After finishing their meal, Zich and Lyla followed Romanne. She took the two and guided them down to the first floor where an entrance leading to the basement was. Zich looked at the stone floor that had been sloppily paved leading to the basement entrance and asked, “I thought this as soon as I saw it, but was this place blocked before?”
“Yes, it was blocked without a trace. They tried to make it seem like this place had never existed in the first place by making it unnoticeable. Thus, the other tribes even forgot about it—of course, except for the people who should’ve forgotten it.” As if she thought of Renu in her last statement, Romanne talked disgruntledly.
“Now that you mention it, what did you all decide to do with the Iron Tribe?”
“We are still discussing that matter. Since they lost their king, all their elders, and their main force, they are completely powerless, but they still have many elves left in their clan.”
“I suppose it would be a difficult problem to deal with.”
“Yes, we can no longer treat them as friendly neighbors like before, but we can’t kill all of them either.” Surprisingly, Romanne wasn’t particularly worried about this issue and also muttered, “But my son and the other kings will probably take care of that matter by themselves. They are kings for that reason anyway.”
As the giant storm of war passed by, Romanne was no longer interested in politics. She was only concerned about carrying out her role as a shaman faithfully. The three went down to the basement that wasn’t different from before; the only difference now was that instead of the Iron Tribe, the allied forces protected it. The door to the tree of fire was tightly shut, and they currently only knew of two keys that could open it. However, one of the two keys, Renu’s key, had disappeared in the fire (Zich confirmed this from Renu’s corpse that they had retrieved). Thus, there was only Zich’s Windur now.
Romanne took out the Lake’s Tear. The jewel looked mysterious and enchanting as usual, and Romanne walked towards the center of the basement while carrying it. There was an altar made out of stone there. Romanne squinted her eyes slightly, and Zich understood how she felt.
‘It’s this place of all places.’
The altar was at a place where the gruesome ritual to take her blood had taken place. However, Romanne was the type of person who didn’t let her personal feelings interfere with her work. Then, she called Lyla to her side.
“Are you going to place the Lake’s Tear here?” Lyla asked.
“Yes,” Romanne answered.
Lyla inspected the altar and saw that there were several unique-looking symbols engraved onto it. Her eyes searched the lines that made up the shapes.
“It’s a structure that brings out the mana of the Lake’s Tear. But what is this? It’s a pretty unusual pattern.”
“Ah, to humans, it might appear that way. However, it’s a magic circle that we elves use often. Its abilities include…”
Zich stopped listening to their conversation. Even after all his experiences, it was still difficult for Zich to understand the conversation between high-level mages. He blocked the room where the tree of fire was and moved towards the wall. The wall still had a big crack where the key could be placed.
“Lady shaman.”
“What is it?” Romanne had been eagerly exchanging opinions with Lyla before she turned to Zich.
“Can I try opening this door?”
When the Iron Tribe was in charge of this place, Zich didn't need permission to open it; but now that the allied forces were in charge, he could no longer open the door however he liked.
“Go ahead. After all, I was going to ask you to do that anyway.”
“I suppose it’s because you want to check if the power of the Lake’s Tear can repress the tree of fire.”
“Yes, I like how I don’t have to explain each and every little thing to you, Sir Zich.”
“It would never happen with my rotten personality, but if I become somebody’s underling, I am confident that I would be able to fantastically meet their whims and expectations.”
Romanne thought Zich’s words were hilarious as she laughed out loud. In comparison, Lyla simply shook her head; she couldn’t even imagine the thought of Zich becoming someone’s underling or disciple.
“Then, I will open it now,” Zich said and placed Windur into the crack.
Clank! They heard something click in place across the wall. Zich turned Windur. The bricks that made up the wall were pushed back, and the tree of fire appeared in view.
“It’s a splendid looking tree no matter how many times I see it.” Lyla moved next to Zich and stared at the tree of fire.
The tree looked the same as before. Instead of green leaves, fiery leaves fluttered on the tree branches and flames moved around the tree trunk. Romanne walked towards Zich and Lyla.
“Fortunately, the only one who can now open this wall is Mr. Zich, so I feel much more relieved. However, I can’t completely drop my guard.”
“We can’t be certain that there are no other keys.” Honestly, Zich was very surprised when Renu had another key to open this wall.
“Yes, and the owner of the key might also be like Renu and want to use this power for themselves. The reason why the Iron Tribe couldn’t get rid of their desire to rule over everyone was because of the power of this tree,” Romanne said bitterly.
Even though Renu and the Iron Tribe began a war to rule over all the tribes, they used to be a neighboring tribe. Zich stared at the tree of fire.
‘In the end, I didn’t figure out exactly why he betrayed the robed figures and began the war by himself.’
Even when Zich acted as a robed figure, he took the attitude of, ‘Regardless of the reason why you betrayed us, you will have to suffer the consequences. But we will work together for now,’ so he was unable to ask Renu directly about it.
‘Before I regressed, rumors about this tree didn’t spread around the world, so Renu probably won with the help of the robed figures. Thus, the Iron Tribe didn’t use this tree in the past timeline.’
The Iron Tribe had known the location of the tree of fire, how to reach the tree, and the way to use the tree throughout history. Zich thought that was probably the same before he regressed as well.
‘There must be a specific reason for it. The reason why there is a difference between this timeline and the past timeline.’
However, Renu was dead and the tree of fire quietly blazed. Zich thought of his sword, Windur. Zich had named it after a famous tree from an ancient empire in mythology. When he named it during that time, he hadn’t thought much about it. He just named it Windur because the sword looked very special and it looked like tree branches. However, after going through various experiences, Zich’s thoughts changed a bit.
‘The ancient empire and the tree.’ He knew about an ancient empire named Clowon, and he also saw a special-looking tree related to Clowon in an ancient ruin. ‘This sword might really have a deep connection to its name.’
Zich tightly clutched Windur’s grip.
* * *
Lyla helped Romane set up the Lake’s Tear, and they were able to successfully transfer the Lake’s Tear to Mentis. As the Lake’s Tear filled up the castle, the flames of the tree of fire visibly shrunk down. Romanne was glad as she sighed in relief. The wall closed and Zich and his companions quietly watched the tree of fire disappear from view.
Like this, what Zich and Lyla needed to do was over. After finishing a short conversation with Romanne, they went back to locking themselves in the library. After searching for letters similar to the ones on the tablet late into the night, they went back to their lodging. The rooms where Zich and his companions were assigned to were in the castle. Since they made the most contributions in this war, the allied forces assigned them the best rooms in the castle.
Fixing the blanket to go to sleep, Zich turned his head back at the sound of the door knocking.
“Come in.”
The person who entered was Lyla. Zich chuckled and laid down on his bed. “What’s the matter? Have you come to me in the middle of the night to tempt me? I’m not such an easy guy though.”
“Shut up and sit here.” Lyla sat in a chair in the room and pointed at a seat across from her. Zich obediently sat down. “There’s something I want to hear.”
“About what?”
“The reason why you suddenly decided to live a kind life.”
“Hmm.” Zich folded his arms and stared at Lyla.
“Honestly, I didn’t ask because I thought I could no longer use that reason to persuade you, but if I want to try to find a reason for you to not change into a Demon Lord, I thought it would be better for me to know what that is.”
“Wow, you’re thinking about this seriously.”
“Just think about what will happen if you become the Demon Lord and the amount of damage it will cause. Truthfully, I think finding this reason is the same as me saving the world.”
“The lady in front of me was the true hero all along,” Zich laughed.
“So can you tell me?”
Zich fell into thought for a bit, but he did not take long. “Well, it’s not hard for me to tell you, especially if it’s you.”
“Especially if it’s me?”
“Because you have knowledge about the future.”
“…Your reason to live a kind life is related to the future?”
“Yeah.”
Lyla squinted her eyes. The reason was probably much more troublesome than she predicted.
“You know that the memory I have is from my Demon Lord days, right?” Zich hadn’t yet told Lyla that he was a regressor and let her think that he also had memories of the future.
“Yeah, I know. Personally, I think the reason why your personality is so similar to Zich Moore is because of your memories as a Demon Lord.”
“The end of my memory ends with me dying in Glen Zenard’s hands.”
“…Yeah.” Lyla was not very surprised. The story of Demon Lords getting defeated by a hero was a topic that frequently appeared in children’s stories. However, Lyla thought it would be uncomfortable for Zich to talk about his death, so she was cautious about agreeing to his words.
“At that time, before Glen Zenard made his last strike, he told me that if I’m born again, I should live a kind life.”
“Is that the reason why you are doing kind acts…!”
“Those words left a deep impression on me.”
Lyla’s mouth was wide open. Lyla always thought that it was very interesting that Zich was trying to do kind acts (despite the sometimes awful methods) considering his bad personality. She was even more surprised to find out that the reason why he did kind acts was because of Glen Zenard’s words in the future.
“Well, I was the Demon Lord of Strength, so when the Hero Party defeated me, I felt a certain degree of admiration for them regardless of their superior numbers. Glen’s words were the reason why I was motivated to do kind acts. I did use my own interpretation though.”
“That’s what happened...” Lyla complimented Glen Zenard inside her mind. Regardless of their current situation, Glen Zenard’s words had worked well to suppress Zich from changing into a Demon Lord.
‘No wonder he is called a hero.’ However, Lyla had to correct her assessment of Glen Zenard because of Zich’s next words.
“But I’m getting suspicious of Glen Zenard.”
“Suspicious?”
Zich told Lyla some of his conjectures and predictions. The more Lyla listened to his words, the more visible was the shock on her face.
“W-wait! Then you are saying…!”
“Yeah.” Zich made a chilling smile. “Glen Zenard. That guy might not be the hero we knew. He might be a hypocrite, and a piece of trash beyond what we ever imagined.”