Chapter 212  Find out!

Amon had ended up sleeping inside the main hall of the temple.

After walking the entire night without rest, his body had finally reached its limit. He lay down near one of the broken pillars, his back against the cold stone floor, his sword placed close to his hand.

The torch had long since burned out, but faint light filtered in through the cracks in the ruined ceiling.

Despite the ominous atmosphere, exhaustion dragged him into sleep.

Time passed quietly.

After a while, Amon stirred.

“…Mm…”

He shifted slightly, his brows knitting together. His eyes slowly opened, still heavy with sleep. For a moment, he forgot where he was.

Then the cold stone beneath him registered.

His eyes widened.

Amon sat up abruptly, his heart skipping a beat. He rubbed his eyes hard with both hands and looked around the hall again.

The same broken pillars. The dark stone walls. The ancient silence. It was creepy, yet peaceful.

“I really fell asleep here…” he muttered.

He got to his feet immediately, shaking off the remaining drowsiness. His gaze sharpened.

Now that he had rested a little, his mind was clearer.

“…There has to be more here,” Amon said quietly.

If there was a map carved into stone inside this temple, then it was only natural that the name of this place should exist somewhere as well.

Temples were never built without purpose. And places like this always left behind clues. Inscriptions, records, something.

It’s not like there were no inscriptions here. But the few things written were in some ancient language.

He tightened his grip on his sword and began searching again.

For now, he decided to keep the sword in his hand.

Slowly and carefully, Amon walked through the hall, examining the walls more closely this time. He ran his fingers over the carvings, inspected worn symbols, and checked the bases of the pillars.

Nothing. No readable words. There was nothing he could read here.

Only ancient designs and patterns that meant nothing to him.

“…Tch.”

His eyes narrowed slightly.

He moved outside the temple.

The gloomy forest greeted him once more, but daylight– dim and grey ade it easier to see. Amon decided to check the outer structure thoroughly.

He walked along the outer wall, circling the temple completely.

Step by step.

He examined the stone closely. Cracks, carvings, eroded markings. He checked near the corners, behind pillars, and even places half-covered by vines and roots.

Still nothing.

No name. No inscription he could understand.

After completing a full round, Amon stopped in front of the temple entrance again.

“…Nothing,” he muttered, frustration creeping into his voice.

He let out a slow breath.

“Was I wrong?”

He didn’t give up and continued to search more keenly.

Then he found something.

Near the stone guardians at the entrance.

Amon found it.

One of the stone guards. On the right side, had something near its feet.

A slab.

A stone slab that had fallen and was half-buried in dirt and moss.

Amon’s heart skipped a beat.

“…That… maybe there is something on it,” he murmured.

He walked toward it quickly.

The slab was smaller than the one inside the hall, cracked at the edges and worn by time. Moss clung to its surface, and dirt covered most of it. It looked like it had fallen from the wall long ago and had been ignored ever since.

Amon crouched down.

He brushed away the moss and dirt with his hand.

And then.

His eyes widened.

“…This…”

Carved into the stone were words.

Not strange symbols.

Not unknown markings.

Words.

A language he could read.

Amon’s breathing grew slightly heavier as he leaned closer, staring at the inscription with disbelief.

“…I can read this,” he whispered.

His heart began to pound—not with fear this time, but with anticipation.

At last.

A clue.

“…This temple is one of the most beautiful temples in the whole Pārijātavana… hm… that’s it? Did someone write a review and leave it here? Well, at least I got the name.”

Amon smiled widely.

Then he frowned. His grip tightened on the edges of the slab.

“Where… did I hear this name?”

Amon tried to remember where he had heard it. His short-term memory worked hard to bring back that small fragment from a lecture by Professor Cristiana.

“I remembered!”

He finally recalled it. The place called Pārijātavana, now also known as the Grave of the Celestial Tree.

“Hahaha.”

A broken chuckle left his lips.

Because he remembered all the content of that lecture. How dangerous and mysterious this place actually was. How no Mythborn-ranked people could enter here.

Also, many kingdoms had their eyes on this place.

“Oh, fuck. No wonder… no one came to find me yet… I am far away from the human continent. Shit.”

He knew his situation was grave. But now it had intensified even more.

‘Wait… does that mean… does that mean the huge tree on the map… it was the Celestial Tree… as the name indicates this place?’

If it truly meant a Celestial Tree, then it would be far bigger and more massive than a normal one.

“…Like the World Tree.”

He knew about how the Elven Kingdom possessed a divine tree called the World Tree. It was so huge and tall that its height touched the sky. Its trunk was so massive that it could take a long time just to walk around it in a circle.

The Celestial Tree was also once a divine tree. Different from the World Tree.

Amon sat down on the stone floor.

“So… who is this guy? Who wrote these words on the stone slab… in common language, which is spoken by everyone?”

Did someone come here before?

But this place wasn’t something one could call beautiful. Maybe they came during a time when it was not yet ruined.

Amon closed his eyes tightly and rubbed his head with both hands.

‘Even if they came at that time… what being did they worship?’

Amon’s small brain was getting overworked. He tried his best to come up with any possibility he could.

“For now… I will stay here for a few days… and then start going toward the mountains.”

Amon lay back on the spot, staring upward.

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