Chapter 142: In the basement (5)
The spiral staircase was around the same length as the one leading from the surface to the basement, but the descending felt as if it took much much longer.
If not for the timer that appeared for the rewardless quest that Zombie received, Cranberry would assume she was already walking for over an hour and not mere minutes.
With the overwhelming darkness pressing on the weak torchlight, Cranberry started regretting not putting an effort to develop the night vision skill.
The enhanced hearing she got instead seemed completely useless and only made the cracking of the fire loud enough to cause a headache.
Still, with the minimal distraction from the outside world - after deactivating the hearing skill, she had every opportunity she wanted to figure out where the spiral stairs were leading her to and try to prepare accordingly.
She ended up with three most likely options:
Treasury - the blandest and least likely of the three, but a possibility nonetheless. It was plausible for the Envy to hide their most valuable treasures somewhere no one would even consider looking.
An even more secure prison for some extremely important captives that couldn't be put together with the rest.
Or...
And that option was derived from both previous options.
Something that allowed Envy to influence the system to allow them to control the elves to a certain degree.
It could be an artifact or...
"Ugh...!"
Cranberry, engrossed in her thoughts, failed to notice that there were no more steps going down and she arrived at the bottom of the platform but tried to take a step down anyway...
...which resulted in an unpleasant shock spreading through her whole body...
"...good thing that Zombie couldn't see that..."
The red-haired girl sighed with relief and looked around and illuminating her surroundings with the torch held up high.
"...?"
She ended up stunned when she turned around and saw a pale greenish-white light coming from a small passage.
Right before it, there was a metal ring hanging off the wall.
At first, Cranberry thought that it was something connected with the secret door upstairs, but after she tried to turn it to check whether something happened, she realized that it was just a ring meant for holding a torch and nothing else.
She leaned forward, focusing on the greenish light in an attempt to recognize its origin...
The only thing that she could think of was fluorescent mushrooms...
"..."
Cranberry glanced at the torch and then at the ring by the passage.
"Haa..."
The ring had to be there for a reason, and it looked like the greenish light was bright enough to allow her to find her way inside...
So she put the torch in the ring and moved through the passage.
After a few steps, the narrow passage widened into a large circular cavern...
/Quest progress update
*investigate the Envy's residence (completed)
(70% completion - Rarest title upgrade)
/Tier 7th reward granted
/Master's title upgrade
Beloved child of pride »» Pride's successor
/Servant title upgrade
Lord of Pride »» Prince of Pride
"Ha ha!"
The moment the red-haired girl took another step, the message she was waiting for had finally popped up, and she couldn't hold back a burst of happy laughter.
How could this be a reward for some random optional quest? Those rewards were completely insane!
For a second she felt the urge to run back upstairs and confront Mason's father to fulfill the next part of the quest as soon as possible just to see what the next level reward was, but she managed to stop herself.
After all...
The green light coming from a whitish veiny pillar in the center looked rather ominous - it might as well turn out to have the connection with the secret of Envy, and that was worth getting checked first.
The timer for Zombie's quest had only nine minutes left anyway, and it was almost certain that once it finishes, her cute blue undead would run to her as fast as he will be able to.
And knowing him, after not seeing Cranberry for almost half an hour, he should be on the verge of losing control and about to start a rampage.
That meant that the confident lord Envy might as well get wiped out before the red-haired girl climbs up the stairs...
Cranberry smirked and glanced back over her shoulder as if she expected to see the silhouette of her servant at the door.
Obviously, he wasn't there, and instead, Cranberry realized that she made the correct choice leaving the torch behind.
Why?
Because while the center of the cavern was illuminated by the eerie pillar, the walls were pitch black, and only the flickering light in the distance was showing her the way back to the spiral stairs.
"...haa..."
She let out a long breath and shook her head to focus back on what was in front of her.
"...you're the person who had forced the system to rewrite the world setting..."
"...?!"
A weak raspy voice came from the pillar and caused Cranberry to instantly prepare her weapon for a counter.
Was it a guardian?
Or maybe the voice was just a distraction and various types of traps were laying in wait for her?
It was also possible that she had multiple Sloth-made cannons aimed at her that very moment.
After all, if even some forest elves could get their hands on one, what could stop someone from the Envy family from getting several?
/The administrator ~Saint~ requests access to master's player info
/Calculating...
/Eternal servant magic (level 3) detected
/Superbia skill detected
/Access denied
Messages that showed up caused even Cranberry to tremble from shock.
"...most peculiar... even in this changed world, that skill shouldn't be unlocked before the very end..."
The voice sighed with exhaustion.
"Administrator? Saint?! You... no, you cannot be...!"
Cranberry clenched her hands on the baseball bat so hard that her knuckles turned white.
"Are you... the kidnapped spirit God, Saint...?"
She asked in disbelief, slowly circling around the pillar.
"..."
The silence felt different as if the voice didn't want to answer.
The red-haired girl continued slowly approaching until she was close enough to recognize that the veiny pillar was in fact numerous roots covered in fluorescent mold clumped together.
And in the very middle of it, as if coddled by all the roots, lied a white empty shedding of some sort of human-insect hybrid.
It didn't look alive.
Cranberry furrowed her brows, anxiously looking around for any other place where the voice could have come from, but then the husk's mouth opened like a gaping wound, revealing more of the molded hollow insides.
"...I am the last living administrator of the system, Saint..."
And a hoarse tired voice echoed through the shedding and escaped from both the mouth and the torn back.