BXBX NOVEL Chapter 66 - Ball
Heidi finally sensed that the magical power was right in front; perhaps there was only one last intersection left. Meanwhile, after roughly estimating the distance that the party had covered and the terrain of the Dark Range in this area, Gawain believed this to be the center of the mountains.
The Gondor construction team might have really emptied a section of the mountains to build this inconceivably massive facility!
What exactly was here that was worth building such a monstrous-level facility — for research or keeping guard over something?
However, regardless of what was here, they had ultimately given up this place.
Heidi replenished the energy for the magic ball of light again. The ball of light that had begun to dim lit up the large areas around them once more. Gawain saw that ahead was a neat corridor laid using gray stone slabs. Magic crystal lamps that had lost their efficacy were mounted on the walls on both sides of the corridor. There were also some tightly shut doors. And straight ahead, at the end, was a door leaf casted in bronze. The symbol of an eye and a triangle was carved on that door.
The bronze door was not completely shut; a very wide gap was left open. Gawain initiated his Danger Detection ability and did not find any traps or potential threats such as toxic gases and the like behind the door.
However, this did not mean they could let down their guard. Before pushing open the door, Heidi first summoned a rune resembling eyes that radiated a faint glow. This rune drifted gently past the gap. A soft light floated in Heidi’s eyes at the same time.
“It’s a circular, empty room inside. It’s very big. There are many broken long tables and shelves… I can see lots of pipelines on the walls. The center of the room is a sunken pit… There is an odd, spherical item in the pit. Right in the middle of the ceiling, there are also numerous hanging chains and tools.” Heidi frowned as she described what she saw, but all of a sudden, she cried out under her breath. The magic was cut off following that.
“What’s going on?!” Gawain instantly focused on Heidi nervously.
Heidi rubbed her eyes, sounding extremely embarrassed. “I crashed into a wall.”
“…Uh, was there anything that appeared dangerous or resembled a trap?”
Heidi shook her head. “No, it just looks like a laboratory, but it is many times bigger than the laboratories I know of, and there are many pieces of equipment that I can’t figure out. Besides, I’ve confirmed that the magical power is coming from the sphere in the center of the room. However, this energy form is something I’ve never come into contact with before.”
Having confirmed that there weren’t any traps or out-of-control ancient magical puppets, Gawain heaved a sigh of relief. As for the odd energy form that Heidi spoke of, they could only study it in detail after entering.
Two stout soldiers came forward and, together with Knight Byron, pushed the ancient, dusty bronze door hard. The rusty and weathered hinges let out a creaking noise from their forceful combined push. In this silent and airless space, the sound of hinges turning was especially piercing, and it resounded very, very far out along the corridor.
Heidi instinctively grasped her staff tightly as she turned back, looking towards the dark corridor. She was almost afraid there would be some indescribable ancient monsters in the darkness that could be roused by the sounds of the bronze door opening and spring out of the shadows. But in the end, nothing happened.
The door was pushed opened. Gawain stepped in, and in next to no time, he saw the things that Heidi had seen — a circular hall, damaged long tables, shelves spread along the hall, the magical power ducts, a depressed floor in the center, and a big rock-like ball lying in the pit.
Gawain stood before the sphere. From a rough estimate, its diameter was about 1.5 meters. Its shape could be considerably well-defined, not taking into account the coarse and uneven surface; this could almost be a standard sphere. While its material seemed to be rock, under the shine of the Illumination spell, it also showed hints of a metal-like texture.
It was somewhat like a natural ball-shaped rock, yet also too round. However, if they were to say it was a man-made magical equipment, it was entirely different from the creation styles of the Gondor Empire. Moreover, there were neither runes nor metal connection points on its surface. It didn’t seem like an ancient magical equipment no matter how they looked at it.
“The magical power is indeed coming from inside this.” Heidi was frowning as she continued, “But it’s too weird. I’m even finding that it’s not quite like magical power, but a kind of… distinct energy wave? Ancestor, was this also produced by the ancient Gondor Empire?”
“No, it doesn’t seem so.” Gawain’s brows were furrowed as he reached out and tapped the ‘rock ball’. It felt about the same as a real rock, very hard. “Judging by the circumstances here, instead of saying this was something they had created, it was more like something they were researching…”
“Was this entire facility built to study this ball?” Knight Byron found it very inconceivable. “The Gondor Empire spent so much effort just to study a ball?”
Gawain thought for a moment and felt that even if it was the Meteoric Era where magical power was free, the people then probably wouldn’t be silly to that extent. “No. When this facility was evacuated, the people here took almost everything that they could with them in an orderly manner. It’s unlikely that they would instead leave the most important item behind. This ball was probably an item they were studying, but most likely just one of the items and a not-too-important one, something they’d decided to give up on. Presumably, they had not had much progress after studying it for some time, and just as they were preparing to dispose of it, orders to evacuate came from the top, so this was cast aside here.”
“So we’ve gone through such a long hassle and only found this thing.” Knight Byron rubbed his chin. “Your Excellency, how shall we deal with it?”
Gawain was slightly troubled too. How were they supposed to transport this rock ball out? He reached out a hand and pushed the surface of the ball as he muttered, “It occupies so much space and is heavy too. No wonder the people of Gondor back then had—eh?”
With a push from him, the rock had shakily rolled out of its position.
Gawain felt slightly embarrassed at once. “It’s not heavy?”
The weightlessness of this ‘rock ball’ was beyond imagination!
Initially, Gawain had thought that this lump had to weigh at least a ton; he never expected it to shift with a light push. When he tried again, he estimated that the rock probably weighed only a bit more than ten kilograms. To the extent that even Heidi could easily push and walk with it; this showed that it wasn’t made of rock at all!
Either that, or its inside was hollow…
Suppressing the urge to break it open on the spot to look inside, Gawain formed a judgment according to the scale of this research laboratory and the remaining traces around the ball. This ‘rock ball’ should have been a research object of ‘first species of safe wondrous items’ and ‘harmless with peculiar attributes’ in this research facility. Hence, he decided, “Let’s bring this thing out, transport it back to the camp, and properly study it… Hold on, it’s not appropriate to put it directly in the camp. For safety’s sake, put it on the newly leveled piece of land beside the camp. Send two soldiers to watch it. We’ll specially build a tent for it tomorrow.”
The Gondor Empire and the current era had several levels of generational difference in technology. A safe, harmless object of research then might not still be harmless today; therefore, it was better to be slightly more cautious.
They were nervous on their way in but were now pushing a ball on their way out. One had to say, the scene of pushing a ball within the team allayed the soldiers’ nervousness immensely, yet it also gave Gawain a deep sense of conflict. He felt that the atmosphere of his ‘first alternate-world relic exploration that didn’t come easy’ had been ruined by such a ball. It was like you were wearing the legendary armor, carried the best sword in the village, accepted the title of ‘valiant hero’ bestowed by the emperor, and even teamed up with four sages. Then, all of you started ambitiously on the journey to exterminate the demon king, but in the end, the demon king turned out to be Patrick Star 1.
The people of Gondor in those days really had nothing better to do: why were they studying a ball?!
With Heidi’s magic marks and the almost hack-like map in Gawain’s mind to show the way, the team’s speed on their return was many times faster than before. Although they were now also pushing a ball, this unbelievably light thing couldn’t be considered much of a burden. When it came to upward slopes or steps, Heidi would directly summon a Sculpture Hand to lift it.
The team went back the way they had come just like that. Very soon, the faint light of the exit appeared ahead.
Meanwhile, the soldiers outside had been waiting for a long time and were even starting to feel uneasy. The sounds of footsteps and commands that came from deep within the central door finally had them heaving sighs of relief. However, the noise coming together with the footsteps made them stare at one another. That sounded like something rolling on the ground…
The sight of two soldiers pushing a ball appeared before their eyes. As a matter of fact, one person was enough for the job; this was mainly to maintain balance.
“Let’s end it here and get back.” Returning to the entrance hall once more, Gawain let out a long exhale. He rested a hand on the rock ball. “This is the result.”
The soldiers looked at one another.
The next day, everyone who moved about at the edge of camp all saw this odd sphere.
It had been parked on an empty area of land outside of camp with several fully armed soldiers keeping guard beside it. The surrounding ten-odd meters around the sphere was circled by wooden stakes planted into the ground and linked using rope to form a partition.
It looked utterly embarrassing, the bunch of soldiers keeping guard must have lost at cards; such murmurs of discussion spread among the people.
Rebecca heard this news after she woke up and quickly rushed over to watch the fun. Seeing that both her ancestor and Aunt Heidi were present, she squeezed her way in, also looking curiously at the ball. “Lord Ancestor… this was what had been brought back from the remnants last night?”
“We also had some metal samples and whatnot. There was a considerable amount of good stuff that could be dug from the ruins,” Gawain said with a nod. “But it’s just this thing that we can’t figure out.”
Rebecca curiously circled the big ball twice, then came back to ask, “Can I touch it?”
Gawain waved his hand. “Don’t throw big fireballs at it. You’re free to do anything else.”
Although this ‘rock ball’ was strangely light, it was actually really solid. He had already tested it. Under the premise that no superpower be used, striking on the sphere using ordinary swords caused almost no damage; hence, giving it a few knocks should be no problem.
However, throwing fireballs at it would not necessarily be so; especially given Rebecca’s stubborn temper, she just might throw a super fireball the size of a bathtub at it…
Rebecca curiously placed her ear on the surface of the sphere while tapping on it twice with her staff. She turned and shouted to Gawain, “It’s not hollow!”
“Yes, it is solid, yet it’s also unbelievably light.” Gawain shrugged. “Your Aunt scraped bits off it and found that it’s a compound material with extremely high metal content. If the entire ball was made of the same material, it’d definitely be able to kill a man with its weight.”
“Perhaps the outer layer is only its shell, and the inside is actually an extremely weightless material?” A deep interest in research emerged in Rebecca. “Shall we cut it open and have a look?”
Gawain laughed. “That was what I’d been planning on, but not now. We’ll first use all sorts of methods that won’t cause damage to study it. If there are really no results from it, then we’ll consider cutting it open. After all, the Gondor people back then had used so many tools to study it but ultimately did not break its outer shell. There’s probably a reason for that.”
Rebecca appeared to be slightly disappointed. “Oh…”
Gawain glanced at her with a smile. “Compared to researching this ball, I have something else I would like to have you do… if you have the time.”
Rebecca’s eyes lit up instantly. “Ah? I do, I do! I’m not personally needed with Magic Web 1 for now. The craftsmen and apprentices are currently digging ditches to smelt quartz sand. I’m idle now! What do you want me to do?”