The Author's POV

341 Taking the initiative [1]

Halting his steps in front of a large metallic door, the guard paused for a moment.

Placing his small blue hand by the side of the door, the metallic structure rumbled and slowly opened up.

Rumble-

Once the door was halfway open, the guard started talking.

"This over here is the artifact testing area. As you're probably aware, this place is dedicated to testing artifacts and their power."

"Oh? I've heard of this place."

Walking into the room, I pretended to be unamused by what I saw.

In truth, I was beyond shocked. With all sorts of complex machinery around the room, duergars could be seen testing all sorts of artifacts.

BANG-

Covered in sophisticated equipment, the duergars tested weird-looking artifacts against some sort of odd machinery. Displayed on the machine was all sorts of data which other duergars looked at by the side, taking notes on their holographic- looking devices.

Some of the artifacts were so powerful that I could sense the mana in the air convering towards it.

Keeping a straight face had never been more difficult for me.

'...I wonder if I can steal them.'

I thought to myself.

Oddly enough, that was the first thing I thought as I looked at the artifacts. I couldn't be blamed though.

Each one of the artifacts present would sell for astronomical prices back in the human domain.

To be honest, the probability of me being able to steal them was low, but a man could dream, right?

'Mhm... Actually, it's not impossible for me to steal them...'

A wild thought suddenly entered my mind.

If everything proceeded as planned, then, perhaps, I may be able to take some of the stuff here.

having, standing next to me, the guard patted the side of

facility are made of Rhimestone, ensuring some solid safety. This way, our researchers can

"Rhimestone?"

my brow

was an incredibly sturdy rock that

also ridiculously

across the wall,

it, we don't have to worry about the facility if the artifacts ever do malfunction. The walls over here can withstand the full-blown attack of an ranked

be stupid if they didn't

trying my best to memorize the layout

to be more useful than

place isolated from the other

I could probably

longer a matter of greed. This place could be

you asking whether the mana fluctuations and the like reach

"Yea."

In that case, no. Everything in this place is completely isolated. Take a look

guard pointed towards the corner of the room, where

density reaches a certain level, it will trigger a

it shuts down, what about the ones stuck inside? Do they have a chance to

head. "They'll be sealed inside, and probably die. We don't want to

he

soon as it judges that the mana density in the room

"...I see."

ruthless

sure the threat would not go outside of the room, they were prepared to have

happened to the people here, I did feel that Inferno had

sacrifice their own,

would be a pity to lose so many

actually quite useful

had previously envisioned

we go to the

guard called out to me, moving towards the door of the

one last glance at the

"Yes."