—————————————————————–
Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Lord Fourth
—————————————————————–
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Isn’t that… Lady Lucy?”
Eilly’s voice echoed softly. A murmur went through the group, the excitement of exploration replaced by a tense silence.
“It is.”
Varis muttered, pointing at the statue, his eyes wide with surprise.
“It looks just like her… No, it’s more than just a resemblance.”
Elisha also moved closer, her breath catching in her throat.
“It’s a doppelgänger.”
The treasure chest, which had been the focus of their attention just moments before, was now forgotten.
Their gazes were fixed on the statue of Lucy, its presence strangely… significant.
The surface of the massive statue was worn with age, but the facial features and intricate details were still remarkably clear. And the most unsettling part was that the face was identical to Lucy’s.
“This is… strange…”
Eilly muttered in a low voice.
“I thought this was an ancient ruin…”
Their minds were filled with confusion, the pieces of the puzzle not fitting together. The unexpected discovery left them bewildered.
The excitement they had felt upon finding the treasure chest had vanished, replaced by an unsettling feeling, an unspoken sense of dread.
But while everyone else was staring at the statue, one person was frozen in place.
Lucy.
Her face was a mask of conflicting emotions: shock, anxiety, worry… A bead of sweat trickled down her cheek, betraying her inner turmoil.
She seemed to want to say something, but her lips only trembled, unable to form the words. Her fingertips trembled slightly.
“Lucy, what’s going on?”
Elisha took a step back, her eyes narrowed with suspicion, her voice laced with a mix of anxiety and accusation.
This was a dungeon, an ancient temple. It was supposed to be a place filled with the traces of a bygone era, a time beyond human comprehension. But the statue before them, seemingly untouched by the passage of time, bore the face of a living person.
It was a sight that defied all logic.
But Lucy forced a smile and spoke in a lighthearted tone,
“I… I don’t know~”
She laughed awkwardly and patted the statue.
“Haha… It really does look like me, doesn’t it? What a surprise.”
But her acting wasn’t convincing. Her voice trembled slightly as she spoke.
Elisha’s suspicion intensified, and she discreetly distanced herself from Lucy.
Varis, Eilly, and Melina also looked at her with a mix of emotions.
They all seemed to have realized it.
Lucy knew something about this place, about this statue…
“Upperclassman… do you know something about this place?”
Varis asked cautiously.
Lucy’s body stiffened slightly. He frowned, looking at her.
“Don’t tell me… you’re connected to this place?”
Silence.
Lucy remained silent, her lips pressed firmly together, her gaze shifting between the statue and them.
The tension in the air grew thicker, a suffocating silence filling the space.
“But that’s impossible… This temple was built in an era long before even our ancestors were born.”
Elisha, though still wary of Lucy, disagreed with Varis’s suggestion.
But Melina countered Elisha’s argument with a plausible explanation.
“Even if she’s a long-lived species like an elf, this is a story from a much more distant past. It’s impossible.”
“But it’s also impossible to dismiss it as a mere coincidence.”
“It’s more than just a resemblance… it’s exactly like her.”
“It’s as if the statue was sculpted using her as a model.”
Melina’s words were persuasive. They were all swayed by her and Elisha’s arguments. It was too much of a coincidence, yet the timeline didn’t add up.
“Guys…”
Lucy finally spoke, her voice strained. Her gaze held a mixture of resolve and worry, as if she was about to make a momentous confession. Her fingertips trembled slightly.
But—
“It’s alright, upperclassman.”
—Varis stepped forward.
“Varis…?”
Lucy muttered his name.
“If there’s something you want to tell us, please do. We’re a team. We’ll understand.”
“So, let’s face this together.”
Lucy’s expression shifted slightly at Varis’s sincere words. This wasn’t a small matter for her. To have someone reach out to her when everyone else was suspicious… it was a lifeline.
“Varis…!”
This was one of Lucy’s main events. This was the scene where she would develop feelings for Varis, who was the only one to trust her when everyone else was suspicious. And the fact that this scene had occurred meant that a much bigger event was about to unfold.
“Actually, there’s something I have to confess to you all…”
Lucy clasped her hands in front of her chest and was about to speak when—
Boom –
—a massive tremor shook the entire dungeon.
“Ugh?”
“The dungeon is shaking! Master, are you alright?”
Just as the tension was about to break, the dungeon began to tremble violently, as if it was about to collapse, as if a giant, dormant creature was awakening.
“An earthquake? No, something’s wrong!”
“Everyone, get down!”
They were all caught off guard, unsure what to do. But the disaster was far from over.
Crack, crack –
“The floor is cracking…! Master, be careful!”
The floor began to crack, as if the entire structure was about to collapse. But it wasn’t a simple crack. The fissures were spreading in a specific direction.
“Lucy!”
Varis, sensing the danger, called out her name. But it was too late.
“Oh…! Wait,”
Boom –
“—?!!”
The floor beneath Lucy’s feet suddenly collapsed. She fell into the darkness, a bottomless abyss opening up beneath her.
“Upperclassman!”
Her body disappeared into the void before anyone could react. Varis instinctively rushed forward.
“Lucy!”
But he was too late. Her silhouette quickly vanished into the darkness, and he gritted his teeth in frustration.
“Master, what do we do?! Lady Lucy has fallen.”
Eilly looked around frantically, but there was no safe way to go down.
“It’s too dangerous to go down recklessly.”
Elisha muttered, looking down at the chasm. A bottomless pit, its depths shrouded in darkness. It was impossible to see what lay below.
“It’s too deep…”
Melina also looked anxious, a bead of sweat trickling down her cheek.
‘So far, it’s following the original storyline.’
He quickly assessed the situation. In the original story, Lucy would fall into the abyss just as she was about to reveal her true identity. But…
‘Something’s wrong.’
There was a subtle, yet significant, difference.
“Ugh, we have to go down there!”
Varis exclaimed, but in the original story, he was supposed to have fallen with her. He was supposed to overcome the crisis in the depths of the dungeon with her, alone.
But just as he was thinking that—
Thud—
“Ugh?”
—he felt a strong force from behind.
‘What?’
It felt as if someone had pushed him, a chilling sensation running down his spine.
“Oh, Master?!!”
He heard Eilly’s horrified cry, but he had already lost his balance, his body lurching forward.
‘Who… pushed me?’
But he didn’t have time to think. He fell into the chasm.
“What the—”
His vision swam, the floor beneath him disappearing. He felt a lurch in his stomach as he plummeted into the darkness.
“Arnold?!!”
He could hear their desperate cries from above, but their voices grew fainter, drowned out by the sound of the wind rushing past his ears.
“……!”
A world of darkness.
He was falling into the abyss, towards the same place where Lucy had disappeared.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Hi Lord Fourth here!
I’m new to translating so if you find some mistakes or inconsistencies let me know about it on the dedicated channel on discord.