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Chapter 12
‘Had I been just an ordinary ten-year-old, I would never have been able to keep up.’
Dante followed behind Fran, scanning his surroundings as he thought.
Even if this were a proper mountain trail, fatigue would have been inevitable. But the path they were climbing couldn’t even be called a road.
Fran, walking ahead, cleared away some of the brush with his sickle, but even so, moving forward was far from easy.
“Are you all right, sir?”
Fran glanced back as he slashed away branches with his long sickle.
It had been thirty minutes since they began ascending Mount Kalotes. For a boy—especially a noble—Fran had assumed Dante would already be exhausted.
“I am fine. Focus on leading the way.”
Dante replied without a trace of uneven breathing.
“A-amazing…” Fran muttered, astonished.
“How long until we reach the summit at this pace?”
“Roughly another hour and a half.”
So, a total of two hours.
‘That’s surprisingly low.’
To think one could scale a whole mountain in just two hours. And not even along a proper trail, but on terrain barely passable.
Still, while the mountain wasn’t particularly tall, it sprawled wide. That was why traversing all of Kalotes in a single day was considered impossible.
“Have you ever seen anything unusual in this mountain?”
Dante asked, hoping to cut down wasted time.
“Unusual, you say…?”
“I mean exactly that. Something not ordinary. Anything strange, out of the ordinary, regardless of its form. Have you ever seen such a thing?”
Fran furrowed his brows, searching his memories, then shook his head.
“I’m sorry, sir. I cannot recall seeing anything like that.”
“I see.”
“But…” Fran hesitated, glancing at the soldiers’ torches. “Your question reminds me of a story I heard as a child.”
“Tell me.”
Hope flashed across Dante’s eyes.
“They say midway up Mount Kalotes lies a small cave… and within it lives a beast that feeds on fire.”
“A beast that feeds on fire?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Have you seen it yourself?”
“Of course not. It’s nothing more than a tale meant to keep children from straying into the mountains.” Fran waved his hands.
“Though… when I grew older, working as an herb gatherer, curiosity led me to visit the cave myself. But there was no such beast. Not even a rabbit’s trace.”
“You went inside yourself?”
“Yes, sir. No fire-eating beast—only the reason such a tale arose in the first place.”
“The reason?” Dante tilted his head.
Fran brightened, as if pleased to explain.
“If you bring a flame into the cave, it goes out in an instant. Whoosh! Just like that. Likely that’s where the story came from.”
“Flames going out, you say…”
Dante’s eyes glimmered.
But Fran shrugged it off.
“It’s nothing unusual, really. Likely some sort of gas seeps out inside, snuffing out the flames by cutting off air. It happens in other places too.”
“Ah…”
That was plausible. Certainly more convincing than the notion of a beast that devoured fire.
Dante turned toward Milleon with an inquiring look. Milleon answered with a faint smile.
“Better to check it out than wander aimlessly without a lead, don’t you think?”
It was exactly the reply Dante had hoped for.
He nodded once, then ordered Fran, “How far to this cave?”
“Quite close, sir. Perhaps ten minutes.”
“Then let us stop there first.”
“As you command.”
Fran studied the terrain for a moment, then veered off in another direction.
Exactly ten minutes later—
“There it is.”
Fran pointed to a low hill. Beneath it yawned a small crevice, barely wide enough for one person to crawl through.
Much smaller than Dante had expected.
“You’d best not go too close. The gas can knock you out in seconds.”
That danger had birthed the fire-beast tale.
They halted their approach at Fran’s warning.
“Milleon.”
At Dante’s call, Milleon silently stretched out a hand.
Chk—
A soldier immediately placed a torch into his palm.
“Step back a little, just in case,” Milleon warned.
Dante retreated a pace. Milleon hurled the torch into the cave.
Pfft—!
The flame snuffed out at once.
The sight was unnatural, unmistakable.
“As I mentioned, sir, the gas cuts off air and extinguishes—”
“Silence.”
Dante cut Fran off with a raised hand.
Because he had noticed something strange as the flame went out.
‘What is this?’
Yes, the torch had extinguished due to unseen gas, just as Fran said. But what followed…
The lingering embers of fire were drawn downward, as if sucked into the earth.
“Dante.”
Milleon’s voice came from behind. His expression confirmed he, too, had noticed.
“Sir Patrick. Lady Elaine.”
Dante looked at the other two knights. They also nodded, their faces grave.
The soldiers and Fran felt nothing, but the knights had sensed it.
“Another torch.”
Dante took one himself and cast it into the cave.
Pfft—!
Again, the same sensation—stronger this time.
“It’s as if the fire’s essence itself is being absorbed into the ground,” Patrick murmured.
“How many torches remain?”
“Counting the spares we packed… forty-eight, sir,” Elaine replied.
“Keep three. Throw the rest.”
The soldiers obeyed without hesitation, tossing torch after torch.
Fwhoom! Fwhoom! Fwhoom!
Every flame vanished, every ember pulled below.
Milleon drew his sword.
“My lord?” Fran gasped, startled by the sudden tension.
“Stand back.”
Dante motioned Fran aside.
‘It’s here.’
To find it so quickly was beyond his expectation. Whether it was truly the Sacred Flame, he had yet to confirm, but something unquestionably lay beneath this earth.
“Dante.”
Patrick and Elaine had unsheathed their blades as well, their expressions equally uncanny.
They had come only to humor Dante’s curiosity, but now—something extraordinary was happening.
“Sir Dante, step back as well,” Patrick advised.
Intrigue gleamed in his eyes.
“Very well.”
Dante withdrew, standing beside Fran, who trembled with unease.
“Fear not. We have simply found what we were seeking,” Dante reassured.
“Y-yes, sir.”
Though his words did little to calm Fran’s nerves.
“Sir Patrick,” Milleon said.
“You want me to do it?” Patrick grinned.
“Of the three, you’re best suited,” Milleon replied evenly.
Patrick chuckled, spinning his blade with casual grace. Yet that effortless motion carried lethal skill.
‘He wields his sword as though it were his very limb.’
Dante’s estimation of Patrick rose sharply.
Shhk—
Patrick settled into stance. The merging of sword and mana radiated a perfected aura that made Dante’s chest tighten with awe.
“You two—hold it back,” Patrick told Milleon and Elaine. His lips curled into a sharp smile.
Whuuuuung—!
A heavy pressure split the air as his sword descended.
Ruuuuumble—!
The ground erupted. Dust and soil blasted upward as if the mountain itself were tearing apart.
“Block it!” Elaine shouted.
Together, she and Milleon unleashed their mana, cleaving the shockwave apart. The wave of earth split and collapsed harmlessly to the sides.
‘Incredible… the power of mana…’
No special technique, just pure mana channeled into a blade—yet it wrought devastation beyond anything Dante could imagine imitating.
Desire surged within him. Someday, I too…
How long would it take? A year? Five? Ten? He didn’t know.
But he would reach that unknown realm. Beyond anyone’s footsteps. Just as with the sword.
As Dante’s heart blazed with determination, Patrick sheathed his sword.
Rrrruuuumble—!
The ground collapsed, revealing a hollow space beneath.
And then—Dante felt it.
It burned, but not with heat.
It shone, but not with light.
It blazed, yet held no menace.
Only a faint, ethereal presence—
A flame of blue, flickering softly in the dark.
“What… what is that?” Fran’s eyes bulged as he pointed.
Dante’s fist clenched, and he stepped forward instinctively.
‘Found it.’
The trace of the Fire God. The remnant of a dead deity. A fragment of divine power from an age long forgotten—yet still overwhelming in its sanctity.
Dante knew, without doubt, that this fragile blue flame was destined to be called the Sacred Flame.
“Dante.”
Milleon’s voice broke the silence.
When Dante turned, he saw his knight staring wide-eyed, his face pale with shock.
“That book you said you read… Sir Dante, what was its name?”
