Chapter 66
As I looked around, countless statues stood in formation at regular intervals.
Statues lined the way from the entrance to the throne like royal guards standing watch over the path to an audience with the king.
But something about them was a little strange.
Every statue near the entrance was lying flat on the ground in a crawling pose.
I stepped closer and examined one of them in detail.
A dog-like snout and spindly limbs.
“Kobolds?”
They were monsters I'd seen so often I was sick of them in the abandoned mines on the early 20s floors.
But the kobold statues here were somehow different.
Their faces were full of pain, like prisoners sentenced to endless labor.
Their posture made it look as though they were crawling toward the king, begging for forgiveness.
I tilted my head and kept walking toward the throne.
A bizarre change caught my eye.
The closer I got to the end, the more the statues changed.
“This is….
At first, it was only a slight change.
A kobold that had been pressed flat against the ground straightened its back a little, and the next statue was kneeling.
Their long snouts shortened little by little, and muscle gradually began to fill out their once-skeletal bodies.
Instead of shaggy fur, thick, bristly beards covered their chins.
By the time I reached the throne, the statues looked completely different.
Small but sturdy builds and steel-hard muscles. Above all, full, long braided beards.
Instead of pickaxes, their hands held massive warhammers and razor-sharp battle axes, and they stood poised as if they might spring into action at any moment.
Only then did I realize who the master of the 20th floor was: a race that was both warrior and craftsman.
“Dwarves….”
I stopped walking and followed the flow of that transformation with my eyes.
From the kobolds at the entrance to the proud dwarves before the throne.
It was as if it were showing the evolution of a single race.
This long corridor was a history book.
A chronicle of how dwarves had transformed into lowly kobolds.
At that moment, the mural I had seen in the ruins on the 19th floor flashed through my mind.
“This is a phenomenon similar to what I saw with the elves.”
I remembered the story of the elves on the late teens floors, who lost the World Tree and fell from grace, becoming dark elves.
Then was this the same thing? Had the tower turned them into this too?
“Did some of the dwarves become kobolds? And then a war broke out or something?”
I took my phone out of my pocket.
I couldn't just pass up this scene.
Starting with the view of the hall, I captured the statues of kobolds transforming into dwarves with my camera.
“If no one else, Fridge will like it.”
I was absorbed in taking photos when—
Kiiiiiik.
With a grinding sound, the entire hall vibrated slightly.
Hidden doors opened in the walls and pillars all around, and over several dozen golems began pouring out from within.
I clicked my tongue and put my phone back in my pocket.
“You really can't read the room.”
I set Chohogi, who had been on my shoulder, down on the floor.
Sand surged up from the floor and formed sand clones.
“Chohogi, hold those guys off for me.”
At my words, Chohogi nodded and patted its chest. A confident gesture that said it had no problem.
Just like on the 29th floor, I enlarged its body and gave it a shield and spear.
Kugugugung-!
The golems charged in, dragging their heavy bodies behind them.
Chohogi and the mass-produced clones thrust their shields forward and collided with them head-on. Sparks flew with a deafening boom.
I turned my back on the commotion and moved forward without hesitation.
Those trash mobs weren't my opponents.
My gaze was fixed only on the throne at the highest point of the hall.
“The real one feels like it’s up there.”
My instincts were telling me that the throne was at the center of everything.
Sure enough, as I started up the stairs, the throne began to move on its own.
Kigigigigik-!
The royal seat began to change shape amid a tremendous racket.
The armrests became arms, and the backrest folded over a few times to become a torso. The lower body split apart, becoming legs that braced against the floor.
I stared at the sight, dumbfounded.
“... Kind of cool, actually?”
The words escaped me before I knew it.
A combine-and-transform mecha, of all things.
Every man's dream was being realized right before my eyes.
I could take it down in the middle of the transformation, but that would be improper.
So I waited for it to finish transforming.
It felt like a scene from a transforming robot movie I watched as a child.
The only difference from the movies was that grotesque things were embedded between those cool machines.
Wriggling clumps of flesh. Dozens of faces twisted in pain, as if screaming.
“Uwooooooo-!”
It let out a sound somewhere between a scream and a roar.
I formed the now-familiar Diamond Cutter and split it clean in two.
The giant mechanical monster collapsed.
I brushed my hands off lightly. A surprisingly bland finish.
“And I picked up the core….”
I stood atop the wreckage and looked around.
The golems that had filled the hall were being picked off one by one by Chohogi and the clones.
I nodded in satisfaction and began searching.
“Since it's a royal palace, there ought to be treasure or something?”
When it comes to dwarves, it's all about treasure. Besides, this is a royal palace.
Leaving a place like this empty-handed would be rude.
I wandered around the hall, tapping the walls and pushing the statues.
But nowhere seemed to have a tightly sealed hidden chamber.
“Ah, so there really isn't one?”
The moment I murmured in disappointment, the ring on my finger vibrated faintly.
[Sandworm says your method is inefficient.]
“Then do you have another method or something?”
[Sandworm explains that there are rules to how dwarves hide treasure.]
[Sandworm advises you to check that wall over there. Find the stone tablet of the king who laid down his crown.]
I walked in the direction he pointed.
The wall was carved with the life stories of countless dwarf heroes. Among them, I found the stone tablet Sandworm had mentioned.
It depicted a king removing his own crown and placing it atop a blacksmith's anvil.
A symbol of returning to being a craftsman?
[Sandworm says to pull the dwarf's beard.]
“Is that really right?”
Half skeptical, I touched the surface of the tablet. With a click, it moved.
The tablet sank inward, and a hidden compartment appeared.
Inside, there was nothing but a single black tablet densely carved with runes.
There was no sign of jewels or skill books anywhere.
“That's it?”
I took the tablet out. The runes, which looked like ancient characters, were impossible to decipher. It was hard to tell whether they were pictures or writing.
“How am I supposed to read this?”
[Sandworm says it's the ancient dwarf language, and that it can interpret it.]
As expected, Sandworm was reliable in situations like this. I held up the tablet so it could see it clearly.
A brief silence fell.
[Sandworm says the content is far too vast to convey in this manner.]
[Sandworm hopes you will quickly raise your rank so you can actually hold a conversation with it.]
“...? You're saying my rank is lower? Than yours?”
Sandworm bobbed its head.
“No, there's no way that's true.”
[Sandworm understands how you feel. It's not easy to accept.]
“....”
I was at a loss for words. It felt like a complete defeat.
That was when it happened.
Crack-!
On the far side of the hall, the last remaining mechanical golem was skewered through the head by Chohogi's spear and fell.
At the same time, a brilliant light burst out from my chest.
“Huh?”
I looked down at my chest in surprise.
The light was coming from the pendant hanging around my neck.
The World Tree's Leaf.
It was an item I'd forgotten about for a while after obtaining it on the 19th floor.
“What's this now?”
While I stood there confused, a system message appeared before my eyes.
[The World Tree's Leaf resonates with your deeds.]
[The World Tree responds to your heroic actions: slaughtering the filthy dwarves and desecrating their royal palace.]
“What? Slaughter? I didn't do anything like that!”
I had never even met any dwarves. I had only done a little investigating in the palace.
It was beyond unfair.
Regardless of my feelings, the system kept talking.
[The item is evolving.]
The light pouring from the pendant grew even more intense.
The leaf, which had been tinged with pale green, soon turned emerald.
It shone with a radiant glow, as if it had just been plucked from the World Tree.
[‘World Tree's Revived Leaf’ has evolved into ‘World Tree's Radiant Leaf’.]
[The item's grade has increased from 'Epic' to 'Unique'.]
[Special Ability: 'Vitality' has been added.]
[The wearer's vitality increases greatly, and resistance to all types of curses and status ailments is granted.]
[Special Title: 'Hero of the Elves' has been added]
[You have resolved two of the five long-held wishes of the elves. All elves will treat you with absolute respect and goodwill.]
I stared blankly back and forth between the system window and the brilliantly glowing leaf pendant.
In the middle of the dwarf city.
I had somehow become a hero of the elves.