“So, what exactly happened that things turned out like this?”
Liyami asked the most direct and critical question, but Lavinia’s reaction made her uneasy.
Lavinia was still as hesitant and conflicted as before, as if she didn’t know how to explain the situation. Just watching her made Liyami’s uneasiness grow.
Sure enough, as Lavinia started to recount what happened, Liyami finally understood everything.
Just a few dozen minutes earlier, Captain Laryan had led the knights to the other side of the Broken Bridge. Immediately after came that endless tide of enemies.
But they stopped at the edge of the Broken Bridge, not crossing over using teleportation magic or any such method. Instead, they calmed down by the bridge, each of them gazing into the abyss below.
Then, a tremor stronger than ever before suddenly began, making everyone too busy keeping their balance to worry about the enemies on the opposite side. Each grabbed onto whatever was nearby, fearful that the already unstable ground would simply collapse beneath them.
If it really collapsed, they’d all be exposed to the terrifying abyss below. No one present wanted to know what that would feel like, and no one dared imagine it.
Fortunately, by the time the shaking stopped, the ground hadn’t collapsed much; only the outermost edges had fallen away, while the main ground remained mostly intact.
When the tremor ended, the enemies on the far side of the Broken Bridge, who had been motionless, began to move again. This put everyone on high alert.
But, surprisingly, the enemies across the Broken Bridge didn’t attack—instead, they all began to retreat in haste, as if chasing after something back in their original direction.
Since they didn’t know why, Captain Laryan didn’t order everyone to relax, but kept everyone alert and watching their surroundings.
It was then that someone, startled, noticed something strange beneath the Broken Bridge—the evil abyss that had been there was now gone.
This immediately made Captain Laryan tense, but after confirming that the abyss truly had disappeared, she could only sigh helplessly and finally let everyone rest on the spot.
After all, she knew the seriousness of the situation, but had no idea about the cause or consequences. Rather than worrying pointlessly, it was better to rest and recover their strength.
Afterwards, Captain Laryan discovered that the room which had been buried by rubble had loosened a bit due to the earlier tremor. It seemed possible to clear some of the stones and go inside to investigate. What happened next was Liyami waking up.
After listening to Lavinia’s explanation, Liyami understood what had happened, but still felt lost. Mainly, she didn’t know why the abyss disappeared, nor what consequences that would bring.
Unfortunately, no one could answer that question for her now. All she knew was, if an abyss like that appeared in a city outside, there would surely be massive casualties.
It would definitely be an immense and terrifying high-risk event—maybe it would take all the special incident response teams to solve it. No, maybe not even they could do it. Perhaps only the legendary Hero could handle such a thing.
Thinking of the possible consequences made Liyami shiver. But as frightening as it was, it really had nothing to do with her for now; she could only think about it and leave it at that—there were more pressing matters at hand.
The moment she remembered the task the President had given her, Liyami felt a headache coming on. Not only had she carelessly forgotten it before, but she still had no idea what the President meant by that “Iyuu Seed.”
Was it a type of tree seed? If so, how was she supposed to find a tiny seed in such a vast labyrinth?
But even if she had no clue, she still had to search for it. After all, it was the President’s order, and she didn’t want to find out what happened if she failed.
But where should she start looking? Thinking this, Liyami’s eyes drifted to Lavinia beside her. Come to think of it, elves were supposed to know a lot about plants, right? Maybe Lavinia did too…
But when Liyami saw Lavinia’s confused expression, she dropped the idea.
Forget it—even if normal elves were knowledgeable about plants and trees, this one definitely wasn’t a normal elf. She probably didn’t know either. Asking would be pointless.
But if she didn’t ask Lavinia, Liyami really didn’t know where to start.
Just as Liyami was racking her brains, a figure came over to her side.
“What are you thinking about? You look so troubled.”
Laryan’s voice startled Liyami, making her jump up and quickly back away a few steps. She looked just like someone who’d been caught doing something guilty, leaving Captain Laryan utterly baffled.
“Come on, I didn’t mean to scare you, did I?”
Coming back to her senses from her guilty panic, Liyami gave an embarrassed smile, then asked curiously, “Uh, did you need something from me, Captain Laryan?”
Seeing that Liyami didn’t want to talk about what just happened, Laryan didn’t press the issue.
“First of all, I’m not ‘sir,’ I’m ‘ma’am,’ got it? And do you remember the room I was buried in? We managed to open a small gap—we can finally get inside and check it out. Want to come with us?”
“Huh? Go in together? Why me?”
Liyami was stunned by Laryan’s words. She couldn’t figure out why Laryan wanted her to go along. Did this have anything to do with her? But Laryan’s next words made Liyami embarrassed.
“Why you? Who else would it be? Wasn’t the whole reason we came to this labyrinth to help you change back? Even though more people ended up needing to change back, your reason is still the most important. If I don’t ask you, should I go ask Colin instead?”
Laryan said this matter-of-factly, making Liyami feel a bit awkward. Only now did she remember she’d come here to change back as well. She’d gotten used to this body, and the urge to change back wasn’t as strong anymore, but if it was possible, she still wanted to return to normal.
“Sorry, sorry, I just woke up and my head’s a bit muddled—I totally forgot about it. Oh, right, aren’t we bringing Sifni along? Didn’t she say she’d translate ancient documents…”
Before Liyami finished, Laryan helplessly pointed towards Sifni. Over there lay a short girl with a huge chest sprawled on the ground like a corpse, looking as if she had lost all hope. Forget translating ancient texts, she probably couldn’t even stand up.
Seeing this, Liyami dropped the topic and stood up, ready to follow Laryan to the room.
At that moment, Colin walked over from the side. Though he was still a bit unsteady, it seemed he was well enough to move on his own.
“I’ll come with you, too.”