[Guidance beginning.]
No sooner had his words ended than a faint arrow of light appeared on the floor.
A trail stretched long along the floor.
Jin-woo followed that direction and began walking.
The A-3 point was located a little away from the Main Room.
A section he had finished repairing with difficulty a few days ago.
“I finished working here yesterday. But I didn’t expect the Records Room to be hidden here….”
He tilted his head.
During the repair process, he had examined the internal structure carefully.
The fact that he still had not noticed it at all meant someone had deliberately hidden it.
[Concealment and perception distortion barrier active.]
“There was something like that? I had no idea.”
Jin-woo slowly looked around as he walked.
The walls, the floor, the ceiling.
Outwardly, it was only an ordinary passage.
“The energy supply was cut off… so why was the barrier still alive?”
[Independent energy usage record confirmed.]
[Concealment maintained through B-grade Mana Stone consumption.]
Jin-woo let out a short breath.
“So this is a highest-grade facility.”
The fact that it had consumed emergency energy meant this space was a highest-grade facility even within the Magic Tower.
“So that’s why I couldn’t find it until now. And when I repaired A-3, the connection was restored.”
[Affirmative.]
“I’m going in.”
With that short answer, he stood in front of the direction indicated by the arrow.
There was only one ordinary-looking wall there.
With a suspicious gaze, Jin-woo reached out and knocked on the wall.
Tap. Tap.
It was solid.
Too solid.
For a hidden door, it was “perfectly” blocked off.
“……This is really a barrier?”
The moment his fingertips touched it, a cold numbness ran across his skin.
‘The mana… is repelling me.’
This was not ordinary concealment.
Someone had deliberately made it so this place “could not be seen.”
[Affirmative.]
[Beginning barrier release.]
[Mana circulation operating normally….]
[Disengaged.]
The next moment.
The wall rippled like a wave, then slowly disappeared.
As if an illusion had been lifted, the space split open and revealed the inside.
What remained there was not a wall, but a door made of solid metal.
Unfamiliar characters were neatly engraved across its surface.
It was Arcanist’s language.
[Translation: Records Room.]
Jin-woo’s gaze fixed on the door.
“…Found it.”
Another core space the Magic Tower had kept hidden.
He placed his hand on the handle.
[Checking….]
[Entry possible.]
[Temporary Administrator (C) Authority satisfied.]
[Opening.]
Click.
The door opened.
[Mana circulation confirmed.]
[Normal circuit operation confirmed.]
FLASH—
At the same time as Lumina’s voice, a soft light seeped into the Records Room.
The space submerged in darkness slowly revealed itself.
“…….”
Jin-woo silently looked inside.
It was not as large as he had expected.
Instead, it was an orderly space that seemed to have excluded every unnecessary structure.
Only a few shelves arranged along the walls spoke of this place’s purpose.
Books were neatly lined up on the shelves.
Several dozen volumes or so.
For a place called the Records Room, it was a surprisingly small amount.
“……There aren’t as many as I expected.”
He had expected thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of records to be piled up, but reality was different.
The books here all looked as if they had been deliberately selected.
It felt as if only what was necessary had been left behind, while everything unnecessary had been excluded.
Jin-woo approached the nearest shelf.
Unfamiliar characters were engraved on the spines, but the structure itself was simple.
Blueprints, maintenance records, mana circulation reports, documents related to structural stabilization….
“These are management records.”
[Affirmative.]
[This space was designed for the maintenance and restoration of Magic Tower core facilities.]
[Personal research records and general literature are not designated for storage.]
That was why the number of books was small.
Quality over quantity.
An operations-focused Records Room that left behind only the necessary information.
Jin-woo nodded.
This was more useful.
Then a small gap entered one edge of his vision.
Another door, located in a corner of the room beyond the record shelves.
It was somewhere his gaze had not reached when he first entered.
Because it was camouflaged in the same color as the wall, its structure was difficult to recognize unless one was conscious of it.
“……There’s one more door.”
Jin-woo carefully moved toward it.
Outwardly, it was a door with the same structure as the Records Room.
However, the pattern engraved near the handle was clearly different from the previous door.
[That area is classified as a sub-area of the Records Room.]
[Access authority: restricted.]
Jin-woo placed his hand on the handle, then immediately removed it.
《Magic Tower Stability: 33%》
“…For now, I start here.”
There was a good chance that a method for saving the mine was inside this room.
***
As Jin-woo looked over the shelf, his gaze stopped at one point.
“…What is this?”
On the shelf.
There was something with a slightly different texture from the other books.
As expected, Arcanist’s language was written on the cover.
“Lumina. Can you translate this?”
[Translation: The Great Black Flame Dragon’s One-Day User Manual]
[Translation: The Sage’s Secret Tastes]
At Lumina’s translation, Jin-woo wore a dumbfounded expression.
Just from the titles, they were books that did not suit the nature of this space at all.
“…These count as records too?”
[Classification: personal preference record.]
[Practical utility: 0%.]
“……Right.”
Jin-woo immediately moved his gaze to the next shelf.
The Arcanist.
They possessed absolute Magic Engineering technology and were called “the designers of the Tower.”
But when he looked at the traces they had left behind, sometimes….
‘They really do feel human….’
Thinking that, Jin-woo calmly examined the Records Room.
Most of the characters were impossible to decipher, but thanks to Lumina’s real-time translation, he had no great difficulty understanding the contents.
Maintenance records.
Structural reinforcement designs.
Mana circulation diagrams.
As he looked through them one by one, his gaze stopped on a certain paragraph.
“Magic Tower… for smooth energy supply… an outpost Magic Tower built above a mine?”
Jin-woo’s eyebrows rose slightly.
“Outpost Magic Tower?”
[Checking records.]
With Lumina’s response, a data window appeared in the air.
Broken sentences, erased sections, incomplete diagrams.
Only an extremely small portion remained intact.
[This record is severely damaged.]
[Only approximately 18% of the full content can be restored.]
[Precise functions and Design Purpose cannot be determined.]
“Was it erased on purpose?”
[High probability.]
[Traces of mana interference confirmed.]
[Possibility of record erasure due to external factors: 73%.]
Jin-woo let out a short breath.
“Of course, only the important parts were completely wiped out.”
[Summary of confirmable information.]
[The current Magic Tower is classified as an ‘outpost Magic Tower.’]
[Possibility of a higher-level management facility and a main-base Magic Tower existing: very high.]
[Energy accumulation structure and part of a long-distance mana transmission and reception circuit confirmed.]
“…A higher-level Magic Tower.”
Until now, he had believed this Magic Tower was a “completed model.”
But this—
meant there was a separate main base.
‘Outpost.’
That word remained heavily in his mind.
“Then this place is….”
[Energy mining and survival infrastructure construction.]
[Lowest-stage facility for Tower operation.]
Jin-woo quietly stared at the record screen.
“Literally, the starting point.”
Jin-woo read the record again.
Outpost.
Energy mining.
Mine.
“…Then if the mine collapses, the outpost itself ends. In other words, what I have to do right now is exactly one thing.”
Structures he had not yet seen.
Areas not yet opened.
And the true intent of the being that had designed this Magic Tower.
All of it was hidden beyond the places where the records had been damaged.
‘The main Magic Tower, huh….’
His thoughts deepened.
He had never imagined that this Magic Tower was an outpost, and that there was a separate main Magic Tower.
“Then… there must be an existence like you at the main Magic Tower too.”
[High probability.]
Jin-woo did not ask any further.
Lumina alone was already quite capable.
And if there was a Magic Core of a higher Grade than it, then honestly, that was not bad.
‘If I can obtain even that place… my survival chances will rise, right?’
“Location of the main Magic Tower?”
[Record damaged.]
“Right. There’s no way they’d write their main base here.”
It was their main base.
There was no way core records related to it would remain here.
Swallowing his disappointment, Jin-woo began looking through other materials along the shelf.
And among them, his gaze stopped on one book.
[Record discovered.]
[Mine Management Logbook.]
“What’s in it?”
[Contains numerous personal records.]
[Merged document of maintenance and accident report logs.]
The logbook spread in the air was densely filled not with a standardized format, but with sentences that looked as if someone had hurriedly left them by hand.
[Record Day 17]
— Overtime again today.
— The higher-ups only rush us for speed.
— There is not a single line saying, “Check safety before digging.”
— We’ll be lucky if it just doesn’t collapse. This is gambling.
Jin-woo silently turned to the next page.
[Record Day 24]
— Fine cracks again.
— Fortunately, there was no major rockfall, but the atmosphere is ominous.
— Submitted a request to inspect the stabilization frame.
— Please, let them actually act on it this time.
“…Stabilization frame?”
[Searching additional records.]
The pages of the logbook turned rapidly.
Similar words appeared repeatedly.
[Record Day 31]
— Automatic mana structural stabilization frame still dormant.
— Core circuit is damaged, so it can only be deployed manually.
— It keeps getting postponed because of a shortage of maintenance personnel.
— Honestly, I am anxious.
[Record Day 39]
— Today, the cart overturned.
— An arm was broken.
— Frame request rejected again.
— They had the look of people saying, “People can be replaced.”
Jin-woo’s gaze stopped.
“Automatic mana structural stabilization frame….”
[Summary: Deploys automatically upon detecting signs of collapse and supports the structure.]
[Drawback: Mana Stone consumption increases.]
Jin-woo murmured as if organizing the record.
“When the mine shakes, this frame automatically spreads out and supports the structure.”
[Affirmative.]
[Original purpose: prevent large-scale collapse and minimize casualties.]
[The relevant device is currently dormant due to mana circuit damage.]
[Only limited operation possible.]
Jin-woo rested his hand against his chin for a moment.
“Even if it isn’t perfect, it’ll be much better than the current state.”
[Additional record.]
A new sentence appeared in the air.
[If the frequency of mine collapses exceeds the threshold, parallel operation of the automatic structural stabilization frame is recommended.]
“Recommended.”
Jin-woo quietly repeated that word.
Recommended.
Not a duty, not a requirement.
But considering the situation when this sentence had been written, there must have been clear desperation inside those words.
‘The people who worked here must have wanted this too.’
If they could not stop the mine, then at least keep it from collapsing.
Jin-woo slowly closed the logbook.
For a while, he said nothing.
“…It’s the same.”
Jin-woo raised his head.
“Lumina.”