Chapter 79: Talk
The group of Gordon and the soldiers reached the Fortress just before the Eternal Night took over everything.
Every one of them was shaken from their earlier encounter, and their gloomy faces clearly showed it.
Edgar, who had watched them move inside the Fortress from the patrol path, was quite concerned.
He walked down and met with the six of them, who had just dismounted from their horses.
"Are you guys alright?" he asked, looking over Gordon. "Did something happen?"
Gordon remained silent for a few seconds. His breathing was still uneven despite the journey back.
The veteran looked toward the towering Norwood Mountains in the distance before returning his gaze to Edgar.
"...Yes." His voice was unusually heavy. "We found the Burning Tree Bark."
One of the soldiers quickly untied several bundles wrapped in cloth from his horse and handed them to Oswald.
Edgar glanced at the Burning Tree Bark before looking at Gordon.
"Let’s go inside," he said, noticing the people who had gathered around.
It wouldn’t be good to talk about things that could bring unrest among the people.
Gordon nodded his head and followed Edgar inside his house.
The blond boy gestured for him to sit down while he did the same.
"So..." he began. "What happened?"
Gordon didn’t hold back anything. He told Edgar everything that had happened on their trip from start to finish.
The room fell silent once he had narrated everything.
Edgar leaned back on the sofa and closed his eyes.
His mind began to churn with all the information that he had obtained.
’An ancient road. Crimson engravings. A mechanism that still works after who knows how many years, and something powerful enough to part that damned fog.’
None of it made sense. Edgar was having a hard time believing everything was true.
’I am still damn naive about the ways of this world... I should be more cautious after that "dream."’
Thinking about the dream, Edgar wondered if the monster they saw was one of the eleven monsters born from the Sun.
But he quickly dismissed his own thoughts.
’From my understanding, all those creatures are extremely arrogant. I don’t think they would let any human be anywhere close to them.’
Edgar stood up and walked toward the window.
Outside, the Eternal Night had already swallowed the world beyond the Fortress walls.
His eyes drifted toward the direction of the Norwood Mountains.
"Do you think the legend of the Level Ten Builder is true?"
Gordon hesitated to answer, but in the end, he nodded.
"Perhaps what we saw was the way to that treasure."
"....."
Edgar remained silent for a long while, his eyes never drifting away from the blackness of the night.
He turned around and instructed, "Pretend none of this happened and tell the others to do the same."
Gordon looked confused. "You don’t want to investigate?"
"We do not have the power," Edgar replied. "I don’t want to fuck around with a powerful monster that can obliterate us."
Gordon immediately responded. "Then why save Lady Hera?"
"..."
Edgar couldn’t reply. By his own logic, he shouldn’t have saved the girl and put himself on the bad side of the monster.
Noticing he had overstepped his boundaries, Gordon stood up and bowed deeply.
"I am sorry for asking. I will make sure what we saw remains between us."
Edgar nodded his head. "Get some rest."
"As you wish, my lord."
But before he could walk away, Gordon paused and took out a piece of stone from his pocket.
"This is what I managed to chip out from the road." He passed the stone to Edgar. "It has the same markings as everything else."
Edgar took the stone and looked at the markings that weren’t emitting any crimson light.
’...Isn’t this a rune?’ he wondered, staring at it.
"I will look into it," Edgar said, to which Gordon just gave a short nod.
The young-looking old veteran walked out of his house, leaving Edgar alone.
’...This is really concerning.’
To know that an enormous monster was living just five kilometres away was rather unnerving.
It was like a constant reminder that he could very well die the next day.
Edgar rubbed his face and let out a tired sigh.
’What a pain in the ass.’
He walked out of his house and once again stood at the top of the Fortress Wall.
Though his mind was still trying to understand what that monster was.
’Was that a Nightmare... but how could a Nightmare come out in the daytime? If it’s not a Nightmare, then how did it become so big?’
There were so many questions with no answer in sight. All Edgar could do was stop thinking about it.
’Well, at the very least, we won’t be attacked by the ape-like Nightmares today.’
Edgar more or less understood the strategy of those apes.
They wouldn’t attack his Fortress without a plan.
As he was looking into the Eternal Night, someone walked close to him.
When he looked back, he found Hera standing there.
The girl looked tired, with her long hair slightly disheveled, but it still couldn’t make her any less attractive.
The lady handed Edgar a bunch of parchment and said,
"Here is the record of everything in the Fortress."
Edgar blinked in surprise and took the sheets. "You did all this in a day?"
"...You asked me to do it," Hera replied in a monotonous tone.
"I didn’t mean to make you do everything in a day... You could have taken your time."
Hera lowered her gaze toward the Fortress below. "...I had nothing else to do."
There wasn’t even the slightest complaint in her voice.
’...You would make a really good wage slave, Hera.’
Edgar mused to himself as he looked down at the parchment.
Her handwriting was pleasant to look at and easy to read.
It only took him a few minutes to flip through everything.
’She is good at this.’
He looked up at Hera, who was standing close to the battlement.
"Everything is fine," Edgar replied, raising the parchment. "This will help a lot."
Hera gave a lifeless nod before looking around the darkness.
Her gaze remained cold, but it did have some purpose in it.
Edgar looked at her when she refused to return. "Do you need something?"
"....You are warm," the lady whispered quietly. "Let me bask in your warmth for a while."
’...I do really push away negative thoughts, huh?’
Edgar didn’t mind and let her stay by his side for some time.
Leaning back against the battlement, Hera whispered softly, "Do you ever wonder what is up there?"
Her head tilted upward to look at the Eternal Night, where nothing could be seen.
"In the sky?" Edgar asked. "Well, I do wonder what makes the murky fog cover everything."
"Wouldn’t it be nice if we could go up beyond the fog and look at what’s on the other side?" she asked in a wishful tone.
"Perhaps we could do that if we could fly like the birds..."
While talking about birds, Hera’s voice became filled with grief.
’Ah, I haven’t seen her pet owl for quite some time.’
Edgar leaned back against the battlement as well and looked up at the sky.
"You know, where I come from, we could see countless stars in the sky," he said with a smile. "Night was really different there."
Hera gave him a curious look that also held some doubt.
From what she knew, Edgar was from the Aretus Clan, which wasn’t that far away.
That made her doubt whether he was making things up.
It was funny to her when they first met, but now she was wondering if there was more to his words.
Still, she asked, "...Where are you from?"
"Somewhere far away," Edgar replied cryptically. "I don’t even know if I can ever return there."
Hera gave a gentle hum and kept looking at the sky.
She gently raised one of her hands and whispered,
"I want to fly in the sky one day."
"Is that so..."
The girl looked at him and just nodded her head.
Edgar didn’t say anything and just looked around his Fortress. His eyee fell on the ⟨Tower of Souls⟩.
His gaze, however, immediately froze on the tower.
’...Why?’
He slowly took out the stone from his pocket that had been given to him by Gordon and held it beside the lit-up tower.
’...Why do they both have the same runes?’