Chapter 90 : Chapter 90

Chapter 90 - Finding a Clue (4)

Boom!

10 minutes after they entered the battle.

Everyone except Artier was thinking this.

‘Why is this manageable?’

The creatures came in slowly, keeping their distance, and each time they were hit by Reinard's flame magic.

Moreover, they were weak and their bodies were soft. They were incomparable to the ones they fought in the county.

They soon found the reason.

‘It seems the real forces are concentrated in the east.’

The northwest was a place that had been occupied 8 months ago.

There was no way they would leave strong individuals in a place like this.

“As I expected. If things proceed like this, we can win.”

Reinard said calmly, but no one agreed with him.

Gerard hurriedly grabbed Tersion’s arm and redirected the trajectory of her bow.

“Hold back.”

“Just one shot.”

“No.”

“Please, just one shot to the mouth!”

“It’s still an instant kill, isn’t it!”

It seemed she had been influenced by Jeina in many ways.

Though she would deny it.

“……”

“Master? What’s wrong?”

“Hmm, something’s strange.”

“Are you worried about their scheme?”

Artier stopped turning his sword and pointed to one side.

“Don’t you feel like they’ve been flocking to one side since a while ago?”

“Ah?”

Come to think of it, it was true.

Of course, it wasn't easy to approach because of the walls built on all sides. But even so, they had been foolishly coming only from the front since a while ago.

“It seems the individual commanding them has also gone to the east.”

“Even so, this is an excessively foolish act.”

Even a pack of wild animals would generally try to detour if they were continuously blocked.

This was not the behavior of Hellmorphs, whose individual intelligence was comparable to humans.

Pow!

Soon, the last one exploded from Gerard’s Mana Bullet, and the battle ended just like that.

[Quest Complete!]

[Search magic has been completed.]

Fwoosh!

A large pulse swept through the entire castle for the last time.

“This is……”

Reinard seemed quite surprised.

“What is it?”

“No contamination from Hellmorphs is detected within the castle. It can be considered a clean zone.”

It was an expected but still incomprehensible reality.

Why had the Hellmorphs just left this place alone?

“Seeing as they attacked, it’s not that they can't enter, so why couldn’t they contaminate it?”

“The reason for that, I also……. Please wait a moment.”

Reinard waved his hand in the air as if controlling something and then said something unexpected.

“There is another clean zone. It’s more than 3km away to the northwest.”

“Northwest?”

What on earth was there?

The answer was known to Gerard.

“There is only one facility located northwest of the viscounty. A mine.”

“What kind of mine?”

“It was a place where mithril was mainly collected. Jestion’s viscounty has been famous for its mithril production since ancient times.”

“……Mithril.”

At those words, Artier glanced at the surrounding buildings. They must have been abandoned for a long time, yet they were not rusted at all.

“Collie, is this also mithril?”

“It probably is. One of the biggest characteristics of mithril is that it doesn’t rust, you know.”

Mithril.

It was a well-known good mineral in fantasy worlds.

It was light and had excellent magic resistance, so it was often processed into armor or accessories, but in <Cross Destiny>, it was also used as a building material like this.

In a world where magic was commonplace, the magic resistance of buildings was also important.

“Even so, it’s not like mithril is cheap, yet it seems to be plastered everywhere. He must have been quite rich.”

“The price of mithril is cheap here since it's a production area, which would have also played a part.”

As he listened to Collie and Gerard, it felt like the pieces of the puzzle in his head were fitting together one by one.

Artier grabbed a mithril rebar attached to the wall and pulled it off.

Clang!

[Mithril Rebar (Magic)]

Attack Power 15~18

Option: Does not rust, Defense +5, 10% additional damage to evil-attribute creatures

‘Why does a rebar have a higher attack power than the sword I’m carrying?’

Even though it was the wreckage of a completely destroyed building, he had to use quite a bit of force to pull off the rebar.

It had truly enormous durability.

“Perhaps this mithril is suppressing the Hellmorphs’ infection.”

“Why mithril? This is just a lump of iron.”

“It’s not an absurd hypothesis.”

Reinard said in response to Jeina’s question.

“We can’t confirm it’s mithril, but we can at least assume that something that exists in common in this castle and the mine has suppressed the Hellmorphs’ infection.”

“Right. At least it seems certain that some kind of ore has suppressed the Hellmorphs’ infection.”

Gerard looked at the rebar Artier was holding.

“Artier, but why did you pull that off?”

“To use as a weapon.”

“……?”

“……?”

“……”

What?

Artier couldn't understand the bewildered gazes of the people.

“Why would you use a rebar as a weapon when you have a perfectly good sword?”

“Because this is sturdier and stronger……?”

“It doesn’t have a hilt and the center of gravity will be off, you know?”

When Artier obtains an item that can be used as a weapon, the attack power is displayed in the information window.

But to others, he was incomprehensible for suddenly pulling out a rebar, leaving a perfectly good weapon aside.

“If it were me, I would have saved it and used it later to make armor. Mithril, being a light ore, is not suitable for weapons.”

“I didn’t know the fool who would use mithril as a weapon would be our leader.”

“No……. Alright, I won't use it, so stop now.”

As Tersion’s sharp sarcasm began to be heard, Artier finally gave up and put the rebar into his inventory.

“First, let’s go to the mithril mine in the northwest. We need to confirm for sure what is blocking the Hellmorphs’ infection.”

Artier tried his best to ignore the suspicious gazes of the party and started walking. As soon as he passed outside the castle walls, the poisonous gas began to increase.

Artier asked, just in case.

“Gerard, do they happen to use mithril in the castle walls or waterways?”

“It's not used directly, but I heard they use a magic circle made of mithril powder when enchanting them.”

“As I thought……”

Reinard said it couldn't be confirmed, but Artier was gradually becoming convinced.

This mithril was definitely suppressing the Hellmorphs' power.

‘There was not a single explanation like this in the game. What a crappy game!’

How can the only thing properly explained in the game be the controls!

Artier decided to plate the party's armor with mithril as soon as this mission was over.

***

On the way to the mine, the Hellmorphs no longer appeared.

It was because they had cleaned up all the Hellmorphs in the vicinity.

“Hmm?”

Tersion, who was walking ahead with another archer, found something and immediately bent her knees.

“What is it?”

“This is a human trace.”

The party gathered at Tersion’s words.

“Humans here? That’s absurd.”

Reinard scoffed and shook his head.

In a place where poisonous gas filled the air instead of air, it was impossible for a human to live unless they were a Grand Magus.

“I’m not trying to spout nonsense about survivors being left here either.”

Tersion said so and traced the footprint with her hand. She put her finger in to measure the depth and also measured the stride.

Soon, Tersion straightened up and said.

“It's a fake footprint.”

“As expected.”

“It’s not something to just end with that. The stride itself is real.”

Just from her voice, one could tell that Tersion was disgusted.

“This is a footprint made by a corpse. It means it's an undead.”

“Huh?”

Most of them who heard that were disgusted and stepped back from the footprint.

“Hoo.”

Only Reinard was looking at the footprint with an interested expression.

“Interesting. Are you saying that undead are still left in this vicinity?”

“What’s so interesting? Doesn’t it mean there’s more to break?”

“That’s not it.”

Reinard wagged his finger.

“So far, the Hellmorphs have shown two reactions when they encountered something. They either destroyed or infected it. But for the first time, a reaction that is neither has appeared.”

Perhaps what the Hellmorphs are hostile to is fixed?

That fact could create several hypotheses.

And perhaps even a way to deal with them.

“Anyway, let’s keep moving forward. If we go a little further, we should see the safe zone we searched for.”

The party, which was moving forward while destroying the continuously appearing membranes, found a sign erected on an old road.

As they continued to walk along the sign, they found a huge, never-before-seen membrane blocking the area around the mine like a fence.

“What is that?”

“Hmm.”

Gerard looked around and nodded.

“It seems there is something in this mine after all.”

“Even though the area around the mine is covered in membranes?”

“Think carefully. What do you think is the easiest way to close off an empty mine?”

That would be to block the entrance.

But they didn’t do that.

As if the membrane couldn't reach the entrance, a huge living wall was erected around the mine.

“Ah, there's something.”

Tersion pointed somewhere.

The ground shook, and a huge tunnel appeared.

The tunnel wriggled like a living creature and was spewing out dozens of Hellmorphs.

“It seems they’ve grasped the situation and sent reinforcements, you know……”

“What a swarm of dogs!”

“Pardon?”

“Ah, no, I’m not talking about you!”

Leaving Jeina’s meaningless excuse behind, Artier drew his sword.

“To enter the mine, we’ll have to force our way through.”

Even now, Hellmorphs were continuously appearing.

A quick glance told him that they were stronger individuals than the ones that appeared before.

Perhaps if they dragged on time, stronger individuals would appear, and in the end, the ones on the front line might come out.

“A swift battle……. I’ll have to use holy magic.”

Artier said so and looked around at his comrades.

The two who understood his gaze stepped forward.

It was Jeina and Gerard.

“I just have to blow them up roughly, right?”

“That’s right. Jeina, take the left, and Gerard, take the right.”

“Understood.”

Jeina took out her axe, and Gerard took out his grimoire, and they both floated up a Holy Light at the same time.

Soon, a rough and thunderous echo spread from one, and a calm but sharp flow from the other.

“Uahahaha! Just shatter!”

Flash! Boom!

First, Jeina raised her axe to the sky, and a huge axe made of light appeared in the air.

Jeina struck the ground with her axe.

Then the huge axe instantly fell to the ground, swallowing the Hellmorphs and membranes.

Rumble-rumble-rumble-boom!

‘W-way stronger than I thought?’

Artier broke into a cold sweat as he saw more than half of the membranes turned into pulp.

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