Gonna Be a Demon King!-Chapter 53: Secrets Underfoot

Wherever the barrier's energy was strongest, that was where the barrier core had to be.

With that in mind, they headed straight for the right wing of Level 4, the section where the Archmages always gathered.

The room was lined with shelves along the walls, and at its centre sat a large conference table. The two quickly began scanning the room, but even after going around the room multiple times over, the gauge did not spike as high as it should have.

The marker never maxed out.

If they were close to the barrier core, the gauge was supposed to hit its limit, but it never did.

The highest reading they got was near a bookshelf, where the gauge came close to maxing out but still fell five units short.

No matter where they searched on Level 4, the gauge refused to reach its peak.

Just as Xaren started to suspect the use of Spatial Magic to hide the barrier core in an alternate space, Ilya, who had been beside him the entire time, suddenly had a realization.

Without hesitation, she grabbed his wrist and pulled him out of level 4 and into the stairwell.

Then, she asked,

"The barrier is a dome, right? How is that dome generated?"

Xaren thought back to the mission review they had done over a week ago, recalling the information written in the barrier's description.

"It fires a pulse beam of magic power into the air, which then sprinkles down like rain. That magic power is drawn to the barrier nodes placed on the roofs of tall buildings and along the city walls, creating a grid-like network in the air. That grid forms the framework that the dome is built upon, covering the entire city."

Hearing his response, Ilya immediately followed up.

"And what about the second method?"

Xaren furrowed his brow, placing a hand on his chin as he tried to recall the experimental barrier method they had read about.

"I think... the barrier core sends energy into the ground, creating a network of magic power beneath the city. It uses underground barrier nodes—placed beneath the city walls and across the terrain—to generate the dome, raising it from below and stretching it into the air to cover the city."

The moment he finished speaking, Ilya spoke again.

"Those Archmages who stayed behind—they went to the ground floor before returning here, and then they left.

Why? 

Why go from the top floor all the way to the ground floor only to come back up before leaving?"

The moment Ilya said those words, Xaren's eyes widened in shock.

Without hesitation, he dashed out of the room, Ilya following close behind.

The two of them raced down the stairs to the ground floor, and as soon as they arrived, Xaren reactivated the scanner.

He moved around the entire floor, moving the scanner around as he walked.

Then, just as they reached one of the document room doors, the gauge maxed out.

Xaren immediately grabbed the key, unlocked the door, and rushed inside. Even inside the room, the gauge remained at its peak.

Without wasting a second, they began searching the room for any hidden doors or secret compartments but found nothing.

They tapped along the walls, searched the shelves, inspected the floor—nothing.

After five minutes of fruitless searching, Xaren finally sat down in the middle of the room, placing the scanner on the ground as he tried to think of where the barrier core could be.

He checked the timer on the Perception Blocker to see how much time he had left. But just as he reached for the scanner again, something clicked in his mind.

Ilya's question.

His gaze snapped to the ground beneath him as he muttered with certainty.

"...Underground. The barrier core is underground."

Ilya raised a brow, momentarily confused, but the realization struck just as fast, and she nodded in understanding.

But if the barrier core really was underground, that raised a new problem—how did they access it?

They had no idea where the entrance to this apparent underground layer was.

Which meant there was only one way forward, and that was tailing the Archmages when they went there.

Xaren got to his feet, letting out a breath as he turned to Ilya.

"Thanks, Ilya."

"...mhmm."

The girl just nodded silently, glancing around the room one last time, as though trying to find a hidden mechanism.

Meanwhile, Xaren silently ran his hands through his hair, thinking about how short-sighted he'd been.

He had been so focused on the primary method of barrier operation and had ignored the experimental method.

The main method—where the barrier core sent pulses of magic power into the air to form the protective dome—was the most efficient at the time of the barrier's creation.

The underground method had been considered too difficult due to magic power interference in the ground.

Xaren had simply assumed that, given the low level of magic technology in this world, they would have used the easier method.

But they hadn't.

They'd used the more difficult method, which was still experimental at the time this barrier system was stolen from the demons.

◇　◇　◇

Now that they had confirmed the barrier core was somewhere underground, directly beneath this document room, Xaren found himself with another question.

"Why did those Archmages go up before they went down and left the building?"

He thought back to the area in Level 4's right wing, where the barrier's energy had been unusually high.

He mentioned this to Ilya, and the two of them headed back upstairs.

Returning to that particular bookshelf, they resumed their physical search, flipping through books and inspecting them carefully—until Xaren noticed something unusual.

As he pushed a book back into place, he spotted a small gap at the back of the shelf. At first, he almost dismissed it as a natural seam where the wooden panels joined.

But after glancing at the upper and lower layers, he realized that none of them had a similar gap.

Without hesitation, he removed the book and pressed against the suspicious section of the shelf. It tilted inward slightly, revealing a false back.

Peeling it away, Xaren uncovered a hidden book. He unhesitatingly pulled it out and flipped it open—only to find that it wasn't a book at all.

Inside, nestled neatly, was a case containing two keys.

His eyes narrowed as he examined them.

One of the keys was identical to the one used to access the barrier core prison, a design he recognized from the barrier's illustrated schematics.

The other, however, was unfamiliar. But considering that the two keys had been hidden together, it didn't take long for Xaren to deduce its purpose. This was likely the key to the secret room housing the barrier core—the same room they hadn't yet figured out how to access.

Wasting no time, Xaren reached into his magic pouch and retrieved another device they had been given.

It was a fairly heavy 50cm by 50cm box. He pressed a button, and the lid flipped open, revealing a strange mechanism inside.

Xaren had no idea what it was or how it worked.

All he knew was what he had been told—place the key on the plate, press the button, and wait.

The device would work for a few minutes and produce an exact copy of the key.

So he did exactly that, duplicating both the barrier core prison key and the other key.

If Xaren had been more knowledgeable about magi-technology, he would have realized that this device was essentially a magical 3D printer.

Once the copies were complete, Xaren returned the original keys to their case, placed the case back inside the false compartment, and slid the bookshelf back into place.

Then, he and Ilya left Level 4, locking up behind them.

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Unbeknownst to them, their decision to duplicate the keys on-site rather than remove the book from Level 4 had been a very fortunate one.

Had they taken it out of the Right Wing, they would have triggered an alarm and Every Archmage in the city would have instantly known that the book had left its designated area.

The same security applied to all the grimoires on Level 4—if any of them crossed the doors, hidden sensors would immediately activate.

But, of course, there was a loophole.

If the books were placed inside something like a magic pouch before being taken across the doors, the sensors wouldn't trigger, as they required direct detection of the books to activate.

Xaren, intending to steal the gravity magic grimoire before leaving, planned to place it inside his magic pouch before making his exit.