At the End of the Hidden Greenery - Chapter 300
How much farther had they walked? At some point, Jiwoo and the others emerged into a vast, open space.
“Wow…!”
Jiwoo forgot for a moment that they were heading somewhere dangerous and stared in awe.
Enormous tree roots supported the sprawling cavern as though sheltering the entire space beneath them. Their faint glow made them look like long, slender moons suspended underground.
Between them, countless luminous organisms shone across the ceiling like colorful stars. Some were mushrooms, while others were bell-shaped flowers resembling lilies of the valley, glowing like tiny lamps.
Underground, there was a different kind of night sky.
“It feels like I’m looking at the night sky even though we’re underground.”
“Those are sometimes called underground constellation flowers.”
Following Jiwoo’s gaze, Lugarmel gestured toward the ceiling.
“They bloom in almost exactly the same positions as the constellations in the sky. Even if you pick them, they eventually bloom again in the same places.”
“Really?”
“What does that one look like? Do you recognize it?”
“That one is… the Lightning-Struck Tree constellation.”
Skiass had taught her about it before. The constellations in this world had shapes and names entirely different from the ones Jiwoo knew, but they were beautiful and fascinating enough that she had memorized a few.
The Lightning-Struck Tree had been the first, since she had been told that its position alone could be used to tell the season.
Still, those were plants on the ceiling, so it was fascinating that they truly glowed in positions similar to the stars above.
“Do you think Skiass would like it if I brought him one?”
“How can you be so thoughtful? Though I think Solmih might be the one who comes running rather than Skiass.”
“Solmih likes things like that?”
“Mm, not exactly…”
As they continued their affectionate little conversation, Jiwoo could feel a prickling stare from beside them.
‘Why are they wasting time talking about something so trivial?’
Shaen was glaring at them with exactly that expression. Normally, he would have voiced the thought without the slightest restraint, but thanks to Quilon, he seemed to be holding himself back.
Jiwoo only paid attention to his displeasure for a moment, however.
She had expected the depths beneath El Ragneil to be dark and dreary, filled with little more than the smell of damp stone, but the underground was far more beautiful than she had imagined.
She had once spent a summer night in a forest filled with fireflies, and this reminded her of that experience while still feeling distinctly different.
“There’s a river down here too?”
It was closer to a stream than a river, and unlike the water aboveground, its surface was pitch-black. That only made it more beautiful, however, because the constellation flowers overhead were reflected perfectly in the dark water.
Perhaps because of the stream, insects that lived underground were also fluttering nearby.
“Ah, damn… What a, kuhm, miserable place to live.”
Naturally, the insects were drawn to Kelvar, making him grumble under his breath. He was still trying to moderate his language because Jiwoo was there, but judging from his expression, that restraint probably wouldn’t last much longer.
“I should take some of this with me. It’s not like I come down to gloomy places like this often, so I might as well get what I need while I’m here…”
Apparently, the water flowing underground was quite useful, because he even collected some as they passed.
The Ellandos aboveground constantly radiated vitality outward, reaching high and wide in every direction. Down here, however, all that life seemed compressed into a single concentrated space.
In a way, the protection afforded by the tree felt even stronger underground than it did on the surface.
And Jiwoo’s companions never let even the slightest flicker of curiosity in her eyes pass unnoticed.
They picked flowers she lingered over and explained anything that caught her interest. Perhaps because the journey was so long, once a conversation began, there was little reason for it to end quickly.
Thanks to them, Jiwoo easily learned several interesting things about the underground, but…
‘Oh!’
At some point, she realized she had been distracted for quite a while.
Shaen was so visibly irritated that even through his dark blue skin, she could almost see his face flushing red with suppressed anger.
Did you come here to sightsee? That was probably what he would have snapped before.
Jiwoo still had no idea exactly what Quilon had said to him, but it was obvious that Shaen was desperately restraining himself from acting according to his temper…
“Did you come here to sightsee? I asked if you came here to sightsee! Do you think we have all the time in the world?!”
In the end, Shaen exploded. Apparently, whatever calming effect Quilon had achieved had finally expired.
Jiwoo understood that he was in a hurry, so she raised both hands placatingly.
“That’s not it. I’m sorry. It’s just that the walk itself is taking a long time… and I can’t move very quickly, so, ah!”
Smack!
Narkreed struck Shaen sharply on the back of the head, startling Jiwoo into silence.
“This is urgent for you, not for us. We’ve got plenty of time. Keep acting like that and we might decide to take the scenic route instead.”
“N, no, that’s all right, Reed. Let’s hurry up and take care of the problem first. We can look around afterward.”
“Oh, shall we?”
Silevion smiled brightly and gave a few light claps.
“Jiwoo really does know how to make the best use of her time.”
“You insufferable bastards…”
Shaen could hardly be blamed for grinding his teeth at their shameless double standard.
***
After that, Jiwoo and the others stopped letting themselves get distracted and headed straight for their destination. Narkreed took the lead beside Shaen, while Jiwoo, whose pace was slower than the others’, was carried by Quilon.
“I feel a little bad… If his brothers are in danger, we should probably have been hurrying…”
“It’s all right.”
Quilon firmly shook his head at Jiwoo’s concern.
“I have encountered a void before… so I believe Narkreed trusted my judgment completely and deliberately allowed us to take our time. Had I told him we needed to hurry, he would have done so. But if rushing would make you anxious, Jiwoo, then that changes matters.”
“Ah… Does everyone know about that?”