Transcendent Warrior With A Dimensional Shifting

Transcendent Warrior With A Dimensional Shifting Inventory 38

38

There was no need to mobilize all the troops to explore the temple.

Minhyuk led only the special forces and entered the arched cave behind the statue.

He instructed the rest of the soldiers to go outside the cave and wait.

Thud, thud-

Minhyuk walked in the forefront.

It was a series of winding paths, turning left and right.

Fortunately, there was no fork in the road.

‘How far do we have to go?’

Minhyuk quickened his pace.

The special forces soldiers following him had to drink a yellow potion to increase their movement speed in order to keep up with Minhyuk’s pace.

After walking for almost an hour, they came to a wide space.

It was a dead end with no further way to go.

In the center of the space was a single, ghastly looking tree.

This place had no water and no sunlight.

Naturally, the tree was dead.

The dead tree had turned into a fossil over time.

However, there was something like a fruit hanging from its branch.

Upon closer inspection, it was not a fruit, but a human head.

It was a severed head hanging from a tree branch.

The strange thing was that it didn’t seem to have decayed at all, as if it had been cut off not long ago.

Suddenly-

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The head opened its eyes.

The soldiers watching nearby were startled and stepped back.

After a moment,

The head began to speak, its mouth moving.

[I am Marcus, the king of Asdel.]

Marcus was the first emperor who founded Asdel.

If what the head said was true, then Minhyuk and his soldiers were now looking at the face of a man from hundreds of years ago.

In any case, the head referred to itself as a king, not an emperor.

Minhyuk knew the reason for that.

Before the Great Flood, Asdel was a kingdom, not an empire.

It was the richest country on the continent of Lania, but that did not mean it controlled the surrounding countries.

Asdel became an empire after the Great Flood.

The current emperor’s grandfather declared Asdel an empire and became the emperor himself in order to restore the declining royal authority.

And he raised the deceased former kings to the rank of emperor.

I knew that because I had read Asdel’s history books.

As the commander of the expeditionary force, basic historical study was essential.

However, there was nothing in the books about the head of the first king hanging from a tree like this.

Minhyeok approached the head and asked.

“Why are you hanging in a place like this?”

The head did not answer the question and continued to repeat the same words.

[I am Marcus, the king of Asdel.]

He didn’t seem to be in his right mind.

Minhyeok changed the question.

“Is this a dead end?”

[If you want to enter the deepest part of the temple, water the roots of the tree with the blood of my lineage.]

The soldiers murmured at the head’s words.

“If it’s the bloodline of the first emperor, isn’t that the royal family?”

“Do we need the blood of the royal family to go further inside?”

“The blood of the royal family…”

All the soldiers thought of the princess in the Tamirn Fortress.

To go further into the temple, the princess’s blood was needed.

But Minhyeok thought differently from them.

Minhyeok asked the soldiers.

“Does anyone have the surname Marcus?”

Marcus was the surname of the Asdel royal family.

The founder, Marcus, used his name as his surname.

That’s why the princess’s official name was ‘Christina von Marcus’.

However, not everyone with the surname Marcus was a member of the royal family.

In the past, the Chinese and Korean royal families considered the monarch’s fifth-generation descendants as part of the royal family based on the paternal lineage, and the children of princesses as part of the royal family based on the maternal lineage.

Not everyone with the Jeonju Lee surname is a member of the royal family.

The concept of the Asdel royal family was not much different.

As generations passed, the distant relatives who were far removed from the direct line were not considered royalty, even though they shared the same surname.

However, this was just a custom set by humans,

Minhyeok thought differently.

‘DNA doesn’t care about such things.’

Genetically speaking, anyone with the surname Marcus was a descendant of Marcus.

However, there was no one in the special forces who had that surname.

Minhyeok rephrased the question and asked again.

“Does anyone have a mother or grandmother with the surname Marcus?”

Then, someone raised a hand.

“My grandmother’s last name is Marcus!”

Minhyuk called him close and instructed him.

“Drip your blood on the tree roots. You don’t need much.”

The soldier was puzzled by Minhyuk’s instruction.

However, he did not question the commander’s order.

He pricked the tip of his finger with a dagger and dropped a few drops of blood on the tree roots.

Then,

Rumble-

The ground vibrated and the surrounding earth sank.

A staircase leading to a deeper part of the temple was revealed.

Minhyuk looked at the stairs, lost in thought.

‘This doesn’t seem to be the place Balin visited.’

Balin, who traveled alone, could not have been of Marcus bloodline.

Besides, wasn’t he a dwarf?

The probability of him being of Marcus bloodline was also zero.

This place could not be the temple Balin visited.

If so, the probability of finding a high-level magic disk here was very low.

‘But there might be something better.’

Minhyuk led the special forces down the stairs.

***

General Drake ran somewhere in a hurry.

He was not the type to rush things.

However, he could not contain his excitement at the news that the family of his friend living in Melbek had come to Tamrin Fortress.

‘Why on earth did they risk their lives to come all the way here through the danger zone?’

The general arrived where Lynn was.

And he asked her, surrounded by soldiers,

“Are you Tarman’s daughter?”

“Yes, sir! And this is my grandmother.”

The grandmother greeted General Drake first.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. I am Tarman’s mother.”

“I’m so glad you made it here safely!”

The general bowed deeply to his friend’s mother.

And he asked Lynn again,

“But why did you come all the way here? What on earth happened in Melbek?”

“Everything is written in my father’s letter.”

Lynn handed the letter to General Drake.

The general’s eyes trembled as he read the letter.

‘Oh, no···.’

The general instructed his aide.

“These are my friend’s family. Treat them with utmost care, for they are precious to me.”

“Understood, General!”

The General rushed off to another location.

After a while, he arrived at the site where the fortress restoration work was in full swing.

Amidst the scene of rebuilding the castle walls that had collapsed due to the ravages of time, stood the Princess.

“Your Highness! I have a report!”

“What is it?”

“This is not the appropriate place.”

The Princess and the General moved to a location where there were no soldiers.

There, the General informed the Princess of the letter’s contents.

The King of Melbeck is targeting Teidon’s heart to infuse his altar with magic power.

The moment the expedition obtains the heart, he plans to mobilize an army of 200,000 to seize it.

The Princess gasped in surprise and asked the General,

“Are the contents of the letter really reliable?”

“Tarman is a trustworthy friend. And until recently, he was the Grand General of Melbeck. Besides, his family risked their lives to come here. There’s no way the letter’s contents could be false.”

The Princess seethed with anger at the ugliness of the King of Melbeck.

However, it was more urgent to devise a plan for the sudden situation than to seek justice now.

“It has become more difficult to protect Teidon’s heart than to obtain it. We must transport the magic orb to Asdel Fortress without fail!”

The General replied with a grim expression to the Princess’s words.

“Even if we transport the magic orb to Asdel Fortress and restore the power of the altar, the problem will not end there.”

“What do you mean?”

“Melbeck’s army of 200,000 will shift their target from the magic orb to Asdel Fortress.”

If they fail to seize the magic orb, Melbeck’s fortress will soon become uninhabitable.

Therefore, the King of Melbeck will try to seize the fortress of Asdel in its entirety.

“That could indeed happen.”

“It will definitely happen!”

The General emphasized once more with a desperate look in his eyes.

“War with Melbeck is inevitable!”

It was a situation where war could not be avoided.

However, Asdel was too outnumbered.

The enemy had an army of 200,000, while Asdel’s entire force was only about 30,000.

“But we have an elite force armed with Star Metal and Commander Michael! We will never be defeated in vain!”

The General nodded at the Princess’s words.

“Of course, we will! Commander Michael is a transcendent being! The elite force he leads will never be defeated under any circumstances!”

After embarking on the expedition, the entire expedition, including the Princess and General Drake, came to trust and rely on Minhyuk even more.

However, to be honest, they were anxious.

The attack power of the elite force armed with daggers, spears, and crossbow bolts made of Star Metal was truly one hundred men against one.

However, their defense was not so.

The soldiers’ armor was the same as what they had been wearing before.

Ordinary armor made of cowhide and reinforced with steel.

Even though he had a flame-retardant poncho, it was only useful against fire-breathing monsters.

If all you have is strong offense and no defense, you will eventually get eaten by a horde of enemies.

Hmm-

The princess and General Drake sighed at the same time.

They knew a bit about Min-hyuk’s mysterious ability.

They had seen him mass produce supplies for the soldiers.

So they also knew that not everything was possible.

For some reason, some things could be made and some couldn’t.

And one thing that definitely couldn’t be made was something large.

He had never mass-produced large items like greatswords, shields, or armor.

You could tell just by looking at the spears.

He made only the spearheads and connected them to the shafts separately.

If only he could supply the soldiers with armor made of Star Metal,

they would have a truly invincible force.

Then the expeditionary force alone could defeat an army of 200,000.

***

Min-hyuk and the special forces finally reached the deepest part of the underground temple.

There was a complex magic diagram carved into the floor.

And there was a large object in the center of the diagram.

When viewed from the front, it was a rectangular object about 2 meters wide and high.

Min-hyuk approached the object and examined it closely.

Wow-

It was a large refrigerator.

He had found a large commercial refrigerator in an ancient temple.

But it wasn’t a real refrigerator.

It was a stone statue shaped like a refrigerator.

There was even a logo carved on the top of the statue.

It was a famous South Korean conglomerate brand.

‘Is it a clue to expanding inventory?’

Min-hyuk reached out and touched the statue.

Then a message appeared.

＜Find the same refrigerator as the statue in the other world.＞

＜You can replace your existing refrigerator with the new refrigerator.＞

Min-hyuk looked at the back of the statue.

Just in case, there was also a nameplate with the specifications engraved on it.

The model number of the refrigerator was written on the nameplate.

＜C170LDxx-xxxx＞

‘Okay.’

I’ll go buy the exact same refrigerator right now.