Chapter 189 - Greinif (5)

["You have come. Star eater."]

A voice resonated in Alon's ears—no, deep within his mind.

He hurriedly looked around, but all he could see was Rim's eyes regarding him strangely. He had only just realized that the voice was audible solely inside his own head when it spoke again.

["Reach the depths of the Root. What you seek will be there."]

"Wait—"

The resonant voice delivered that simple fact and vanished. Alon hastily opened his mouth, but the only response came from Rim.

"What is it?"

He lowered the hand he had unconsciously raised.

"... No, nothing."

"We will keep moving."

"We have farther to go?"

"This is only the entrance. We're heading to the outpost."

Rim moved ahead as though there was nothing more to discuss. Following her, Alon recalled the voice he had just heard.

'Who was that?'

At first, he had thought it belonged to the thing that had directed him beneath the Root, but it did not.

'I could hear it clearly. Unlike the Pupil's voice, which gave nothing away, that was distinctly a man's voice.'

It was unmistakably different from that being's voice, in which he had been unable to distinguish anything.

While Alon pondered behind his expressionless facade, Rim announced their arrival.

"We're here."

"... Oh."

Alon let out an exclamation of wonder.

A castle-shaped base stood in the dark abyss. It was not particularly large, but amid that boundless darkness, the little castle alone gave off a faint glow like a firefly.

The atmosphere was profoundly dreamlike. After gazing blankly at the view, Alon followed Rim inside.

'This is a little better.'

Unlike the abyss of the Root, where he had been unable to see anything around him, the castle's interior was dim but visible. He was calmly looking around when voices rang out.

"Huh? Rim, why are you down here? It isn't time to change shifts yet, is it?"

"What's going on?"

"It's Rim! ... Huh? The Black Leaves are here too?"

Three elves emerged from farther inside: two men and one woman.

"... A human?"

The moment they spotted Alon, their cheerful air vanished, and each reached for a weapon.

"Stop. This is a direct order from Her Majesty."

"... From the queen?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It's that matter. You may not have heard the details, but you know the general situation, don't you?"

At Rim's intervention, they seemed to recall something. They looked at Alon with expressions that said, "Oh, that," and lowered their hands. The wariness on their faces remained, however.

'... They seem much like Rim.'

As Alon considered this, the tall elf carrying a sword spoke.

"Egal."

Next, an elf unusually bulky for his kind, with a massive double-bladed axe on his back, and a petite elf with a pair of daggers at the waist gave their names in turn.

"Bian."

"I'm Ramu."

"... Alon."

The introductions were exceedingly brief.

Alon looked at the three elves for a moment before Rim's voice reminded him of his original destination.

"So, is there anything else you wish to do here?"

"How do I descend farther from here?"

"... You intend to go deeper than this?"

"Yes."

Rim's expression grew a little colder at his answer.

"Do you even know what lies in the depths of this Root?"

"What is there?"

"There are 'Ashes' down below."

Bian answered in Rim's place. Alon turned toward him.

"Ashes?"

"Yes. To put it simply, think of them as monsters that inhabit the space beneath the Root."

"... Are they strong?"

"No. We can handle several dozen of them ourselves."

Bian stated the truth plainly.

"Then—"

"But in the depths you speak of, there is an 'Ash Scatterer.'"

"... An Ash Scatterer?"

"The Root's gatekeeper, which creates Ashes endlessly. That thing—"

Unlike before, Bian's face twisted.

"We cannot kill it. That's why we're stuck enduring all this."

"... Is it that powerful?"

"Yes. But that is not the only problem."

"What do you mean?"

This time, Rim answered Alon's question. Still wearing that cold expression, she added:

"You cannot use mana in the depths where the Ash Scatterer resides."

"... You cannot use mana?"

"Correct. The farther you descend beneath the Root, the less you can use it. That is why we cannot eliminate those things below, even with Master Pilde, who has already set foot to some extent in the ninth tier."

Rim's explanation gave Alon a rough grasp of the situation.

'So, to learn how to wield stature, I have to kill the Ash Scatterer somewhere I can't even move mana, then go inside. Is that it?'

"..."

He deliberated. Unlike his encounters so far, for which he had possessed information, he knew nothing useful about this Ash Scatterer.

In other words, the chances of encountering danger were far higher than usual. Being unable to use mana would only make it more dangerous.

Yet even taking all of that into account, it was worth going.

"I would like you to take me to the depths."

"Of course, you needn't come with me. Just tell me the way, and I'll go down and return on my own."

Recalling his emergency safeguard, Alon decided to go alone.

"Sorry, but we never intended to let you reach the depths in the first—"

Ramu stepped forward as though Alon were talking nonsense, but Rim blocked the elf's path.

"No. That's not so."

"What isn't?"

"The queen told us to grant this man's wishes."

"... Really?"

"Have I ever lied?"

"No, but no matter how I look at it, going beneath the Root is far too—"

"Ramu. It is Her Majesty's command."

The queen's command.

Ramu's lips moved several times, as though wanting to argue, but the elf eventually backed down.

"... All right."

"Then let's move immediately."

They left the castle once more and began walking through the dark abyss, toward the depths of the Root.

####

How long had they walked since leaving the castle?

With the abyss all around him dulling his senses, Alon trudged along in a daze. Just as his legs began to tingle slightly—

"...!"

Light suddenly poured in, as though the view ahead had opened wide. At the first stimulus in some time, he involuntarily squinted.

"This is the Root's middle level."

At Rim's dry announcement, Alon took in the scenery. The middle level was entirely different from the area above.

'It's bright.'

Unlike the uppermost level, which had been an abyss, this place was bright enough to see far into the distance. Enormous roots tangled together everywhere, forming a chaotic network of paths.

Alon soon realized that the path beneath his feet was itself one of those many roots, but it did not feel particularly strange. The root was so large that walking along it was practically like walking down the middle of a massive eight-lane road.

As he marveled inwardly, Rim spoke.

"We will continue down this way."

He followed her farther below.

####

As they descended farther with Alon, Rim walked ahead with a mildly irritated expression and let out a small sigh.

'... Why must we do something this dangerous just because that human asked?'

No matter how she considered it, she could not understand the queen's command. At least to her eyes, the human behind her seemed to be neither the primordial elf nor anything of the sort.

There was circumstantial evidence, of course. He possessed an item belonging to the primordial elf, and Pilde, the elves' archmage, had vouched for him.

But apart from that, what was there? What conclusive proof was there that this man was the primordial elf?

And that was not all. His actions directly contradicted Master Pilde's words. Pilde had said that the primordial elf had been reincarnated through a contract with something, and that the strange thing behind him prevented him from coming to the World Tree.

But what was he doing now? He had come to Greinif with that horrifying thing attached to him—a thing that might harm the World Tree. He was even heading into the depths of the Root.

In short, he was acting entirely contrary to Master Pilde's expectations. Yet Her Majesty behaved as though she had seen definitive proof.

That worried Rim. Perhaps the queen, unable to let go of her lingering attachment to her dead elder brother, was clinging to the slightest possibility because she wanted to believe this man was the primordial elf.

As Rim struggled to hide her displeasure, Bian's voice suddenly reached her.

"... Rim."

"What is it, Bian?"

"Something is wrong."

"... What?"

"We should have encountered Ashes by now."

Only then did Rim look around and frown. Bian was right: something was wrong.

The Ashes constantly crawled up the Root, but hundreds also remained stationed on its middle level to prevent the elves from descending. They should have been here.

'But we're almost all the way down already, and there are no Ashes...?'

They should have been absurdly easy to spot wherever she looked, yet not a single one was visible.

Rim's body involuntarily tensed. She knew that the absence of Ashes was not a good sign.

After a moment's thought, Rim called to Bian.

"Bian."

"Speak."

"Wasn't there an anomaly last time as well?"

"The last one was that enormous surge of Ashes a month or two ago."

"And since then?"

"There have been no noteworthy signs, but this must be—"

"... An anomaly."

An anomaly: the term they used when the Ashes' behavior suddenly changed. It did not happen often, but whenever it did, something extremely dangerous followed.

"We would have had to come down at some point anyway," Rim murmured.

Anomalies had to be detected as quickly as possible so they could prepare for what followed or take action to resolve the problem at hand.

Her face grew more serious, and her steps toward the depths of the Root became more cautious.

At last, they reached a place where all the chaotically tangled roots converged around an enormous hole.

"The depths of the Root begin here."

"How do we get down?"

Like the upper level, the hole was too dark to see into clearly. Without a word, Rim pointed to a spiral staircase running down its wall, and the group began descending the stairs once more.

By the time her feet hurt so much that she wondered whether blisters had formed, Rim realized they had finally reached the depths of the Root.

"—"

At the same instant, she froze.

And she was not alone. Egal, Bian, and even Ramu, who had followed her, stood rooted to the spot with horror written across their faces.

Their vision was filled with—

■■■■—

An immense number of Ashes.

"Hah—"

Rim involuntarily caught her breath.

They clearly had human or beastfolk forms, but gray powder drifted from every part of their bodies. With each movement, red soot stirred across their skin like the ground of an active volcano with lava quietly churning beneath it.

Every one of those features confirmed that they were unmistakably Ashes.

Rim tried to count them.

Hundreds?

No, far too few.

Thousands?

Still too few.

Then—

'Tens of thousands.'

Rim gritted her teeth. The future that awaited them was all too clear.

Whether they could use mana was no longer the issue. Their numbers were so overwhelming that if all of them ascended the Root at once, the Pagade would collapse with appalling ease.

As her lips tightened in despair—

—■■■■■■■■!!!

One of the Ashes, silent until moments ago, howled at Alon's group, who had descended underground—no, invaded it.

■■■■■■■■—1!!!!

As if resonating with that cry, the other Ashes began howling madly. Soon, they shot toward Alon's group, trailing swirling ash.

"Run—!"

Rim shouted urgently and immediately began racing back up the spiral stairs.

But—

"No!"

"What?!"

"They're above us too...!!!"

At Rimu's ensuing scream, she looked up.

"...!!"

She saw Ashes beginning to descend the stairs above, which had plainly been empty only moments earlier. It was as though they had waited for the group to reach the depths.

It was exceedingly strange. In the hundreds of years they had fought the Ashes, those creatures had never once behaved as though they possessed intelligence.

Before the elves could contemplate this inexplicable situation, despair spread across their faces.

Not one of them was weak. They were Pagade. Yet even Pagade could see no hope of breaking through this impossible number of Ashes and surviving.

"Th-this is..."

As despair gave way to resignation in every one of them—

"Everyone, get against the wall."

"!"

A voice rang out, far too calm for this desperate situation.

Rim turned to see Marquis Pallatio. Even with the Ashes' grotesque cries filling the space, in a situation where death could come at any moment, he merely regarded them with emotionless eyes.

"You could get caught in it."

"You fool—! I told you...! Mana won't move here, so using magic is—"

The marquis casually surveyed the Ashes bearing down on them from above and below. But he was a mage. Remembering that he was effectively bound hand and foot here, Rim shouted urgently.

"My sworn ally, manifest."

The moment Alon's calmly murmured words rang out, the elves witnessed it beneath the roots of the World Tree.

KRRRRAAACK—!!

Crushing countless Ashes as he appeared—

■■■■■■■■■■■■—!

The manifestation of Basiliora, the Receiver.