A white wolf monster with terrifying fangs, will attack anyone who enters its territory, break through and then be killed. The hordes of monsters fall one after another due to the faint light from the shot guns.
This was an area within the forest with green grass and large roots, even so there were lots of spaces where group battles could be fought.
Just to the west of Kyle's current position, a line of green mountains stood firm like a great wall separating the regions.
A path that leads to the top of the mountain is filled with large roots of trees that look very old. Among the tree roots, monster corpses were scattered in all directions. Kyle with a fluttering white coat, stabbed the long sword right at the monster's head.
[Level UP]
It took about 89 monsters for me to level up, but this I can get at one time, this is of course a big catch. I started chuckling at my underlings behind me, of course I covered my mouth with my hand to hide it.
The team that I led with Sergeant willo, numbered about 70 people including 10 of them were me, Zen and people from my company.
But most of the monsters that were defeated were of course thanks to the hard work of the knights. Right before the hunt started, I had told Sergeant Willo not to kill monsters and just immobilize them, it was all so I could gain experience points.
With magic-enhanced rifles, targeting a monster's vital points wasn't impossible, the soldiers seemed to be working hard to learn how to aim in a vertical trajectory with little smoke coming out of the gun casings.
Pulling out the sword embedded in the monster's head, Kyle then looked at Sergeant Willo who was walking towards him.
"Mr Burnet. It seems like the last remaining monsters around here, we still have plenty of time until the afternoon, but my people until now didn't find any remaining group of monsters."
"Good, this seems to be enough. You did a very good job incapacitating a group of monsters without killing them."
"It's not an easy job, but we can do anything you order. Let me ask, why don't you order us to directly kill monsters, it will make it easier for you not to feel tired."
"Materials that can be obtained from monsters may be damaged if your people act too aggressively. I'm just trying to ensure the quality of the material remains intact without compromising its value on the global market, this is my job, Sergeant, you don't need to worry. "
Doesn't this sound like a great businessman? Ah— I'm starting to like him. I have never felt this sense of accomplishment and comfortable life in my life except for when I first graduated from university before seeing the rigors of the adult world.
I hope this won't happen a second time, the harsh reality after celebrating success, I've had enough in the past.
I then looked around at the large roots of the tree and attention was now drawn to a crushed stone pillar. At first glance it looked like a ruin.
"Could there be some sort of legend around here, Sergeant? Something like a grand city or something. "
Sergeant Willo who is a 40 year old man complete with a light mustache and a knight's uniform, understood what I meant as he followed the direction where my eyes were looking.
He then answered in the affirmative.
"This is a very old legend, I don't know the full story but I've heard that in the past there was a huge castle built on top of a mountain. No one knows where that castle is for over a thousand years, but if it really is on top of a mountain, it must be on the border between the three countries and the North continent."
From my experience as a game developer, I can confirm that the concept of a castle on a mountain must really exist.
In casual games, stories about legends are 60% true and the rest is something that is spread in society. And this is where I started to get curious.
"When did you ever hear about that story? And where did you hear?"
"I've heard that in the military academy, it was when I was playing chess with my fellow soldiers from different divisions, some of us believed, that whoever created the chess game must have come from a civilization that built a magnificent castle on a mountain. It wasn't told to most Republicans, so I understand why you never heard of this story. "
The military faction seems to have a lot of information hidden. Such a historical story, I have never heard of it from anyone. In the boring book, no such story was recorded.
As I started to tidy up my coat which was starting to come loose because of the wind, I then ordered Sergeant Willo to follow.
"Sergeant, I would like to take some men to follow that trail of stone pillar-like ruins. Can you protect me?"
"Of course Mr Burnet, I will bring about 15 men and the rest will be here on guard."
I then nod. Just as I was about to take a step, I looked at Zen who was kicking the corpse of a monster to play around with, he put the toe of his shoe on the skin of the monster like someone checking a corpse to make sure it was really dead.
"Zen, you come with me."
Hearing what I said, Zen then nodded slowly and walked towards me. I just want to make sure you won't have anything bad happen to me and that's a function of good luck charms, right?
.....
The ruins seemed to lead to the top of the mountain, there was a path that was enough for a dozen people to walk through, every time I took a step, the stone pillars became more and more, some of them were buried in leaves and some were also attached to tree trunks.
That seems to lead to a certain point. I, along with 16 of my subordinates, have now arrived at a Goa that seems to have been built by civilization.
The walls of the cave are made of marble and limestone, the path under my feet is made of very hard checkered stone. I can see that this cave is indeed from the remnants of an old civilization, there are lots of ancient carvings.
"Apparently, people in the past had broken morale," one of the soldiers muttered.
I then saw what he meant, the carving on one part of the wall showed a woman and a man embracing each other in erotic poses. Here I started to think, did the soldier who announced that think that people in the past were people who didn't know what breeding was?
This lascivious carving really wasn't much, but it was what he noticed. I then walked into the cold with a mysterious large carving.
A magnificent carving. This is a written record made by an old civilization. If it was ancient writings, I wouldn't understand anything, but they are depicting their customs on the wall, I'm really grateful to them because it will make it easier for me to understand something.
My hand then touched the indentation on the wall, when it did, Zen who was behind me muttered.
"This is a fine painting, very large and majestic."
"Yes, but unfortunately there are lots of pieces that cut and collapse. I can only see that this is a painting of all the townspeople. Meanwhile, on the carving that looks like an altar, there are only outlines symbolizing a bright light."
Zen then put his hand under his chin, his hair started to fall to cover some of his eyes, he and I paid attention to every detail in the painting.
"This carving is cut off at the most important point, I don't know where the source of light is from, why was that altar made, What are they worshiping?" Zen muttered that in a low tone.
"That's hard to say for sure, but, take a look at this."
I then placed my hand on another carving, in the lower corner with a collapsed piece. There, vaguely an image of eleven hands trying to reach for something.
"This is an engraved gem, but the lower margin than the other parts makes it very different from the other gems that are on top of the carving. Not only that, there isn't even a line surrounding it like a ray."
As I was about to say my conclusion about the gem, Zen then answered right before me.
"Black gem. "
"Yes, this carving shows that the gem that the eleven hands are trying to grab doesn't shine. Maybe it really is black."
The black gem, an engraving in the lower corner, this might be a symbol of something hidden from civilization. Most of the carvings tell of a civilization that worshiped the source of light, but this dark gem was clearly very different, there were no images of humans or other creatures around the gem and only hands trying to reach for something. That meant, even the painter didn't know the people who wanted to reach for the black gems, but he did know that such entities actually existed.
This point is even more interesting than most of the carvings. If my estimation is correct, the portion of the pieces that were lost and collapsed, is probably 70% of the entire carving, the remaining carvings are only a small portion.
The carving that was in front of me was actually huge, it was even six meters tall and that was only 30% of the entire length.
When I thought that the real mystery might be somewhere around here, my eyes immediately looked into the cave, Zen's eyes then followed. I glanced at him and muttered something to Zen.
"There's nothing in there."
Zen then gasped, his arms raised and his eyes flashing.
"There's nothing in there? "
"Yeah, there's nothing inside the Cave, it's just filled with emptiness. We don't need to waste time on something useless, forget it, you're not thinking of going there right? "
"Fine, I won't go there even if I wanted to. I'll withhold it for now, maybe there's something much better you'll show me than just entering a mysterious cave. "
Stop your stupid fantasies, Stop dangerous adventures, something in there might be a dangerous monster, and I want nothing to do with it. For me who even almost died just to be able to gain stats on par with an ordinary person, going inside would mean death.
I will show you something better than seeking danger, I will even increase your fee if you are dissatisfied and give you a house in the capital as compensation.
Zen, you must realize that you are just like an ordinary knight, someone who can enter there must be a hero or someone on par with Irina.
I then straightened my body to take a step out of the cave, when I made it out Sergeant Willo rushed up to me and said something.
"Mr Burnet. There is a thick fog coming around here, you should hear the reports from my subordinates who went to check the situation."