You can read ahead up to 30 chapters on my patreon https://www.patreon.com/marvel6395
Dawn had only just broken. At the bottom of the deep pit that had once been the Great Swamp, the light was still dim.
But it was enough to clearly make out the underground tomb chamber that had been buried for years and had finally seen daylight once more…
Dust floated through shafts of sunlight as the golden iron staff descended from above, carrying Liam and Robin slowly down into the underground tomb chamber.
The two stepped casually off the staff one after another. With a casual flick of his hand, Liam made the golden staff flip through the air under magnetic pull and fall back into his grasp. Behind them, the Black Battle Armor, its narrow glowing eyes gleaming faintly, drifted over as well, turning its head to inspect the chamber from all sides.
An underground tomb chamber was, naturally, a "room."
In truth, this was an enormous stone chamber. Burrowed deep into Zou's back, it formed a vast subterranean space. The four walls, along with the floor beneath Liam, Robin, and .b, were all laid with neat, solid blue stone slabs.
Liam exchanged a glance with his Stand. The environment reminded both of them of the Island Whale, Laboon.
Inside Laboon's body, the Pirate King's ship doctor, Crocus, had once carried out modifications. There was a passageway large enough to resemble a hallway to humans, allowing Doctor Crocus easy access so he could enter Laboon's body at any time to inject sedatives or treat injuries.
Compared to modifications on Laboon's scale, this underground tomb chamber on Zou's immense back, at most only a dozen meters high, probably hadn't even pierced completely through its thick hide…
Even if it had penetrated the skin, it would be no more than a sore on its back, patched up with these "bandage-like" blue stone slabs.
And across those stone walls and floors, one could see scratches everywhere.
Some were sets of parallel gouges, rough, savage, irregular in outline.
Others were scattered individual marks, some crisscrossing one another, narrower and deeper… clean sword cuts.
"Some are claw marks from beasts. Others are sword scars left by a swordsman's slashes."
Robin traced the ancient marks on the stone wall with her fingers. She exchanged a look with Liam, and both thought back to the skeleton they had first discovered, the Mink Tribe's King-Wolf Lord from centuries ago.
Had the Wolf Lord fought someone here? A swordsman?
Was that why the Wolf Lord had died in this underground chamber, unknown to the world, eventually buried beneath the Great Swamp?
Robin examined the chamber's structure, layout, materials, and decorative details…
Based on those clues, she quickly deduced the location of the true burial chamber.
"It should be over there."
Leading the way, Robin guided Liam and .b around several paths toward the tomb chamber. Before long, they heard the voices of the mink tribe members who had gone ahead.
"What the hell is this?!" The startled shout was clearly Nekomamushi's.
"Keep your voice down, Monster Cat… This is a tomb chamber connected to the Wolf Lord and the Kozuki Clan." The anger-laced voice unmistakably belonged to Inuarashi.
The cat and dog immediately slipped into their usual low-voiced bickering.
Following the sound, Liam and Robin rounded a corner and entered a doorless burial chamber room. The sight that greeted them left them stunned.
Just as Robin had predicted, a coffin stood in the middle of the chamber,
And, just as expected, it had no lid.
The missing coffin lid was clearly the one Robin and the others had discovered earlier, the slabs engraved with the Kozuki crest and ancient script.
Nekomamushi, Inuarashi, and the other Fire Gun Team minks were gathered around the lidless coffin.
What shocked Robin was beyond the coffin: on the opposite wall, whose stone was a distinct color, dense lines of ancient writing covered its surface!
What shocked Liam, however, was what lay inside the coffin itself…
Being taller, he saw it immediately.
Inside the lidless coffin… lay a skeleton.
How was there another set of remains?
And inside this coffin, no less?
No wonder Nekomamushi had cried out in surprise earlier…
Before coming down here, they had assumed that the three-meter-tall human corpse they found before was the person buried within the coffin.
But if this coffin already had an occupant, then who exactly was the person whose remains they had recovered earlier?
"Smaller than the other one by quite a bit…"
Liam walked up beside the coffin and examined the skeleton inside together with the cat, dog, and the other minks. Compared to the three-meter-tall human skeleton they had discovered the previous night, the one inside the coffin was clearly much slimmer.
Nekomamushi frowned.
"So this is the Kozuki who wrote the ancient script on the underside of the coffin lid? Then the skeleton we found earlier…"
"Perhaps that one really was 'Amatsuki Kumi'!" Inuarashi said gravely, shaking his head. "Or perhaps neither of them are."
Nekomamushi rolled his eyes.
"So you're going to say everything yourself, huh?"
Grinding his teeth, he growled:
"You saw the claw marks and sword scars outside too! The Wolf Lord fought someone here, that's why he died such a mysterious death!"
He counted on his claws one by one.
"The only people we know of connected to this place are the Wolf Lord, a Kozuki, and that so-called Amatsuki! The Kozuki and the Wolf Lord were as close as brothers, so naturally they wouldn't be fighting each other. That leaves only Amatsuki!"
"The Wolf Lord died by Amatsuki's hand, died in a deadly battle against Amatsuki Kumi! And the one lying inside this stone coffin is a Kozuki who hated Amatsuki Kumi to the core!!"
Inuarashi stared fixedly at the skeleton in the coffin.
Nekomamushi continued bitterly:
"That explains why the Kozuki in the coffin wrote, 'Amatsuki Kumi, this resentment, this hatred, can never fade for eternity'! The Wolf Lord died because of Amatsuki Kumi; of course the Kozuki, who was like a brother to us, hated him beyond measure!"
"And when he says, 'My heart is burdened with guilt, through life after life, impossible to repay', isn't he obviously talking about failing to save the Wolf Lord and blaming himself for it?!"
"You still can't see something this obvious, you old dog? Don't tell me you actually sympathize with that bastard called Amatsuki Kumi?!"
Some memory had clearly been stirred within him. Bloodshot-eyed, Nekomamushi pressed his forehead against Inuarashi's and snarled:
"I knew it, you traitor were never on the 'Kozuki' side!!!"
"Crazy cat, have you had enough?!" Inuarashi roared back, his own head pushing against Nekomamushi's.
"I'm only saying the truth isn't that simple!"
"Think carefully! If things really happened the way you say they did, then why hasn't a single detail about the Wolf Lord or the Kozuki in this coffin been passed down in our country?!"
He pointed a paw toward the skeleton inside the coffin.
"If, as you claim, a Kozuki centuries ago failed to save the Wolf Lord and carried that guilt forever, then why did he have time to carve those words onto the back of the coffin lid, lie down neatly inside the coffin…"
"…yet not bring the truth out of this tomb chamber so we could know what happened?!"
Nekomamushi, however, exploded with anger.
"Maybe his injuries were too severe for him to leave! Maybe the swamp appeared and trapped him inside! Are you questioning the honor of the Kozuki clan's samurai?!"
"I really misjudged you!"
The two of them had reached full explosive hostility in less than a handful of sentences. It looked as though they were about to start fighting on the spot, completely ignoring where they were. The Fire Gun Team members had no idea how to intervene.
Then Liam drawled leisurely:
"Did you two forget something?"
The cat and dog, heads still pressed together and breathing angrily, turned toward him in unison.
Liam pointed ahead.
The two turned simultaneously in the other direction.
There, on a stone wall covered completely in ancient writing, Nico Robin stood with her back to everyone, gazing upward in concentrated study.
"The truth you're looking for…" Liam said irritably, "…might be written right there."
"Before Robin finishes deciphering it, what exactly are you two rushing for?"
At that moment, Robin reached out and touched the stone wall engraved with densely packed ancient script.
Suddenly, she jerked her hand back and gasped softly:
"This entire wall…"
"…is made of Seastone?"
(End Of This Chapter)