Chapter 196

Ludger stood there for a long moment, staring at the soil beneath his boots. The faint traces of mana still clung to it, like the echo of someone’s last heartbeat.

Could he be one of them?

The thought came uninvited, and Ludger didn’t like it. He shook his head once, hard, but it didn’t help. The possibility dug into his chest like splinters.

Gaius wasn’t the type to go down quietly. If the old man ever got cornered, he’d probably make the entire mountain fly before letting himself be buried under it. That was the kind of mage he was—one who turned the world itself into his weapon.

Still… even that kind of power had limits.

Ludger exhaled slowly, his breath clouding in the cold air. “You better not have died on me, old man.”

He knew what running out of mana meant for someone like Gaius. For all his strength, the man’s body was still human. When the mana was gone, all that remained was flesh and bone—old, tired, and breakable.

If Gaius had been ambushed—if these bodies were part of that fight—then it wasn’t impossible he’d burned everything he had before the end.

Ludger’s gaze drifted toward the higher ridges, where the stone was cracked and scorched. His pulse quickened. The idea of Gaius lying somewhere up there, surrounded by the people he’d buried, made his gut twist.

“...No,” he muttered, setting his jaw. “You’re too stubborn for that.”

Still, even as he started climbing again, his chest felt heavy. For the first time in a long while, Ludger wasn’t sure if he was chasing a teacher—or a grave.

Ludger crouched near one of the shallow mounds and pressed his palm to the dirt. The mana signature was faint but fresh — less than a week old. Whatever happened here, it wasn’t ancient history.

He exhaled slowly, then raised his hand. The soil trembled and peeled away under his control, rising in thin, careful streams until a few shapes began to surface.

The smell hit first—the kind that clung to the back of the throat and made even seasoned delvers gag. Blood, rot, and earth. Ludger grimaced and covered his nose with his sleeve. “...Great,” he muttered, “definitely rotting.”

He snapped his fingers and used Tinder.

A flicker of orange light sprang to life in his palm, just enough to push back the dark. The glow revealed pale skin, torn armor, and faces that hadn’t fully decayed yet.

The bodies were new. Too new.

Some had heads caved in, skulls shattered like pottery. Others had holes through their torsos — clean, brutal punctures that could only come from a weapon formed with precision and overwhelming force.

Ludger crouched closer, scanning the wounds, the angle of impact, the patterns of the fractures. They weren’t random.

“Crushed from above… pierced straight through…,” he whispered under his breath. “Heavy stone and Earth spears.”

His eyes narrowed as the firelight flickered over the carnage. These weren’t wild monsters or bandits. Whoever killed them had control, not chaos. And there weren’t signs of a crossfire — no marks of return spells or counterblows.

Whoever did this… had ended the fight before it began.

Ludger let the flame die between his fingers, the darkness swallowing the scene again. “Gaius…” he muttered, his voice low. “What the hell did you walk into?”

Digging out all the bodies would take too long—and even Ludger, with his usual detachment, knew it’d leave its mark. The air was already thick with death; unearthing dozens more wasn’t something his mind—or stomach—was ready to handle.

He straightened, brushing dirt off his gloves, and took a slow breath.

His Seismic Sense could give him the layout, but it couldn’t tell him who those corpses were. And tracking beyond that wasn’t exactly his strong suit. Without footprints or fresh mana traces, he was nearly blind.

So, he did what he always did when the trail went cold—he started thinking.

If Gaius had killed that many people and

still

hadn’t returned, there were only a handful of explanations. None of them good.

The simplest—and most dangerous—possibility. Gaius could’ve burned through his mana to wipe out an entire enemy squad and then collapsed afterward. For a mage, being drained was the same as being mortal again. Ludger knew that firsthand. Without mana, a body couldn’t defend itself, couldn’t heal, couldn’t even stay warm in the cold.

If that happened in the mountains… Gaius might’ve just fallen where he stood.

He could have being captured. A stretch, but not impossible. Gaius’s control over earth was unmatched—but mages had weaknesses. If someone hit him with anti-magic gear or runic dampeners mid-fight, even he could be taken down.

The corpses here could’ve been his attackers. Maybe he’d slaughtered most of them before the rest overwhelmed him. If that was the case, they wouldn’t have left his body behind. They’d

take

him—either to question, or to make an example of.

He could be covering something up. Ludger frowned at this one. It didn’t fit the old man’s usual style, but Gaius wasn’t naive.

If he found something buried in these mountains—something tied to the assassins from the Iron Golem Labyrinth—and realized it was too dangerous to let spread, he might’ve wiped out everyone involved. Then gone to ground himself.

Disappear before the wrong people connected the dots.

It’d be just like him—grim, methodical, pragmatic to the end.

He was dead and buried himself. A bitter possibility Ludger didn’t want to admit.

If Gaius had known he was dying—outnumbered, exhausted—he could’ve used the last of his power to bury the evidence, sealing his enemies and himself under tons of rock.

No body, no grave, just a mountain full of ghosts and stone.

Ludger stared up at the ridge above, the cold air biting at his skin. Every theory led to the same place—he’d have to climb higher and see it for himself.

“...You better still be breathing,” he muttered, pulling his scarf tighter.

Then he started up the mountain again, one hand resting on the ground as his Seismic Sense mapped the way forward—searching for life among the dead.

Ludger reached the mountain’s summit just before dawn. The cold bit at his cheeks, wind slicing through his cloak as he crouched and pressed both palms to the ground.

He closed his eyes, letting Seismic Sense pulse outward. The wave spread beneath the surface, tracing every tunnel, cavity, and heartbeat it could find. The land came alive in his mind—a web of shapes, stone, and stillness.

No movement. No dense mana signature. Nothing that stood out among the dozens of shallow graves scattered below.

He exhaled through his teeth.

So he didn’t die here…

If Gaius had perished in this place, the mana concentration around his body would’ve been distinct—denser, heavier. Every mage left behind a trace; the stronger they were, the longer it lingered. But the mountain was cold.

That meant one of two things: Gaius was alive—or someone had taken his remains and erased every trace.

Ludger’s fingers drummed against the ground. “Alive. He has to be.”

He stayed there for a while, staring at the horizon. If Gaius had fought and survived, then after two days his mana reserves would’ve recovered by now. Even if he was injured, a man like him wouldn’t stay buried or hid.

But that also meant he could’ve gone anywhere.

Ludger replayed his earlier thoughts, sifting through each possibility again. Injured. Captured. Hiding. Testing something dangerous. Every scenario had a thread of truth—but following all of them at once was pointless.

He needed to pick one and move.

If he’d been captured, the trail would already be gone. Ludger rubbed his temples, exhaling a cloud of white breath. “One move, one lead.”

The mountain waited, silent and cold beneath his boots. Somewhere out there, his teacher had either buried a secret—or was still walking the earth to protect it.

Either way, Ludger didn’t plan to leave without an answer.

After a long stretch of silence and calculation, Ludger finally reached the conclusion he’d been avoiding.

He had one option left.

If Gaius’s enemies—or whatever force had turned this mountain into a grave—were still watching, then sitting quietly wouldn’t draw them out. He had to force their hand.

The idea sat in his chest like a weight. He didn’t like it, not one bit. But hesitation wouldn’t bring answers, and time was running out.

“...Guess we’ll do this the loud way,” he muttered.

He pressed his palms against the earth. Mana pulsed through his arms, and the ground around him began to ripple and churn.

The soil loosened, collapsing inward, turning to a rolling sea of quicksand that poured down the slopes.

One by one, the shallow graves gave up their secrets. Arms, armor, bones—all swallowed by the shifting sand and revealed under the moonlight. The air grew thick with decay, the stench cutting through even Ludger’s patience.

He gritted his teeth and pushed harder, expanding the spell. The quicksand spread until it bled down the mountain, carrying dirt and corpses alike.

“Come on… someone’s got to be watching.”

He didn’t stop there. He called to the stone beneath, reaching deeper—feeling the bedrock’s slow heartbeat—and pulled.

The boulders and pillars scattered across the mountainside rose like giants, trembling under his control. Then, one after another, they crashed downward, rolling in deafening waves.

The ground shook violently, the noise roaring across the valley like thunder. Birds scattered. Distant echoes bounced off the cliffs, traveling for kilometers.

By the time he stopped, the once-quiet mountain was a scar of moving earth and fallen stone.

Ludger stood at the center of it all, breathing hard, his cloak coated in dust.

The trap was set—the kind of noise no one could ignore.

He glanced down the slope, a grim smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “All right,” he murmured, voice low. “Let’s see who bites.”

By afternoon, the mountain had gone still again, save for the wind.

Ludger stayed hidden in a small crevice high on the slope, half-buried under rock and shadow, watching and waiting.

It took hours, but eventually figures appeared at the base of the mountain—small shapes moving hesitantly through the wreckage. Through Seismic Sense, he could feel their steps—light, uneven, curious.

Not soldiers,

he realized.

Too uncoordinated.

They came from the direction of Meira, a handful of townsfolk armed with nothing but shovels and nerves. Probably just locals drawn by the noise.

He watched them wander closer to the valley floor, stop when they spotted the bodies and the sand, and then quickly back away. No inspection, no shouting—just a silent, fearful retreat. Civilians. Which was fine by him. The bait wasn’t meant for them.

When night fell, Ludger remained in place. The cold crept deeper into the stone, and the world grew silent again—until he felt it.

Soft steps.

Far more deliberate this time, coming from the opposite side of the mountain. The rhythm was careful, precise, almost invisible to normal senses. But through the ground, Ludger felt the truth: trained movement. Balanced weight. Controlled breathing.

Not miners… not hunters.

Whoever they were, they knew how to move unseen.

Ludger’s eyes narrowed as he sank deeper into the shadows, mana coiling quietly beneath his skin. “Finally,” he whispered, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “The real ones show up after dark.”

Down the slope, the night air was thick with dust and the faint echo of shifting gravel.

Ludger stayed hidden, his Seismic Sense stretched thin like a net. Every vibration was clear—the crunch of boots, the scrape of metal, the quiet murmur of voices.

Three men, maybe four, were moving slowly across the debris field where the quicksand had dragged the bodies down. Their steps were measured, cautious—the gait of people used to ambushes or set them.

“You see this?” one of them whispered, crouching near a shallow crater. “The ground gave out here. Look at the way it caved—it’s not natural.”

Another voice answered, older, rougher.

“No landslide does

this.

The sand’s too fine, too uniform. Someone used magic—big magic.”

They moved closer to one of the holes where boulders had been expelled from the earth. Moonlight spilled faintly across the slopes, catching the edges of stone.

“The rocks look

pushed out,

not dropped. Like the mountain spat them up.”

“You think it’s someone related to the old man? Stonefist?”

A pause followed, tense and heavy.

“Could be. He’s the only one who can twist terrain like this, but we got him. A hidden student?”

That thought silenced the group for a moment. Only the crunch of their boots and the faint hiss of sliding sand filled the air.

Finally, a quieter voice spoke from the back.

“Orders?”

“We report first. Don’t touch the bodies yet—whoever did this might still be nearby.”

Ludger smirked faintly from his perch high above, the sound of their steps and whispers clear through the ground. They were cautious—smart enough to recognize a trap, but curious enough to walk straight into it. Exactly what he needed.

Before long, the figures vanished into the far side of the mountain, swallowed by darkness.

Ludger stayed still for a few seconds longer, listening—nothing but the faint hiss of settling sand. Not a single heartbeat or vibration left in range.

He stepped out from his hiding spot, brushing the dust from his cloak as his eyes swept the slope. He couldn’t even see where they’d gone. No silhouettes, no flicker of movement. “Professionals, huh…” he muttered. “At least they’re not amateurs.”

Still, the ground told a different story.

He knelt, pressing his palm flat against the dirt. The layer of loose sand he’d created had changed the entire terrain—fine-grained, unstable, and sensitive to any pressure. The men might’ve been silent, but their steps left tiny pockets of disturbance that even trained assassins couldn’t erase.

Through Seismic Sense, he caught the faintest echoes of their path—shallow impressions moving downslope, heading northeast. Their trail was faint, fading with every shift of wind and sand, but it was there and getting stuck on their boots. That meant that a bit of his earth magic was on them.

“Got you,” he whispered, a small smirk curling his lips.

The sand made it easier to read their direction, but he knew it wouldn’t last. The mana would settle again within the hour, wiping their traces away. He’d have to move fast.

He stood, stretching his shoulders as mana began to hum beneath his skin. The night wind whipped his cloak back, scattering dust around his boots.

“Time to hunt some scum,” Ludger murmured, voice low and steady.

Then he took off down the slope—silent, focused, and grinning faintly as the earth guided his every step.

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