Thud.

The ominous sound of a door closing behind them was heard.

Thud, thud.

They went down the stairs in the pitch dark without letting their guard down.

“It’s deeper than it looks?”

“The air is relatively clean for something like this. Is there a ventilation system?”

Arendt looked around while eavesdropping on Arthur and Richt’s conversation. The torches installed here and there on the walls barely illuminated the area beneath his feet.

‘It would be difficult for an ordinary person to even take a single step.’

All three of them were trained as knights, so they were able to walk without any problems, but for ordinary people, it was a passage that would be quite confusing.

Right then.

Ssss.

A sound that didn’t fit the situation suddenly passed his ears.

When Arendt reflexively raised his head, Arthur and Richt also stopped talking and looked straight ahead.

Beyond the dark stairs, a vague silhouette was visible.

“Huh?”

At first glance, it looked like a human being.

But soon they noticed something strange.

The part that should have been the head of ‘it’ was bent in a strange direction. That wasn’t all. The arms were strangely long, almost dragging on the floor, and the legs were too thin compared to the thick upper body.

Ssss.

It took a step forward and revealed itself under the light of the torch.

It wasn’t a human being.

It would be more correct to say that it was a doll carved out of stone. An unknown jewel was embedded in the spot where the eyes should have been, gleaming ominously.

Arthur widened his eyes.

“What is that?”

“Golem?” Arendt muttered without realizing it.

Clank, clank.

The joints, which were not properly aligned, moved and made strange noises.

There wasn’t just one golem.

All three of them focused their eyes forward, and soon lost their words.

The path covered in pitch-black was filled with golems. At first glance, there seemed to be over 50 of them. Their eyes, gleaming in the darkness, did not seem friendly to the knights.

Thud!

As they all took a step forward at once, the ceiling shook and dust fell.

Arthur burst out laughing.

“Aren’t we doomed?”

“It seems like it was a trap.”

Richt blurted out calmly and grabbed his sword.

Arendt, who had been staring at the golems filling the passage, opened his mouth.

“Hey, do you see that thing shining on their chests?”

“Uh?”

“That’s their power source, right? If we destroy that, we can stop them easily. Destroying other parts won’t help because they’ll regenerate right away.”

Arthur and Richt looked at the golems again. Sure enough, they could see a jewel with a soft glow set into their chests.

“Hey, how do you know that?”

“Does that matter now?”

As Arendt started to vent his frustration, the golems began to swarm the three of them.

They grabbed their swords without any further conversation.

Arthur stabbed his sword into the golem that was approaching him.

Then the golem stiffened for a moment as if it had been attacked in the heart, and then collapsed to the ground.

“It worked?”

“Then would I lie in this situation?”

“Don’t fight, just concentrate!”

Richt, who had been nervously glaring at the two people arguing, also cut down the golem in one go.

However, half of the golems that fell like that slowly reattached their severed limbs and got back up again.

Arthur destroyed the golem’s heart again with a tired face.

“How did golems appear? Wasn’t the recipe for making golems lost a long time ago?”

“They have ancient magic books. It looks like they created this before studying ghouls!”

Clang!

Arendt dodged the golem’s arm that brushed past him and thrust his sword forward.

In an instant, the golem that had turned into a pile of dirt collapsed. However, before they could catch their breath, other golems surged in.

The fact that those guys suddenly appeared meant that there was an alchemist in front of them who was commanding them.

‘Is is him?’

Arendt clicked his tongue in annoyance.

‘Are they following along well?’

Count Stadler swallowed dryly. No matter how much he strained his senses, he could not feel any sign of any knights following him.

Of course, there was no way he could sense the knights’ presence, but he couldn’t help feeling uneasy.

The Marquis kept his mouth shut and simply walked ahead.

Boom, bang!

The distant sound of a pickaxe could be heard from somewhere.

After descending the stairs and walking through the dark hallway for a while… Marquis Grieg finally opened his mouth.

“Count, I told you about the gold in the ‘garden’.”

“Yes? Yes, that’s right.”

“In fact, it can’t even be compared to gold. It’s something much more valuable.”

Before they knew it, the two were standing in front of an old, worn-out door.

As Marquis Grieg pushed hard, the door opened with an unpleasant creak.

The Count, who had instinctively covered his face from the dust that blew, was left speechless by the sight that unfolded before his eyes.

‘Is it a cave?’

It was about the size of a medium-sized hall.

No matter how much he thought about it, it wasn’t a naturally formed cave.

The interior of the artificially dug cave was brightly lit by lights installed on the walls. In addition, there were dozens of passages throughout the walls that people could enter.

Count Stadler, who had been blankly staring at the sight, suddenly came to his senses at the sound of Margrave Grieg’s voice.

“Isn’t it amazing?”

“Well, Marquis. This place is…”

Margrave Grieg smiled, revealing his teeth, at Count Stadler, who was barely able to move his lips.

“Yes, that’s right. It’s a mine.”

Mine.

The Count’s mouth opened.

The place where they were standing now was the center of the mine. Those little caves were tunnels.

He felt a faint, indescribable magic throughout this space. Then, he felt like the puzzle pieces were starting to fall into place in his head.

The reason for spending so much money to build a garden in the middle of a wasteland was to hide the noise from mining.

The reason for wanting to monopolize the mine while enduring such economic burden and hardship is because the minerals produced here were…

“Welcome back, Count Stadler.”

At that moment, the Count was startled by the sudden sound of a stranger’s voice and stepped back.

A young man was standing just a few steps away, who had been there for who knows how long.

The young man appeared at first glance to be around Arendt’s age. He was dressed in a neat suit, his body was well-trained and well-proportioned, and a longsword hung from his waist.

What caught Count Stadler’s attention more than anything else was the black mask that covered half of his face.

Only his chin and lips were exposed.

Whether it was made solely for the purpose of covering his face, the mask did not even have any of the usual decorations.

Count Stadler did not dare to respond to the greeting offered by his counterpart. Instead, Marquis Grieg hurriedly stepped forward.

“Mr. Vincent! It’s been a while. How have you been?”

“I have always been well, Marquis. I have received your report. I never thought Count Stadler would be so happy to come here. I’m very much indebted to the Marquis.”

The man named Vincent smiled broadly and patted Marquis Grieg on the shoulder. Marquis Grieg smiled brightly and bowed his head deeply.

It was quite a sight to see Marquis Grieg bowing down to a young man who looked barely twenty years old.

Vincent spoke again to Count Stadler, who was just blankly looking at him.

“Count?”

“Oh, sorry. I was a little surprised… My name is Rex von Stadler.”

“You can call me Vincent.”

Vincent smiled kindly again.

“I understand that you are surprised. As you can see, this is a mine, and what comes out are not ordinary minerals.”

“Could it be that what is coming from here are… magic stones?”

Count Stadler asked hesitantly.

Then Vincent burst into a bright laugh.

“As expected for Count Stadler, who is renowned as a magic researcher. He lives up to his reputation. You already figured it out.”

The Count felt dizzy after the revelation.

It was no exaggeration to say that gold cannot even compare to magic stones.

It was known that the mines of magic stones within the Empire dried up long ago. However, it was not known that such a large-scale mine existed, even so close to the Imperial Castle.

“Follow me, Count. The magic stones here are of very good quality. You may take as much as you want.”

Vincent searched through his pockets and took out several small, bright purple gems, which he held out to Count Stadler.

Count Stadler was once again at a loss for words. As if to prove that it was the best, the magic stones were faintly shining with pure magic power.

‘This is a magic stone of a completely different dimension.’

With a magic stone of this quality, you could easily buy a house within the Capital with just three of the smallest pieces of magic stone.

Moreover, its usefulness in research was beyond question.

Vincent smiled and handed him the magic stone.

Count Stadler accepted it absentmindedly, unable to even think of refusing.

“It’s a gift, so keep it. Of course, the Count is more interested in magic books than this. I’ll show you the way right away.”

“Ah… Yes, yes…”

Vincent pulled him inside, who was just nodding absentmindedly. Marquis Grieg, who had been watching them, also quietly followed behind them.

“What the Count expects is inside. It was just a coincidence that I found this. I was very lucky.”

“The word coincidence…”

“I found this while investigating the magic stone mine. The entrance was tightly hidden.”

Vincent, who was walking without hesitation, spoke cheerfully with a smiling face.

They walked for a while further down a corridor that led in a different direction from the mine shaft.

The moment Vincent, who had gone ahead, opened another old wooden door, the Count opened his mouth without realizing it.

“Here…”

“I did some research first, but I left it mostly intact. These are all things that the Count should study.”

The outside was quite pleasant for a part of the mine, but the air here was so cool it was hard to believe it was underground.

He didn’t feel any moisture or cold at all.

The floor was decorated with a carpet of a style he had never seen before, and the display case was lined with all sorts of jewels, magic stones, and statues of gods he had never seen before.

And above all, there was a bookshelf that filled one wall.

Count Stadler walked towards the bookshelf in a trance-like state.

Most of the books on the shelf were magic books, but there were also quite a few books on alchemy and engineering techniques.

“I would have liked to have taken them outside, but there was a spell placed on them that prevented them from being taken out of this room, so I had no choice but to leave them here.”

The Count reached out with trembling hands and took out a book. The pages had discoloured over the years and were densely inscribed with ancient language.

In addition, some illustrations that were drawn directly were also shown.

Count Stadler muttered distantly.

“Nonsense…”

This was a great discovery, unprecedented in the history of the Caerleon Empire.