Chapter 45 - Shrine

Chapter 45: 45 - Shrine

Before his feet even touched the ground, King had already turned left and right to search for any signs of anything unusual around him. But no matter how hard he looked, the result was still that there was nothing.

"Strange... System, didn’t you say that I would see the wand after taking down the boss? I’ve been looking around this whole time, but I don’t see anything that has changed around here."

Not only did he look around, but he also tried stomping on the rocky ground a few times to see if there was anything special underneath, but there was still nothing different.

[This is something I really don’t know. I only know the basic rules of the dungeon. It is natural for this world to change its rules to welcome a noble guest like master.]

The system’s words had no informational value, but they were effective at flattering him, so even though King was not satisfied, he still felt pleased.

"You’re not wrong. When I came here, the protagonist wasn’t really the protagonist anymore."

King nodded his head, but his eyes still looked around, waiting to see where the ’surprise’ would come from.

Just then, the heavy sounds of mechanisms moving rang out from all around. The ancient stands covered in dust and dirt slowly began to rotate as if some kind of lock was being opened.

The entire dungeon shook violently. Dirt and rocks once again fell like rain. There were so many of them that even King couldn’t easily avoid them.

"Tsk, I’ve caused too much destruction just now, so the whole dungeon is in chaos."

Clicking his tongue, King ran over to Elias and hoisted him onto his shoulder. But before he could even run, the system was already screaming loudly in King’s head.

[Master! What are you doing?!]

[Be a little more careful. Elias is already very weak right now. If you’re not careful, he’ll really die.]

Elias was indeed the protagonist, but this was a mage world, not a world of martial artists with bodies of iron and steel. His body had only just reached rank I, but after being weakened by blood loss and shocked by electricity to that extent, he was already close to his limit.

"Hmph, and you still want me to be careful? I haven’t slapped him a few times to wake him up because I’ve already been extremely kind. If he dies because of something this trivial, then he’s not the protagonist. I’m sure the Heavenly Dao won’t just stand by and let him die."

King curled his lips, giving the system a sideways glance. This system wasn’t exactly bad, but it seemed way too timid. The slightest thing happened, and it would start panicking like crazy, looking anything but professional.

[...]

Faced with his master’s contemptuous gaze, the system awkwardly fell silent. Was it worrying too much? Everything it thought about made logical sense, but unfortunately, its master was a stubborn guy who was way too confident in himself.

The stands rotated clockwise around the arena. The more they turned, the dirt and rocks above kept falling nonstop, as if they wanted to bury the entire stands.

"System, I’m sure the wand is hidden underneath the stands. I’m way too familiar with these kinds of secret mechanisms already."

After only watching for a few seconds, King was already completely certain. He really didn’t understand how the stands could rotate clockwise like that, but that didn’t reduce his confidence in the slightest.

But before he could feel pleased for even thirty seconds, high above, the bottom of a huge structure like a shrine began to be revealed after the thick layer of dirt and rocks beneath it had almost completely fallen away.

King’s face instantly turned ugly, like he had swallowed a fly by mistake. The more confident he had been just now, the more painful the slap in the face was now.

"Cough, cough, system, you’re too incompetent. Just now, I was only testing your intelligence, but it seems you’re really useless. The shrine up there is obviously the most reasonable answer. Think about it, wasn’t Cerberus sleeping up there to protect the treasure above?"

The system was suddenly stared at and lectured by King, leaving it dumbfounded.

Clearly, its master had guessed wrong, so how had it suddenly become incompetent? But whatever, as long as its master was happy. The system existed only to serve its master anyway.

[Just now, I didn’t have time to react. Everything happened too quickly.]

Although it couldn’t deny King, the system also wouldn’t take all the blame upon itself. If it suddenly admitted so many mistakes, it would look like an incompetent and unreliable system.

It really is true that like master, like system. Neither of them learned this roundabout way of speaking from the other, yet they were exactly alike.

The shrine above gradually became clearer and clearer. The sound of giant chains clashing once again echoed everywhere.

The shrine only fell a little before stopping. Judging from the material, it looked quite similar to concrete, granite, and marble. King wasn’t really sure either, since he wasn’t an expert after all.

The huge shrine was suspended by five enormous chains, allowing it to remain steady in midair instead of swaying back and forth.

"The style of this shrine isn’t bad either... Wait, why does it look a bit like the Pantheon? Since there’s already the Colosseum, adding another situation of ’learning’ a bit too much is pretty normal."

King didn’t really care much about these details. He had never been inside the Pantheon anyway, so he was still quite interested. It was basically like getting a free trip to another world, which wasn’t bad at all.

But the more King looked, the more he discovered a huge problem. The height of this shrine meant nothing to him, but for an injured rank I mage, it was a huge problem.

"System, how the hell is Elias supposed to get up there? It’s so high. How is he supposed to get the wand?"

[Master, how about you try thinking about it from another angle? For example, maybe the wand will automatically find its way to Elias.]

The moment the system finished speaking, an extremely ancient wand painted red flew out of the shrine. It seemed to have locked onto a fixed target, so it flew straight toward King.

"Huh? Is it trying to take me as its master?"

This strange scene made King frown. Although this red wand looked very stylish and its color was extremely eye-catching, he was a swordsman after all.