Chapter 205: A Door?

Spending countless years orbiting the heavens as a surveillance satellite hadn’t changed the core of Highlord Gawain’s personality, but it had granted him a unique perspective on the world below. When necessary, he could adopt an almost detached, observer-like stance to analyze the shifting tides of history, distilling patterns from changes that often spanned thousands or even tens of thousands of years—patterns that were nearly impossible for surface-dwelling species, even long-lived elves, to grasp.

Having witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations on the surface multiple times, Gawain could confidently speculate that the magical catastrophes—the so-called “Magic Tides”—had struck more than once. Even though he hadn’t directly recorded any of these events, the surveillance footage before and after each upheaval allowed him to piece together what must have happened in between.

Another of his theories was that the scale of these Magic Tides was not fixed.

A large-scale Magic Tide could reshape the entire planet’s civilization, while a smaller one—like the disaster that wiped out Gondor seven centuries ago—might have been just a “minor” Magic Tide.

Though it destroyed the mightiest human empire in history, that catastrophe was confined to the central continent. The Elven Silver Empire and the Dwarven Kingdoms in the west remained untouched.

Or… perhaps what happened seven hundred years ago wasn’t even a full Magic Tide, but merely a kind of “prelude”?

Gawain’s mind involuntarily spun through countless speculations and connections, many of which were pure conjecture. Nearby, Amber watched him silently for a long moment before finally poking his arm.

“Hey, hey, what are you thinking about?”

“Just something,” Gawain snapped out of his reverie and asked casually, “What do you think would happen if, one day, all the resources humans rely on changed? Like, if the properties of all magical materials suddenly shifted?”

Amber blinked. “Wow, that’s quite a leap…”

Gawain tapped her on the head. “Just tell me what you think would happen.”

“Well, everything would probably fall into chaos,” Amber replied offhandedly. “Especially the mages—they’d suddenly have no idea where to find their spell components. A lot of magical materials would have to be re-studied from scratch…”

Gawain was silent for a long moment after hearing her answer, then let out a soft sigh. “Mortal civilizations really are fragile… aren’t they?”

Amber’s ears twitched. “You say the weirdest things.”

Gawain stood up and turned to look at Holm and the other members of the exploration team waiting nearby. They hadn’t dared interrupt his thoughts, but now that he was on his feet, they edged closer.

“This mineral needs a name,” Gawain said with a slight nod to Holm.

“M-Master?” Holm, who had only recently been a serf, was startled by the honor. His eyes widened in disbelief as he repeated, “Holm Ore? I… I don’t deserve this! How could I have such an honor…”

“In the exploration of the unknown, the discoverer is always great. No need to refuse,” Gawain waved his hand. “In the future, we may find more valuable things on this land. Naming them after their discoverers is a simple and effective method—and it really motivates explorers.”

“T-Thank you, sir!” Holm straightened up abruptly. His back, long bent from years of hard labor, cracked audibly as he forced himself upright, pain shooting through his spine, but he held firm. “I… I…”

The simple-minded, barely literate commoner struggled to find words to express his feelings. Gawain didn’t press; he just waved his hand again. “Everyone on the team contributed. I’ll have Hetty record it officially and convert it into rewards according to the contribution policy.”

He then glanced toward the mountain path—earlier, he’d seen a soldier run up and wait for him there.

“What’s the situation?” Gawain asked as he approached the soldier.

“Master, I bring a report from the ruins,” the soldier stood at attention and saluted. “Sir Byron discovered a strange magical device and a hall covered in runes in the lower levels. He requests your personal inspection.”

A new area deep within the ruins?

Gawain frowned and beckoned to Amber. “Come with me.”

Led by the soldier, the two ascended the mountain path. After a long trek, they finally reached the deepest part of the ancient facility.

“This place is huge…” Amber marveled, looking at the towering corridors and the dim glow of magic crystal lamps lining the walls. “It takes so long just to walk straight in…”

“That’s after Sir Byron cleared the path,” Gawain nodded. He noticed the lamps were newly installed. Considering cost and the output of portable hive magic network units, the crystals were spaced far apart, making the corridors dimly lit. Still, compared to the pitch-black ruins before, the restored lighting was a huge improvement.

Inside the circular hall, Gawain spotted the middle-aged knight he hadn’t seen for days.

Despite the long exploration, the knight looked surprisingly fresh, almost invigorated—as if rediscovering the thrill of his mercenary days. Byron’s face was bright with excitement as he approached Gawain.

“Master, you have to see this! I bet the two sets of inscriptions by the entrance describe the purpose of this room—but we’ve studied them for ages and still can’t understand.”

Gawain followed Byron’s finger to the entrance. On either side of the inner door were two metal plates, spotless and uncorroded, etched with neat ancient script using a laser-like technique.

“The left one says ‘Exercise caution to prevent accidents,’ and the right says ‘Personnel must lock the door upon exit.’ What’s wrong?”

Byron was speechless.

Gawain saw several soldiers behind Byron flush red. If not for military discipline, they might have been rolling on the floor in embarrassment.

“Don’t bother with things outside your expertise,” Gawain sighed, patting the seasoned knight’s shoulder. “Even Hetty can’t read all this ancient script. Why get yourself worked up?”

Byron broke out in a cold sweat, awkwardly turning away and pointing to the center of the hall. “Master, you’re right. You should come see this…”

Gawain’s gaze shifted to the hall’s center—he’d noticed the striking object the moment he entered.

It was a vertical ring embedded in the ground, about a third of it buried underground. The inner diameter was roughly four meters. The ring’s surface was covered with dense magical patterns and symbols, with rare metals and magical crystals embedded at key nodes, indicating it was a device that consumed enormous energy.

Surrounding the ring on the floor was an equally complex system of magical sigils, along with several metal devices fixed to the ground and connected to the surface runes—looking like control consoles.

“A… door of some kind?” Gawain stroked his chin. The ring’s shape reminded him of a teleportation gate, but he was skeptical. Even at Gondor’s peak, long-distance teleportation spells were theoretical. This world didn’t have such convenient spatial magic. If mature teleportation gates had existed a thousand years ago during Gondor’s Starfire Era, some record would have survived.

It was more likely a “magical gate” for small-scale spatial shifts, linking different spaces at the same coordinates—a technology quite advanced in Gondor’s time.

“This was initially thought to be stone, but it’s actually some kind of metal unknown to us,” Byron continued. “Also, we found several sealed rooms on this level containing ingots of the same material. It seems the original inhabitants planned to build more rings or expand this one—but they abandoned the project when they evacuated.”

“Unknown metal…” Gawain muttered. “If it’s not an ancient alloy, then the Magic Tide must have altered its properties. If it’s the latter, studying it will be much more complicated.”

Byron didn’t catch that. “Master, what did you say?”

“Nothing,” Gawain waved it off. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Amber had quietly wandered over to the ring and was poking at the purple-black crystals embedded on its surface with her precious little dagger.

He immediately called out, “Hey! What are you doing? You can’t—”

“Relax, I’m not stealing!” Amber shot him a glare, loudly denying any suspicion of her usual kleptomaniac tendencies. “I just feel the residual energy in these crystals is… familiar.”

“Familiar?” Gawain was surprised. “You’ve seen crystals like this before?”

Amber examined the crystals like a scholar, stroking her smooth chin with her free hand. “Based on my years of… experience…”

Gawain blinked. “What?”

“Ahem, work experience, work experience,” Amber quickly corrected herself, though everyone had already heard. She pressed on shamelessly, “From what I know, these are rare Shadow Affinity Crystals—the most expensive among elemental crystals. Honestly, their purity is terrifyingly high. Crystals this pure are almost extinct nowadays.”

“Shadow?” Gawain blinked. He knew about elemental crystals—special magical formations created when ordinary mana crystals are eroded and transformed in high-elemental-concentration environments. Since natural shadow environments are rare, and places with stable, high-concentration shadow energy even rarer, shadow-affinity crystals are the most precious and scarce. Though Gawain was a scholar, his expertise lay in herbalism, wilderness survival, domain management, and monster hunting—not crystal research. Amber, on the other hand, was notorious for her shadow affinity and reckless boldness, so it wasn’t surprising she’d encountered such crystals.

“Could this be related to the Shadow Realm?” Gawain guessed.

Amber patted her chest. “Then I’m going in to check it out!”

“Wait,” Gawain grabbed her arm before she could enter the Shadow Realm. “Take me with you.”

Amber hesitated, suddenly recalling the terrifying experience of facing a god’s flesh and blood in the Shadow Realm during their last expedition. A cold sweat broke out as she clutched Gawain’s arm. “You better lead the way!”

Gawain gave the half-elf a wry look at her sudden cowardice and waved his hand. “Alright, alright, let’s go.”

Amber took a deep breath to steady herself, then activated her shadow affinity talent.

That familiar haze washed over him again. Gawain felt the world around him start to blur and sway. Just as the shadowy realm was beginning to take shape before his eyes, Amber suddenly gasped, “Ah!”—and in the next instant, both of them were abruptly pulled back from the brink.

Dizzy and rubbing her head, Amber took a moment to gather herself before saying, “Looks like… we got kicked out?”

(End of chapter)