Chapter 179: Mage’s Secret Room

This cellar must have had a ladder once, but it had long since rotted away, forcing Ron and the others to jump down.

They could have used *Feather Fall Magic*, but in the time it would take to cast, Aive and the others could have just formed a human ladder. It was simpler to just jump.

"This just goes to show the benefit of my potions," Ron said in the cellar, flexing his recently sprained ankle and casually stuffing the empty vial back into his pack. "If I’d used a regular Healing Potion, I definitely would have been reluctant."

"I could have just healed you with my magic," Victoria said, holding up the *Eternal Bright Flame* candle to illuminate their surroundings. "Even the cheapest Healing Potion still costs Gold Coins."

"It’s not like there’s anything here anyway..."

The Priest raised her candle, but her words died in her throat. When Ron and the others gathered around to look, they saw her gaze fixed on an ancient drawing on the wall, unable to look away.

"This is..." Ron and Silvia were also stunned when they saw it. The drawing had clearly been treated with Magic, so even after so much time, the ink on it was still clearly legible. But that was precisely what shocked the Casters so much!

"What is this?" Delaford asked, not understanding. He looked up at the wall and felt only a vague sense of familiarity. As for why that was, he neither knew nor cared to find out.

"Is this a magic model?" Ron murmured. "It just looks... unfinished."

"Without a doubt, the former owner of this place must have been a powerful Mage," Silvia said with a nod of agreement. "Only a Caster who can master advanced Magic like *Creation Magic* (Fifth-Circle) has the ability to construct their own magic models and write their own rules for Casting."

"Most of them have left behind magic spells bearing their names in the histories of various worlds," Victoria said with admiration. Although she would never have such an opportunity, it didn’t stop her from paying respect to these famous legendary figures. "Tasha, Tan Sen, Ma Youfu... They live on in every corner of every world, on every page of every Spellbook, and are spoken by every Arcane Caster."

"Then what are you getting so sentimental for?" Delaford looked at Victoria, annoyed. "Aren’t we supposed to be on the same side?!"

’You use Divine Magic just like me, damn it!’

Victoria gave the goblin a look that said, ’Who’d want to be on the same side as you?’, and returned her full attention to the writing on the drawing. "This Elf Mage... what kind of Magic was he trying to create?"

"A defensive type, without a doubt—look at his calculations and model drafts here," Ron said, borrowing Silvia’s Walking Stick to point at several places on the drawing. "The intended effect of this Magic should be..."

"To push away surrounding enemies, buying the Caster more space for further Casting," Silvia added. "In that case, he would have needed to create a spell that could be activated quickly, like *Shield Magic*, otherwise it would be pointless."

"And it would need to be sturdy enough, with enough force—far greater than the Caster’s own," Ron said. He tried to take the drawing off the wall, but when he touched a corner, it instantly turned to ash, forcing him to stop. "It would even need to be able to affect enough targets. Affecting only a single target obviously wouldn’t be enough."

"This Mage even tried to attach some extra energy to it to damage enemies at the same time," Aiksuuri glanced dismissively. "Getting too greedy never ends well. This model was clearly beyond his capabilities, which is why he never managed to finish it."

"Maybe I can record it," Ron said after a moment’s thought, opening the *Weaving Introduction*. "I think the concept is good. It might be a useful reference later on."

The *Weaving Introduction* helped him firmly commit every detail of the entire drawing to memory. After he had recorded all of its contents, the drawing itself seemed to finally give out, turning into a wisp of ash on the faint breeze blowing in from the entrance.

"The Magic on it resonated with the *Weaving Introduction* and was finally depleted," Ron explained while reaching out to touch the wall behind the drawing. "What’s this? It feels like wooden planks."

"What’s so strange about that?" Yelena said casually. "Even a house built entirely of stone can have wooden shelves."

"No, it feels hollow inside."

"Move, move, let me have a look and we’ll find out!" Sera pushed Ron aside. Without even drawing her sword, she slammed her elbow into the wall, shaking the entire cellar.

"Even a stone wall couldn’t take a hit like that." Ron spat a few times. Other than Sera, he had been standing the closest. The wall was indeed hollow behind it, and a cloud of accumulated dust almost choked him.

However, in that same moment, the Shadow Spirit’s expression changed instantly.

"Do you guys smell... sulfur?"

"Sulfur... you mean the Hells?!"

With no time to answer, Yelena ignored the lingering dust and smoke and charged right in. The moment she entered, a huge pattern on the wall of the hidden space behind it flared with a crimson glow!

"A Spiky Agate and a curved, horned crown—that’s the symbol of Asmodis, the Lord of Nine Hells!" Constance cried out in alarm. "I’ve seen this symbol before!"

"Rose City has Devil’s Believers, too?" Aive raised an eyebrow.

"You’ll find Devil’s Believers everywhere. After all, they’re more... accessible to mortals than the Gods," Victoria said with a grimace. "So the Elf Mage here was a worshipper of a Devil Duke?"

"No wonder the Personification Monster found Soul Coins around here," Silvia said, approaching curiously. "It’s fine. This thing’s power should be limited to just glowing now. I don’t sense any alluring or corrupting energy."

"That’s because I turned it off," Yelena huffed. "Why else do you think I rushed in first?"

She walked over to a desk clearly used for prayer and "pulled" a journal out of the dust on top of it. "It’s written in Purgatory Language. He might as well have put up a sign saying he was one of the Devil’s Believers."

"I suppose most people wouldn’t come down here anyway," Constance said, covering her nose and mouth with a handkerchief as she scanned the secret room. "Yes, that’s right... this is the setup..."

"What did you say?" Aive glanced at her, her gaze casual yet pointed.

"N-Nothing," Constance stammered, startled for a moment before her expression quickly returned to normal. "Like I said, Rose City has Devil’s Believers. I went to check out one of their sites once out of curiosity. The arrangement was just like this. Very similar."