WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Dionysus
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◈ The Wizard's Memoir ◈
Chapter 32: Metallic Clang
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Etran and the other adventurers raced down the stairs to the second level without a moment to catch their breath.
They would have liked to look around, share their impressions, have an expert discussion about monsters and traps, and give a few hearty cheers to build team spirit. But the zombies stubbornly pursuing them from the central hall left no time for delays.
“Wait! Wait! What if monsters come from ahead too?”
Only the first room on the second level had been checked. No, with the dungeon's atmosphere changing, even that room couldn't be considered safe. Since they didn't know what might appear ahead, they needed to shake off the pursuing zombies for a while.
“Etran!”
This was when a mage stepped in to solve the problem. They had reached the second level, so Etran had technically followed the leader's order to conserve mana. Etran loosened their hold on Ash's reins, handed them to Dahlia, and snapped their fingers.
Snap!
Light Tracery danced through the air, drawing brilliant shapes. The magic circle was perfectly symmetrical from top to bottom and left to right. Finally, it expanded into three dimensions.
Copies of the magic circle began extending forward, one after another. Complex magic circles filled the space for about four feet, or 1.2 meters, in front of Etran.
“Flame March!”
The Light Tracery at the tip of their index finger turned into a flame. It was a tiny flame, no bigger than a candle's. But each time it passed through a magic circle, it doubled in size.
By the time it passed through thirty-something circles, it had become a stream of fire far larger than the circles themselves. It engulfed the zombies crowding the stairs.
Fwoooooooosh!
The intense heat created convection currents. Etran's hair and the hem of their tunic flapped wildly. With every shadow wiped from the scene, it was terrifying beyond description.
The zombies on the stairs turned to charcoal in the blink of an eye. Radiant heat set even the zombies above the stairs alight in places. Their already fragile bones and muscles crumbled, and they dropped one after another.
From the bottom of the stairs, the party couldn't directly check the damage upstairs, but a certain gut feeling told them enough. At least one room had been completely devastated.
“Hah... Haaah...”
Even the party that had seen this before was shocked, let alone the party seeing it for the first time. The casting had taken only eight or nine seconds, making it hard to grasp what had just happened. Only the cheerful halfling stood with hands on hips, puffing up with pride.
“Ahem! That's what our mage can do!”
In the Northern Ridge sewers, Etran had held back somewhat because the opponents were human. When the genius mage unleashed their mana in earnest, they could roast dozens of zombies at once.
Etran kept pouring out flames until it felt a little excessive, then canceled the magic circles. Dizziness made them sway slightly. Dahlia hurried to support them, though it didn't help.
“...I don't think I can use that many times.”
The fire came out in one continuous stream, making it look like a single spell, but it was actually multiple spells at once. And it was a sustained spell that required gathering the greatest possible amount of mana for an extended period. Even Etran's enormous mana reserves could manage only about two castings.
“You can do that again?”
With proper rests between castings, they could manage a few more. The axe warrior and the archer stared at Etran as though looking at some bizarre monster. Still, there was no hostility or ill will in their gazes.
Etran took a deep breath and steadied themself. Olivia checked that the party members were all right, while the axe warrior checked whether any more zombies were coming down from the first level. Neither found a problem.
“Heh. Do zombies get scared too?”
“Of course not. With the ones in front wiped out, the others lost track of where to follow.”
“Either way, our backs are safe.”
The adventurers turned their eyes forward. The real challenge lay ahead.
@
The halfling seeker stepped between the two warriors.
A seeker's job wasn't simply to find the way, but to detect traps and ambushes early. It was the most important role in an exploration.
Etran stood in the middle, while Rolf and the archer fell back. From now on, Etran would be the main artillery. Since they didn't know what monsters might appear, they kept their greatest firepower ready at all times.
“There's nothing much here.”
They had loaded their best weapon, but there was nothing to shoot. After pressing an ear to the walls on either side, Dahlia made a show of looking disappointed.
“Not even a rat squeaking.”
Were there no monsters on the second level? The adventurers exchanged glances and cautiously advanced. They reached the first room in fewer than fifty steps. By the second level's layout, this was the northernmost room.
“It's unpleasantly quiet.”
As expected of a stone tomb, several stone coffins stood inside. They peered into one in case a sleepy zombie was hiding there, but it was empty. So were the others.
“The dust...”
Dahlia ran a hand along a coffin's rim and rubbed their fingers together. For something hundreds of years old, it was strangely clean. The axe warrior rested the axe on one shoulder and muttered uneasily.
“I think I'd rather there were monsters.”
After a thorough search, the party continued down the southern passage. There, they unexpectedly found the coffins' occupants.
“Zombie!”
“It's just a corpse.”
Bodies lay on either side of the passage. Olivia prodded one firmly with the mace to see whether it might be a moving corpse. Fortunately, or unfortunately, it didn't so much as twitch.
“If it's not a zombie, why's it out here?”
The corpse gave them the answer. At the third prod, it toppled sideways, revealing a hole in the front of its skull. The mood turned cold at once.
“I think someone else is here.”
The damage had clearly been caused by a weapon. Taken together with the state of the first room, it suggested that the zombies had awakened in their coffins and attacked someone, only to be struck down instead. The bodies were already rotten, so they couldn't tell when it had happened, but the circumstances suggested it was recent.
“Etran. Some light.”
Etran lowered the Light Orb to the floor as requested. Dahlia lay flat, bringing their eyes level with the floor and the light. No explanation was needed. The seeker was looking for faint traces left by people passing through.
“Between three and six.”
“That's a pretty wide range.”
“I'm sure about three, but not the rest. If there were more, they were very light on their feet.”
Etran looked at the axe warrior's party. They had kept watch from the hideout the whole time, so surely they would have noticed anyone entering. Yet their surprise looked too real to be an act.
“There's another party trying to clear this place?”
“That's impossible.”
It began to seem as though either the axe warrior or Dahlia was lying. But the wise mage found the answer with surprising ease.
“The zombies suddenly increased seven days ago, right?”
“Huh? Yes. That's right. We've been stuck here keeping watch ever since.”
“Then this party must have entered seven days ago.”
An unknown party had entered just after the axe warrior's party withdrew and made it down to the second level. The zombie numbers had exploded around the same time, so that explained it.
“What the hell did they do to make the monsters multiply?”
“I don't know. Maybe this dungeon was always like this, or maybe they tried something and caused it...”
It didn't feel right. These didn't seem to be ordinary adventurers. Olivia wiped blood and scraps of flesh from the mace and muttered.
“We'll find out when we meet them. At least now we have something to look for.”
The two parties continued onward. They slowed down to watch for possible traps, but the distance itself wasn't great. If the layout matched the first level, they would soon reach a broad central hall.
“I think this is it.”
“Halt.”
As expected, an open chamber lay ahead. But there was a difference from the first level. A huge statue blocked their way, too large for the Light Orb to reveal all at once.
“What is this? A bird?”
“A bird statue underground... Our ancestors had unusual tastes.”
With its long neck and wings, it certainly seemed to be a bird. But as they moved around it, something strange caught their eyes. It stood on four legs, and the grooves deliberately carved into its surface looked like scales.
“It's a dragon.”
“A dragon? An actual dragon?”
It was a monster from legend. The adventurers expressed their wonder in their own ways as they examined the statue from various angles.
There were plenty of dragon statues in the royal capital, but finding one in a dungeon built hundreds, perhaps even a thousand years ago felt different. After all, its maker might have seen a real dragon.
“Couldn't we sell this to scholars for a lot of money?”
“If we could get it out of here.”
While admiring the dragon's imposing form, Etran stumbled upon something else. Literally stepped on it.
Startled, Etran stepped aside, and a metallic Claaang! rang out. It was a heavily rusted blade.
“More corpses?”
“Zombie corpses, to be precise... No, they're not.”
Bodies lay scattered behind the dragon statue. Unlike the zombies they had seen so far, these undead corpses wore armor and carried weapons. They were as dry as dried fish, but a closer look showed that their muscles were still intact. Olivia recognized them.
“Draugr.”
They were a higher form of undead than zombies. They could use the skills they had possessed in life, sometimes making them harder to fight than when they were alive. After all, they had become warriors who wouldn't die even when stabbed.
“There are quite a few. One of 'em, two of 'em, three's company, four-leaf clover...”
The halfling counted in that peculiar way and announced that there were fifteen bodies. Olivia's expression darkened. That meant a party capable of defeating fifteen draugr had passed through.
Once they stopped admiring the dragon and focused on investigating, they began to notice a few more things.
Unlike the first level, where trees on the surface had caused some sections to collapse, the passages in all sixteen directions were intact. But they didn't need to explore them all. The seeker confirmed that the unknown party ahead had followed a single route.
“It's like they know.”
“Know what?”
“If they came here seven days ago, like Etran said, they'd have had more than enough time to search the whole second level, right? But they only went that way.”
Dahlia pointed to the passage due west. Everyone looked in that direction.
“And there's no sign they came back.”
Either they had been wiped out there, or they were still doing something.
The warriors raised their heavy metal weapons, and the shooters readied their shots. Having come this far, there was no need for a long discussion.
“Let's go.”
Whatever that unknown party knew, west was the right direction. Unlike the passages they had followed so far, this one seemed endlessly long. Even after more than two hundred steps, there was no sign of an end.
Their tension rose despite the lack of combat. Just as they began to wonder whether they might reach a third level, Dahlia stopped dead. Everyone was so alert that they stopped too, rather than kicking the halfling from behind.
“I hear something.”
“What?”
“Someone's muttering, but it's hard to make out.”
If even a halfling's hearing could barely catch it, they weren't speaking loudly. In any case, they had come to the right place. Olivia moved into the tanker position and growled.
“They've barged into our dungeon run without even registering with the Guild. Let's see their faces.”
The words fired everyone up. Seven adventurers surged toward the cemetery dungeon's final area.
Far away, light shone at the end of the passage. It was the first light they had seen apart from Etran's Light Orb. Sure enough, several people were gathered together. Olivia struck their shield and charged bravely inside.
“That's far enough!”
They would have to take back one of their earlier accusations. It wasn't that this party hadn't registered with the Guild to explore the dungeon. They couldn't have. Everything else, however, deserved even stronger criticism.
“Demons?”
“And dark elves!”
The party that had joined the underground cemetery expedition wasn't an Alliance party. The demons and dark elves, caught doing something very suspicious, looked flustered.
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