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The longer he looked, the more unsettling it became. Something about this place tugged at his memory, filling him with an ominous dread.
And sure enough, The next moment, Merlin led him before a sheer cliff face.
"This… isn't this the ancient site you mentioned before?"
Ian's heart lurched, his face twitching involuntarily. He remembered Morgan once guiding him through these cliffs in her memories.
But back then, she had never said this place was a tomb.
Was it intentional?
Or just a coincidence?
Ian's feelings were complicated. Merlin, however, didn't notice his unease. He stood before the cliff face, scrutinizing the surface with a frown.
"There's a strong magical influence here," he murmured. "Seems to be guarded by some ancient seal. I'll need time to break it."
From his robes he produced a bundle of strange tools and scrolls, immediately setting to work before the rock wall. His hands moved with practiced precision, carving intricate runes while his lips whispered incantations under his breath.
Ian watched in silence for a while, then finally asked, his voice tight.
"How long will it take?"
His chest felt far from calm.
"A few hours." nMerlin's reply carried the weight of certainty.
At that, Ian exhaled sharply, the corner of his lips twitching in exasperation. "A few hours? You're trying to kill me with suspense."
He strode forward, standing right before the cliff, and in a low voice of ancient English, he invoked words he had no right to know.
"Pose me your riddle, O King of Bronze and Flame."
Just as he had imagined, his voice reverberated through the gorge, triggering something hidden deep within the stone.
"Hm?"
Merlin's head snapped up, shock flickering in his eyes. But before he could speak, a low, resonant rumble echoed from within the mountain itself.
Something was stirring.
The runes Merlin had painstakingly etched onto the surface were abruptly erased. In their place, countless glowing lines crawled across the rock face, weaving together into an intricate and arcane sigil.
And then, A pair of piercing eyes opened within the cliff itself.
Merlin stiffened, his body taut with caution as though facing a deadly foe. "An alchemical lifeform?" he muttered, recognizing the signature of its creation.
But the cliff spoke.
"In quantum mechanics, the wave function describes the state of a particle. When that particle is observed, the wave function collapses into a definite state."
The voice, resonant and inhuman, posed its challenge: "Tell me, how does this collapse occur, and why?"
A question utterly impossible for this era to answer.
Ian sighed softly. So it's her again, Mizuki Nana…
He glanced at Merlin, whose brows were deeply furrowed as he wrestled with the incomprehensible.
"I don't know," Ian said flatly.
Merlin turned toward him, startled.
But before he could scold him for giving up so easily, Ian's face flushed red. He clenched his fists, forcing the words out.
"But I do know this, I love you most of all."
He hated every syllable of it, but the looming sense of danger left him no choice. If he didn't offer an answer that pleased the entity, the warding mechanisms here would surely annihilate them both in an instant.
No choice.
The little wizard had to spit out words he didn't mean.
"Oh! That's absolutely correct!" the voice of "Mizuki Nana" cried out with giddy delight.
The ground shook, and the cliff face split open, revealing a yawning cavern of pitch blackness.
"..."
Ian didn't so much as glance at Merlin's bewildered expression. Keeping his head down, he stepped straight into the darkness.
Merlin lingered at the threshold for a moment, eyes following Ian's back with a strange, thoughtful light, before he too entered.
"You never fail to surprise me," Merlin said at last, his voice layered with meaning.
The little wizard gave no reply.
He simply kept his head down and walked deeper.
The cavern was pitch black, the winding stone steps stretching endlessly downward. On either side, ancient runes had been carved into the stone walls, glowing faintly in the darkness like fireflies.
Before long, a massive bronze gate loomed before them.
Intricate, elaborate engravings sprawled across its surface, clear as day.
Some kind of teleportation spell.
"Savior Who Eradicates Disasters"
"Sole Authority Across Eternity"
Eight familiar characters still burned brightly on the gate.
They were in Simplified Chinese but his mind automatically did the translation.
The little wizard let out a weary sigh.
"I know this one." Merlin stepped forward before Ian could move, his eyes sweeping rapidly across the maze of interwoven sigils carved into the gate. With deft precision, he pulled forth shapes, lines, fragments of letters, as though he already knew exactly what he was looking for.
Ian barely had time to react before, in the span of a heartbeat, Medivh
The word had been assembled.
Too late to stop him.
A thunderous rumble tore through the earth as the bronze gate began to grind open.
"Damn it! There's a trap behind the door!" Ian panicked instantly. He remembered all too well how Morgan had died. His wand flashed into his hand as he frantically layered protective charms over himself, dozens in rapid succession.
"Don't be nervous."
Merlin, by contrast, was calm. Almost unnervingly so.
He turned to Ian, and in that moment, his eyes glowed white. The sensation struck Ian like lightning, he had felt this before. Aurora. Grindelwald.
And indeed…
"The greatest prophet of this century is on your side. You have nothing to fear from traps." Merlin's voice was certain, though a flicker of puzzlement passed through his gaze as he studied Ian.
But only for a moment.
His conviction never wavered. He trusted his foresight completely, and with that certainty, he gave his back to the grinding gate. Ian, however, instinctively gathered his magic, bracing for the eruption of dark energy he was sure would come.
"…?"
But the flood never came. No searing torrent of sickly green fel-magic, no catastrophic surge.
Instead, what lay beyond the gate was only… fog.
Thick, rolling fog, white and endless, spilling out into the cavern like a living tide.
"What…?" Ian froze, confusion etched across his face.
"Come."
Without hesitation, Merlin stepped through the fog. His figure vanished almost instantly, swallowed whole.
He was far too confident.
"…"
Ian lingered for a moment, waiting, listening for the snap of their contract, the signal of Merlin's death. But it never came. Only silence.
Reluctantly, warily, Ian stepped in after him. He knew Medivh better than anyone. He knew the danger. And yet…
The sight that greeted him was beyond anything he had expected.
"Where is this…?"
It felt as though he had crossed layer upon layer of overlapping space. Images, landscapes, whole fragments of reality flickered past his vision like dissolving film reels, fading to monochrome until, Solid ground.
The little wizard stood once more upon earth, but all around him stretched a world of black and white. The wind here was sharp and biting, cutting to the bone. Merlin stood in the gale, his robes snapping wildly, his expression unreadable.
"If I'm not mistaken," Merlin said evenly, turning to Ian, "this is Helheim. The Realm of the Dead. A divine dominion existing apart from the Underworld… perhaps one plundered by a god-eater."
He paused, his eyes aglow, the light almost unnatural against the bleak monochrome.
"He chose it as his tomb."
Merlin's voice was calm, but when his gaze fixed on Ian, it was like a blade.
"The laws of this place cannot be overstepped, even by gods. In my understanding, only souls should be able to tread here." His glowing eyes locked on his companion, unyielding.
"Then why…?" His voice lowered to a whisper, carrying the weight of judgment.
"Why have your flesh and your magic power not been stripped away?"
The King of Wizards stared into the boy's eyes, and in those glowing pupils was the reflection of Ian himself, still glancing around curiously, his colors vivid and alive against this dead, monochrome world.
A speck of color in the land of the dead.
So out of place.
(End of Chapter)