Magic Circle
The inside of [Foro Neem] was so quiet that you wouldn’t believe that there were supposedly more people already inside, and only our footsteps echoed in the surroundings as we made our way in.
After climbing down to the bottom of stairs under a heavy atmosphere, we reached a grand floor that spread across wide, and perhaps because people haven’t been regularly visiting this place, the entire area had a very dungeon-like feel to it.
“The entrance alone was incredible but, the interior is just on a whole different level! They really dug up this big of an area under the ground to build this place huh!”
“It’s fine to appreciate the ruins but don’t let your guard down either okay? Considering the candlesticks within the ruins seem lit up, we might run into them at any point from here onwards.”
Right, the insides of the ruins were already so bright that you didn’t even need to use [Fire] as a torch.
That’s because the candlesticks placed all over the ruins had been already lit up by someone long before we came here.
It was clear proof that Klaus and his team were somewhere within these ruins, so I went closer to inspect one of these.
“Chris-san, learn anything from it?”
“Can’t say for sure. I was hoping to find out how long these have been burning from how much was remaining but it seems, they were lit up with magic instead.”
“Fire type magic. Allow me to check instead in that case?”
“Sure, go ahead. Maybe you can learn something from it Esta.”
Exchanging places with me, she approached closer to the candlestick and then began to check the magical fire.
While I continued to pray that she finds something, I began looking around in the meantime when……
“I think more than a day has passed since these were ignited. I can’t tell anything more exact than that however, but there’s no doubt, these have been lit for quite some time now.”
“I mean, that’s decent amount of info already. How can you tell?”
“Well, I can get a decent idea of such things from the flickering and the remaining mana………but, I can also tell that whoever lit these up was an accomplished magician. Probably that Elphas.”
“If it’s someone that can create a flame that keeps on going for many days, yeah, I imagine it probably was Elphas in that case. Anyway, it’s good to get even a vague idea of just how long they have already been inside this place.”
After entering [Foro Neem] I still couldn’t sense anyone with my [Life Presence Sense] so I already knew that they are not waiting around the entrance at the very least.
But even if I knew that, it still doesn’t hurt to have as much info as possible.
“Alright, from here onwards, we’ll move with Snow as our vanguard. Snow, instantly tell us the moment you sense something okay?”
“Awoo!”
Giving orders to Snow, we slowly began to make our way further inside [Foro Neem].
The entire place was designed like a huge circle, and there were a huge amount of rooms all over the place.
Our current location was supposedly the main floor so most of these rooms were probably used as guest rooms in the past.
Charlotte had already told us that we didn’t need to investigate these rooms that much for that very reason.
We continued onwards in a straight line and saw a giant door that supposedly led directly to the spectator stands of the main arena but, to make sure that Klaus and his party had to spend a longer time in here, they had made sure that this door couldn’t be opened from here.
I do have the permission from Charlotte to destroy that door just in case but, to make sure we don’t accidentally miss each other, I was planning to follow the exact same path they had gone through.
With this entrance blocked, the only other way to get inside the arena was from the place where competitors would enter which was located much further inside so we needed to head deeper.
And right now, Klaus and his party should be near the residential area, the place where the competitors would stay and investigating that place.
Seeing the map, there was only one path connecting these areas so as long as we move through there, we should run into them no matter what.
I feel like it was a bit too convenient how this massive place only had one path going between the two areas, as if it was designed specifically to help me corner Klaus but……
But perhaps the real reason was to make sure that the competitors couldn’t escape [Foro Neem] so easily in actuality.
I know it’s a benefit for me so I probably shouldn’t be complaining but seeing the intent behind its entire design, I once again realized just how steeped in the ugly darkness of this world this [Foro neem] place must have been in its heyday.
While pondering such things, we continued moving through the main floor quietly and reached the giant door to the arena that we had set as our first landmark here.
About 30 mins had passed since we had entered [Foro Neem].
While we were certainly being cautious, we did have a map to guide us so we had taken no detours and yet so much time had passed just getting here. It once again made me realize just how massive this place truly was.
“Chris-san, this is the door right?”
“Yeah. It connects directly to the arena. We can destroy it in the case of emergency or so she said though.”
“Damn, the size alone is shocking but, the magic circle engraved on this thing looks even more incredible! Even I can tell that a lot of mana has been poured into it!”
Ralf spoke that somewhat excitedly, and sure enough the giant magic circle really was exactly how he said.
Probably, that is the seal keeping this door closed.
“It really does have a lot of mana embedded in it. I know Charlotte said we can destroy it but……..judging by the circle, I doubt we could actually do something like that?”
“It is definitely impossible, I can confirm. Perhaps she said that because she knew that it was completely unbreakable?”
The possibility of that was high.
That would be very much like her to do something like this but, part of my personality also made me want to really smash this door open now because of that as well.
Well, I doubt I could do it right now but, if I am able to safely defeat Klaus…….it might be a fun challenge to smash this door open.
