Once the basement door swung open, it revealed a set of stone stairs winding downward, not unlike the ones he’d seen beneath the mountain villa.
Jenkins glanced back at Chocolate before stepping through the doorway. An instant later, his foot met empty air. He realized with a jolt that the stone stairs and the passageway were a complete illusion; there was nothing behind the door at all.
He hadn't anticipated anything and plummeted before he could even cry out. Fortunately, something soft cushioned his landing; otherwise, the fall would have almost certainly knocked him unconscious.
"Damn it! How am I supposed to get back up? Am I going to have to rely on a 'Real Illusion' just to get around?"
The ordinary candle in his hand had gone out, so he held his miner's lamp high to inspect his surroundings.
Above him was impenetrable darkness, so deep that even the silver-blue glow of his lamp couldn't pierce it. To his left and right, the space was immense, like a vast underground stadium.
What had broken his fall wasn't a cushion at all, but a large bed, fully made with a mattress, sheets, and a quilt.
In other words, he had fallen from above and landed perfectly on the only bed in this vast underground cavern.
"What's a bed doing here?"
Hopping off the bed, Jenkins put on his monocle and activated his Eye of Reality once more, searching for any spiritual aura. He then headed off toward the left.
Judging by the length of his fall, he hadn't plunged too deep underground. Yet, as he advanced, he could distinctly feel the ground sloping downward.
The exploration was dreadfully dull. There was nothing around him but the rhythmic clap of his boots on the hard ground. Out of sheer boredom, Jenkins even started tapping his feet to the rhythm of a "Song of Praise" he had learned from Fini. But once the novelty faded, even he had to admit how foolish it was.
After about half an hour, the vast space began to narrow, and walls came into view on both sides. He quickened his pace for another ten minutes, and soon, scattered signs of mining started to appear along the walls. Jenkins even spotted a broken pickaxe.
"So, the miners must have discovered something extraordinary. Then Mr. Pisco sealed the place off and dug a tunnel here from his apartment?"
That was his guess, anyway. He continued forward, following the man-made traces. The farther he went, the more pronounced the signs of mining became, until he saw the wreckage of a minecart track up ahead.
The path gradually narrowed into a true mine shaft, but after only a few more steps, he found his way completely sealed by a massive boulder.
"So it was sealed off. Looks like they really did stumble upon something they shouldn't have."
He ignored the boulder, taking a few steps back to press his palm against an inconspicuous hexagram symbol on the wall. A faint light flickered, and the true staircase leading deeper underground revealed itself.
It reminded Jenkins of the seal he had encountered at the mountain villa. Unlike that place, however, the walls of this spiraling passage were covered in faint murals.
Ravaged by the dual assault of time and oxygen, the murals were nearly indecipherable. As Jenkins descended, he raised his miner's lamp to study them, gradually making out what they depicted: the entire process of sealing the entity that lay below.
The scenes repeated in a cycle, telling the same story over and over. To ensure this event was remembered, the ancients must have used an incredibly rare type of paint; otherwise, the murals would never have lasted this long. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ novel※fire.net
From what Jenkins could gather, the story told of a group of people who unearthed a wondrous machine. After modifying it to suit their needs, they found it could produce a vast array of items. It was only after they had abused its power that the ancients discovered its creations were all incredibly dangerous. Unable to destroy the machine or its products, their only recourse was to seal everything away.
It sounded like the ancients had unearthed some kind of "Cursed Item manufacturing machine." Thankfully, Jenkins's mission was only to deal with one of the items it had created, not the grotesque machine itself.
It took almost another hour to reach the bottom of the passage. The deeper he descended, the more clearly he could hear a faint voice. It was calling his name, over and over, in the formal sequence of first name, middle name, and surname.
But it never managed to get his middle name right. "Redemptor" wasn't a difficult word to pronounce, yet the whispering voice failed every single time.
Slightly worried that his cat might be getting anxious up above, he was relieved to finally see the stairs level out ahead. At the bottom was a narrow, square chamber containing an altar. The altar pulsed with a visible purple light, its surface flickering with incomprehensible runes and symbolic characters. Combined, they resembled the star chart Miss Audrey had once described, though the scene before him was far simpler than he had imagined.
"I think Miss Audrey mentioned this ancient type of seal... one that borrows power from the starry sky..."
During his first encounter with the Star Spirits, he had been blessed with a vast trove of celestial knowledge. Part of that knowledge covered the history of humanity borrowing power from the heavens. After a moment of consideration, he concluded that this sealing altar must have been created by humans during the 14th Epoch.
The 14th Epoch was a critical juncture in history. Mainstream archaeologists and historians believed that before that time, humanity had developed a steam-powered industry on par with the modern era.
The few surviving historical records, along with ruins unearthed over the years, indicated that people of that time had already begun harnessing the power of steam to transform their world. Even modern steam airships were simply improved versions of ancient contraptions discovered in those ruins.
He was, of course, referring to the ruins of large city-states, not the sealed sites Jenkins so often frequented. If it were the latter, the world would have been doomed long ago.
The great cataclysm at the end of the 14th Epoch changed everything, most notably causing a massive regression in industrial technology. Humanity still retained control over the power of steam, but due to years of incessant warfare and other factors, they never managed to advance again. It wasn't until the current epoch, a time of relative peace on the continent, that the steam revolution was rekindled, sparked by a divine oracle from the great Righteous God, the "Masterful Craftsman."
Jenkins turned these historical facts over in his mind as he began the anxious work ahead. The method Mr. Pisco had detailed in his letter for reinforcing the seal wasn't difficult, but it was incredibly tedious.
It was Monday, and he had combat training at the church that evening, which meant he needed to work quickly.