Vault

The ancient vault lay hidden among the mountains. Vines crawled over ruins unknown to all, and the walls piled from massive stones and metal were covered in scars. Every mark was a character left behind by time, yet all humanity could read from them was the word "vicissitudes."

The history of these Ancient Ruins could be traced back to the distant Gondor Empire. Its solemn and imposing style was utterly unfamiliar to the Ansu people of today. In Gawain's memories, it had already been a ruin when the northern pioneers found it—and even then, it had not looked much "younger" than it did now.

Gawain, Rebecca, Amber, and Knight Byron entered the mountain through the largest archway. The wavering torchlight left the corridors on both sides shifting between light and shadow, like the legendary Soul Corridor leading to the land of the dead. Amber complained unhappily, "We should've brought your Aunt Heti. What good are you? You can't even cast a Glimmer Spell, and you call yourself a mage?"

Rebecca flushed red. "Fireball Spells... Fireball Spells can be used for lighting too..."

Unfortunately, she sounded so weak that she was not convincing in the slightest.

Knight Byron walked a short distance behind and to the side of Gawain. Looking at the ancient stone walls and the indentations whose purpose could no longer be discerned, he could not help recalling his days as a mercenary. "How old are these ruins?"

"I don't know." Gawain shook his head. "They were already ruins when we first found them. The more knowledgeable people in the team said they were relics of the Starfire Era—the period when Magic Technology underwent rapid development in the middle and late Gondor Empire. Back then, the great Magic Well, the Azure Well, was successfully activated. A wave of expansion swept through the Empire, and it began constructing large numbers of fortresses and research facilities along its borders, hoping to find other massive Magic Power Focuses like Azure Well elsewhere on the continent. But later, those facilities were abandoned one after another."

Rebecca found it hard to believe. "Did they not find a single Magic Power Focus?"

"No, they couldn't find any Magic Power Focuses like Azure Well." Gawain searched through the history in his mind. "The power of Azure Well is beyond anything you can imagine. It was a massive Magic Source located at the center of the continent. The energy it produced every day could keep every Mage Tower in present-day Ansu running for an entire month. That is why later scholars believed that the explosion of Azure Well in Gondor year 1739 was actually the trigger for the Magic Tide. That explosion did not destroy the entire Empire on the spot, but it tore open a huge gap in the elemental plane. The imbalance in Elemental Power accumulated until the following year, when it triggered the Magic Tide. But there is no way to prove that theory. Azure Well and the Magic Power Focus known as 'Azure' were completely annihilated. No one can investigate them anymore."

"So incredible..." As a mage, Rebecca naturally understood how astonishing that ancient Magic Well had been. What shocked her even more was that humanity had once wielded power on that level. "The Gondor Empire back then was incredible..."

"In short, in the eyes of the Gondor people of that era, Magic Power Focuses scattered across the continent were hardly worth noticing. After barely finding a few medium-sized ones, Gondor stopped exploring more distant regions, and a great many fortresses and research facilities were abandoned. This place should be one of the facilities abandoned during that same period, and it was probably some kind of multipurpose complex."

Amber suddenly grew nervous. "Then... then there wouldn't happen to be any out-of-control ancient magical monsters or magic traps in here, would there?!"

Gawain glanced at the tense Half-elf. "You dare dig up other people's ancestral graves, yet you're afraid of an Ancient Facility that has been abandoned for over a thousand years?"

"That's different! Even if someone came back to life in an ancestral grave, they'd still just be a person—but if something jumps out in one of these Ancient Facilities, who knows what it might be! I heard that some Ancient Facilities even seal away synthetic Monsters and magic-powered colossi created by insane mages..."

Veins bulged on Gawain's forehead. "So it disappoints you that when I came back to life, I was still just a 'person'? And those rumors about the Dark Mountains before, and these Ancient Facility ghost stories now—where did you get all this nonsense in that head of yours?"

Amber thought for a moment, then suddenly put on a mysterious expression. "Let me tell you something. I really am the Goddess of the Night's Chosen. Sometimes, when I pray especially devoutly, the goddess gives me revelations. She taught me all of this..."

Rebecca casually formed a miniature Fireball Spell no larger than her thumb and tossed it at Amber. Caught off guard, Amber got a face full of black ash and immediately started shrieking, "Mother of—are you insane?! Throwing a Fireball Spell out of nowhere is dangerous, okay?!"

Rebecca shrugged. "...Looks like she isn't the Chosen."

Gawain had already become too lazy to deal with those two, who never seemed to get along.

Because the ancient door had appeared before them.

At the end of the corridor stood a massive, heavy door forged from dark violet metal. It possessed the typical Gondor Starfire Era style: thick, solid, and decorated with abstract reliefs of soldiers and city walls.

Amber rubbed the soot from her face with all her strength, her eyes gleaming as she stared at the door. "This thing... isn't an entire slab of Purple Steel, is it?!"

"That's right, an entire slab. But for every scrap you scrape off it, I'll have Rebecca convert it into a Fireball Spell to the face." Gawain tapped Amber on the head with the hilt of the Pioneer's Sword. "So put away those bold ideas. Waiting obediently for me to pay you is the only sustainable path."

Amber turned her head and muttered under her breath, "...Miser..."

Gawain heard her muttering, but ignored her. Instead, he stepped back half a step and took out the crucial "key" from inside his clothes.

A relic from seven hundred years ago: the Platinum Disc.

Rebecca looked somewhat worried. "After all these years, can this thing really still work?"

Gawain looked at her and smiled faintly. "This is Gondor Empire technology. As long as the main structure of the facility has not collapsed, its main door will never malfunction."

As if to prove his words true, the intricate patterns on the Platinum Disc began lighting up one after another as soon as he finished speaking. At the same time, threads of radiance began flowing through the reliefs on the heavy metal door.

Once the radiance filled the entire door, creaking mechanical sounds came from deep within the door and the rock walls on either side. Everyone felt the ground beneath their feet trembling slightly, and amid that tremor, the massive door slowly opened.

Gawain, Rebecca, and the others had long been prepared. The moment the door opened, they covered their mouths and noses and retreated to either side. At the same time, Gawain activated Aura Protection, one of a knight's basic skills. A faint barrier protected everyone present. This ability worked much like a mage's basic spell, Breeze Shield. Though it offered very, very limited defensive power, it could effectively maintain a clean air environment. When venturing deep into places like ancient ruins, it could protect its caster from poisonous gases.

There were no poison gas traps in these Ancient Ruins, but who knew what gases might have accumulated in a sealed space closed off for seven hundred years? An extra layer of protection was always better.

Only after several minutes did Gawain dispel the protection. He nodded to the others, then took the lead in stepping through the door, with Knight Byron following closely behind.

Amber hesitated for a moment, but ultimately gave up on trying to chip off a piece of metal from the door while no one was looking—Purple Steel was too hard for her dagger to pry loose.

Beyond the door was a vast rectangular hall. Sealed doors could be seen in all four directions, while those ancient assets had simply been piled inside the hall.

The sealed environment and the runes placed throughout the hall ensured that the supplies within oxidized and corroded at the slowest possible rate. Even now, many of them remained in good condition.

Piles of Metal Ingots, crystals in every color, swords, armor, and several large chests over half a person's height, stacked in the very center.

Gawain stepped forward, wedged the Pioneer's Sword into the gap of one chest, and wrenched it open.

One chest contained still-glittering gold and silver coins, while the others held neatly arranged pale violet crystals—charged and engraved Military Crystals.

The gold and silver coins were not the most valuable things here. The crystals were.

The Ancient Gondor Empire had dominated the continent through its advanced Magic Technology. The magical energy from Azure Well gave the Empire's mages almost inexhaustible power to squander. Even the most incompetent mage could pile up technical results under such conditions. Thus, the Gondor Empire of that era accomplished something that the Four Great Kingdoms of today considered nearly unimaginable:

It mass-produced Extraordinary Armaments.

Ordinary swords, armor, and weapons were not enchanted. No matter how sturdy or sharp they were, they remained mundane equipment. Only equipment that had been enchanted and contained Supernatural Power could be called Extraordinary Armament. In present-day Ansu, enchanted weapons and armor were issued only to officers of various ranks—and even then, not always. But during the Gondor period, every soldier being equipped with a longsword enchanted with the Sharpening Technique and a standard crystal was the norm.

The thumb-sized crystals had Spell Models for Basic Shield and Explosion Spell preset inside them. They operated automatically and could distinguish friend from foe, so even ordinary soldiers with no spellcasting ability whatsoever could use them. When attacked, the shield would activate. Once the shield was depleted, the crystal would heat up, flash, and issue a warning. Then, if thrown with force, it would explode once it had reached a safe distance from the wearer and nearby friendly units. To Gawain, this was simply unbelievably advanced armament.

If circumstances had not forced their hand and made it impossible to carry these things away, the pioneers would never have left them behind. Back then, the team had taken every more valuable item they could carry on their bodies. These crystals had been the portion they had no choice but to abandon.

Gawain reached out, picked up a crystal, and lightly rubbed it between his fingers.

This might have been one way for ordinary people to access magic, but it was not a viable path.

Only with Azure Well activated could such items be charged without regard for cost. Now that Azure Well had been destroyed, every ancient crystal used meant one less remaining.

But at the very least, for now, these crystals would become the foundation stones of the territory's stability.