I looked in confusion in the direction the boy in my memory had gone, but I didn't see anything special or noticeable, nor did I sense any mechanisms that could be triggered. There was, however, a closed stone door.
I extended my senses toward the stone door again, but received no response; it was as if it had been swallowed up by something, leaving only emptiness.
Perhaps due to the influence of the cave, a small amount of magic was constantly flowing around here. The senses transmitted back were either distorted or empty and unresponsive, only causing a dull ache in my head. In addition, I was certain that there was someone more suited to the current environment than me guarding this place, so I did not maintain my senses around me. I did not expect that I would lose track of Ai An in such a moment of inattention.
"There's nothing to worry about."
Shen Xue's calm voice promptly soothed my increasingly chaotic thoughts: "The child opened the door and went in by himself."
"I explored the area before waiting for you. There are no special traps to watch out for; it's just a simple dwelling built inside the mountain."
This relieved me, but then a question popped into my head.
"Is this place also related to the person who built the hot spring hut?"
The moment I realized this was a residence, that was the only thought that popped into my head.
Shen Xue shook her head in disbelief, seemingly surprised but perhaps still expecting it: "Although that person did leave behind convenient things like residences in various parts of this continent, the traces here are clearly different from that guy's habits." Her icy blue eyes swept across the hall illuminated by candlelight. "At least that guy didn't have the time to specifically stay in one place and do so many pointless carvings."
"That person, like me, prefers sword practice, and his dwelling was just something he made in his spare time while practicing swordsmanship."
Even something that's easy to do is quite remarkable.
I quickly suppressed my exclamation: "Of course I know this place has nothing to do with the person you mentioned. After all, the traces left here all indicate that everything here has been through a long period of time. But... maybe it was someone before him?"
Miyuki hesitated: "...Perhaps? I don't know."
Hikari quickly stepped in to smooth things over: "Why don't we go find little Aian? It would be unsettling to leave a child alone in a place like this, wouldn't it?"
“That’s just you guys.” Miyuki retorted instinctively, paused for a few seconds, and then nodded slightly. “Let’s go.”
As she spoke, she strode forward and pushed the closed stone door open with all her might.
The stone gate slowly opened behind it amidst a heavy resistance that felt heavy even to look at, revealing a passage illuminated by the eternal flame, just like before.
"I wonder where the people who built this place collected so many mermaid candles."
Hikari glanced worriedly at the candlelight, which flickered steadily and upright regardless of the wind direction: "Could it be the spoils of hunting mermaids?"
She seems to attribute the extinction of mermaids to human greed and rampant hunting.
But this is a fallacy.
"The extinction of mermaids is more likely due to the impact of environmental changes."
I recalled a scene I vaguely glimpsed deep within the memory of that accidentally captured core spirit: "The source of these candles should be the trade between mermaids and the inhabitants of the shore long ago."
"Otherwise, I doubt that the residents who live in the sea year-round would be willing to work together with the people on the shore to resist the successive waves of high tides."
The little fool nodded, seemingly accepting the explanation.
While I was talking, Miyuki kept glancing at me, and I didn't know what she wanted to ask. Her stare made me almost explode.
After going deeper into the passage and passing through several more single rooms with nothing particularly noteworthy, we finally found the little boy standing quietly in front of a bookshelf behind what looked like the largest door at the end of the corridor.
Judging from its decor and appearance, this appears to be a small study.
The desk, once made of fine wood, has rotted and broken in the middle, but by some coincidence, it has managed to stay in its original state.
The gilded pen holder and chair back have faded, and there are dark black marks on the table and chairs that look like they were once wet. If you sniff carefully, you can smell a putrid odor that has been covered up, but it is still very pungent to a cat's sense of smell. It is likely that someone sat here and died.
Fortunately, someone managed to collect the long-decayed remains before we could, preventing the scene from becoming even worse.
Stepping over the carpet whose original color and pattern are no longer discernible, in the area illuminated by the light, we could only see a few piles of paper, already showing signs of decay and making us worry that they might crumble at the slightest touch, as well as many sculptures placed in the four corners of the room.
This makes the room look similar to the outside.
Of course, there are also many distinctive personal items: a rotten, frayed cloak, a well-made bow with a broken string, a wand with a pure magic stone at the top but completely drained of magic, a spellbook with tattered pages, a longsword with a broken blade, and a sword with a dim luster.
Most of these items were stored on the top shelf, along with a few scattered books, which could be considered as filling the empty space on this side.
"The savior swordsman, the radiant mage, the unerring elven archer, the resurrected saintess, the blade wielder who annihilates all..."
Standing before these things, Ai An murmured softly the names I had heard before.
Although I had come here with the intention of visiting, I never expected that after entering from an unexpected place, I would eventually arrive at the right place.
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