Chapter 543:
The Summoning Circle and the Voice
THANKS TO SOL, the summoning circle had completely vanished.
“Did that summoning circle look familiar to you?” my father asked.
Zinal and Fische tilted their heads thoughtfully.
“It wasn’t exactly the same…but I did see something like it once,” Zinal said.
“I know what you’re talking about,” Fische replied, staring at the spot where the summoning circle had been. I wasn’t sure why, but he seemed hesitant about what to do.
“What is it?” my father asked.
Fische looked at me.
“What’s wrong?” I softly touched Snakey next to me, feeling a little worried.
“Just a hunch…but I think that summoning circle was supposed to trap somebody and steal their magic energy.”
Zinal’s words made me stop breathing. Stealing somebody’s magic energy meant killing them. Why? Who would do such a thing?
“Are you saying something might be trapped behind this rock?” my father asked.
Zinal and Fische nodded unhesitatingly. “Except…while this summoning circle was similar, one part of it was different.”
I wanted to believe Zinal was right.
“Okay…guess we’ll break the rock. We have to check it,” my father said.
Zinal shook his head. “If it’s the summoning circle we were just talking about, there’s no need to smash the rock; just touching it ought to disintegrate it.” Then he touched the rock with the summoning circle engraved on it. A part of me hoped it wouldn’t disintegrate.
Crumble, crumble, crumble…clank.
As the rock disintegrated before my very eyes to reveal an empty space behind it, I clenched my fists. Zinal’s and Fische’s shoulders slumped in disappointment.
“I wish I was wrong,” Zinal said. “Ivy, you should probably wait right where you are.”
I hesitated for a moment, but I shook my head. I wanted to know what was happening. Whatever it was might still be alive—though, from the way the men were acting, I could tell the chances of that were very slim.
“Yeah, I get it,” Fische said with a sigh. “But we’re going in first, okay?”
I nodded. The men took the lead and went inside the hole in the cliff, which was spacious. Even Snakey could fit comfortably. We slowly walked inside by the light of a magic item.
“Oh!” Zinal stopped in his tracks. Since he didn’t say anything more, I just looked where he was looking.
Deep into the cavern, there was a bright-white monster lying atop a summoning circle. It looked like a sharmy, but it was about twice as big and only had two arms. It was emaciated and bony, and even from a distance, I could tell it had already taken its last breath.
“Is that a kamice? But its fur color…” Zinal’s voice was quiet and filled with confusion.
Kamice? Is that a type of monster?
Zinal took another step closer to the monster. Immediately after that, the summoning circle shot out a faint light.
“Please hear me…wi…come true.”
As I braced myself, I heard the voice. It was clearer than before.
“The voice…”
This time, the grown-ups could hear it, too. My father examined the cavern.
“Dad…I think the voice is coming from this monster.”
I didn’t know why, but somehow I knew. The monster in the summoning circle was no longer alive, so it didn’t seem possible. But I just knew.
“Somebody please…his…ish…come true.”
“Somebody please hear me. Please make his wish come true,” Zinal deciphered the message. “This is probably the guild master’s tamed kamice. The fur was a completely different color the last time I saw it, but I think that’s probably what we’re looking at.”
Fische nodded in agreement.
“This summoning circle is completely different from the last one,” my father said.
Zinal’s and Fische’s auras distorted a little. That had never happened before, so I shot them a surprised look.
“This summoning circle… I’m sure this monster cast it.”
“What?!”
I looked at the deceased monster, whose expression was severely twisted in pain. It was so tragic I had to look away.
This monster sacrificed its life for this…
Zinal and Fische looked anguished. What was their connection to this summoning circle?
“A hostage,” my father said. “This kamice was like family to the guild master, so it made the perfect hostage.”
My chest tightened with pain. The thought of any of my creatures getting taken hostage hurt so bad. The guild master must have been thwarted with worry. Was he lured to the cave under the promise of seeing his friend again? I might have been wrong. I hoped I was wrong. But…
“Those bastards!” Zinal kicked the ground.
“Let’s destroy this summoning circle,” my father said.
“Don’t!” Zinal yelled. His voice sent shivers through me. “This circle really is bad news. If you make a wrong move, you could suffer even in death.”
“What?!” we gasped.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to shout,” Zinal sighed quietly.
“No, it’s okay,” I assured him.
“This summoning circle is connected to everything in this kamice. Every time the circle is activated, the kamice hurts all over.”
Zinal sadly looked at the kamice splayed on the ground. That explained why the poor creature’s face was so twisted in pain.
“What does it mean to ‘suffer even in death’?” my father asked.
Zinal’s gaze shifted from the kamice back to us. “If you try to erase the summoning circle, the victim will scream and struggle, even though it’s dead. It’ll writhe in agony until the circle disappears. The suffering doesn’t end, even in death.”
My father and I both fell soberly silent. I’d never even considered such a thing.
“To be honest, we don’t know for sure if the victim actually is in pain, but I’ll never forget that voice as long as I live.”
“But, Zinal, we can’t just leave it…” Fische sighed.
“Is there a way?” my father asked.
“If we devour the entire kamice, the summoning circle will disappear, but that takes quite some time. Meanwhile, its voice will keep echoing around us and impacting its surroundings. Some monsters go berserk when they fall under the influence of a voice like that. And I’m sure this monster is still suffering, too…”
So it was the voice again. The voice still echoed through this cavern periodically, and it was seeping outside into the forest, making the other monsters go mad.
“So, um, do you think that’s why the Snakeys brought us here? Because they heard the voice?”
The men nodded.
“Probably so. But maybe they couldn’t pinpoint the exact spot because it was hidden behind a summoning circle carved into the rock?”
So it was that summoning circle. Seriously. Who put such a thing there?
“Do you think our monsters knew the guild master was a tamer because of the voice?” my father asked.
This time, Zinal and Fische didn’t look too sure. They both had the same quizzical stare on their faces.
“That, we don’t know. The voice they heard didn’t give out that information. But as fellow tamed monsters, maybe they could’ve picked up on something.”
“Gyagh! Grah!”
Suddenly hearing an anguished cry, we looked at the kamice. Its white fur was shaking, and its face was twisted even more painfully. Why?
“I thought so…” A pained look filled Zinal’s face. Was this what he meant when he said the monster was surely still in pain? So it didn’t happen only when the summoning circle was erased.
“Yeah…it really looks like it’s suffering,” my father said.
I had no words. I just stared at the kamice. Wasn’t there anything we could do?
This is just too cruel.
“Teryuu…”
“Teryuu…”
Huh? Flame?
I looked toward the voice to find Flame at my feet. It bounced up and down and then jumped into the magic bag hanging on my shoulder.
“Teryu-teryu-teryuuu.”
The little slime was staring hard at me, trying to tell me something. Wondering what it was, I looked in my magic bag. It had to be something…
“The magic stone!”
The black and green magic stone. My father had said that Flame “creates the magic stones we need with exquisite timing,” and from the way Flame was reacting now, it was clear. I took the magic stone Flame regenerated out of the magic bag, and Flame looked satisfied to see it.
“What’s that?” Zinal asked, peering at the stone in my hand.
“A magic stone that Flame regenerated,” I explained.
Zinal and Fische stared at Flame, who tilted a little away from them in response.
“So…how do we use it?” I asked.
I knew it would be useful, but how? I looked at Flame and met its expectant gaze.
…Well, let’s touch the magic stone to the summoning circle for a start.
I rolled the magic stone at the summoning circle. The moment it touched the line, the area echoed with sparking noises.
“Huh?!”
Somebody yanked my arm, threw me against his chest, and covered my ears.
Uh-oh. Did I mess up?