Chapter 86: The Mithril MineThe same day that we got the request to check on the cave, we teleported back to the knights’ camp at the border after having lunch in Speranza.

    As we arrived, the knights already seemed to be in much higher spirits than the day before, thanks to the rations we left for them to eat.

    I noticed that some of them were already using the gym, although they weren’t exactly doing the exercises correctly.

    I wanted to wait until their living conditions got better before starting their training, but the rookiest of the group were already eager to start, as they had heard that their commander was training hard in End Town.

    We decided to spend the night at their camp and search for the cave that we were supposed to locate the next day.

    That morning, I showed some of the knights how to properly use the gym equipment before leaving with the princess so that they wouldn’t hurt themselves trying to train while we weren’t around.

    After that, we took flight and began traveling north along the border wall.

    We had heard from the guild that the cave was to the north of the knight’s camp, but we weren’t sure how much to the north.

    We used our "search" spell to look for anything out of the ordinary as we flew above the fields with no luck. In the end, we ended up camping outside for three days until we found the cave’s entrance.

    At first, we weren’t sure if it was the same place that the guild’s clerk referred to, but there were no other caves around the area. We would know since we scouted the place for an entire day after finding it.

    We both cast a small mote of light above our heads to illuminate the way and went inside.

    The cave started as a tunnel, quite long, in fact. We walked for over fifteen minutes before we could find anything other than rock and darkness.

    Reaching the end of the tunnel, the cave widened up, showing us a massive room with a pond, a few cliffs, and different colored rocks plastered all over the walls.

    The light from our motes made everything look a little more resplendent than what it would usually look like, but we didn’t take it as a bad thing. It made the whole place look kinda pretty, in a way.

    Seeing no monsters around, we both started investigating the cave and inspecting the different colored rocks.

    They were mostly ordinary minerals that were easy to find in any random cave at End Forest. However, I saw one rock that called my attention over the others.

    The veins on the rock were light blue, and when inspecting the boulder, I realized it was mithril.

    Mithril was a metal that I only knew about its existence thanks to all the fantasy stories that I read in my past life, but in this new world, mithril was not only real, it was quite valuable.

    Since we were "mithril rank" adventurers, our cards were made with that metal. But other than our cards and the battle maids’ weapons, I hadn’t been in contact with so much mithril. Much less in such an unrefined state.

    The other metal that was compared with mithril, at least in this world, was "adamantite," which had a dark green color to it that wasn’t as pleasing as the light blue from mithril.

    The battle-maids had explained to me that mithril was a metal that could nullify magic, while adamantite was a metal that could conduct it.

    "Could this entire cave be a mithril mine?" Melina asked as she inspected the rocks with me.

    It did seem like the mineral that was the most present in the cave was mithril, so I started wondering if we should mine some for ourselves.

    Placing my hand in one of the mithril veins, I tried using earth magic to mine the ore, but my spell was quickly absorbed by the rock.

    ’Right. Mithril is a magic nullifier, so I suppose we won’t be able to mine it like this...’ I thought, a little surprised at how fast my magic had been canceled.

    As I thought about a strong enough material that I could use to mine the mithril, we heard an eerie sound coming from deeper within the cave.

    On the other side of the room filled with minerals, there was another tunnel similar to the entrance where we heard a loud breath.

    However, this tunnel was completely surrounded by mithril veins, which absorbed the magic from our light motes slowly, even though our orbs weren’t even grazing the rocks.

    ’Okay, well. Now it’s just getting annoying...’ I thought, wondering if I was using magic too much to rely on ordinary tasks that, the moment I couldn’t use a little bit of it, I felt somewhat irritated.

    It was the same with our "search" spell. Once we tried casting it inside the mithril tunnel, it was canceled almost immediately, not letting us take a peek at what was ahead, and the breathing we heard certainly came from something big.

    Since there was no way for us to see anything, we decided to leave the cave for a moment to think of a new strategy.

    We needed something that could let us see in the dark without getting too close to the walls. Realistically, the best option was a lantern, which was actually pretty simple to make.

    Now that we were outside, we used earth magic to create a lens and a frame for it to hold it. Then, using the same type of magic, we made a handle.

    Inside the two lanterns, we placed a light magic enchantment that would produce light depending on the amount of magic that was poured into the object.

    It was the same type of enchantment that I used to illuminate my home and that we subsequently placed in all of the villager’s houses at End Town.

    "Let’s try to keep these close to us so the mithril doesn’t absorb all of the magic," I mentioned as we both went inside the cave again.

    Passing through the massive room to the second tunnel, our lanterns flickered a little, but they didn’t fully turn off as long as we kept them close to our bodies.

    Minutes of walking later, we reached another opening that was just as big as the first room. However, the first room had different ground levels and felt more cluttered with rocks and minerals.

    This room was more open, and the deeper we went in, the brighter our lanterns got.

    "Does this mean there is less mithril around us?" Melina asked, noticing the change in brightness.

    "Maybe. Or the room might just be large enough that the nullification effect doesn’t reach us..." I replied.

    As the lanterns adjusted, we were able to spot something in the back of the room.

    It looked like mithril rocks, but they moved slightly up and down, making me wonder if I was seeing correctly.

    Taking a few steps forward to get a better look, I heard the voice of Yoru, who was hiding in my shadow, telling me to stop.

    [Do you know what that is, Yoru?"] I asked with telepathy.

    [Can you not see it?"] He asked, a tinge of frustration in his voice.

    [It just looks like some moving rocks...] I said.

    But right as he was about to tell me what he was looking at, the pile of rocks moved, showing short scaly legs as the rocks lifted from the ground.

    It was a giant lizard that seemed to be completely armored with mithril rocks, with only its belly, eyes, and bottom of its legs uncovered.

    Seeing the giant monster standing up made me realize the real reason we had come to the cave in the first place.

    The report from the guild said that a bunch of monsters had been coming out of a cave distressed, attacking the settlements around. Now it made sense why all the weak monsters had left the cave.

    If we had arrived weeks before, we would have found a bunch of monsters in the first room that was filled with mithril. But it was completely empty, and the lizard seemed to have most of the mithril from the second room stuck to its body, like armor.

    Both of us quickly inspected the monster.

    Mithril Basilisk

    Rank S

    Its body is armored with mithril, making him impervious to magic.

    Can spit acid that its tongue produces. S~ea??h the ηovёlFire .net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

    Their rocky armor can only be equal to or stronger than their scales.

    I gulped, a little scared of the thing in front of us. Normally, I would have stayed calm, but this situation was different from our usual monster hunting.

    I mean, a basilisk like that wouldn’t have been that big of a deal in End Forest. In fact, I can confidently say that the black dragon serpent was more dangerous than this basilisk.

    However, we were deep inside a cave where our magic capabilities were limited, and the monster had armor made of a strong metal that was immune to all magic.

    Needless to say, we were at a massive disadvantage against the monster.