“Did you just hear that sound?!”

“What is this… the floor…?”

As the ground opened up, the search team members who were exploring the area began to gather around the opening.

Most of them were startled by the sudden opening in the floor.

However, the one who was more surprised than anyone else was Jessie, the one who opened the floor.

“Uh…?”

Buried underground for hundreds of years, it was a place that held the legends of their ancestors. Jessie must have been really excited to see such a place with her own eyes.

But the sight of the forge she faced was completely different from what she had expected.

“The forge…?”

In the past, it must have been a huge forge filled with the heat of countless blacksmiths creating all kinds of items throughout the seasons.

But in this place, there was no trace of that glorious past.

All that remained were rusty, broken scraps of metal and an eerily cold atmosphere.

“This… can’t be….”

Seemingly shocked by the stark contrast of the forge, Jessie entered the ruined interior with a sad expression.

Following the somber mood of Jessie, I quietly walked in behind her with the other search team members.

As we entered and lit a light, the previously dim interior of the forge became a bit clearer.

The inside of the forge, which had been left unattended for a long time with rusty anvils and tools scattered everywhere, looked no different than what we had seen from outside, but there was something particularly eye-catching inside.

“Hammers….”

They were hammers lined up in a row in one place.

Each rusty hammer bore names inscribed on their surfaces.

– Carmos, son of Kalin

– Yuna, daughter of Igram

And behind all those names was the same phrase.

– “They depart for eternal rest, but their souls shall be with us.”

As we were examining them, Jessie, who was slowly exploring the inside of the forge, walked over and spoke.

“…These are gravestones. A traditional dwarven way. They engrave the names on the tools they used to honor them.”

“A gravestone? But there’s no tomb here?”

“…I heard this from my grandfather, but when dwarves die, they don’t bury the bodies in the ground; they all get cremated. They believed that the flames that burned the corpse would harbor the soul of the deceased, and that melting metal using that fire would imbue the equipment with the soul, protecting future generations. So, for the dwarves, the forge isn’t just a place to create items; it’s a sacred site for rituals. Oh, wait a moment. What does it say here?”

While examining the row of hammers, Jessie discovered an inscription on the wall and read it aloud.

“—The device has been activated. Now, the once-grand kingdom shall vanish into the earth along with history, along with our lives. To protect this forge, imbued with the spirits and souls of countless ancestors, from the wicked witch, there was no other way. Yet, there is no regret. Even if we die, the flames of the unquenchable furnace shall blaze eternally with the will of we dwarves.”

What she read to us was a farewell letter.

A heroic farewell left by the dwarves who buried their entire kingdom underground to prevent the witch from invading the forge.

Upon hearing that, those present seemed to understand now, expressing their recognition.

“…So it was because the dwarves buried themselves along with their kingdom. To protect their sacred site from the witch. They weren’t just a crazy race.”

“To think that was the reason… I actually thought the dwarves were just foolish extremists who would resort to self-destruction because they thought they’d lose…”

Glancing at the thoughtless remarks that might seem harsh from a dwarf’s perspective, Jessie shook her head and sighed deeply.

“Sigh… Still, I can’t deny that the dwarves did something foolish. The forge they went to such lengths to protect has ended up like this… Ugh, what is this… The forge is a wreck, and even the unquenchable furnace has cooled down. What was it protecting…?”

Jessie complained as she looked at the completely ruined forge with an expression of both sorrow and disappointment.

And then it happened.

“Huh?!”

Startled by her own musings, Jessie suddenly turned her head toward something.

“Another sound. The sound of a hammer….”

She remarked, glancing at us.

Yet, naturally, we couldn’t react.

Like she mentioned, we couldn’t hear any sounds.

So we exchanged confused glances as if asking what she was talking about, and Jessie, seemingly perplexed by our response, exclaimed.

“W-What’s wrong with you all? Can’t you hear it?! The sound just now! It definitely came from over here…!”

Seemingly frustrated, she shouted and dashed toward one wall of the forge.

There was a large door, so covered in soot and rust that you wouldn’t notice it without careful inspection.

Jessie struggled to open that large door, insisting that the sound had come from inside.

“The sound…?”

And what lay behind that door was,

“This is….”

Fire.

To be more precise, it was a minuscule flame, perhaps more accurately described as a spark.

A tiny flame radiating a faint red glow, burning alone amidst the already ruined forge.

At that moment, everyone probably had the same thought.

“Th-That flame…!”

All eyes were drawn to the large iron door that Jessie had just flung open, and they examined the structure of the wall where that door was attached.

Why hadn’t we noticed it sooner?

Now looking again, it was clear.

“…A furnace!”

Exactly, it had a structure that could indeed be called a ‘furnace.’

The name of the sacred relic we sought, the unquenchable furnace.

However, contrary to its name, the furnace was an ordinary structure.

It was unquestionably not the kind of object to be called a sacred relic.

Then what was it that made this furnace a relic?

“…The unquenchable!”

That was undoubtedly something that kept the furnace from extinguishing.

Like that flame, which, after being left unattended for hundreds of years, continued to burn on.

That flame, indeed, was the sacred relic we had been searching for.

Finally, we had discovered the relic.

But there was a problem.

“…It seems like it could go out!”

The flame appeared to be in such a precarious condition that it seemed as though it could extinguish the moment a breath of wind touched it, ironically contrary to its name.

“What?! What’s wrong with this?! Is it because it’s been left unattended for so long?”

“Wait! Don’t make any loud noises…! What if it goes out with your breath…!”

As everyone frantically covered their mouths, worried that the state of the relic would extinguish, I instinctively felt something.

‘Is it feeling fear?’

That the flame was indeed feeling fear about something.

I didn’t know how I could tell.

Whether it was because I had the ability to manipulate flames or some other reason.

But regardless, it wasn’t important at that moment, so I cautiously asked the flames.

– What are you afraid of?

As I asked that, the flame trembled slowly and pointed toward me.

Afraid? Of me?

No, that wasn’t it.

I concentrated a bit more and listened carefully to the voice of the flame, and eventually, I understood what it was afraid of.

And hearing that, I stood still for a moment before turning to Jessie who was beside me.

“Uh, Jessie.”

“What is it, Scarlet?”

“The forge and the path we saw while coming here, how was it?”

“Uh, suddenly? Well, it was a complete mess. Eroded and rusted away.”

“…Right. I thought the same, but it wasn’t.”

“Not that?”

“Yeah. It wasn’t a mess. Because…”

I spoke to Jessie while recalling the scenery we saw upon descending into the underground.

The forge, and the other places we passed by.

Though they had been buried beneath the ground for hundreds of years, eroded and rusted to look like ruins,

Still,

“…There were no demonic beasts.”

“W-What? Now that you mention it… Huh? How?”

At my comment about there being no demonic beasts, Jessie realized it and exclaimed in surprise.

She couldn’t help but be surprised.

Hundreds of years. The years during which the underground kingdom of the dwarves had collapsed and been left untouched.

Yet, despite that, there was not a single demonic beast wandering around.

Logically, it should have been impossible not to have demonic beasts arising naturally due to the accumulated magic.

It was absolutely impossible unless someone or something had stopped it.

For that reason, I shared my thoughts with Jessie.

“…Jessie, you said the dwarves did something foolish, but it seems like they did something right. They must have fought to protect what they treasured with their lives. That’s why this place remained untouched by the demonic beasts and has lasted this long.”

In their long years, they had considered the dwarves as their friends.

They hadn’t forgotten that they sought to protect them, and thus, for hundreds of years, they did their utmost to protect this place where memories of the dwarves remained, resisting the magic within.

The story of a certain flame.

As I shared that story, Jessie murmured in a voice that sounded like she was about to cry.

“T-Then, is this flame here to fend off magic…?”

“…Yeah, it seems it has exhausted its power trying to purify the magic.”

The flame was afraid of not me but of the magic that a witch like me emitted.

To be precise, it seemed afraid of the fact that it might not have the strength to purify the magic anymore and that this place, filled with memories of the dwarves, might end up ruined.

Upon realizing this fact, Jessie spoke through tears.

“…Ugh, then isn’t there a way to restore this flame to its original state?”

“Don’t worry.”

And with that, I responded by igniting flames from my own body.

Flames that burned magic.

The flames, which did not feel hot, enveloped the surroundings, incinerating the surrounding magic.

Even the magic that had been suppressing the unquenchable flame.

“Ah, the flame…!”

As the magic obscuring it vanished, the flame grew in size as if in jubilation.

The once cooled furnace became hot, and the atmosphere of the ruined forge filled with warmth.

And at that moment, as the forge, which had been cold for so long, heated up,

—Hahaha!

—Gong! Gong!

Was it the spirits of the dwarves embodied in the flames that made that sound?

We all heard it.

The sound of numerous dwarves laughing and hammering away in the forge.

Jessie jumped in surprise and looked back at us as if asking if we had heard it this time.

Now that we all distinctly heard the sound, we nodded back to her with smiles.

And I watched that scene, smiling.

One ear felt slightly numb, but the resounding sound of hammers was sharply clear.