“Torture tools? Well now, that’s not what I imagined we’d find here… At least, not down here.”

And I sure as hell didn’t expect to find such things at all. Whether it was down here or up there.

“Haaa… Anything else other than those?”
“No, Captain. But it seems that the area beyond where we found the tools is—or was—inhabited.
“Mm…”

Korwen rubbed his chin, lost in thought. After a short while, he turned around, addressing everyone in the room in a loud voice.

“We’ll take a break first, after that we will split up. One group stays here and continues the search. The other group goes back to the surface. There’s some stuff I’d like you to do. Now then, as for who will stay down here…”

He continued to call several people’s names, including Karen and mine. After he called up everyone’s names, he dismissed us so that we could take a short break. The people who weren’t called earlier already made their way back up. There was no reason for them to take a break down here, after all.

“I would’ve liked to go up, too, though…”
“We can’t, Yumi.”
“I know, but… I really want to take a bath…”

Our earlier excursion had resulted in us being caked in dust. And it was, frankly said, a little uncomfortable.

“We’ll have to endure…”
“Nn…”
“If we can take a bath at all.”
“... Couldn’t we bath in the lake?”
“I mean, that would be doable…”

It was still summer so it shouldn’t be too bad… The only problem we’d have was the fact that it was out in the open…

“Let’s ask Miss Fenna later. I’m sure we’re not the only ones wanting to take a bath.”
“Nn. Let’s do that.”

I’d like to ask her now but Fenna was among the people who went back. Or rather, it seemed that Korwen had entrusted her with supervising whatever they were going to do now.

“Break’s over! Everyone, line up!”
“... That was one hell of a short break…”

Korwen clapped his hands, ordering everyone to line up. Barely a minute later, we had all lined up in front of Korwen.

“We’ll continue the search down the path that Merim’s group took. We don’t know if people might live there or not, so take care at all times. Got that?”
“””Yes, Captain!”””
“Good. In formation. We’re moving out.”

With those words, our group took a similar formation to the one we had earlier in Taddicks group. The Dragon Knights took the front and the back and everyone else was in the middle. I only noticed it now, but he had kept all the Dragon Knights here. Apart from them, it was only Karen and me, Ria, Merim and, much to my surprise, Sanna. Sanna in particular was once again holding her drawing utensils, ready to make a map. She looked nervous as always.

“Merim, lead us to the point to which you managed to search.”
“Yes, Captain.”

Our group entered once more the narrow corridor, walking down at a slow pace. The doors had all been kept open and the Dragon Knights made short stops at every door, peering inside the room to make sure it was still empty. As such, our progress was rather slow but we still managed to catch up to where they had left off the search after a short while. One of the doors in front of us was opened, a large black mass spilling out of the room.

“That’s a hell of a lot of black sand… And the other rooms were all empty?”
“Yes, we found nothing up until this point.”
“Mm… Odd. And the room with the tools?”
“That’d be there.”

Merim pointed to the door behind the one with the black sand spilling out.

“Let’s take a look, shall we?”

Our group moved onwards until we stood right in front of the mentioned room… The door had been left open by Merim’s group, revealing the contents inside.

“Well, damned I’ll be.”

Dozens of… tools… stood in the room, as if they had stored them away for a later time. Chairs and tables with questionable contraptions on them, something reminiscent of a medicine cabinet with old bottles, and… other tools, like pliers. There were also some small boxes with mana crystals in them, covered in dust and… something else.

The whole room was… It felt uncomfortable. Oppressive. As if the air was too thick to breathe in here.

“They got the whole set, didn’t they…”

Korwen, who despite his words didn’t seem all that disturbed, walked into the room, checking the tools.

“These were used without a doubt as well… Can’t say the people here had good hobbies, can I?”
“Captain! We found more!”

Behind us, a mercenary called out to Korwen.

“More?”
“Yes, sir! The room opposite has more. Also, there’s something you should take a look at.”
“Oh?”

Hearing those words, Korwen left the room and followed the mercenary into the other room. Curious as I was, I followed behind him so I could peek into the other room.

“... What… What is this?”

I regretted my curiosity immediately. My eyes couldn’t believe what they saw. Torture tools lined the walls of the room but the middle had been left suspiciously empty.

“This really is in bad taste,” muttered Korwen.

Circles and other geometrical patterns were drawn all over the floor. Some looked like a stereotypical pentagram or hexagram. Others were so crooked they didn’t resemble anything particular at all. Unfamiliar symbols surrounded everything and lines connected each pattern with the others, creating a large… I had no idea. What… What was this? Especially… Every single of these patterns… Things were left on top of them… Small bones and bags… The bags were partially rotting, revealing the similarly half-rotten insides.

“... Ca— Captain…”
“Ahhh… This is… quite bad.”

Saying so, Korwen took some steps back, leaving the room and closing the door, barring the view for everyone.

“Ria. Did you see that?”
“I did…”
“What was that…”
“Mm… I am… not sure… but it… might be… some type… of ritual magic…”
“... Seems our neighbours aren’t the very likeable kind, are they?”

More like, I really didn’t want people who could… do something like that… as neighbours.

“Keep this room closed off. Someone guard it at all times and don’t let anyone in without my explicit permission.”

One of the Dragon Knights saluted and immediately positioned himself next to the door, holding his weapon ready.

“Let’s keep going… and hope we won’t find anything else like this.”

With a dampened mood, our group continued the search.

---

As we kept searching the area, we found many things indicating that people had lived here. Storage for food, a kitchen and a washing area. We also found an area that seemed to be something like a prison, with empty cells lining up to the dozens.

That said, everything was kept very simple and it was hard to say the living conditions in this place were sophisticated and good, even outside those prison cells. Or rather, you could bluntly say they were astonishingly bad. There was no light at all and the sanitary conditions, from what we had seen, must have been really bad.

Then again, this is still better than the way we lived back in the slums… Not like that’s hard.

At the very least, you had a roof over your head and the wind didn’t blow through every crack in the wall. There was also plenty of space. Compared to that tiny hut that was on the verge of collapsing, this was still quite great.

“I wonder why someone would live here, though… Hey, sis, what do you think?”
“I don’t know. Maybe they were running away?”
“But then… What about the stuff from earlier?”
“Maybe those were left here when the fort was abandoned.”
“Nn… Maybe…”

That was assuming, of course, that the people who had lived here had done so after the fort had been abandoned. Which we couldn’t say for sure. Or, at least, I couldn’t. But it seemed that Ria and the others assumed that had been the case.

“Captain! We found something!”

As I wondered about that, a mercenary shouted from a corridor we had found earlier. Korwen, who was a little away from us, immediately followed the shout.

“Should we take a look as well, Yumi?”
“Nn… As long as it’s not something like earlier…”

That incident had been quite unpleasant, after all. Fortunately, there had been no other incidents like that yet. Even the prison cells we had found had been completely empty, devoid of any remnants of life.

Nonetheless, the two of us followed after Korwen into the corridor, only to find him standing in front of one door, looking troubled.

“Captain. What’s wrong?”
“Mh? Ahh… Take a look for yourselves.”

After we approached him, I peeked through the door and…

“Woah, what’s that? Did the room cave in?”

The whole room was buried in rubble, barring the way.

“Probably either that or someone blocked this deliberately. The ceiling looks undamaged so it’s probably the latter… Oh, right. Yumi. Climb up that rubble and check what’s behind it.”
“Eh?”
“You’re probably the only one here small enough to fit through that.”

He pointed to the top of the rubble. True enough, there was some space between the ceiling and the rubble, but…

“Do I have to?”
“Yes.”
“Ugh…”

How wonderful…

“We’ll put a rope around your waist again, just in case.”
“That’s not what I was concerned about but okay…”

Oh well, not like I could help it. While I was staring at the rubble, Karen had fetched a rope already.

“Mr Captain, could you teach me the knot you used earlier?”
“Mh? Oh, sure, I can.”
“Nn?”

The knot? Wait, was I being used as a practice material now, too?

“Put the rope around her waist… Yes, like that. Now, move the rope there and hold it with your hands like this… Good. Now, pull the rope through there and there.”
“Like this?”
“Yes. And that’s it already. Make sure it sits securely and well by tugging on it. But be mindful of Yumi now.”
“Yes.”

Karen pulled on the rope a few times to make sure it was secure.

“Well, that was quicker than I expected…” I said.”
“It’s not like teaching a knot the first time is hard. It’s practising it and remembering it afterwards that’s the hard part. So, Karen, make sure you practise later.”
“Yes, Mr Captain.”
“Mm. Now, Yumi. Up with you. Can you get up on your own there?”

I glanced towards the rubble in response to his question. The rubble was quite high but it wasn’t particularly steep with plenty of footholds. Shouldn’t be too hard, even for me.

“I think so.”
“Then we’ll wait for you down here.”
“Nn.”

After deciding on the most reliable path upwards, I began my climb upwards. Though I said that, it was more like a steep trek rather than actual climbing. If this had been carried over here to block the way, they definitely had put in some work… But on the other side, reaching the top of the rubble hill turned out to be pretty easy. The gap between the ceiling and the rubble wasn’t large but it should be big enough for me to squeeze through.

Well, I could probably squeeze through even narrower places, boneless as I am…

Not like I’d have to make use of that characteristic of mine. It wasn’t that bad,

“Now, let’s see what’s in here…”
“Yumi, can you see something?!”
“Nn! It seems to be… some corridor? No, there’s a dead-end… Huh?”

There wasn’t a path forward anymore. What the hell?

“A dead end?”
“Yes…”

I climbed down the rubble and took a look around. There… was nothing here. Only a wall in front of me. No abnormalities in the mana either. I touched the wall and tried to find something irregular on it, maybe some physical mechanism or so but there was nothing here either.

“There’s nothing here, Captain!”
“...”

I could hear some mumbling on the other side of the wall but nothing loud enough for me to hear. As I waited for a response, I knocked a few times on the wall but even that wasn’t met with any success. There wasn’t room or something behind it.

Seriously… Don’t tell me they just dumped their rubble in this room, for now, particular reason?

That’d be a little depressing but unfortunately quite possible. In the vain hope of finding something, I kept knocking on the wall a few more times. First at my own height, then after I crouched down and finally I…

“Nn? Oh? Oh! Captain!”
“What?”
“There’s a hole in the ceiling!”
“... The ceiling?”
“Yes.”

I had completely missed the ceiling… A deep hole, similar to the one we had come down from, was extending from the ceiling to high above.

“Captain, I think this is another exit. Or entrance.”
“... I see. Come back for now.”
“Okay.”

Holding onto the rope, I climbed back up and squeezed through the gap once more, returning to the other side. Once I had made my way down, Karen immediately unwound the knot, freeing me from the rope.

“You’re sure there was nothing but the hole in the ceiling?”
“Nn. Behind the rubble are only a wall and the hole in the ceiling.”
“Anything you could make out through the hole?”
“It goes up far in a straight line and then ends. It’s a bit hard to compare but I think it’s about the same height as the one we came down from.”

The height was quite hard to judge, to be honest. Even if I could see to the end, saying how far it was through such a narrow hole wasn’t easy.

“I see… I guess whoever used this area came from this entrance then. And when they left they moved all that rubble to this place to block the entrance.”
“Nn, but would they really leave out the other entrance then?”
“That’s a good point… Maybe they didn’t expect anyone to use that entrance but they thought this was one was an issue… Mm, either way, we’ll have to clean this up and check what’s above there.”
“How are we even going to go up that hole, though?”
“There are some ways to manage that but I’d have to see it first. And for that, we’ll need to clear this rubble. After that, we’ll see what we can do.”

In other words, it wasn’t something we’d have to bother with right now.

“Well, let’s go back. We still got places to search.”

The three of us—plus the mercenaries who had called for Korwen—returned to the main corridor.

“Ah, Captain!”
“How is the search going?”
“We’ve finished most of the rooms. We found several empty rooms and another two storage rooms.”
“What was in them?”
“Most of the shelves and crates were empty but we also found some with black sand, remains of charcoal and sulphur.”

Sulphur, huh…

“Did they manufacture black sand here? Mhm… How odd…”
“Manufactured?”
“Sulphur and charcoal are both ingredients for it.”

Sulphur and charcoal were ingredients for black sand? Huh… The more I heard the more this sounded to me like black sand was black powder, just with a different name. Not that I knew how black powder was made but I believed to recall that sulphur was part of it… Probably.

“But what did they need it for?”
“Nn, for firearms?”

It was also called gunpowder for a reason.

“That’d be the logical conclusion, I guess… Let’s keep looking and see if we can find anything. But just in case, we’ll be a little more careful now. So, stay behind the Dragon Knights or me, you two.”
“Nn, understood, Captain.”
“Understood, Mr Captain.”

We got official permission to use the captain as a living shield! That’s probably not something I should shout out loud.

“Captain!”
“Yes?”
“We found something!”

Once again, a mercenary called for Korwen, making him hurry over.

“What is it?”
“Well, we just tried to open this door and…”

The mercenary rattled the door… or at least, he tried to. It didn’t move. And it wasn’t like it didn’t move because it was locked or anything. No, it didn’t move. At all. As if it was fixed in place by something.

The doors weren’t as precisely measured as they were in my old world, where they wouldn’t budge anyway. No, if you rattled a door here, it would rattle. And this door definitely looked like it would rattle a whole lot. In fact, I had the feeling that if I kicked it, it would break apart.

“A magical lock?”
“Seems so, Captain.”
“That’s interesting. Yumi, Karen, can you two see anything in this door?”
“Nn? Well…”

I stared at the door, concentrating on the mana. The mana I perceived didn’t seem out of ordinary… There was only… how to say it… the mana around the door felt… stagnant.

“I can’t see anything, Mr Captain.”
“Nn, I feel like it’s not moving… but, honestly, I don’t know.”
“I see… Ria! Come over here!”

When in doubt, we always had our resident magical expert at hand.

“Mm… What is… the matter… Captain?”
“This door seems to be locked. Can you open it?”
“Mm… Let me… see…”

Ria crouched down, looking at the door. After a while, she touched it with her hand, as if she was looking for something.

“This is…”
“... Something wrong?”
“Mm… It’s not exactly… locked…”
“But we can’t open it.”
“Because it is… in a fixed… form…”
“Fixed?”

What the heck was that supposed to mean?

“It’s a… type of… magic that… prevents something… from moving… Mm… Say… a wooden branch… You can… bend it… right?”
“Yes, of course…”
“There exists… type of… magic… that prevents… that bending… The branches… form… becomes fixed. You can… still swing… the branch… but it… becomes like… a rock…”

A branch that wouldn’t bend… That sounded like quite amazing magic.

“Ahhh… I think I see. Ria, is that the magic that’s sometimes used to stabilise structures?”
“Exactly… that…”
“I see… I didn’t know it could be used like this, too. Mh, I’ll remember that.”
“But it’s… troublesome… the magic… is hard to… dispel… It’s not… suitable as… a lock… Unless you… want to… seal it up…”

So, whoever used that magic was… sealing this place?

“Well, doesn’t that sound ominous. So? Can you open it?”
“I can…”
“Then do it.”
“Mm… But I’ll… have to… use some… force…”

She wasn’t going to brute-force her way through that door, was she?

“... Is that really necessary?”
“Yes…”
“Got it. I’ll make sure we’ll take enough distance.

She was…

“Everyone, listen up. Gather in that room! Ria will use magic to open that door and you sure as hell don’t want to be in her range!”
“Run!”
“Hide! Everyone, hide!”
“Take cover! Protect your head!”

The scene following that… was almost magical. Before Korwen had even finished speaking, the moment the mercenaries heard that ‘Ria was going to use magic’ they all jumped up and stormed into the room, as if they couldn’t to safety any slower than this.

Frankly said it was chaos.

“I knew this would happen… Oh well… Yumi, Karen, you two take cover as well.”

Following his orders, we joined everyone into the room that had been chosen as a shelter. For some reason, all the mercenaries were huddled towards the wall, trying to have as much distance to the door as they could possibly have.

“... Sis, what’s wrong with these people?”
“I don’t know…”

It couldn’t be that bad… could it?

“Girl, you haven’t been that long with us yet, right? Then let me tell you: Every year there are several injuries because of Miss Ria’s magic! Either she blows things up without warning in the camp, catching everyone nearby in the blast or she uses magic during a job and also catches everyone nearby in the blast! Damned I’ll be to suffer that again!”
“...”

So, either way, things were exploding.

“But… during the battle with the mother roper, she didn’t use any magic that could cause a blast…”
“She did with the spirit trees, though, Yumi…”
“... Oh.”

She did… Now that Karen said that, I remembered how everyone had frantically tried to find cover back then, too…

“... But we’re surely safe inside this room, right?”
“I won’t bet on it!”

Oh well… Maybe we should have chosen a room slightly further away? Then we wouldn’t have this problem. Oh, but if the area caved in… Wait…

“Hey, isn’t it a really really bad idea to blow something up underground anyway?”
“...”

Somehow, everyone’s eyes wandered to me.

“Actually, forget I ever said that…”
“""We can’t!”""

Too bad then…

No, no, no, it’s the captain who ordered her to open that door. Surely he is aware of what she’s doing, right? And surely, he doesn’t expect the area to cave in. I’m sure he knows what he is doing! Please let him know what he’s doing!

As if to answer my inner plea, Korwen walked into the room, only to stop right in front of the door, staring at everyone with an exasperated expression.

“It’s not like I can’t understand it but you’re all a little overreacting…”
“Hey, Captain.”
“Yes?”

As he replied to me, he turned around so that he could close the door.

“This place isn’t going to cave in, right?”
“This place was made by earth magicians. It needs more than one or two explosions to make this area collapse, so don’t worry about that.”
“I see… That’s a relief…”

Once he had closed the door, he paused for a second, seemingly in thought.

“Well, I guess there could be some dama—”

A loud blast interrupted him. The door rattled violently before it broke free of the lock, swinging open with tremendous force. Right into Korwen. Unable to withstand the impact it, scattered into dozens of pieces…

“...”
“...”
“...”

Silence fell over everyone. The echo of the blast ebbed away and fell silent as well.

“... could be some damage.”

He turned around, his face expressionless. He seemed to be uninjured, only slightly reddened in the face.

“Is this how people feel when they walk into a closed door at night?”
“I think that’s a little different, Mr Captain…”
“I see.”

Without saying another word, he turned around again and left the room.

“Let’s pretend we never saw that.”
“Nn…”

That… probably would be better. For everyone.

From the corner of my eye, I could several mercenaries nodding in agreement, while others seemed to hold back a chuckle. Not like I could see their faces through their helmets. One, in particular, seemed to mutter something along the lines of “Now he knows how we feel!” or something like that.

“You lot, stop lazing around and move,” echoed Korwen’s voice over to us.

But… it couldn’t be helped, right? That situation had had too much of an… impact.

“Let’s go before he gets angry, Yumi.”
“... Nn. Guess we should.”

In a way, I felt a little bad for Korwen.

We left the room, with the mercenaries right behind us. At the formerly locked door stood Ria and Korwen. Ria’s hair was a little dishevelled but that was all. How did she escape the blast anyway?

“There you are. Look at this and tell me what in the blazes you see there.”

Korwen pointed into the room. Curious about the particular wording, I peeked inside.

“Huh?”

I tilted my head, confused about the view.

It was a large hall. It might have been something like a dining hall or so, as there were several large tables with chairs. The passage of time took a heavy toll on them, though, and much visible damage and broken legs. But that’s not what surprised me.

There was something drawn on the ground. It was suspiciously familiar to the weird drawing we had seen earlier. But this time, there were no bones or rotten bags. No, there were… humanoid bodies strewn across it. Or, they probably were humanoids. Each and every one of them wore a thick robe, hiding their outline.

“Those are… Captain, are they dead?”
“If they were alive under those circumstances I’d call that one hell of a miracle.”
“...”

So, they really were…

“Ria, what’s that?”
“... Probably… failed ritual magic…”
“Failed? How do you know that?”
“Those people… they were… probably… the casters…”
“... In other words, the ones who lived here, huh? Seems we found them. Or what’s left of them.”

The ones who lived here… They were already all dead.

“Hey, Ria, is that on the wall also because of the ritual magic?”
“That is… probably… the case…”

The wall? I glanced over to the place Korwen had pointed to and… there was a streak of yellow in the wall. No, not just one… There were dozens of them… all over the walls… As I noticed them, a smell entered my nose. The smell of rotten eggs.

“Just what did they do… to turn the place into this?”

Korwen, holding his nose, stepped into the room and took a look around. After he confirmed that the area seemed safe, he beckoned us to come in as well.

“Just what happened here…”

But even if I asked that, nobody could give me an answer.

Korwen walked up to one of the robe-clad bodies and turned it around, revealing the person who was inside. Or rather, what remained of them. A pure white skeleton.

“These didn’t die just yesterday… Judging from those patterns on the robes… Them again, huh?”

Them? I glanced towards the robes, unable to figure out what he meant. The robes seemed to be rather simple brown robes, except for some patterns that were sewn on them… Actually, no, that was wrong… It was a little hard to see but the robes were covered in patterns. The same ones as the large drawing on the ground.

“Captain, those…”
“They are Worshippers. Were Worshippers. Whatever they did here, can’t be good.”
“My, my, you certainly wish to know that, don’t you?”
“Who?!”

A high-pitched bell-like voice. A very familiar voice.

“You sure took your sweet time and left me waiting here for quite a while.”

Pink hair and a witch costume.

“Yumias?”

What the hell was she doing here?!