Chapter 164: Alchemical Product?
A single spark of fire left Ronin's mouth as he completed the final seal, diving
into the basement shaft like a falling ember.
Behind him, Vanessa's silhouette slowly materialized from the shadows of the
doorway.
She stared at Ronin, her expression a mix of disbelief and annoyance. "You call
this an infiltration?"
Ronin's main body appeared beside her. "I noticed an anomaly. My tactics shifted
to accommodate the new data. Just watch."
As he spoke, the tiny fireball bypassed the heap of smoldering raptor corpses
and reached the deepest part of the sub-level. The moment it hit the floor, the
condensed Chakra within detonated.
Fire Style: Intelligent Hard Work (Zukokku).
In an instant, a roaring firestorm swept through every inch of the basement
level Ronin could see.
As the heat surged back toward the stairwell, Ronin slammed a palm into the
floor, raising a thick earthen wall to shield them from the backdraft.
But before his vision was blocked, Ronin's Sharingan caught a crucial detail:
every raptor caught in the blast didn't just burn—they ignited like oil.
My theory was correct.
With their line of sight cut off by the stone, Vanessa looked at Ronin, still
confused. "What exactly did you see down there?"
"Let's head back to the surface for a bit," Ronin said, turning back toward the
stairs. He didn't offer an explanation. "We'll come back later. By then, the
bodies should be finished burning."
Vanessa followed him, her curiosity mounting.
Before exiting the tower, Ronin's Shadow Clone grabbed a single raptor carcass
and dragged it out with them into the open city street.
Muherr and the rest of the unit were waiting outside. They looked surprised to
see the pair return so quickly.
"That was fast," Muherr noted, checking his watch. "I expected a deep-level
scout to take hours. Is the basement smaller than we thought?"
"And why did you bring a souvenir?" Mashur asked, looking at the charred raptor.
The Shadow Clone dropped the carcass heavily at their feet.
"Vanessa and I didn't push deep," Ronin explained. "I discovered something at
the entrance to B1 that demanded a pause in the mission."
Without waiting for more questions, the Shadow Clone wove a quick set of seals
and spat a concentrated Fireball Jutsu directly onto the raptor's remains.
The fireball dissipated quickly, but the monster's body continued to burn with
unnatural intensity.
Even Vanessa, who had seen the firestorm below, felt a chill as she watched the
small-scale demonstration.
"The way it burns... it's not right," Mashur whispered, voicing the group's
shared realization.
"Exactly," Ronin nodded.
He had noticed it during the initial Fire Dragon attack. These creatures were
highly flammable—too flammable.
The first monster that had charged him didn't char like human flesh. Its body
reacted to high heat more like charcoal or dry timber.
Ronin's Shadow Clone had briefly removed his mask to confirm his suspicion: the
scent wasn't the metallic, sickening smell of burnt meat. It was a pungent,
resinous odor, similar to the smell of incomplete combustion in green wood.
Moreover, Ninjutsu fire had a disproportionate effect on them. Once a raptor
caught fire, it was impossible for its comrades to extinguish it. They became
living torches.
This was why Ronin had used the large-scale Zukokku to "mop" the basement. He
was simply letting the fuel burn itself out.
"But if we go down now," Ronin warned, "the internal temperature of the tower
will be high enough to cook us in our gear. We wait."
He explained his logic to the unit. They watched the burning corpse with a mix
of awe and unease.
"If these creatures share the biological traits of plants," Muherr mused, "then
their origin is a total unknown. This changes the classification of the ruin
entirely."
Muherr was already calculating the fallout. A discovery of this magnitude—a
potentially new biological kingdom—was the kind of find that could elevate a
Hunter to Single-Star status overnight.
"We finish the sweep before word gets out," Muherr decided. "If the V5 or the
Association get wind that there are Dark Continent-tier biological anomalies
here, they'll lock this site down in hours. We'll be kicked out before we can
claim a single coin."
The unit settled into a tense, patient wait.
One hour later, Ronin led the group back to the basement entrance.
When they opened the stone seal he had placed, a wave of blistering heat hit
them.
"Still too hot," Muherr noted, shield raised. "We can't operate in this."
"I have a solution for the temperature," Ronin said.
His method was direct: Water Style.
By flooding the lower levels with high-pressure water, he could use the water's
heat capacity to absorb the thermal energy of the scorched walls and floors.
The shock of the flash-flood might damage some structures, but the fire had
already done the heavy lifting in terms of demolition anyway.
The mercenaries watched in shock as Ronin performed another "miracle." To see a
man shift from master-level Pyromancy to high-volume Hydromancy was unheard of
outside of legendary Specialists.
Ronin exhaled an ocean.
Water Style: Great Explosive Water Colliding Wave!
Tons of water surged into the sub-levels. The hiss of steam was deafening.
The flood didn't bring the temperature to a "comfortable" level, but it dropped
it enough for the unit to move.
Ronin also suggested a tactical change. Following the discovery of the monsters'
flammability, the Golem swapped its Gatling gun for high-output Flamethrowers.
They moved in a tight formation. Ronin took the center, while the Golem acted as
the vanguard.
The flood had swept the charred remains of the raptors into the far corners of
the B1 level. No living monsters remained in the immediate area. However, at the
far end of the hall, they found a secondary stairwell leading even deeper.
At the bottom of those stairs sat a massive, reinforced metal gate.
The gate was covered in intricate, ancient murals. It depicted people in long,
flowing robes kneeling in prayer before a colossal, banyan-like tree.
Hanging from the tree's branches were dozens of round, organic-looking pods.
In several sections of the mural, the pods were shown splitting open, with
juvenile versions of the raptor-monsters crawling out of the pulpy interiors.
The unit stared at the gate in silence.
Ronin's theory was confirmed: the "immune system" of the city was a biological
harvest. The predators were "grown," not born.
But Ronin's focus was on a smaller detail in the corner of the mural. It
depicted people working with jars, vials, and complex glassware. They were
conducting experiments on the seeds.
The image of another Dark Continent treasure surfaced in Ronin's mind.
The Alchemical Herb: Metallion.
Is that what this is? Ronin wondered. Was this city an alchemical laboratory
using the Forbidden Continent's flora to manufacture a private army?
A darker thought followed.
And is that tree still alive behind this gate?
☆☆☆
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