“…How deep do you think it goes?” asked Elena as she gingerly stooped down at the edge.

  “I don’t think we should be trying to find out,” murmured back Milo.

  Daisuke pinched and pulled Rexar’s garb as he attempted to test the iy of the fl with a daring leg. “That may not be such a good idea,” he warned.

  Croug beside Elena, Milo cautiously lowered his index fioward the fl. But instead of toug the light blue… phenomenon, his finger went right through.

  “Huh?” Elena excimed with a frown. “What exactly is happening right now?”

  Milo looked to Daisuke questioningly.

  “…Maybe some kind of barrier that rejects anic matter?” he replied as he tried to jure up aheory. But nothing else came to mind.

  “Is that even possible?” queried Milo.

  “Shouldn’t our focus right now be finding a way around it?” argued Rexar with evident impatience. “I’m really sick of this pce.”

  “That makes two of us,” agreed Daisuke while pointing at the eastern wall. “Elena, I want you to use your Wind Cutter to rip down those testries.”

  Elena didn’t ask any questions; Daisuke’s brilliance during the guild assessment and his performan the dungeon was enough for her to fide in his judgement without hesitation.

  “You haven’t steered us wro,” she said as she aimed a crest moon-shaped gust of wind toward the upper threshold of the tapestry.

  The carefully measured projectile sliced through the embroidery with ease, sending them pooling to the ground without a sound. On the gray cobblestone wall where they once hung, two intricate circles roughly a meter in width were inscribed in bk.

  “Are those… magic circles?” Elena asked with a frown.

  “It seems like they have something to do with the chamber,” guessed Milo. “The question is, whie do we trigger?”

  Through the Eye of Verity, Daisuke hat one of the circles radiated a grayish-silver glow while the other—the one on the right—exuded a pale light blue.

  Employing a simple method of visual matchmaking, Daisuke deduced that the circle on the right radiated the same blue color as the tightly-knitted fl.

  His other assumption was that mana o be remotely ied into the magic circle to activate its effects, but all four of them were amateurs at that level of mana manipution.

  But Daisuke had a theory.

  When he was younger, his father used to have him sleep in the dark whenever he had been a bad boy. Instead of getting out of bed and risk being pulled underh it by the boogeyman or worse—that one from a scary movie, Daisuke would hurl his stuffed animals at the light swittil one of them hit its mark.

  “Milo,” Daisuke called, shifting his attention. “Being a healer demands pretty delicate trol, so I’m pretty sure you have a better grip on your mana than the rest of us.”

  “…I-I’m not sure I like where this is going,” Milo murmured back.

  Daisuke frowned, veying the criticality of the immi request. “I want you to nd a Magic Missile in the ter of that magic circle without damaging the inscription.”

  Milo turoward his objective, measuring its feasibility. “W-Wouldn’t Eleter suited for the task?”

  “He’s right,” the pouting Rexar agreed. “Mages are always firing off spells, so her aim will be way better.”

  “And why do you think a mage has excellent marksmanship?” asked Daisuke. “It’s because the spell’s velocity also pys a vital role in power and accuracy. But if there’s too much power behind the Magic Missile, it may damage the circle.”

  Milo shifted his gaze to the mage, and Elena nodded in a relut firmation. With a sigh, the healer turoward his target. Gripping his staff with a stance remi of a soldier wielding a rifle and peering down the sights, he closed one eye and swallowed nervously.

  “Breathe,” enced Daisuke. “Just remember that you’re not ung an attack—you’re merely feeding the magic circle some mana.”

  Easy for you to say, thought Milo, but he took a deep breath and held it in his chest. In his ears, he could vividly hear the erratic beating of his heart, but his hands had steadied.

  Like a surgeon seeking a vein, he focused his senses and unched a single projectile that resembled a fluffy cloud rather than a pointed bde. It found its mark with incredible accuracy, and the magic circle hummed in response.

  Milo finally breathed, and Elena and Rexar looked on in anticipation as the light in the blue magic circle faded while the light iher oensified.

  Systematically, the meshed fl gradually disappeared while cobblestones materialized to pletely fill the gaping hole in the floor.

  Milo stood in stunned sileil Daisuke flicked his forehead. “Ouch!” he cried out in pain, rapidly rubbing the swollen and steaming spot.

  “Well done,” Daisuke praised with a smile.

  Rexar roughly tousled the healer’s head like an older brother while Elena clutched his arm and jerked his body iement.

  Without a word, Daisuke approached the glittering heap and touched his fiip te ana Crystal. With a single gnce, he hat the loot was hoarded together in a disanized clump; everything ooled together and toug one another.

  Testing a heory, he id his palm ft on the k of crystal and willed his iory to store everything that was in tact with it. To his surprise, it worked fwlessly—every piece of gold, silver, crystal, and other materials were pulled into his possession. All except for a piece of coiled part.

  “Show off,” murmured Rexar.

  "What is it?" Elena asked, curiosity flickering in her eyes as Daisuke reached for the length of papyrus and began unfurling it.

  The trio huddled close, ing their necks to get a better look.

  "It's a map," Daisuke informed them, his eyes sing over the details before it vanished into his iory. "Let's head back. We'll decide what to do with all this stuff once we're ba the vilge."

  “So, in the end, we didn’t really learn anything clusive,” uttered Milo dejectedly.

  Rexar’s expression hardened, his fingers g into tight fists, and Elena’s lips pressed into a thin line, her eyes being glum.

  “…Not necessarily,” replied Daisuke, his words rekindling a sliver of hope withirio. “Do you remember how frantic Vernie was to stop those two girls from esg?”

  Their eyes widened in recolle.

  ***

  The girls iion were being forted by the borers in the mining shaft when Daisuke and the others returned.

  “Did you… really take care of the ones responsible for taking us hostage?” queried one of the Beastfolk.

  “That’s unbelievable!” uttered another.

  “Thank you,” said Whindel, resting a rge callused hand on Milo’s shoulder. “You’ve all done us a great service.”

  The grandson and the elderly man who was nearly cast into the pit shared a gleeful gnce before turning their grateful gazes toward their rescuers.

  While Elena, Rexar, and Milo were being endlessly praised for their moal feat, Daisuke approached the women who were partaking of food given to them by the others.

  “I’m sorry to ask while you’re both still visibly shaken up by this ordeal, but is there anything you tell us about this pce?”

  Stirred by curiosity, everyone quieted down at the import of the question. The Beastfolk had interrogated the two girls the moment they had joiheir ranks, but they were too perturbed to answer.

  Daisuke got down on one knee before them, his eyes patient and sincere. “Don’t worry, you’re both safe now. Whether you answer my questions or not, we’ll be esc you and the others baridge vilge.”

  Elmridge vilge.

  Just voig the name of their home was soothing therapy; it made them feel rexed, secure, and a strong sense of longing.

  The girls took a moment to assess Daisuke—despite the horrors in the cavern that they were instructed to flee from, the young boy was entirely unscathed, his tenance cool and collected. His physical, mental, aional state of being was obviously due to his overwhelming power, and it was incredibly reassuring.

  The females exged gnces and hen one of them—a girl with short-cropped hair and daring eyes—turo Daisuke and parted her lips.

  “Um… I’m sorry but those guards didn’t really talk about highly secret stuff while we were around.”

  Daisuke frowned. “Guards? You mean Vernie and that uy?”

  “Keith, yes,” the irl chimed in. “They were… ordered by their boss to safeguard the mountain.”

  “The Mhaledictus?”

  The girls’ ears perked up at the name, and the female with the short-cropped hair spoke. “Yes, that’s the name.”

  “Any idea why they were ordered to protect this pce?”

  The girls thought about that for a while, sieving through the trauma that clouded their memory. And it was the long-haired girl, the introvert, who was able ter the memory.

  “Fail-safe!” she blurted out awkwardly.

  “Ah! Th-That’s right!” the irl excimed, the words evoking her own memories. “Fail-safe is the word Keith used when he said the mountain was being used to store a pertage of the Mhaledictus’ funds, just in case anything bad happened.”

  Whispers rose amongst the onlookers, and Daisuke cupped his in thought. “So, essentially, this pce is like the equivalent of an offshore Swiss bank at.”

  fusion permeated throughout the crowd, and it wasn’t until the two girls voiced their befuddlement did Daisuke realize that he was thinking out loud.

  “Oh, sorry about that,” he said, sheepishly running his hand through his hair. “Based on what I've gathered, the Mhaledictus is an anization of sorts. Their exact activities remain a mystery, but it seems they stashed some of their wealth here as a safety in case of their downfall.”

  “And what about us?” asked Whindel. “Why were tured and imprisoned here?”

  “They probably noticed that the mountain was rich with materials and figured they could expand their wealth if they mi.”

  Anger and sorrow fred amongst the crowd, but Daisuke khere was no possible way to quell the storm within that moment, so he turned his attention back to the girls.

  “Is there anything else you tell us?” he asked. “Like where the Mhaledictus has their base of operations, or where the demons inated from?”

  Regrettably, the girls shook their heads in denial, and grief finally extinguished the fmes that had fueled the anger and hate within the people, casting a somber atmosphere over the crowd.

  For an instant, Daisuke’s expression crumbled, but for the sake of the people who had fided in him, he maintaihe perfectly smooth mask he had molded. “Don’t beat yourselves up,” he reassured the girls with a measured smile. “Vernie ah were just too careful, that’s all.”

  He got on his feet and turo the people. “Those two men got what they deserved, and I have no doubt that the Mhaledictus will face their reing iime. But for now, let's make our way back to the vilge. I'm sure you're all anxious to be reunited with your friends and loved ones.”