"A basement, is it?"
At Regulus 45’s call, Jin and the others returned inside and stared down at the staircase that had opened in the floor.
"Even Regulus 45’s preliminary investigation didn't detect this. There must have been a special barrier in place," Jin concluded after examining the entrance.
Hidden rooms and passages could usually be found using Sonar. The fact that it had been concealed suggested a highly advanced barrier was at work.
"I will enter first to confirm whether it is safe."
Hardly had the words left Regulus 45’s mouth before he vanished into the opening in the floor. The clatter of his footsteps faded as he hurried down the stairs, eventually falling silent.
The group waited in the quiet for about five minutes until the sound of footsteps returned. Regulus 45 reappeared.
"There is no danger. It is quite an intriguing place," he reported.
It seemed it would be faster to show them than to describe it.
"Alright, let's go."
They descended the stairs in a single file: Regulus 45, Reiko, Jin, Hanna, Saki, Stearena, and finally Elsa.
To their surprise, the walls were lined with Ether Light (AL) panels that illuminated as the group approached. Given that they hadn't reacted to Regulus 45, they appeared to be keyed to respond to humans—a sophisticated bit of magi-engineering.
The stairs consisted of about fifty steps, leading down to a fairly deep first basement level. At the bottom stood a door. Regulus 45 pushed it open.
"Whoa!"
"How interesting!"
"Hmm, this is..."
"What in the world is all this?"
"...Incredible."
Each of the five reacted in their own way.
What lay before them was a sea of stars.
Or rather, it was a mural and ceiling painting depicting the night sky. Dim, ambient starlight filled the room, which appeared to be hemispherical. It was like a motionless, ancient planetarium.
"Welcome, one and all."
A voice echoed from nowhere.
"Who’s there?" Jin asked.
"I am an entity left behind to convey the truth to those who visit after a vast span of time."
"...An artificial intelligence?"
"You may think of me as such."
In essence, it was something like Laojun, though its functions seemed limited to relaying this specific message.
"And this 'truth' you are meant to tell...?"
"It concerns why the people of the Leonard Kingdom vanished."
The revelation was jarring. The citizens hadn't simply died out; they had disappeared for a specific reason. Everyone leaned in, eager to hear the explanation.
"Tell us."
"That is the reason for my existence."
The story the mysterious voice told was nothing short of astonishing.
"Two hundred and thirty-four years ago, an unknown plague swept through the kingdom. It was named 'magical consumption fever.'"
"Magical consumption fever..."
It was the very illness Jin and Elsa had struggled with recently. It seemed there had been a major epidemic in the past as well.
"The plague began in the north and gradually moved south. The mortality rate was staggering, and initially, there was no way to prevent it. Bodies were burned to ash, and the kingdom's population was halved."
Whether by luck or isolation, the kingdom had no diplomatic ties with the neighboring Klein Kingdom, Celuroa Kingdom, or Kingdom of Egerea at the time, so the disease never crossed the borders.
"While searching for a cure, the government considered an exodus. Since the plague was moving south from the north, escape lay further south. The entire nation began constructing massive ships."
Jin wondered if they could have possibly finished them in time, but the voice continued.
"The ships would not be completed before the plague arrived. Thus, another refuge was chosen: the heavens."
"The heavens?!"
"You mean... the sky?" Saki asked.
"Specifically, the moon. The Leonard Kingdom possessed an ancient magic circle of unknown origin."
A magic circle was an arrangement of magi-formulas in a circular pattern—essentially a magi-circuit composed entirely of magi-formulas. By circulating mana in a ring, the effect could be amplified. However, they were notoriously difficult to handle and were a magi-engineering technique that had largely been lost to time.
"Legend stated it would create a path to the moon floating in the heavens."
Jin assumed it was a type of teleportation magic circle.
"The royal family went first, followed by the ministers. Then the ritters, the soldiers, and the commoners. They teleported one after another, and not a single person ever returned."
"..."
"The few who remained succumbed to the plague. I was created by one of the survivors, the magi-technician Alexsta Staycle, and charged with the duty of recounting these events to those who came after."
In short: a plague broke out. To escape, they used a legendary teleportation magic circle. Most of the population teleported and was never heard from again. The voice was a Messenger left behind by a dying magi-technician.
Jin organized the facts in his head, but several questions immediately surfaced.
"That magic circle... did no one verify the destination first?"
Jin found it hard to believe they would be so reckless, but the voice replied:
"No. The first to step onto the circle was the king of that era, Lentra XI. The King declared he feared nothing and went through first."
Jin felt a surge of silent criticism. To say he feared nothing was a hollow boast; he had abandoned his country because he feared a plague, and he was the very first to flee.
"Even if they didn't come back... couldn't it just be that they had no way to return?" Saki speculated.
"No. The magic circle itself is easily drawn, and it requires almost no mana."
"So if they wanted to come back, they could have?"
If that were true, did it mean the destination was so pleasant that no one wanted to leave? Saki couldn't think of any other explanation.
"Do you know the design of the magic circle?" Jin asked, his interest piqued.
The answer was disappointing. "That information was not transmitted to me. Therefore, I do not know."
Jin wasn't too bothered since he already had Warp Gates, but the technology of teleporting using only a magic circle was fascinating. However, the reason for their disappearance bothered him even more.
"You’d think at least one or two people would have come back to tell everyone what it was like over there."
He wondered if the plague had truly been so terrifying that they refused to look back, then a sudden, grim thought occurred to him.
"...No way."
Jin’s brow furrowed. Elsa, noticing his expression, followed his train of thought to its logical, horrific conclusion.
"...Ji-Jin-nii! If they really went to the moon... then the moon... the moon is... a... va... cuum..."
Jin nodded slowly in silence.
"Yeah. I was thinking the same thing. I doubt the people of that era even conceived of the idea that there’s no air at the destination."
Saki and Stearena turned pale. Both understood enough of the science Jin had taught them to grasp the implications.
"Ji... Jin, does that mean... everyone who teleported..."
"Jin-kun... if the destination was a vacuum... then... that would be the end of them, wouldn't it?"
Jin nodded with a pained expression.
"Only if the destination really was the moon. I hope for their sake it was just somewhere far away in this world."
"...But if that were the case, wouldn't someone have come back eventually?"
"...Normally, you would want to see your home again."
"But since they never did... I suppose that’s the answer, isn't it, Jin?"
It was highly probable that the people of that era had died at their destination before they even realized what was happening. The Messenger had no way of knowing this, nor did it have the scientific knowledge to understand it.
"Is there anything else we should know?" Jin asked, trying to shake off the gloom.
"No. I was created solely to convey those facts."
"I see."
With heavy hearts, the group turned to return to the surface. Only Hanna remained confused, wondering why everyone's faces had suddenly gone so dark.
Once they had all climbed the stairs, the hole in the floor slid shut. Jin used Craft Magic to reseal the activation magi-stone in the wall, then walked outside in silence. The others followed.
Outside, the same blue sky that must have watched over the ancient kingdom stretched out above them, vast and indifferent.