Chapter 16

Children of Luo beidra

'It's the same as back then.'

Roberta recalled Rashid.

Old knight Rashid—this was just like when the monster he believed to be his son attacked Ulrich. Back then as well, Ulrich had no wounds. No… he had wounds, but they disappeared. As if they had never existed in the first place.

It was a miraculous recovery ability. Even seeing it again, it felt as though she were witnessing an illusion. Narrowing her eyes, she wondered if his endless stamina and immeasurable lifespan were connected to this as well.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't save him."

Carrying the corpse, Ulrich emerged from the pit. Only the upper half of the body remained, soaked in digestive fluids. He had dug through the monster's stomach and pulled it out from beneath the soil, where even opening one's eyes would have been impossible.

"…No. Rather, I should be thanking you."

Duke Vailen seemed shaken, but quickly restrained his emotions as he spoke. Turning his gaze away, he continued:

"Still, thanks to the Duke of Dithmarschen stepping in, Velido survived, did he not?"

Receiving Vailen's gaze, Velido checked his body and nodded, indicating he was fine. The wound where the pincer had pierced him had mostly closed thanks to Roberta's emergency treatment. With a bit more time, only a scar would remain.

"More importantly… are you alright, Your Grace?"

"I am fine. It merely… hurts a little."

Ulrich let out a short sigh.

"Do not worry about me. This is nothing worth concern."

Roberta, who had been treating Velido's injury, lifted her head. For a moment, she sensed deep fatigue in his voice.

But perhaps it was her imagination. He quickly returned to his usual calm demeanor.

"The problem is you all. You will face far more dangerous creatures ahead, yet you lack vigilance."

Roberta nodded as she looked at the pit.

Thinking back, they truly had been too careless. Wasn't the reason those two fell into the pit because they had strayed from the formation on their own?

After spending several days in the snow mountains and growing accustomed to their harshness—and with no one having died so far—it must have bred a sense of complacency: "It's hard, but manageable."

Even though, according to Ulrich's bestiary, the monsters they encountered in the mountains were only a fraction, and far more dangerous ones lay ahead.

"Do not rely on me. I cannot protect all of you."

"I will keep that in mind. And… may I ask for a little time?"

When Ulrich nodded, Vailen approached Roberta.

"He was with us for a long time. If possible, I would like you to conduct a prayer for him."

Roberta silently agreed. It was her duty. Bringing her hands together in a ritual gesture, she performed a brief rite for the departed soul.

When the rite ended, Ulrich spoke.

"I am sorry to say this, but we cannot stay here long. This is the Ice Peninsula—when night falls, monsters will swarm. We must move to the next location before that."

"Understood."

They buried the body and left.

As Ulrich had warned, the real danger was only just beginning.

After a day passed, another person died. While Ulrich and Roberta had gone out hunting, he had stepped out alone to relieve himself and never returned. In the morning, parts of his body were found nearby.

Three days later, they were attacked by a monstrous bird. It was larger than an adult human, yet incredibly swift—there was even a moment when Roberta herself was in danger. Had Ulrich not tripped her, her throat would have been pierced by its beak.

And the following day, another man was injured. Fortunately, he survived, but he lost one leg and could no longer walk. Vailen carried him on his back.

"Duke of Dithmarschen, is that the place over there?"

Duke Vailen asked.

After fourteen days since leaving Dithmarschen, a mountain began to appear on the horizon. It was one of the nameless peaks of the Caldorekai Mountain Range that cut across the Ice Peninsula, its summit high enough to pierce the clouds.

Why had they only seen such a towering mountain now?

According to Ulrich, it had been visible ever since they descended the mountain—but due to the fog, it had blended with the sky and gone unnoticed.

"Yes, Narbakayani has made its lair somewhere there."

At the word somewhere, Roberta flinched.

"You don't mean we have to go and search for it, do you?"

"Do not worry. That will not be necessary."

"…That's a relief."

She let out a breath, clutching her chest in relief. Climbing the mountain again would already be dreadful—having to wander in search of a nest made her feel faint just imagining it.

"Why would they live in a place like that?"

"Precisely because it is such a place—it suits them."

A place like that… suits them?

"The environment of the Ice Peninsula is dreadful from a human perspective, but to a dragon, it is nothing. In fact, it is preferable. If they settle in such a place, it naturally prevents the intrusion of apex predators."

"I suppose that makes sense…" Roberta murmured.

Hadn't the dragons described in the texts she read been stronger than any race and deeply attuned to mana? The trials her group had endured would likely be nothing from a dragon's perspective.

"It feels strange, thinking of humans as apex predators."

"That is true if you view humans not as individuals, but as a collective."

Roberta gazed at the mountain for a moment, then followed Ulrich.

As the sun began to descend from the center of the sky, he led the group to their next waypoint. It was a tower. Judging by the collapsed walls surrounding it, now forming snow-covered mounds, it had likely once been a watchtower.

The first man-made structure they had seen since entering the Ice Peninsula, its upper portion had fallen away, leaving it resembling a single-story rectangular house.

Had it been built by dwarves or fairies who lived here long ago? Or by the army of Emperor Tywin, who had undertaken a failed expedition?

While she examined the tower from the outside, the group lit a campfire, and Ulrich took out meat from prey he had hunted earlier and began to roast it.

He called it prey, but in truth, it was monster flesh.

He never brought back the entire creature—only portions of its meat. When asked why, he merely smiled without answering.

She had no intention of complaining about the food in a place like this, but the unease was unavoidable. Watching Ulrich hang chunks of meat over the campfire, she asked:

"Why do such monsters even exist?"

"Because of the evil gods, is it not?"

It was Duke Vailen, not Ulrich, who answered.

"Kun'kan, Takna, Galpa—did they not scatter their seeds recklessly in defiance of the creation of the divine gods, filling the world with monsters?"

"No, that's not what I meant."

"Then what?"

"Before I was ordained as a priest, I was educated in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. So I know more about monsters and evil gods than most priests. But… the monsters here—I've never seen or heard of them anywhere."

Each demonic realm had one or two creatures that could not be found elsewhere, but the Ice Peninsula was excessive. Most of the monsters they had encountered were entirely new species unknown even to her or the Pantheon.

That was precisely why, even after reading Ulrich's bestiary, she had doubted it at first.

"That would make sense."

Ulrich nodded.

"The mana here is denser than elsewhere, its flow greater and more irregular. Life cannot help but evolve more rapidly under such conditions."

Mana was the element the gods had spread across the world to create life. Thus, if its concentration was high and its movement intense, the influence on living beings would inevitably be greater.

"Then why has the flow become so intense and dense?"

"Because of an event large enough to disrupt the balance."

He lifted a cup of pine-flower tea from the campfire.

"The land we now call the Ice Peninsula was originally divided into an island and a continent. Near the end of the age of the dwarves, when they resisted using the island as their base, the fairies dragged the island to the mainland and fused them together."

"…They dragged an island?"

She asked in disbelief.

A glance at the others showed they shared the same reaction.

Ulrich looked over them all, affirmed it with a "Yes," and drew a map on the ground with his finger. It was simple, but it depicted Osnover and the Ice Peninsula to the north.

Then he drew a line across the peninsula.

"Look. This line I've drawn—this is the main body of the mountains we spent days climbing. Caldorekai. Everything west of this mountain range was once the island."

Roberta pressed her lips together.

The peninsula was roughly the size of the entire Kingdom of Osnover, and the western half alone made up half of it. If Ulrich's claim were true…

Then the fairies of the ancient age had dragged a colossal island, equal to half a nation's territory, and smashed it into the mainland.

"If such a feat were accomplished, consider how twisted nature would become. Where something rises, something else must fall—how could the flow of mana remain the same?"

After saying this, he added that there were many places besides the Ice Peninsula where the flow of mana had become imbalanced for similar reasons.

"A race that claimed to love nature ended up causing a pollution no one else ever had, all in the name of protecting it. Even if they realized their mistake and regretted it later, it was too late. Regret is always late, no matter how early it comes. I opposed it, yet…"

Roberta did not fully catch his muttering.

Dragging an island and smashing it into a continent? It sounded nothing short of absurd. She had heard many of the lord's claims, and as always, this too was difficult to believe.

"But as you know, my lord—"

"Mm. A story that neither texts nor oral tradition have preserved."

He cut her off, as though he had read her thoughts.

"…Yes. If the fairies truly accomplished something so great, I believe there should be some mention of it somewhere. For example, in the scriptures."

"The scriptures were not compiled to simply list historical facts. Their purpose is to inspire faith. Would they record the achievements of a race that humans once kept as subjects, rather than humans themselves?"

Roberta felt several gazes upon her. Duke Vailen and the others were cautiously watching her reaction. After all, he had just spoken critically of the scriptures in front of a priest.

But Roberta merely frowned slightly and said nothing.

"That is not the only reason. What became of this tower is another."

Ulrich rose and stood near the wall. Pouring pine-flower tea over it, he melted the frost clinging to the surface. Carved letters were revealed beneath. Pointing at them, he asked Roberta:

"Can you read it?"

The inscription was crude—clearly not the work of a skilled mason. Narrowing her eyes, Roberta examined it and recognized it as ancient script.

After the gods departed, the language and writing they had spread gradually changed over time. The characters carved into the wall were one such result of that process.

"No… I can't read it."

She vaguely recalled seeing similar characters before, but she could not decipher them. She could only guess that it was a script used before the age of humans—perhaps from the era of dwarves and fairies.

Ulrich traced the letters and slowly read them aloud.

"We… die… here. That is what it says."

It was an ominous phrase.

"What does that mean?"

"It means exactly what it says. A last testament."

"A… last testament?"

Roberta blinked.

The Ice Peninsula had once been a battlefield between dwarves and fairies, ending in the fairies' victory and the dawn of their age. Perhaps… this inscription had been carved by a dwarf on the verge of defeat?

"It was left by a civilization that existed before our history."

Ulrich answered after hearing her speculation.

"The owner of this tower was neither dwarf nor fairy. It was built by a civilization that belonged to neither—and this is what they left behind at the end."

"Neither dwarves nor fairies…"

Roberta looked again at the inscription.

We die here.

Thinking that this was a final message left by someone nearly ten thousand years ago gave her a strange feeling. Who were they? Why were they here? And how had they perished?

"Think about it. Do you believe history simply appeared out of nowhere? It becomes history only when something survives after countless failures and collapses."

He placed his hand on the inscription.

"This place is the trace of a civilization that collapsed—and did not survive."