“I Found A Secret!”

As I walked in, I couldn't help but cough because of a cloud of dust. The place had been abandoned for years with no one taking care of it after all. Everywhere was dark and dull, void of any signs of activity.

As I was passing by the deserted rooms filled with broken training equipment, I couldn't help but sigh.

'I briefly described this dojo when the protagonist came here, but even though it is in ruins, you can tell it was once a grand institution.'

Most of the valuable items had been taken already by the Alliance once Alistar and his Phantom Knights died in the war. They had hoped that they could find the key technique of Alistar and his Phantom Knights, the Movement Art: [Mirage Steps], and grow their own forces with that Art.

Alas, Alistar knew how 'pragmatic' the Alliance could be, and hid it while leaving behind a trial for whoever wishes to take it.

In this world, when mana and magic was confirmed to actually exist, many people debated whether the myths and legends recorded were true, and their thought process eventually lead to: "Could we create techniques based from the stories?"

Humanity was eventually successful after many trials and errors, creating the three currently used and different Art Systems. [Weapon Arts], [Body Arts], and [Magic Arts].

[Weapon Arts] are special techniques with different effects based on the type of weapon you are using. This category can be further divided into sub-categories such as [Sword Arts], [Mace Arts], [Bow Arts], etc. which can be used with their respective weapon. Some underlying theories and logic of certain Arts can be applied to different types of weapons than the intended weapon of the Art.

[Body Arts] or [Martial Arts], are techniques used to enhance the body. Whether it is strengthening the body like the sub-category [Strengthening Arts] or how you move with [Movement Arts]. Any technique that affects the body can fall under this category and sub-categories.

[Magic Arts] are techniques related to the direct or indirect usage of mana via spell-casting. It is utilizing the mana within you and the environment to physically manifest spells that you can cast. This can also refer to other categories and sub-categories like [Alchemy] or other crafting professions that utilize mana during crafting such as runesmithing.

These are the main three categories of Arts that Earth currently uses.

Back to the story…

"I've been searching for half an hour already… Just where is it?"

After walking through many dull and dark rooms, I was starting to get concerned.

Frowning, I kept on moving while raising some questions in mind.

'Did the location of the inheritance change, or is the problem with my memory?'

I shook my head to deny that thought before gasping and face-palming.

"Ah! I didn't specify the amount of time it took to find it, just that it took 'awhile'."

"At least it didn't take a whole day or afternoon…"

I comforted myself while continuing to look.

"Clink!"

Noticing that my foot bumped into something again, I looked down and after seeing it was a weapon, I picked it up.

It was a training dagger.

[Training Dagger]

[Offensive Ability]: ★☆☆☆☆

[Defensive Ability]: ★★☆☆☆/★★★☆☆ (Note: For weapons, it first shows it current defensive capability in its current state, while the second shows when it was new.)

[Speed Ability]: ★☆☆☆☆(Note: This can be interpreted as attack speed for the weapon.)

[Note]: A standard-issued training dagger used by trainees at the Phantom Knight Dojo, though this one seems to have been well-taken-care of compared to the others.

Seeing that note by the status, I immediately checked the bottom of the hilt. On the bottom of the hilt, there was nothing on the flat surface.

"Yes!"

I couldn't help but exclaim in excitement. This was one of the things I needed to get to the inheritance. I recalled the moment when the protagonist found it.

"I walked for awhile with my group before finding an old training dagger on the floor. It looked like no one had paid attention to it, probably thinking it was worthless.

The strangest thing was that there was no icon on the bottom of the hilt instead of something like the other training daggers we found. The scout of our group took it, saying that it was the best one they found so far and that it was good for training before we moved on ahead to a storage room filled with broken weapon racks and other things."

Looking ahead, I could see the storage room I wrote about. Despite myself knowing what room to look for, I wasn't sure at first because there were multiple storage rooms. But now that I had found the training dagger, I knew I had found it.

Walking into the storage room, I went to the bottom-left corner of the room where there was a pile of debris. Moving the pile, I found what I was looking for.

"There you are."

The pile of debris revealed a small circle-shape indent. That is why I needed this training dagger, it was the key to finding the inheritance!

What made this training dagger special was that it was made with a different type of material than other training weapons, and had the icon of Alistar attached to the hilt.

Now you may say that "There's nothing on the hilt!"

Exactly! The icon of Alistar is "Void" or "Nothingness" because of his superb stealth skills and speed!

Kneeling while holding the training the dagger, I placed the bottom of the hilt into the indent which a brief but bright light shined for a moment from the indent.

"Rumble!"

Something had shifted under me.

After I moved the training dagger away, the indent revealed a slot hidden beneath it!

"And in you go."

While mumbling to myself, I slid the blade of the training dagger into the slot, and turned it to the right.

"Click!"

After hearing the click, I felt a powerful burst of energy appear behind me.

Turning around, I saw what looked like a portal appear in the center of the room. It was a dungeon gate, or more specifically, a gate to an artificial dungeon.

Gates are what the demons used to establish connections to other worlds on Earth, forging a connection in which mana could flow into Earth at first. At first, the dungeons were only small, but once Earth adjusted to the influx of mana and was able to produce more mana at a larger scale, the size of gates and therefore dungeons, grew in size.

After their goal was accomplished, the demons stopped forcing gates open yet gates still occurred naturally. These are known as natural dungeons. Artificial dungeons are artificial worlds that are man-made, and normally cannot grow like natural worlds.

Back to the story…

Feeling the energy emanating from it, I couldn't help but gasp out in surprise.

"So this is what mana feels like…"

This was the first time I had been exposed to mana, let alone a dungeon gate that exhibited such potent mana. The pressure from the gate was almost suffocating.

"Gulp."

After observing the gate for a few minutes I decided it was enough stalling. I almost walked into the gate before smacking my face once I realized something.

"I'm going to need something to defend myself, even if it's a training dagger."

I pulled the training dagger out and after making sure the gate was still active, I walked into the gate.

As I was passing through the gate, I could feel the mana flowing like waves thrashing in water around me. It was sickening. Luckily, this feeling didn't last long as I was spat out by the gate about ten seconds later.

Struggling to stay standing, I fell onto my hands and knees.

"Ugh, I think I'm gonna pu-BLARGH!"

After vomiting for a minute which was not fun to do so, I got back up while wiping my lips with my sleeve.

"I do not want to experience that again."

Fortunately, that was something a first-timer that experienced gates went through so my reaction wouldn't be this bad when I have to go through another gate later.

Looking around, I was in a dark stone corridor with torches dimly lighting it. Judging from my height which is 5'11, the height of the corridor is probably around four meters or so while it was about the same width wise.

"This looks like a catacomb or medieval dungeon, it's giving me the creeps."

"Clack, clack, clack."

The sounds of clacking not far from myself cut my thinking short.

"They're already here? That's faster than I -"

A immense feeling of dread that filled me cut off what I was saying.

'Killing intent!'

Immediately after perceiving that, I leaped to the wall of the corridor, barely dodging an arrow.

Sweating, I looked ahead where four skeletons were haggardly running towards me, their glowing red eyes pulsing rapidly.

I recalled what happened in the book.

"We encountered a few skeletons, though they didn't pose much of a challenge to us. We were, after all D-ranked"

You see, those skelly-boys may not have been a threat to them, but for me…

"This… may be harder than I thought."