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The 'Archipelago.'
It is now a group of islands on the sea between the north of the Begaritt Continent and the south of the Central Continent, specifically the Utopian territory at the southernmost tip of the Asura Kingdom.
Why do I say 'now'?
According to legend, over four thousand years ago, the main continent of the human world covered eighty percent of the entire human world. At that time, the "Southern Peninsula" of Begaritt was connected to the main continent by a narrow strip of land, which is now the location of the Archipelago.
So why did it break into the scattered "Archipelago" we see today?
Legend has it that in the final battle of the Second Human-Demon War, Her Majesty, the Golden Knight Aldebaran, used a heaven-shattering blow to repel the demon race. The power from his final attack at the site of the decisive battle pierced a deep crater through the continent.
The main continent cracked. Earthquakes and tsunamis lasted for several years, and the sea poured in. Over hundreds of years, the Lingus Sea was formed.
The land that connected the main continent to the narrow strip was also shattered by the immense force. Submarine volcanoes erupted, and through the passage of time, it gradually formed the "Archipelago" we see today.
It is said that the lingering mana vortex from Her Majesty the Golden Knight's blow still firmly changes this world, which is inherently filled with mana.
That is why every cave between the islands and reefs of the "Archipelago" hides so many dungeons!
And it is precisely because of this! Within those dungeons, which are beautiful, fertile, and bathed in the gentle sunlight between the two continents, looking like a noble's scenic area, there are so many magic stones!
A dungeon in three steps, a pile of magic stones in five!
That is the fortune left to us adventurers by the great hero, the dawn of humanity, and the river of time!
The glory left by Her Majesty the Golden Knight is all in the dungeons of the Archipelago! Those magic stones are just waiting for you and me to unearth!
Adventurers, what are you waiting for? Take on this long-term magic stone commission.
And go get the fortune that should belong to you!
Note:
Fragmented Magic Stones (fingertip-sized): Gold coin exchange rate: 300:1.
Slightly Flawed Magic Stones (palm-sized, with some cracks): Gold coin exchange rate: 100:1
Flawless Magic Stones (fist-sized, no cracks, full of mana): Gold coin exchange rate: 1:10.
—Asura Adventurer's Guild.
Swish!
The white light falling from the sky pierced through the dense night, and the text on the adventurer team's bounty poster became clear for an instant.
Then it grew dim again.
The sound of rain was furious. Wind flowed like a waterfall.
Crack, crack. The rotten wooden hut wailed in the storm. The two-month-long storm brought prolonged hypothermia.
Whether it was from seeing the poster clearly again, or from her body temperature dropping a few more degrees.
The hand holding the paper trembled uncontrollably. The adventurer's commission, soaked by the rain and dried by her body heat, was already wrinkled and torn. This time, it couldn't endure the slightest tug. Just the trembling of her body ripped it into strips.
Swish!
Her hand was filthy, rougher than a man's palm from years of holding a sword. Blood, dirt, and moss were mixed in the yellowed gaps between her fingernails.
Clang! The window frame suddenly cracked. A gust of rainwater that entered slammed the poster onto the rotting tabletop, which was saturated with moisture and had turned a dark brown. Patches of green mold were vaguely visible on the side.
"The poster didn't say that... 'Magic stones everywhere'... 'Magic stones everywhere'..."
By the table leg, a naked human corpse was already rotting. No, to be precise, it was no longer a corpse.
It had been turned into a pile of rotten flesh by the rain.
"The Archipelago... 'A noble's scenic area bathed in sunlight'..."
Swish! Lightning layered upon lightning, giving no one a chance to breathe. A tree of light fell on the distant horizon, connecting the filthy sea to the sky. The black sea surface burst with clumps of white light. Only at this moment, could one see the scattered 'neighbors' outside this island.
Identical islands, in the distance, looked like black stones, wrapped in a gloomy curtain of black clouds that occasionally flashed with electricity, floating on the murky sea.
Filthy golden hair was matted and tangled to the sides of her deeply hollowed cheeks. Her bloodshot, vacant green eyes shifted their gaze back from the distance.
The needles of rain screamed as they pierced into the hut through a large hole where a window frame had once been.
—This old wooden hut, located at the highest, most open point of the small island, had long since been eroded by the storm, becoming a tattered, leaky shelter with puddles on the ground.
Rainwater flowed down the rotting roof, creating shimmering, reflective 'mirrors' on the ground.
It was daytime now.
But it was darker than night.
A passing flash of light illuminated the ground. The reflection from the puddles created a shimmer in the steam.
Shattered magic stones; a cracked breastplate; a broken, rusted steel sword; a missing arm; a severed leg lying on the ground; the half-eaten face of a fellow adventurer; all of it was illuminated by the constant flashes of lightning, flashing in her eye sockets.
Spreading across the ground.
Not far away, a vaguely visible transparent 'cover' enveloped the area around the shelter. The ragged adventurers, like walking corpses, were soaked to the bone, their tattered clothes clinging tightly to them.
The storm continuously stole their body heat, yet no one trembled.
If they trembled, they would die.
Screams and roars were drowned out by the sound of the rain. Sparks flew as blades clashed with bone knives.
The battle was still ongoing.
The adventurers formed a circle. Before them, a defensive line set up with magic circles—a barrier spell. A thin, membrane-like 'cover' constantly rippled. In the gaps when the barrier spell's tolerance limit was reached and it couldn't be replenished with mana in time, a bone knife would pierce through.
Between the gaps of people, a faint golden arc of electricity occasionally flickered in the air.
The good news was that the defense line had not been breached. The monster tide, following the second earthquake today, was about to be repelled.
The bad news was...
The green eyes shifted upwards.
Swish! A lightning bolt tore through the sky.
And she saw it again...
On the other side of the adventurers, a countless, endless sea of...
...faceless, withered, upright spindle-shaped creatures, about two meters tall, with bone blades for hands, moving at an incredible speed.
A-rank monsters—Specters.
Although their bone-blade hands could be blocked by a solid blade, their bodies were as insubstantial as smoke. To fight them effectively as a group, they had to be contained in a narrow space with a warrior in front to distract them and pin them down.
Then, a mage who knew Divine Strike could deliver the killing blow.
The monsters were powerful. They were rated as A-rank only because in the small dungeons on the outer reefs of the Archipelago, they would only appear at most in groups of three. This made them not so difficult to deal with for a coordinated team of adventurers.
After killing them, if they were lucky, they could get a slightly flawed magic stone.
This was the reason why the Archipelago's outer reefs were so sought after by adventurers.
But because they were few in number, and the risk of obtaining them was low, it would lead to fierce competition.
It should have been so...
But, two months ago.
The situation changed.
First, there were a few inexplicable earthquakes.
After that, for some unknown reason, the dungeons beneath the island reefs lost their ability to contain the monsters. The Specters, who should have been confined to the third level of the dungeon, began to wander the island. From one or two, they became a dozen. From a dozen, they became hundreds.
In their excitement to defeat the monsters, the adventurer teams also failed to notice the subtle, continuous rain that started to fall. It was as if it was mocking the greed of humanity. Within two weeks, it had turned into a full-blown hurricane.
Since then, the island hadn't seen sunlight for a month.
The roles of predator and prey had completely reversed. The situation on the island took a drastic turn, forcing all the adventurer teams, who were trapped on the island by the storm and were originally competing with each other, to unite in order to survive.
It was effective at first. The monsters had an animal-like instinct. As their companions fell, they could sense that these people were tough nuts to crack. After a continuous assault on the barrier for a while, they would back off.
But the problem was that after every earthquake, which occurred two to three times a day, new Specters would emerge like mushrooms after rain.
The newly born Specters were incredibly violent. As soon as they appeared, they would join forces with the lingering Specters from the previous wave to launch a ferocious attack on the human camp.
The storm showed no signs of stopping...
Now, the magic stones that the killed Specters dropped were not even being picked up.
These things...
You couldn't eat them.
Crack!
A massive bolt of lightning flashed in her eyes. A sudden shout of excitement rose from the crowd. It seemed this monster tide was about to be repelled. But a Milis believer named Merna suddenly began to tremble. She clutched her hair in a panic, and a few clumps of hair fell out with just that one action.
She turned, intending to run out of the shelter, but she ran headfirst into someone's shoulder and fell to the ground.
"Where are you going?"
Merna looked up, trembling, and looked at the dagger in the other person's hand with tear-filled eyes.
"No... nowhere..."
Slash, the blade scraped against the tabletop, scraping off the moss that had grown on it, leaving green patches. The wet moss and the mushrooms they had picked were kneaded into a ball, flattened, and thrown aside.
It had formed a small mountain.
—Food. This was all everyone had been eating for the past month.
Though hard to swallow, for people who had lived in peacetime for so many years in Asura...
'At least it's better than eating people.'
Leuf, with a sword at his waist and a large scar on his neck, glanced at the adventurer's corpse that had rotted into a puddle on the floor by the table leg. He casually threw the newly made 'moss-mushroom bread' in his hand aside, and thought to himself.
'Even eating monster feces is easier to accept than eating people. Damn it, why is there suddenly a storm!?'
He gritted his teeth and glanced at the battle raging outside, which was about to end. His expression turned grim.
In the torrential rain, among the figures, besides his one-eyed companion, all were new faces.
It had been over fifty days and nights since he arrived here. Unlike these adventurer teams who had been stranded on the island before the storm and had never left, he was forced here after a disaster.
Three months ago, Leuf, still in Red Dragon's Jaw, had re-equipped himself. He had gathered enough money and people, and had even recruited a mage who was an expert in detoxification magic, a perfect addition to an adventurer team. He had set sail again with high spirits, amidst the drizzle.
But at the edge of the Archipelago, he ran headfirst into a sudden tornado at sea.
The ship was destroyed. He and his two companions, who managed to grab a small boat in the chaos, were thrown onto this island by the storm.
The good news was they were alive.
The bad news was, living was more miserable than dying.
He took a deep breath, looking at the golden-haired woman beside him. His gaze lingered slightly on her hair. His eyes were bloodshot.
Leuf was an Advanced Water God Style swordsman. Because of his perceptive abilities, he was sent here to guard Merna, to prevent her from committing suicide in a breakdown. Klem, on the other hand, who had been a trainee in the Milis Church for a few years, was sent to the front lines to block the monster tide because he knew a beginner Divine Strike.
'Fortunately... Klem learned Divine Strike during his two years as a Milis Church trainee, not a barrier spell. Otherwise, we would have been in trouble.'
Leuf scratched the incredibly itchy scar on his neck. His face was gaunt and covered in stubble. He lowered his head, looking at the woman on the ground. He gritted his teeth, subtly glancing at the adventurers behind him who were also assigned to monitor Merna.
—Two of them were looking at the 'moss bread' on the table, trying to figure out which one had more mushrooms.
Leuf, seeing this, sheathed the dagger in his hand.
He crouched down, reached out, and gently brushed the golden hair from the woman's face, revealing a delicate face despite her gauntness.
But the woman, facing what should have been a 'gentle' gesture, was so frightened that she didn't know where to put her hands. She just trembled uncontrollably.
A voice entered her ear.
"Merna, this is the third monster tide after the earthquake. Based on our experience over the past two months, no more monsters will attack tonight. There will be a brief respite until tomorrow, when the earthquake 'spits' out more newborn Specters, and a new wave of monster tides will begin..."
"You know what to do next..."
Suddenly, a faint cheer sounded in the rain, piercing through the curtain of rain and interrupting his words.
Leuf turned to look outside the shelter.
The monster tide had been repelled.
But this sign of safety only made Merna's body tremble violently. She stood up, wanting to run out of the shelter. But as soon as she stood up, she tripped over the corpse on the ground, falling headfirst into the mud beneath the table.
Merna looked at the woman who had been cut in half on the floor. She wanted to cry, but no tears would come.
The corpse, just like herself, was a Milis believer, and also a practitioner of barrier spells.
Beneath a wavy head of curly hair was a mature and beautiful face. Before the storm, she was sought after by the men in the adventurer team, her reputation for beauty preceding her.
She and Merna were the only two barrier spell users in the team. In this team that relied on barrier spells to survive, she should have been a prized asset, protected by the adventurers.
But because she was 'disobedient,' she was chopped into pieces by the enraged adventurers...
Right in front of her.
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