore this warning and set foot on forbidden land will go mad in eternal regret where even death is not permitted.}

“Seems like they really don’t want us approaching the ancient ruins.”

“So it’s true that you can understand Arcane Word.”

“Arcane Word? Is there Arcane Word written in this cave?”

“No. It’s not written in the cave; it came as a voice. It’s saying we’ll become undead monsters if we don’t go back down immediately.”

“I didn’t know Arcane Word could be used like that.”

“It’s essentially a language. But using Arcane Word for warnings… no wonder people don’t bring elves when climbing this mountain.”

While mastering Arcane Word completely requires extensive training even for elves, simply recognizing or hearing it should be relatively easy.

Otherwise, there would have been no point in leaving the warning “If an elf is reading this, pretend not to notice” in Arcane Word at the ancient ruins where we found Ancestor.

If an elf entered this mountain and approached the ancient ruins, hearing the warning in Arcane Word, how would they react?

They would probably caution their non-elf companions not to disclose anything about Arcane Word while somehow trying to guide them down the mountain.

To quote Garia, when no one but elves could understand Arcane Word, ignoring this warning and going to uncover the secrets of the ancient ruins would be premature.

‘But our party is different. Because I’m here.’

Although I may not match Phyllis, the Elder’s successor’s sister who uses Arcane Word in her spellcasting, I am what the elves have long awaited—’another race that can understand Arcane Word.’

With me by her side, there’s no reason for Phyllis to turn back just because she encountered Arcane Word intended as an ‘elf deterrent.’

“We might discover something amazing in these ruins.”

“There could be powerful monsters hiding. We should proceed carefully while maintaining full readiness.”

“Let’s rest here for about 30 minutes before continuing. Phyllis, keep watch at the front of the cave, and Will, take the lantern and guard the entrance.”

“Understood.”

“I’ll take the entrance. Will, you’ve fired quite a lot too, so rest and recover your magic.”

Having said that, Mina took the lantern and moved toward the entrance without waiting for my reply.

Although the magic consumption of magic bullet guns is minimal compared to mages’ attack spells, I decided to accept Mina’s kindness and take sufficient rest.