WETRIED TRANSLATIONS

Wizard of the Abyss

[Translator – Aren]

Chapter 274 - Ark (5)

The next morning.

The dwarves, still reeking of alcohol, hammered away wildly at chunks of metal on their anvils.

"Today we’re definitely cutting through that damned sword…”

"Let’s just make the blade like a saw at this point. Who cares about pride anymore?”

It seemed the fact that they had failed for days to surpass a sword made by a mere human in 10 minutes had thoroughly wounded their racial pride. They looked incredibly disgruntled.

-Clap!

A sharp clap split through the heavy atmosphere.

All the dwarves’ gazes converged on the origin of the sound.

"Listen up, everyone.”

"What is it, Grandpa Kaldrak?”

"What’s wrong with your eyes?”

Kaldrak—the old dwarf who had spent hours discussing the future of dwarvenkind with me yesterday, had bloodshot eyes no less severe than theirs.

He hadn’t slept a wink. He looked over the confused dwarves, clearing his throat, and spoke.

"You pathetic lot, have you still not managed to cut through a sword made by a single human?”

"..."

"..."

Kaldrak, clearly holding considerable influence among them, faced no complaints at all despite being so incredibly blunt.

Still, one dwarf protested, seemingly feeling a bit wronged.

"Grandpa, we did try. To be honest, I’d say we’ve already surpassed that sword in craftsmanship.”

"Then why is that brat still hanging around our city?”

"...The material is strange.”

Another dwarf stroked his beard suspiciously as he answered.

"You can call it an excuse if you want, but that sword…It’s not made out of ordinary metal. No, in the first place, it doesn’t even feel like an inanimate object.”

"You felt it too? Same here. When swords clash, it would leave some sort of trace no matter how fine the swords. But that thing doesn’t even have a single scratch. It’s like the sword repairs its own wounds.”

"It definitely felt strange. I’m not saying the forging was bad, but…”

As expected of dwarves who had spent their entire lives around weapons, they seemed to have realized that the Ego Sword I’d created out of Nightchaser was abnormal. As soon as one of them opened the floodgates, the others began agreeing.

Just before suspicion turned into certainty, Kaldrak clicked his tongue and glared at them with disdain.

"So what?”

"If we’d used the same materials, we would’ve beaten it ages ago…”

"If that isn’t the very definition of an excuse, then what is? If you idiots truly had pride as dwarves, then even if a human challenged you with a leaf as the material, you should’ve won. Am I wrong?”

"W-well, true.”

"How disgraceful. Losing isn’t the ugliest thing. Refusing to admit you’ve lost is. And that’s exactly what you lot are doing.”

With only these few words, Kaldrak completely shut them up. Then, as though finally getting to the main point, he pulled several chunks of metal from his pocket and tossed them out.

"Still, your guess was right. The brat really was using entirely new metals. That’s probably why you couldn’t cut through that sword.”

"What’s this…?”

The dwarves curiously picked up the ore chunks that had been tossed out and examined them from every angle. Then their eyes widened in astonishment.

"Huh? What is this? This isn’t even steel.”

"Where’d these come from?”

"I heard they secretly developed a new mine. Everything came from there. And from the looks of it, that brat’s objective wasn’t to take a sword back with him from the beginning. It was to show us the potential of those metals.”

"That cheeky little brat…”

"Tsk, guess he succeeded.”

The dwarves inspected the ores like children who had just received new toys, then asked anxiously.

"...So, Grandpa, did you reject him?”

"Are we really going to cooperate with humans?”

"Well, not exactly cooperate, but..."

The dwarves exchanged glances while quietly slipping the ore samples into their pockets.

"Honestly, we’ve been making the same alloys over and over for ages. Hammering the same things endlessly. And then we just melt the weapons afterward. It’s gotten boring. I'm not saying we should start trading with humans or anything, but hearing them out at least seems worthwhile.”

"Right. He needs us that badly, and we’ve already received help from him. We could afford to compromise a little.”

Their lifelong craftsmanship being surpassed by nothing more than the quality of some unknown metal should've been crushing. But now that obtaining those very materials seemed possible, greed began creeping in.

Kaldrak waited until he saw that desperate spark appear in their eyes, then sighed as though resigned.

"The condition he proposed was building a city.”

"That’s easy enough. I could do that myself.”

"However, the city must be large enough to contain all forms of life in this world.”

"...All forms of life?”

"That’s right. He wants an underground city where humans, animals, plants, and even we could all live for a long time.”

"Why the hell would anyone want something like that built?”

"How should I know?”

The dwarves hesitated for a moment before confidently grinning.

"Well, it’d be difficult, but not impossible. Might actually be a worthwhile job.”

"Within 3 months.”

"...No, that’s ridiculous. That’s basically just saying he doesn’t want to give us the mine!”

"But apparently the excavation and groundwork would already be done. And he’d provide several million assistants.”

"The groundwork’s already done…? Is that even possible? Hmm…”

The dwarves furrowed their brows as they considered the conditions one by one. Eventually they slowly nodded.

"That might actually be possible…”

"Tsk, but can it really be finished in 3 months?”

"Then let’s vote.”

Kaldrak raised his hand, looking like he didn’t want to discuss it any further.

"If even one person objects, we’ll reject it immediately. Anyone opposed to constructing the underground city?”

Not a single hand went up.

"Tsk, you greedy bastards.”

Kaldrak clicked his tongue in annoyance and waved dismissively as he turned to leave.

"Get yourselves ready. We’re departing immediately.”

"Heh, an underground city large enough for all forms of life to live in, eh?”

"Feels like we’re going to need tens of thousands of shovels for this, right?”

While the dwarves, already completely blinded by the prospects of the new ore, returned to their homes to gather tools…

I watched the scene from afar through Tide Sense and sent my voice to Kaldrak’s ear.

[Thank you for your hard work. You convinced them surprisingly easily.]

"I was the one changing the diapers of the oldest idiot among them. And you…"

Then Kaldrak frowned and glared toward the hill where I was.

"You do realize that foundation work is the most important part, right? The reason those fools accepted your conditions at all is because foundation work takes the longest in projects of that scale. If the underground city collapses later, then that’ll…”

[No need to worry. I’m doing it right now.]

"...Right now? What kind of nonsense is that? Foundation work alone should take at least several months…"

[Don’t worry. I’m almost done.]

I answered Kaldrak while slowly pushing up the final mass of earth.

-Ruuuumble!

"...Ugh, my fingers hurt."

Thousands of meters beneath a desert far away from here, the excavated soil rising from below formed an eighth mountain.

I rubbed my aching back and let out a groan. I’d been doing this for several hours since last night.

A depth so deep that even if the entire surface of the world were submerged beneath the sea, it would never flood.

Down there, seawater had been digging, crushing, and compressing everything at an absurd rate.

The blueprint was this city. The dwarves’ underground city had been designed with incredible precision, so all I had to do was use Tide Sense, copy the structure, and expand it several million times.

While it was simple, it still took me 12 hours, though.

"How’s it look? Think this is enough space for the entire population?”

I created a puddle on the ground and dipped Nightchaser, still in sword form, in and out of it.

She stayed silent for a while before speaking through nonexistent gritted teeth.

"This feels a little, no, extremely unfair.”

“What does?”

"This isn’t just a difference in the world you govern anymore. I spent my entire existence as a god, and I couldn't even dream of doing something like this. Well, given enough time, maybe…But you made this in a single night?”

Apparently, even by an Outer God’s standards, creating an underground space large enough to contain all life in a single night bordered on a miracle. Nightchaser couldn’t conceal her astonishment.

"Since when could you do something like this? You were just a human a few months ago…”

"I grew up eating good things.”

I sheathed the indignant Nightchaser and stretched.

The underground was a place the heavens couldn’t notice. Because of that, I had plenty of opportunities to freely use my abilities and discover where my limits were and how far I could actually go.

And what I learned was that I practically didn’t have limits.

'Good thing I devoured Mimicry.'

If I wanted, I could become a single drop of water. The next moment, I could drown an entire city.

Just abandoning the fixed idea that something was impossible increased the number of things I could do by dozens. At this point, I was beginning to wonder whether I could even truly die anymore.

While I knew I shouldn’t let this power make me arrogant, I shouldn’t underestimate myself and fail to do something simply because I assumed I couldn’t at least.

While I was lost in thought, Kaldrak climbed the hill with a displeased expression.

"Follow me.”

Without another word, he gestured for me to come and led me toward his forge atop the hill.

I silently followed him. We arrived at a modest forge, far simpler than I'd expected. And just as I was about to follow him into the furnace itself, I stopped.

"What exactly are you doing right now?”

I doubted my eyes. Kaldrak was trying to throw himself into the furnace.

"Surely, a god like you isn’t scared of a little molten metal, right?”

"I’ll be fine, but, well…”

"I’ll be fine as well. And besides, if you hide something in a place like this, monsters like you wouldn’t even think to look here.”

...Fair enough.

I hadn’t exactly been using Tide Sense to inspect the inside of furnaces. Scratching my head, I stared at Kaldrak in disbelief as he casually dove into the molten metal. Then I wrapped my body in a light barrier of water and followed him in.

After swimming for several dozen seconds, passing through the bottom and resurfacing, I saw a small door.

Kaldrak shook the motel metal from his beard, pulled out a key, and muttered while unlocking the absurd number of locks on the door.

"To think I’d live long enough to show something I never even revealed to my fellow dwarves to a human of all things…Life really is something you only understand after living it.”

-Click.

I'd deliberately refrained from ruining the moment by checking inside with Tide Sense, so when I saw the secret place he’d hidden away, I let out a hollow laugh.

"Hah. I thought you said you melted everything down.”

"Sometimes, things are born that feel too precious for that. Once every few years or so.”

It was a warehouse.

A weapon warehouse.

Even to someone like me, who knew almost nothing about weapons, every piece hanging on the walls radiated an uncanny blend of ancestry and practicality. Nothing but the finest masterpieces filled every inch of he place.

"You said you were fighting another Outer God, right?”

"Ah, yes. Though I wasn’t planning to use a weapon.”

Without a word, Kaldrak reached toward the center of the room and took down an unimpressive bronze dagger.

I slowly frowned.

It felt unpleasant.

I didn’t know why, but that dagger made me feel incredibly uncomfortable even if I just looked at it. Among the countless masterpieces, it felt like the one and only blemish.

"Then change your mind.”

Kaldrak carefully slid the dagger into its sheath as if handling a treasure and handed it over to me.

"This dagger should work even on your enemy.”

"What is this?”

"A dagger that has slain a wizard.”

"My enemy isn’t a wizard, though…”

As I tilted my head in confusion, Kaldrak replied with a wicked grin.

"It seems my explanation was lacking. This is the dagger that killed the very First Mage.”

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