Not A Regressor-Chapter 329: Treasure Hunt (8)

Following Baek Mu-Kang, they spotted the entrance to a mine nestled between towering rocks.

“Over there! That’s it! If we go in through there—Ack!” Baek Mu-Kang tried to charge in headfirst.

Kwon Oh-Jin quickly stopped him and hid behind a nearby boulder to observe the entrance. “Please wait a moment.”

Are there no guards?

He activated the Stigma of Canes Venatici and endured the headache. It seemed like no demonkin were guarding the area.

“What should we do, Mr. Oh-Jin?”

“We’ll have to go inside.”

They had no other option if they wanted to confirm whether Deimos’s domain was truly within the mountain.

“It kinda looks like an ant hill entrance,” Song Ha-Eun commented.

“The inside is probably even more complex,” Kwon Oh-Jin said.

He hadn’t been inside yet, but a mine carved into a mountain this large would likely end up being a maze.

“Boppy, stay here and keep watch for anyone coming,” Kwon Oh-Jin ordered.

“Grrr!”

Since Boppy was too big to fit through the narrow tunnels, Kwon Oh-Jin left it stationed outside.

As they cautiously entered, Kwon Oh-Jin quietly said, “From here on, nobody should use their mana.”

There could be Astral Relics inside designed to detect mana.

Song Ha-Eun and Isabella simply nodded in reply.

“Hmm?”

“Shh. Just follow quietly, elder.”

Given that Baek Mu-Kang was impossible to control, Isabella had taken on the task of shadowing him closely.

The inside of the mine was damp and humid.

Splash, splash.

They briefly considered making a torch since they couldn’t use their mana, but lighting fixtures had already been installed inside.

Roughly ten minutes in, the sound of pickaxes faintly echoed from deeper within.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Kwon Oh-Jin raised his hand for them to halt and knelt on one knee. He brushed his fingers over the ground and smirked.

“So, Deimos’s domain really is inside here,” he muttered.

“Huh? How can you tell?” Song Ha-Eun asked.

“They’re still actively mining for ore here.”

“And?”

“But there’s no sign of the ore being hauled outside.”

Gold didn’t just appear in pure, bar-shaped forms. Gold veins had to be mined with pickaxes. The gold-laced dirt had to be hauled out. Then, it all went through a lengthy refining process to extract the actual gold.

Here, no signs of that process could be seen outside the mine. Meaning, they were hauling the gold deeper into the mine and not out of it.

“Ohhh. That actually makes sense,” Song Ha-Eun exclaimed softly and nodded.

She looked at Kwon Oh-Jin crouching on the ground like a detective from a mystery manga and swallowed dryly. “W-Why do you look so sexy all of a sudden?”

What are you suddenly saying?

“Can you cosplay Detective Konan for me later?”

“Something tells me people would start dying around us if I did.”

Of course, the culprit is always among us.

“It’s not like this was some kind of genius discovery or anything. No need to overreact,” he said.

“I just wanna see you cosplay. That’s all.”

Why the hell do you wanna see something like that?

“Whatever. Let’s check out that direction.”

They carefully moved toward the source of the pickaxe sounds. Following the winding passageways, they eventually spotted a group hard at work mining.

Lizardmen?

Actual demonkin were valuable fighting assets, so they weren’t the ones swinging the pickaxes. Instead, shackled demonic beasts resembling lizardmen worked silently.

“They look like salamander people.”

This smaller race once lived around the Black Rock Mines. Unlike the beastkin or dragonkin, they didn’t possess high intelligence. Still, they were smart enough to form primitive tribal societies. Now, under Deimos’s rule, they were being used as mining slaves.

Feels like something out of the old colonial era.

Watching the salamander people toil away in chains left a bitter taste in Kwon Oh-Jin’s mouth. However, this wasn’t the time to worry about saving them.

“Krrrk! Khrrrk!”

Two salamander people began dragging a minecart full of ore somewhere deeper in.

Kwon Oh-Jin’s group suppressed their presence and silently followed. Either the salamander people couldn’t detect them or were simply too focused and exhausted to notice.

Kwon Oh-Jin’s group followed the cart deeper into the mine’s winding passage.

This is... Deimos’s domain.

Beyond a sign that read “Glory to the Golden,” the sight of an underground city unfolded.

Just as Isabella had speculated, they had built a settlement inside the mountain under the Black Rock Mines. Several structures firmly stood in place.

The city itself isn’t that big.

Perhaps because the relatively small number of demonkin, Deimos’s subterranean domain wasn’t particularly vast. Aside from the ornate castle, which presumably belonged to Deimos and exuded a majestic presence, most of the other buildings looked surprisingly modest.

Maybe he wanted to make his own castle stand out.

This city perfectly reflected Deimos’s greedy personality.

Song Ha-Eun clicked her tongue in disbelief. “He really made the whole damn castle out of gold.”

Just seeing that castle made it obvious why others called him Deimos the Golden.

“The bad guy! The bad guy is in that castle, right?!” Baek Mu-Kang gripped his rusty sword with sparkling eyes and charged straight toward the castle.

Kwon Oh-Jin quickly grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back behind a rock. “Please wait.”

“Why? The bad guy is in there, right?” Baek Mu-Kang cocked his head, genuinely confused as to why they weren’t storming the place.

“Charging in head-on is too dangerous.”

They had no idea how strong Deimos was or how many elite knights he commanded. It would be reckless to barge in without any information.

“Okay. I’ll listen to you, Oh-Jin.” Contrary to expectations that he would throw a fit, Baek Mu-Kang obediently sat down. “My wife always told me to listen to nice people.”

He sat on the ground with a cheerful grin.

Kwon Oh-Jin turned his back toward Baek Mu-Kang and looked over the underground city once more.

There’s no need to fight Deimos head-on.

Their goal was only to retrieve Baek Mu-Kang’s stolen treasure.

First, we need information.

They couldn’t just recover the treasure blindly without knowing anything. He thought about where he could get more information.

“Mr. Oh-Jin, that looks like a gold refining facility over there,” Isabella said.

The two salamander people pulling the mine cart earlier were now entering a massive factory-like building.

“Let’s follow them.”

If Deimos was as obsessed with gold as they had heard, he likely invested heavily in that facility. Unlike the tunnels, which had no guards, several demonkin were shouting and urging the salamander people along inside the factory.

“Why aren’t you guys moving faster?!”

“Delivery is due today!”

“Move it, quickly!”

A demon holding a whip struck the salamander’s back.

Crack!

Grimacing in pain, the salamander began dumping the dirt and ore from the cart into a processing machine.

Kwon Oh-Jin quietly observed the demonkin overseeing the salamanders. Most of them didn’t radiate the same force as the Golden Knights they had fought before, except one demonkin standing with his arms crossed, silently watching the salamanders.

Is he the supervisor of this facility?

Like Jakal, he was also wearing flashy, gold-plated armor. He was likely at least an executive-ranking demonkin.

“Hmm?”

As expected of someone different from the salamanders, the demonkin sensed Kwon Oh-Jin’s group the moment they entered the facility.

The demonkin, standing with his arms crossed, looked at Kwon Oh-Jin’s group.

“Isabella. Ha-Eun.”

“Yes, Mr. Oh-Jin.”

“Got it.”

The two women began preparing for battle without any further instructions.

“Vega, can you mute the sound in the area?”

“If I create a Sacred Ground, it should be possible.”

Casting a Sacred Ground in the material world placed a heavy burden on the Celestial, but the side effects would be minor enough to manage if it was only to mute sound.

“Then I shall cast it now.” Vega soared into the air and spread her arms wide.

A silver glow radiated out and enveloped the entire factory.

“Intruders!”

“Humans?! How did humans get in here?!”

The demonkin quickly grabbed their weapons.

“Can I beat them up now?” Baek Mu-Kang asked.

“Yes, go ahead.”

“Hehe! Okay!” With a bright grin, Baek Mu-Kang charged at the demonkin.

Thus, the battle began.

“Kugh!”

“Aaaagh!”

It didn’t last long. Despite the number of guards stationed to protect the factory, they were no match for Kwon Oh-Jin’s group, who each possessed the strength of a hundred individuals.

Recognizing Baek Mu-Kang, the captured executive demonkin bit his lip and glared. “Damn it! The Old Demon made it here after all...”

He pulled out a communication Astral Relic and tried to send a message to the castle.

“Nope.”

“Argh!”

Kwon Oh-Jin slammed his spear down and shattered both the demonkin’s arms.

Crack!

“Here, bite down on this.”

To prevent him from committing suicide like Jakal had, Kwon Oh-Jin stuffed a towel into the demonkin’s mouth.

“Mm! Mmmph!” The demonkin twisted like a worm.

After subduing all the demonkin, Isabella stepped outside to scout the area.

Soon, she returned to the factory. “Mr. Oh-Jin, fortunately, it looks like no one has caught on yet. It'll only be a matter of time before they find out.”

“Yeah.”

With communication cut off from the factory, word of intruders would spread within a few hours.

In that case...

Kwon Oh-Jin’s eyes gleamed sharply.

“We need to rob the storage before we’re caught.”

“You want to rob it?”

“Yeah.”

Given how obsessed Deimos was with treasure, he would’ve likely gathered a huge collection by now. Unless he was carrying it around with him all the time, there had to be a storage room for his stash somewhere inside the castle.

“But that place is probably the most heavily guarded,” Isabella said.

Raiding the treasure vault was even more dangerous than sneaking into Deimos’s own bedroom.

Kwon Oh-Jin smirked and turned to Isabella. “It’s okay. Do you know when people are easiest to fool?”

“Excuse me?” Caught off guard by the sudden question, Isabella cocked her head.

Without answering, Kwon Oh-Jin simply shrugged and walked over to the demonkin lying on the floor with both arms broken. “Hey.”

“Agh!” The demonkin looked up at him, his face pale with fear.

Crouching in front of him, Kwon Oh-Jin gave the demonkin a friendly pat on the shoulder. “You can help me out a little, right?”

A terrified hiccup slipped from the demonkin’s mouth.