The starlight flowed faintly on the exposed ice walls of the cave, reflecting Torge's face, which was uneroded but full of the vicissitudes of life.
After a brief moment of excitement, the old chief seemed to have exhausted the last bit of emotion and fell back into an almost icy calm.
"Black Anvil's betrayal, the Church's covetousness..." Torger's voice was as low and silent as the wind blowing through the gravel of an abandoned mine. "For two hundred years, they have never given up. But what does it matter?"
He waved his calloused hand extremely slowly, his movements as stiff as rusted gears. "The Star Heart is here, sleeping within its coffin, corroding our blood and devouring our final moments."
He raised his eyelids, and his gray-blue eyes looked at Mark, which were filled with bottomless fatigue and indifference after seeing the ending.
"Let them take it. Anyway..." He paused, the corners of his mouth twitching extremely stiffly, as if imitating a smile, "...we have already been marked by it, and will eventually become one with this frost graveyard. A moment earlier, a moment later, it makes no difference. Whether it's guarding or losing, to a group of prisoners, it's just a jailer changing his face."
The atmosphere in the ice cave was as heavy as solidified black ice.
The blue flames of the campfire struggled, making slight crackling sounds, but were suppressed by the thick frost.
Torge was silent for a moment, as if gathering strength, or simply waiting for a thought to slowly climb the slopes of consciousness.
Finally, he spoke again, his voice seeming to penetrate the thick rock formations. It carried a kind of weariness that seemed to have nothing to do with him, yet it also contained a tiny, perhaps final, wisp of responsibility towards his distant compatriots:
"Tell your Graybeard dwarf companion, Enzo... The Graybeard clan has not completely vanished under the blizzard of this ice field."
His gaze seemed to penetrate the thick ice wall and look towards an unknown direction.
"A branch of Graybeard's roots remains buried where the storms pause... deep in the permafrost, beneath the broken ridges of the Sighing Mountains... the 'Silent Stone' branch."
The word he uttered carried a sense of long-forgotten alienation, but it was a clear guide.
"'Silent Stone'... their forges may still burn in the extreme cold, carrying the last of our Graybeards' flame. Their elder, 'Solid Stone' Balkon, was a trusted figure on the Graybeard Elders' Council when I was still a member of the Graybeard clan.
"If that child... Enzo, is still obsessed with finding the home of his bloodline, then the Silence Stone is his destination. As for this place..."
Torge's gaze slowly swept over his compatriots who were covered in star-blue ice crystals and struggling between pain and clarity, and then cast deeply into the eternal blue glow deep in the cave. His voice became completely low, like the last embers.
“…This is not the way home, but the end of a dead end.”
Mark sat on the cold wooden bench, feeling the biting chill from his fingertips and the dead silence and resignation in the air.
Torger's words were like a chisel, carving the coldness of reality even deeper.
He knew that the story of the Deep Furnace branch here was like a solidified ice sculpture, and its long and tragic final chapter could come at any time.
But whether it is the final chapter or the sequel, it is not something Mark can decide for Enzo.
He would only tell Enzo the truth about what happened here, and it was up to Enzo to make the choice.
But at the moment, the most important thing to Mark is not the location of the other Graybeard Clan.
That makes no sense in the current situation.
"Chief Torge." Mark's voice was remarkably clear in the icy air, his dark eyes fixed on the old dwarf. "Since you've anticipated Black Anvil and the Church's plans, then tell me, what would happen if Star-Moon or the Dark Church succeeded in seizing the 'Heart of the Star'?"
Torge raised his weather-beaten face, and his gray-blue eyes met Mark's sharp gaze, but the emotions in them were like the water in a thousand-year-old well, motionless.
He tilted his head slightly, seemingly puzzled, his rough fingers subconsciously stroking the thick animal hide on his knees.
"'Heart of the Star Remains'? Those outsiders want to get their hands on it?" Torge's mouth twitched, forming an extremely stiff, almost illusory arc, as if he had heard some illogical joke. "I don't know why they're targeting this thing... Is it because of its seemingly boundless power? Or is it because of some ridiculous secret hidden within? Haha... But they can't succeed, young man. It can't happen."
His tone was eerily calm, with a certainty that was almost a statement of fact, as if it were as natural as saying that the sun would rise from the east.
Mark's heart skipped a beat.
He stared closely at Torge's eyes, trying to discern a hint of arrogance, or a deeply hidden self-confidence, or... just a mental disorder after the will to resist was completely destroyed by the frozen star corpse?
He caught nothing.
There was only deep silence and absolute calmness in the old dwarf's eyes, and that calmness itself seemed like the most serious abnormality.
Even after Torge finished speaking, he waved his hand, which was covered with cracks and calluses, very slowly, as if he was driving away a non-existent fly. His movements were slow and stiff, revealing an indifference that chilled one's spine.
"Just leave here, human. Don't dwell on it."
rest assured?
Mark sneered in his heart.
The faint blue starlight flowing on the ice wall was like a cold hand, caressing his nerves.
This is definitely not a question of whether you can rest assured!
The tremendous power emanating from the thing behind the ice wall is like a sleeping ancient beast.
It can silently corrode a group of strong-willed dwarf warriors into inhuman monsters, distort their minds, and make people madly attack its barriers as if committing suicide.
The magic it exuded alone was so heavy and sticky that it seemed to freeze space and time itself.
Especially since this thing might be of the same level as the rune forging hammer in Enzo's hand. It is at least something blessed by the gods themselves.
What if it gets out of control or is controlled by someone with ulterior motives?
On the ice sheet, in the far north, and even further to the central continent...
Mark hardly dared to imagine the specific scene of the disaster that would be caused, but an instinctive warning from the depths of his soul made his scalp tingle.
Perhaps Torge had really been infected by the aura of the star debris for too long, and he no longer cared about life or death, or even whether this thing appeared in the world.
But in Mark's eyes, this is not something that can be ignored.
He has never been a moralist, nor does he have the compassionate heart of a saint.
The survival of the world and the safety of the continent sound grand and vague, even ridiculous.
But he was clear about one thing.
Once disasters break out in this world, they never discriminate against anyone.
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