Trying to Save my Favorite Character from His Tragic Fate

Chapter 56: Underground city of Udarr

There is only darkness in front of them. 

Now that they have fallen from such height, there is no way for them to go back to look for the group. Phanes lights up the tunnels, and they continue exploring them by walking forward. As they walk through the one-way tunnel, they can see blue rays of light reflecting on the tunnel walls from far away. Soon, they encounter a chamber inside the cave. 

Huge stone tablets that reached the ceiling are placed neatly on the cylinder-shaped chamber walls. On the top, the center of the ceiling, there is a huge blue mana stone that shines over the chamberwaves of the blue light project onto the stone tablets and floors. 

Walking in, the cold air gusts to the bottom of the chambers from the blue mana stone. The gentle cold light moves like calm waters. The chamber seems like it is submerged underwater. 

Kyrie rotates around to capture the sight of the giant tablets. Then, he walks close to read the carvings. 

These are the same style of letters from the ones he saw in the chamber where they found Phanes and Erebus's statue. 

"Hmm the language of gods."

Phanes touches the tablet, and the carved out words light up in gold, spreading like wildfire throughout all the tablets. Then, the mana stone on the top of the roof turns in the same gold color. The chamber is no longer melancholic with the blue light but instead showered in warm light - like the sunrise taking away the glory of the light that the moon provided onto the land.

Phanes, holding up the same hand that touched the tablets, turns to Erebus with tearful eyes.

"Did I screw up something?" asks Phanes.

Erebus chuckles and starts to read the tablets, and concludes, "It seems like we have entered into the dungeon that leads to the city of Udarr."

"Old man Udarr's city? The famous city that got destroyed by an invasion?"

"Yeah"

"Wasn't he punished a while back?"

"Hmm Then it must be that he left his stuff behind"

"This is all due to a relic?"

"Most likely" answers Erebus.

Like private detectives, the two gods connect their points to figure out how to clear the labyrinth that has trapped them for weeks. Just like what Imogen said, the key is the ancient ritual song.

The city of Udarr is a city of dwarves that is blessed by the earth god Udarr. The inhabitants love Udarr and worship him fervently. That might explain why, to enter the city, there is a requirement that they know the ritual song that is the center of their way of worshiping this god. People who enter inevitably also have to worship their god. Talk about being devoted!

This all occurred back before space magic has become forbidden to use. People back then must have known the ancient language of gods as their own language. Nowadays, the gods and mortals have different languages, like a huge wall lifted between them, symbolically cutting their interaction almost permanently.

However, this city is more accurate to be called a fallen city.

It all started when the fame of many mana weapons originated from this city spread across the continent. The weapons are famed for being beautifully crafted and increased the wielder's effective combat abilities. The weapons hold mana better; thus, giving the wielder of such weapons an upper hand even if the opponent normally has been their equal match. Equal amounts of mana are used, but with the weapon, the mana is used more efficiently since less mana is getting wasted when transiting it to the weapon. Of course, anyone would look for these weapons. The amount of mana that a mortal can use has minimal growth. Usually, for humans, such growth stagnates after reaching adolescence. 

As a result, the city became a hot spot for adventurers to get their weapons. Naturally, the art of crafting those weapons became also a topic of interest. Many blacksmiths from the outside came to learn the secrets of creating such effective weapons. 

Although their skills increased tremendously studying under masters, they couldn't make weapons that provided such effective combat abilities.

These blacksmiths soon understood that there is something beyond these dwarves' natural abilities influencing these weapons. 

That is the blessing of Udarr.

Unable to take the skills to make these effective mana weapons outside of the city, greed got implanted into many hearts to conquer the city.

As such, the city gets invaded, and its inhabitants get demanded to make weapons for free. The dwarves, proud and hot headed, fight back against them, but they perish in the struggle. Seeing his believers being slaughtered for their talents that he blessed them with, the former god gets enraged and annihilates those invaders. However, due to his meddling with the mortals' fate, Udarr gets severely punished. But before he goes to accept his punishment, he creates a relic that would preserve his city inside that space and an eternal illusion of his followers still living inside of his holy city.

For them to get into the city of Udarr, seeing that their clue is the ancient song, most likely, they would have to turn like how the priestess would as she danced along with the ancient song. The priestess would carry a long rod with bells the size of a fist - twelve bells, three rows by four columns around the wand. She dances on an altar that leads to a long path and would turn according to the song to a side to ring the bells. The ritual was called Ascendance to Heaven. It is to commemorate Udarr passing his test and becoming a god. 

Phanes narrates the story while they walk in the tunnels. 

They turn to the left again.

Kyrie takes out the loaf of bread that Phanes gave him and hands it to Ian. He does it in such a natural way that Ian automatically just takes it before his mind processes the action. 

"He is doing this once again," thinks Ian. "The over-protectiveness The self-sacrifice Why?"

Ian frowns at the loaf of bread. He wants to be thankful, but his heart is stuffed. He does not want to take Kyrie's actions in vain, but it is just

"Too much."

Kyrie turns his head towards Ian and says, "It is not much. Save some for later if you cannot finish it. There is only this much until we might get anything inside that underground city."

Kyrie takes Ian's hand and swings their arms to lighten Ian's mood. 

His heart is pained for Kyrie. 

"Demand something from me too," Ian thinks, "Anything Tell me what you want. I can also give you anything."

"You give me all the reasons to love you, but just let me love you despite any of these. So Let me know Let me know how I can love you Kyrie, tell me. I can't wait any longer."