"Bell ——!"

Forcefully stabbed the short sword into the ice, the gray-eyed boy who clutched the hilt of the sword gritted his teeth and desperately stepped on the edge of the cliff, and his right hand was still holding a certain "megalomania" that was trembling to the point that half of his body was hanging in the air, almost hanging on him!

"Although I have known for a long time that none of you wizards have been practiced, but please climb hard to let me know that you have tried, Lord Isaac Grantham?!"

"Of course I'm trying, otherwise what do you think I'm doing?!"

"You're weighing on me!"

"Then you should be more grateful, because it shows how much I value you, just like the human cervical spine and vertebrae only exist to support the brain!"

"You know you're going to die as soon as I let go, right?!"

"Why do you think I won't pick you up before I go down?!"

"Shut up, don't give me any more reason to kill you!"

"I think your kind of thinking is very dangerous, and it's easy to get into trouble!"

...... "Click——!" The ice layer where the short sword was stuck suddenly had an extra crack, and the two who were arguing just now stopped abruptly in an instant, widened their eyes and swallowed their saliva fiercely.

"Just now, isn't it ......?"

"Shut up. ”

"Good. Isaac immediately stopped talking, and his body, which was two heads taller than the gray-eyed boy, hugged his shoulders tightly, and bit his lower lip like a baby, his expression frightened.

"Click——!" The second sound, this time Lu Sien clearly felt that the fixed short sword was beginning to loosen!

The gray-eyed boy swallowed his saliva and slowly raised his head, fortunately, there was only less than half a meter left from the top, and he could jump at this distance.

"Isaac. ”

"Huh?"

"Get ready, and then start the countdown. ”

"Oh!" Isaac, who had shrunk into a ball, nodded repeatedly, and after a few deep breaths, began to count down:

"Three, two, ah, ——!!!!"

At the moment when he didn't finish shouting, Lu Sien, who gritted his teeth, almost threw him upwards with all his might!

Isaac, who had curled up in a ball with a screaming scream, flipped in the air and fell into the snow at the summit in a standard dog-gnawing mud position!

"Click——!

In the next second, the dagger fell off, and Lusen turned in the air almost at the same time, stabbed the dagger into the ice again by inertia, rolled over, stepped on the hilt of the sword, jumped to the top of the peak, and then lay down beside Isaac with a ...... "pop!"

"I really want to stab you to death with a sword right now!" The gray-eyed boy was expressionless: "Why didn't the Holy Cross come to punish you bastard?"

"You Elemish people are so interesting, even we Lothair people don't believe in good rewards. Isaac, who was so frightened that his legs were weak, was still unforgiving: "Now it is said that good people don't live long, and disasters will last for thousands of years!"

"Wouldn't someone like you be immortal and youthful for the rest of his life?" a panting Lusen rolled his eyes.

“...... I know what you mean, but I accept it as a blessing. ”

For a moment of silence, the only sound of a blizzard was left in the roaring peaks, and the two struggled to get up and looked out at a cliff of ice that stretched far from their feet, narrow enough for only two or three people to pass through at once.

A path to the legendary Dragon King's City.

Although a black-haired wizard had gone to Cliff Mountain for "something special", Isaac and Ruson left the Guard's camp overnight and headed further east in the Valley of the Blood.

At dawn on the second day of their departure, a huge avalanche suddenly came from the direction of Cliff Mountain, and several surrounding snow-capped mountains and cliffs collapsed to varying degrees, and the camp of the guards fell tragically.

As a last resort, Edward gave up the search and led the Legionnaires of the Guard to join Brandon in the direction of Cliff Mountain, while Isaac and Lusen, who had left a day early, missed the avalanche and set out on a journey to find Niederhogg without knowing anything.

Of course, what they didn't expect was that a certain black-haired wizard was not only not late, but was already ahead of them......

"This is where my brothers and I set out during the last search. The gray-eyed boy muttered to himself as he carved a mark on the rock of the cliff with the short sword in his hand:

"It could have been avoided, but the captain of the Church Knight said that it might be some 'revelation from the Holy Cross', and that he would pursue it even if nothing was found... It was unfounded speculation from beginning to end. ”

"But it was his stupid order that led me to discover the legendary Nidhogg, and to hang all the robes who would believe in me as deserters on the gallows. ”

"But you survived. Isaac blinked, clasping his hands on his shoulders: "The only one survived." ”

"That's right, I was the only one left alive by the search party - if I had chosen to disobey the order, the best outcome would have been death in the watchtower. ”

The corners of Lusen's mouth showed a little self-deprecation, and he picked up a broken sword that had long been rusted by the snow next to the rock, and handed it to Isaac behind him: "This is the sword of a certain Ranger that we found here last time, of course, a certain Ranger from nearly a hundred years ago!"

"Look at the pattern on the hilt of the sword and the counterweight at the tail, all of which are nearly a hundred years ago and have the coat of arms of the Turin family - if I'm really right, I'm afraid this long-dead Ranger is the 'Black Duke' of the past!"

The gray-eyed boy's expression was very serious, and the curious Isaac looked at the hilt of the sword in his hand, and suddenly froze as if he had accidentally caught a glimpse of something.

Immediately afterwards, the "megalomaniac" lay down on the rock next to him in a dog-gnawing mud posture under Lusen's incomprehensible gaze, staring at an inconspicuous, cross-shaped carving on it with wide eyes.

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know if the 'Black Duke' really came here as you say he was," Isaac muttered in a low voice, a groan that came straight out of his throat:

"But there's no doubt that this is the way to Nidhogg!"

"Just because of that nick?" the gray-eyed boy frowned, "I guess it was carved by some ranger back then, and it was easy to come back as a marker." ”

"No, you don't understand it - this engraving can't possibly be carved by 'which Ranger' carved it, absolutely impossible!"

The excited Isaac almost knelt on the ground and stared at Lusen with an extremely pious expression: "This carving of the Holy Cross is the standard pattern of the Holy Cross coat of arms nearly five hundred years ago, and the Holy Cross Church has not expanded to its current scale at that time, and only has absolute influence and voice in the Sackland region!"

"That's why the Holy Cross coat of arms back then was also called the 'Ancient Sakran Cross', which is completely different from today's Holy Cross - except that they are all cross-shaped, there is no similarity at all, and it is absolutely impossible for a Ranger a hundred years ago to engrave this symbol!"

"The only person who could have carved it could have been one person—the only person who had known the 'truth' hundreds of years ago, the former missionary of the Church, the first wizard of the future, 'Logan in a hat'. ”

"You've found the same way he got to Nidhogg!"

Rogan in a hat, a missionary who turned his back on the faith, the first wizard...... Hearing this, Lusen's expression was even more incredulous than Isaac's, and it was even more incredible:

"Isaac, you... Where did you hear about that—I mean, Logan the Hatted is the First Wizard and was once a member of the Holy Cross?"

"These are the top secrets of the Nine-Pointed Star Wizard Tower, and theoretically only the twelve elders of the Wizard Tower are qualified to know the truth - in order to find Nidhogg, of course I will collect as much information as possible, otherwise do you think I am here to make wool?"

Isaac Grantham, who straightened his waist, raised his chin proudly, and the next second, his ears moved slightly, and he looked at the other side of the cliff with a frown:

"I mean, there's going on over there?"

"How is it possible, this is already the easternmost side of the Valley of Bloodbones, even the Ice Plain Werewolf will definitely not be able to live in this kind of place......"

The words stopped abruptly, and a drop of crystal sweat oozed from the corner of the gray-eyed young man's forehead, sliding through his trembling cheeks and falling on the snow without a trace:

"That's, that's ......"