After traveling nonstop for two days and nights, the team finally reached the outskirts of Londo Town.
Lu Qiuchen lifted the curtain on the side of the carriage and peeked outside.
Fields stretched out on both sides of the road, neatly cultivated. Hearing the sound of the approaching carriage, a few early-rising farmers working the land glanced up curiously before quickly lowering their heads to resume their tasks.
The carriage rolled smoothly along a road paved with densely packed gravel stones. Before long, the silhouette of Londo Town appeared faintly in the distance.
Due to the presence of the goblin ruins, Londo Town had a sprawling stable area. Even so, the place was almost filled to capacity with horses and earth dragons. Just from this, one could get a sense of how bustling the town currently was.
The carriage came to a stop at the stable just outside the town. After retrieving their weapons and equipment, Audi sent someone to park the carriage, and the group headed toward the Adventurers’ Guild in the town center.
Though it was merely a branch, the Adventurers’ Guild in Londo was impressively grand.
A three-story building stood before them, constructed from elegant red bricks on both its front and sides. The entire facade had been coated in reddish-brown natural paint. However, after years of wear, some patches had begun to peel.
The sloped rooftop was tiled with materials only nobles could afford, painted over with a layer of rare and expensive white paint.
Inside, the lobby was already packed with people. Reception staff were swamped with tasks, rushing back and forth.
A large notice had been pinned up in the middle of the hall: Guild accommodations are only available for Epic-ranked teams or individuals.
Sighing at how irresistible dragon materials and epic-ranked quests were, the group showed their identification to the staff and, under the envious gaze of the surrounding adventurers, passed through to the residential area at the back of the guild.
Londo and nearby Adventurers’ Guilds had all issued announcements that those below a certain level would not be allowed into the ruins, but that didn’t stop adventurers from flooding in.
These low-level adventurers weren’t just drawn by the ruins—they were also lured by the reputations of the famous high-level adventurers gathering here.
“If I can just get in good with one of the big shots, I’ll strike it rich!” — That was the opportunist.
“So cool and stylish! My idol! I’ll love you forever!” — That was the fangirl.
“So many strong ones gathered here, but too bad… they’ll all die by my hand! My King’s Power has long hungered!” — That… was probably some kind of chaotic entity.
Once a sleepy little place, Londo Town had suddenly come to life. The innkeepers were making a fortune, and the swarm of adventurers had attracted merchants as well.
The entire town was bustling with prosperity.
The two teams made their final preparations in the guild’s guest rooms. As for Lu Qiuchen, who didn’t actually need to prepare anything, she half-heartedly put on a show of readiness, then pulled on her hooded robe and slipped downstairs to the guild-run tavern to gather information that piqued her interest.
After ordering a mug of cheap malt ale from the busy tavern maid, she leaned against the coarse wall and quietly observed the scene inside.
Unlike the clean and orderly guild taverns in the royal capital like Druidh, the tavern of the Londo Adventurers’ Guild was dimly lit, relying entirely on the flickering candlelight by the walls and a roaring fireplace for illumination.
Food scraps littered the floor, stepped on by passing adventurers until they were mashed into unrecognizable grime and smeared with dirt and dust, eventually kicked into the dark corners.
Some adventurers gathered around tables, loudly playing cards, while another group had pushed two square tables together for a game of dice—one of the few entertainments available to the average adventurer.
The air was thick with the stench of cheap alcohol and an unpleasant mixture of other unidentifiable odors. Under the glow of the yellowish firelight, it looked as if a thin mist hung in the tavern.
As the weather began to cool, the tavern doors had been tightly shut. Adventurers could only enter through a side door off the main hall, and the lack of ventilation made the stink all the more unbearable.
Unable to tolerate the environment any longer and having failed to glean any information, Lu Qiuchen put down the half-finished ale and left the clouded air behind.
Back in the room, Phyllis—who had just completed the final preparations—glanced at Lu Qiuchen’s disheveled appearance.
She turned to the priestess Tia and gave her a “just as expected” look. The others chuckled softly.
“Alright, let the smelly guys handle intelligence gathering.”
“Good thing those crude men at the tavern didn’t think of pulling back Cecilia’s hood.”
“Oh? And why’s that?”
“Because who among them could resist picking such a beautiful flower if they saw it blooming right in front of them?”
“Miss Cecilia, you wouldn’t want those vulgar tavern goons brawling over who gets to pluck this delicate bloom, would you?”
As her “dear friends” continued teasing her, their words becoming more outrageous by the second, a slight blush rose to her cheeks.
Just you wait until we get into the ruins. If any enemies show up, I’ll show you what real power looks like! Let’s see if you still dare make fun of me after that!
*****
The Londo Ruins were once an underground city built by goblins in ancient times. Though this race was savage in behavior and primitive in social structure, they possessed an extraordinary racial talent for digging and construction.
They hated sunlight and preferred the dark underground, where they built sprawling subterranean cities.
To modern adventurers, goblins were a relatively unfamiliar race—mostly regarded as brutish and uncivilized thieves and raiders.
But thanks to her draconic heritage, Lu Qiuchen knew of knowledge lost to human history.
Yes, goblins did love stealing and pillaging, and yes, many lived by such means. But that wasn’t the whole truth.
The noble class among goblins was actually highly intelligent and cunning, with quick minds and a natural gift for business. In ancient times, they ran the largest trading company in the world, even expanding across the sea to the Northern Continent.
There were no records in dragon lore of humans driving goblins out of the southern continent.
Lu Qiuchen suspected—somewhat maliciously—that the goblins’ mercantile cunning had allowed them to amass great wealth despite lacking military strength, eventually earning the humans’ envy and leading to their expulsion.
Over the past two hundred years, the Londo Ruins had been mostly explored by moderately enthusiastic adventurers, with only a few peripheral areas left untouched.
The site where the dragon’s claw prints were discovered was in one of these undeveloped fringe zones.
The group walked through a dim underground tunnel, following markers left by earlier guild members toward their destination.
Though deep within the ruins, the path had been roughly cleared by prior adventurers, so the air wasn’t too stale.
Along the way, Lu Qiuchen eagerly shared her goblin knowledge with her teammates, surprising them again and again—and greatly satisfying her own vanity.
Everyone simply assumed she had such detailed knowledge because she’d lived on the northern continent and had direct contact with goblins there.
The group turned a corner along the rugged tunnel and saw the exit up ahead. A wall of darkness greeted them. In the lead, the guardian knight Seriel raised her torch high, illuminating a small patch of their surroundings.
Seeing that the torchlight wasn’t enough, the priestess Tia stepped forward and cast a [Light] spell. A glowing orb slowly floated upward, piercing the darkness and lighting up the area around them.
Before them stretched an open space. They could faintly discern the dry bed of an underground river, its cracked terrain stretching intermittently into the distance.
In the far distance ahead stood a collapsed low wall, with a faint silhouette of a castle beyond it. But due to the limited reach of the light spell, many of its details remained indistinct.
As they stepped into the open, the party’s formation shifted. The squishier mages and support classes moved to the center. Seriel continued leading at the front.
Solin, the guardian knight from the Courage & Justice adventuring party, and Dron, the guardian knight from the Lightning Gryphon party, took the left and right flanks. Meanwhile, Audi, the strongest among them and captain of Lightning Gryphon, brought up the rear.
Such vigilance was entirely necessary—dangers within the ruins came not only from unknown creatures, but also from every unfamiliar adventurer, who could be either a rival or a potential enemy.
As they marched on in silence, Seriel quietly reminded them that the markings ahead had changed, indicating they had entered the area where the dragon claw prints were found.
Everyone grew alert. Lu Qiuchen was also affected by the tense atmosphere. She gripped the ornamental staff in her hands more tightly.
This feeling of standing together as a team and facing danger… it was strangely exhilarating.
They continued forward, slowly approaching the collapsed city wall they had seen earlier.
To their surprise, the adventurers discovered that the low wall had been neatly constructed from uniformly sized stones, stacked carefully and held together with mortar.
Though weathered by the passage of time, one could still imagine how neat and impressive it must have looked when it was first built.
The party crossed over the collapsed wall and continued forward. Tia estimated the distance and cast another [Light] spell ahead.
As the soft glow lit up the darkness, a majestic and magnificent castle came into view!
As they drew closer, they saw that the towering outer wall surrounded the entire castle, and behind it stood an even taller inner wall with towers built atop it.
Unfortunately, the wooden towers had long since decayed, leaving behind only some rotted beams as proof of their former existence.
Just like the low wall they’d seen earlier, this castle was also in ruins. Some sections had collapsed, but even in its current state, such a grand castle was a rare sight—even in modern human kingdoms.
Thanks to Lu Qiuchen’s earlier explanations, they now understood the goblins’ exceptional talent for architecture.
But seeing it with their own eyes, they finally realized: the goblins, long dismissed and looked down upon by contemporary humans, had already been capable of building such astonishing structures in ancient times.
Just as the illumination spell faded, a flicker of firelight appeared inside the castle. In this pitch-black environment, it was impossibly conspicuous.
The firelight spotted the torches in their hands and immediately began rushing toward them.
Everyone tensed.
From the direction of the fire came a sharp, panicked scream, “Monsters! There are monsters—run!”