The guide and the liaison turned down the offer immediately, especially the guide, who had already unknowingly moved away from the entrance and would have run away if there were no soldiers keeping an eye on him.

Rother did not put on the weird coat. "I don't need it. Keep it as a backup."

"Are you sure?" Sean frowned.

"The G.o.d's Punishment Warriors have a much stronger resistance and self-healing ability than common people and are immune to general plagues and poisons. I don't think a disease that allowed common people to survive ten more years is a threat to our bodies. This is the most common thing we could find in ruins." She shrugged. "The one-piece coat, on the contrary, would slow me down and dull my keenness, especially in an uncertain place such as this. Moreover, if we encounter a situation that is too difficult to escape, the soldiers outside would have a spare coat to rescue us, though such a thing can scarcely happen."

This was a convincing argument. The G.o.d's Punishment Witch could only perceive the outside world by her sight and hearing, so they heavily relied on them. After having been through centuries of training, they could even estimate the humidity and flexibility of the soil by the sound of their footsteps. Azima had already seen this skill during the journey.

For this reason, the protective coat had a larger influence on the G.o.d's Punishment Witch than ordinary people, who would just take it as a coat that could cover their eyes and ears.

"But what if... the temple was really cursed by the G.o.ds?" Azima was worried.

Rother let loose the same hideous laugh as she did before. "Let's put aside the doubt whether a leather coat can resist the G.o.ds' curse. I have no fear in facing them even if there really are G.o.ds inside. I'd like to see how the curse by the G.o.ds could be any worse than the millions of people who perished on the Fertile Plains.

"I see." Sean nodded after a moment of silence. "Let's move now."

Azima took a deep breath and followed the guard entering the stone gate.

Unexpectedly, it was not damp inside the ruin. The sand that had been brought through the entrance had almost blocked the pa.s.sage so they had to bend over to move forward. However, as they went deeper, the downward pa.s.sage became less congested and less steep.

With the light of the torch, they could see the wall on both sides of the pa.s.sage had been severely damaged and the tree roots and vines had dug out of the paved bricks and crawled all over. Rother, who was leading the way, used an ax to open the way. The downward incline would have taken them half a day to pa.s.s through if they did not have the G.o.d's Punishment Witch to clear the way for them.

"This place has indeed been deserted for a long time, but what Knaff said isn't entirely true. It wasn't sealed off because of the curse," Sean said suddenly. "There must have been people coming and going at least for a period of time."

"What did you find out?" Rother put on a curious look.

"There are torch slots on the wall," he said, pointing toward the wall. "The chiseled lines are much clearer than that of the walls, indicating that they must have formed at very different times. If this is just a place that they used to take shelter from the rain, they didn't need to set up torches at intervals of about ten paces."

There was no doubt that torch slots were only made when people had to walk in and out of this place frequently for a long time.

"Ha, how could the lord not be interested in the treasures inside of this ruin?" Rother sneered. "It's not the guide who lies but the rumor itself has been polished."

"I'm concerned whether the treasures are the thing we are searching for..." Sean said soberly. "If there are many sources, how many have been carried away in the past century and where? His Majesty said that the thing is crucial to the creation of the Glory of the Sun, and we must, by no means, let it fall into the hands of other people."

"These problems can't be solved until Miss Azima leads us to the first source." Rother's body suddenly tensed. "I think we're close."

Finally, there was no more soil covering the stairs and the stone steps were exposed.

They moved much more quickly after that.

30 minutes later, they stopped in front of a sea of darkness. The light s.h.i.+ning from their torches could not illumine the way ahead any longer. It was as if the torchlight was being absorbed by the darkness. It looked as though a dark wall was standing there, separating the two worlds.

"That's..." Azima blurted out in amazement.

"A big hole." Rother lifted the torch, entered the darkness, and totally disappeared.

Sean followed her.

"Mind your step." The soldiers guarding the rear warned.

"I will," Azima took a deep breath and stepped into the darkness. Prior to her promise to accept King Roland's task, she had always thought that she was a brave girl. However, she now found herself far behind Sean and Rother in terms of bravery. Perhaps, this was the reason why she could not make the final decision of leaving the Sleeping Island.

"To be frank, you're a coward."

Nightingale's voice once again echoed in her ears.

But this time, it was no longer sarcasm, but a different kind of meaning altogether.

The darkness enveloped her.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to adapt to the dense darkness. She could make out Sean's and Rother's torches. Their lights seemed to have shrunk by a lot and looked small and dim.

"Are we at the bottom of the ruin?" Rother said as she looked around, her voice echoing from the unseen ceiling. "It's smaller than I thought. No more than 200 paces in any direction."

"You can see the edges of the room?" Sean asked.

"It's not that impressive. You don't have many choices when living under the ground for hundreds of years. You either adapt or remain blind."

It wasn't until now did Azima realize why Rother said it was "a big hole". As she entered, the s.p.a.ce suddenly extended by a lot so that the firelight could not reflect on the walls and looked much dimmer. The hole was not at the same level with the pa.s.sage they had just pa.s.sed through, so those entering first looked as if they had suddenly disappeared.

"How far do we have to go?" Rother looked back over her shoulder at Azima.

She hurriedly took out the coin. Suddenly the green light filled her vision. There were countless bright green spots floating in the air, from the ceiling to her feet, outlining the whole place. It was as though she was in a fictional world, and the endless darkness now had clear boundaries. Under the luminous spots, she could even see the shape of every tile on the floor.

The wall around them was engraved with psychedelic paintings that were beyond description. What the paintings showed were all mad and chaotic. No human beings could create anything like that. There were rows of iron cages under the paintings in which numerous bones were piled up. She did not know how many people had been imprisoned here and died.

About a hundred paces away from them, the ground sank down and formed a large pit from which a splendid beam of light rose. The beam matched the light of the coin, but the beam was much brighter.

It was her first time seeing such a sight!

"Azima?" asked Sean. Upon not hearing an answer, he turned around and asked, "Are you alright?"

Azima felt the dryness in her throat. She licked her lips and said slowly, "I think... we've arrived."

"Ah? Do you mean we've found the source?" Rother spread out her hands and asked, "Where is it then?"

"We are... inside it now."

The witch answered in low murmurs.