The route had taken a long time underground, but walking aboveground, it didn’t take nearly as long. Less than an hour after leaving the road and entering the forest, we reached the abandoned village.

The village was just as I remembered it from my previous life: houses collapsing and slowly becoming part of the forest, vegetable gardens with no trace left of them. The well was no different. The one Adria and I had escaped through was still half-collapsed and covered in weeds. One look told me no one had entered it in a long time.

First, I tied the rope we’d brought to a tree beside the well, then spoke to Juan. “I told you before we came, but I’d like you to stay here and keep watch.” I didn’t know what we might find, but the fewer people who knew the secret, the better. As expected, Juan understood his position. “Yes, understood.” His brief answer was exactly what I wanted to hear. Even today, he hadn’t asked why we’d come here or how I knew the Firebird Hunter. I didn’t know whether that was because he trusted me or because he saw me as the person who had paid for his mother’s treatment. At the very least, he was reliable and knew how to keep his mouth shut.

Even he had something he wanted to ask, though. “Then how long should I wait?” He wanted to know the point at which he should stop waiting. “Until sunset.” “Understood. If you haven’t returned by then, I’ll inform the mansion immediately.” I nodded. We were entering through the exit rather than taking the route beneath the fortress. That should be plenty of time.

Juan and I tied my sword to the rope and lowered it into the well.

THWACK!

A moment later, I heard it strike the bottom of the dry well.

WHOOSH!

I jumped in first. “Ah! You’re not holding the rope...” Juan’s startled voice came from above, but I kept kicking off the walls as I descended. Adria and I had climbed out of this well in my previous life without any equipment at all. I was more skilled now and in better condition, so there was no reason I couldn’t climb down.

As I expected, the Firebird Hunter jumped in after me. Unlike me, slowing my descent with my feet against the walls, she dropped straight down.

WHOOOSH!

She passed me and landed on the dusty bottom.

BOOM! SPLASH!

With a loud crash, water pooled at the bottom shot high into the air.

THUD!

I landed a moment later. Splashed water had made a mess of everything, but the cave connected to the well was still where it had been in my previous life.

“That’s the way, right?” “Yes.” She lit a lamp she took from inside her clothes and entered the cave with it in one hand. The closer we got to our destination, the more obvious her excitement became. She spoke less and moved quickly, as she was doing now. She must have wondered how I’d found this place, too, but she didn’t ask. I untied my soaked sword from the rope and dragged it after her.

As in my previous life, we encountered several cave creatures along the way. They weren’t monsters, but they looked quite different from creatures on the surface. Many of the insects and animals whose eyes had degenerated shied away from her lamplight, though some charged at us. None slowed us in the slightest. She led the way, swinging her sword at them so diligently that I only had to follow, dragging my large sword without even drawing the dagger tucked inside my clothes.

After a long walk, we reached an iron door blocking the cave. A large emblem was painted on it: a bird soaring upward. ‘Ah. Last time I came from the other side, so I never saw it.’ The Firebird Hunter carefully stroked the emblem. I stepped back instead. Last time I’d easily opened the door from the opposite side, but I didn’t know how to get in from here. ‘She has a sword with the same emblem, so she must know how to enter.’ Even if she didn’t, I could take the side passage beneath the fortress alone and open the door for her. I wasn’t too worried. Fortunately, I wouldn’t have to go to that trouble again. She knew how to open it.

‘Is she sending mana into the door?’ She wasn’t merely stroking the emblem. Mana flowed from her hand as she traced its lines in a set pattern: starting at the feet, moving along the fully spread wings, then to the head and both eyes. When she pressed the eyes with both hands, a click came from the door. Then she pushed it with some force.

CREEEAK!

The iron door slowly began to open. I went over and helped her push. Once it stood wide open, musty air flowed out.

“It really exists...” The woman beside me stared at the ancient burial chamber, looking half dazed. As I’d expected, it was just as I remembered: stone walls joined to form a square, and a large coffin resting on an altar in the center of the otherwise empty chamber. While the Firebird Hunter approached the coffin, I looked at a crack in one corner of the wall. It was wide enough for one person to pass through. But I knew the cave beyond narrowed until only someone young and small, like Adria or me, could barely squeeze through. As I recalled what had happened in my previous life, a groan came from the center of the chamber. “Ah...” The Firebird Hunter had reached the coffin and was looking inside.

She abruptly raised her head from the empty coffin and looked at me. “Was there nothing here when you found this tomb? No, how did you know about it? Who told you?” Now that she knew the tomb was empty, the questions she’d put off seemed to have resurfaced. She also seemed to have been fairly certain it would be empty. So she really was descended from the grave robbers who had looted this tomb long ago. That explained why she knew how to enter and possessed a sword bearing the emblem. Damn, I’d let my mind wander too long. Suspicion appeared on her face. I hurried to speak before she broke our contract.

“No one told me. I was just exploring beneath Majorca Fortress when I found a narrow passage leading here.” I raised a hand and pointed to the crack in the wall. “Oh... There was a passage? I never heard about that...” Perhaps the knowledge hadn’t been passed down properly, or perhaps someone had hidden it on purpose. “It looked exactly like this when I came in. I checked that it was empty and went home. Then, in the marquis’s domain, I saw your sword bearing the same emblem as this tomb.” Of course, I’d visited this place in my previous life, so there were no traces of me in the passage we’d taken or the cave leading to the fortress. If she inspected them closely, she would realize I was lying, but she was hardly going to check that thoroughly.

“Then there really is nothing...” See? She took my word for it and immediately looked dejected. She bowed her head, looking close to tears. Was she really a mercenary? Her skill was undeniable, but moments like this made her seem nothing like a hardened one. It was an amusing sight, but I couldn’t leave her like that if we were going to make progress.

“I didn’t look closely before. Is there really nothing in the coffin?” “Nothing. A few scraps of clothing, fragments of bone, bone dust. Just traces of whoever was buried here.” “I see.” I approached the coffin too. Its interior was just as she’d said, and just as I’d seen in my previous life. ‘Adria found it first that time...’ Unlike Adria, the Firebird Hunter hesitated to touch anything inside. I bent down and swept my hand across the bone-dusted bottom.

SWISH, SWISH.

“Ah, you shouldn’t touch that so carelessly...” She cried out as I brushed the dust aside, but her mouth fell open before she could finish. An emblem of a soaring bird and a keyhole had appeared on the floor of the coffin.

“Huh? What’s this?” I put on a startled expression, as though seeing it for the first time. ‘Hmm. Was that a little awkward?’ My acting left something to be desired, but she was too surprised to notice. She looked at the emblem and the hole, then at her sword. Adria’s guess appeared to have been right. Judging by her reaction, I wouldn’t need to prompt her further.

SHING!

She drew her sword. In the light of the lamp held in her other hand, the bird engraved on the blade seemed to blaze. She held the sword and stared at the hole. Left alone, she looked ready to thrust the blade straight in. I spoke first. “I’ve told you everything I know. Before you put that sword in, could you at least tell me the story behind this tomb?” “Ah!” She let out a startled sound. She seemed to have finally come to her senses. “Oh, sorry. I got carried away.” With a sigh, she began to explain.

“I never dreamed I’d find it like this. This was where an ancestor of my family originally gained their power. They were one of the heroes, but sadly, they died during the Great War, so little was passed down. Only part of the story of this tomb survived by word of mouth, and the rest of our knowledge wasn’t preserved intact either.” She looked at her sword with sorrowful eyes. “Maybe this sword is the only thing that made it down to us intact.” She gripped it tightly again. “The rest of my family gave up, but I couldn’t. I had other duties entrusted to me, but I couldn’t stop searching for what had been lost. I didn’t have much time left, and now I’ve found it...”

She really wasn’t an ordinary mercenary. A family descended from a hero... However much their knowledge had been lost, a hero’s descendants had to be nobles. Talking had excited her again. Seeing her face flushed red, I tried to dampen her enthusiasm. “There may be nothing here.” “No, something must remain. The stories passed down to us mentioned a door opened with the sword.” That meant this might not be a dead end, which was excellent news for me too.

“Then I can open it, right?” I nodded and edged back. Even if a secret door appeared, I had no intention of entering immediately. I still hadn’t heard the message. At the very least, I meant to wait for it before moving. But she raised her sword at once and thrust it into the hole.

SLIDE. CLICK.

I heard a mechanism release. And then the entire altar collapsed beneath us.

KRA-BOOOOM!

She was in the center of the altar, and I had only taken one step back. We both fell with it.

I’d gone to the trouble of stepping back, only to get caught up in it anyway. A door opening and an altar collapsing were two entirely different things! Why did the part about the family’s knowledge not being passed down properly have to prove true now of all times? And Murphy’s law was still going strong even in this world. As I fell, a message appeared before my eyes.

[The crisis has ended. A new ‘save point’ has been set.]

Damn it! This must be the very moment when I’d died alongside Adria, my future sister-in-law. The god of this world clearly hated me.