The Last Legendary System

As the cave was the only clue they had on the glitches, there was no other choice but to risk it.

Benign searched for the firewing he had left on guard. Right on top of the cave, the cheeky creature lay asleep. The soldier looked away, shaking his head.

[Alert!]

The screen popped up with exhilarating words.

[Completed Mission!]

[Host completed journey through the desert.]

Benign read the screen twice. The second time, he mouthed the words to be sure they meant what he thought they meant. He raised his eyes to the skies. They had arrived fast, and with no casualties. While he felt relieved that he had naturally gravitated towards it, he still had doubts.

If the Special Treatment were gone, then he wouldn’t be lucky enough to coincidentally reach the destination.

Unless there was something else. He brushed his hair out of his face. ’I could be overthinking it.’ The most important part was that he had another streak to his record to restore the Special Treatment.

[Rewards Bestowed — Location Of The Ancient Artifact]

[Reward Loading...]

[Location: 100m away.]

[Error.]

[Location: Not Found.]

[Error.]

[Location: 1m away.]

[Error.]

Benign walked ahead with the elves with a blank stare. For a terrible minute, he had forgotten that his system was plagued with glitches.

He wouldn’t doubt that his existence in the world wasn’t a result of the glitches. His focus returned to the elves he noticed Vergil was eager to go in.

"Is this the only entrance?" he stood beside him.

Vergil nodded at him.

Benign studied the ten-foot-tall opening and the blackened edges around its mouth, as if a door had been burned away long before. His eyes settled on the two holes in the cave wall. They seemed deliberate. A mechanism? A lock? Or sockets meant for relics? "This—"

"Ignore it." Vergil waved immediately. He knew what he meant. "We always did."

The soldier’s eyes returned to it. He took out a bottle and the sickle. "Let’s just keep it filled."

Afterward, the trio walked to the mouth, and Benign placed the objects in it. Nothing happened. They continued into the cave. From the outside, the mouth led to a dark hall, and Benign took out a fire torch to illuminate.

When they entered, the walls of the cave pulsed. The darkness gave up light with no visible source of illumination.

Benign took it as normal for a supernatural place, but the elf beside him was frozen. He turned to Vergil, who’d been there before, and stared blankly in silence.

"That never happened before."

"It never did?" The soldier pointed the fire-torch still in his hands. "You just used this for illumination?"

The elf nodded, while his eyes searched the caves cautiously. "I believe something really had taken over this place."

Silence stretched between the two. They were only at the entrance of the lit cave. The inner parts of the cave could hold things they weren’t ready for.

"Um... you two," Stun called their attention.

The soldier and the scholar spun around. Stun pointed at the holes where the objects had been placed. "They are gone. When the lights came, the objects disappeared."

Benign’s jaw dropped. Had he traded a useful weapon and a resource for light in a cave? "Disappeared?"

Vergil rushed out to confirm the items, then looked back at Bneign. "I hope that weapon wasn’t very important."

The soldier stood speechless. It was only the very first weapon he snatched and killed with. He shrugged it off. No attachments at all.

"Let’s go further in." He changed the topic. Addressing Stun, he asked. "Are you coming with?"

The elf remained at the mouth of the cave. He gestured to the firewings. "I’ll watch them. We will be stranded if they run off, and you can handle yourself."

Benign forced a smile. Without good weapons, he couldn’t be so sure.

"What about me?" Vergil frowned. "Get in here to protect me. You could also learn a thing or two. Benign has those things under control. They wouldn’t run off."

Benign turned to Kendrick. The Mind-Link worked instantly. He wanted it to wait there, and the next second, he saw it sitting on its legs.

The other two did the same.

Stun turned to the creatures and then to Benign. "Fair enough."

When Stun got in, another strange thing happened. The cave, which didn’t even have a closing, sealed itself with the walls extending to the entrance. While the three stared at the seal, the walls around the holes flipped into the cave, and the objects were there.

Stun took them and handed them to Benign.

"These strange things are happening because a ’protector of the realms’ is here, so keep your eyes open."

Those words reminded Benign of what the old elf said.

The glitches had definitely not been his fault because it was for their very existence that he was brought here by the system.

As for the cave, he couldn’t be sure. They belonged to another civilisation that he had no clue about, so it shouldn’t be connected to him. He held the revolver since it had a better range. "Let’s go."

They got to the main hall in the cave. There was nothing there but hoes and holes in the walls. He turned to Vergil.

"Noria extracts some mineral stones here to boost our magic. It helps us create a portal to a completely different pocket realm that we comfortably live in." The elf said.

Minerals that boosted magic. Benign could see the need. If mere minerals from another civilisation did that, then it spoke wonders about what kind of civilisation that was. Benign stared at the glowing red and blue cobalt stones. They were just like dug-out diamonds, but their lustrous intensity differed.

’Why does this world feel like a parallel of my own Earth?’ He stooped down to hold a stone. There was no power surging into his body. He tossed it back. ’Does it work only on elves?’

He searched the walls with his hands. There was nothing to see or find here. No clues.

"Um..." Vergil strolled ahead of them. His writing instruments stayed behind him by Benign’s side while he stepped further. "That wasn’t here the last time."

Stun and Benign turned to their right, at Vergil’s direction

A twenty-foot gate stood ominously at the end of the cave. Its presence had been hidden, but when they spotted it, it became the only thing they could see within the cave.

Etched on the gate were intricately designed cups, bleeding out their mouths into a small fountain base below. Dirty scrolls littered about. There was a wall with strange writings too.

"Is that another thing my presence possibly caused?" Benign asked, moving closer to the gate.

"Yes," Vergil confirmed, stopping a few metres away from the gate. "It had never appeared before."