Crimson Servant

"There is a hidden place here." Karl knocked on the smooth wall with his silver key. When the other companions heard the word "hidden", they were like giant dragons that smelled the smell of gold and came closer.

At the end of the transportation circle, they found the entrance to the central area on the second floor. This is the processing station for transportation materials. The assembly line has been out of service for a long time because of the accumulation of debris, and it has become a maze. Ancient artifacts have worn out over time. It has lost its value and is displayed in a disabled, derailed minecart.

John and others tried to find property in these junk piles, but found that it would take at least twenty years to completely plunder the place. Fortunately, no traps were set here, but the magical silver key still brought good news to several people.

It was an ordinary wall. Between the two protruding pillars, every stone brick was smooth and even, and fit together perfectly. Other than that, it had no other characteristics.

Jurgen put his ear against the wall and tapped a few places with his fingers.

"It's solid."

The lightning swept its feathers across the wall, and the raised dust sprinkled a layer of mist on the dark feathers. He didn't care, patiently and meticulously feeling the nerve transmission in every tiny pore.

"There's no air movement, no gaps."

If it hadn't been for the magic silver key that had already proven its worth, they would have thought it was just a joke to liven up the atmosphere. The frustration of rummaging through the boxes but finding nothing had plagued the team for an hour or two. Their gloomy mood could hardly be compared with this pile of weathered garbage. Become one.

The paladin squeezed the silver key in his hand, as if this was the only way he could confidently face the suspicious eyes of his companions. He searched around for people and saw the black-robed warlock holding a heavy book and flipping through it. He leaned over and found that it was an ancient Chinese dictionary. The text in the book was as dense as an ant colony. Carl took a glance at it, and his brain felt like being hit on the back of the head by a brick-thick dictionary.

Karl staggered back to alleviate the negative effects of knowledge on himself.

"Did you find a clue?"

John stretched out his hand and pointed, and then several people discovered an inconspicuous pattern high on the wall. After John's prompting, they learned that it was a hieroglyphic character of the ancient Asht people.

The old dwarf was very careful and quickly noticed the confusion on the warlock's face.

"Do you need help? I have some linguistic knowledge."

John shook his head.

"It's not that it's difficult to translate, but it's too simple this time, which makes me feel like something went wrong?"

"No need to doubt, believe in yourself!"

The warlock raised his eyebrows and looked at the speaking paladin in surprise. The silver key provided by the warlock seemed to be understood by the paladin as a friendly signal of reconciliation. He now treated John with strange humility, his eyes shining.

"I have 100% confidence in your abilities. Speak up, Warlock."

The paladin's trust did not bring a warm feeling to John, but instead aroused a chill, but both effects would prompt the warlock to tell his answer.

"You may not understand, but I have translated it twice, both pointing to an answer, but the meaning is too weird, which makes me question the accuracy of the dictionary."

"Warlock, if you can't believe in yourself, then believe in you who I believe in..."

John knew he had to spit out the answer quickly or he would have to spit it out.

"The answer I got from translating is: staff passage, no idlers allowed in."

The paladin was mentally prepared. He listened carefully, then decided that he was not prepared enough.

"...Wait a minute, can you repeat it again, what is the mysterious text on the hidden door?"

John glanced at Carl.

"Employee·work·pass·road·leisure·people·free·progress."

"...Are you sure you didn't make a mistake?"

"...I can translate from the beginning, for the third time."

The dispute finally ended before it turned into a physical conflict. Under the obstruction of Lightning, John gave up and slapped the dictionary on the Paladin's eyelids, asking him to read out the symbols one by one like a baby's flashcards.

The paladin stood behind the dwarf, expressing his views in defense and counterattack.

"We must remain skeptical about the world, and I think the same should be true about the translation ability of warlocks."

"Give me the key." Caught by lightning, John's weak body was unable to exert any strength.

"The staff channel is the staff channel, do we want to open it?" The paladin looked at the others, holding the silver key and ready to unlock it at any time.

"Wait a minute, Karl." The dwarf stopped the paladin. "If this employee passage is consistent with what we understand, it will be a shortcut to somewhere. And it is only for special people with 'employee' status."

John regained his composure.

"So the conditions for opening the door are very clear. How to become an 'employee' recognized by this ancient Asht architectural underground city. This should require some kind of identity authentication. Considering the convenience, the possibility of obtaining this identity authentication is not far away from us. Too far."

Several people understood and looked towards the unexplored depths of the central area.

"Are we going to search for the remains of a former Optitan employee?"

“Or get it personally with the approval of this former employee.”

Lightning shivered, as if John's subtext was frightening.

"You mean, is he... still alive? Or is he... a wraith?!"

"No, Lightning, the mages who claim to be noble will not do these rough jobs. They will leave this kind of work to their servants, followers or automatic golems."

"Phew, that sounds better."

"I would rather be a wraith or some dark creature." John looked at the paladin who was standing aside.

After entering the central area, a feeling of uneasiness lingered in John's mind. It was not clear whether it was the mental deficit caused by Crenzo's spell or other reasons, or both. John's eyes often glanced at the surrounding dark areas, and the detection in the dark became much less frequent. He once asked the dwarf druid if he was aware of it, and remained silent after receiving the reply that everything was normal.

He couldn't be sure whether his perception was accurate, and he shouldn't let the entire team fall into his own sudden pace. John must admit that the good atmosphere of Dark City has caused his mental weakness to a certain extent. Nora once laughed at himself for being in the late stage of persecution paranoia, and encouraged him in his own way, fighting fire with fire through a series of pranks. Mariana did have a complete and mature set of mental soothing skills, but she overemphasized the autonomy of John's thinking and refused to let John rely on her abilities. As for Francis, oh my God, that dark elf is even more neurotic than John. Countless people have been accidentally hurt by Francis because of the wrong way of greeting, and he has no guilt about it.

"No matter what it is, you have to face it."

Comforting himself with the good memories of the past, John followed the team into the depths of the maze.