Chapter 46 – Shadows over E-Rantel
The forest wind was quiet when we arrived.
Not the eerie kind of quiet, but the stillness that told you you were nearing civilization—smoke from chimneys faint in the distance, the sound of faint bells carried through the air.
We stopped atop a ridge overlooking the valley below.
And there it was.
A vast fortress city, walled in stone and iron, sprawling like a gray crown across the plain. Three massive rings of walls layered outward from the center, each glittering faintly beneath the moonlight. Torches lined the battlements like fiery veins.
I crouched, narrowing my eyes.
> "So this is… the city."
Echo, crouched beside me, shifted his form slightly—his edges softening into shadow. "It's large, my lord. Bigger than any we've surveyed so far." His tone was calm, but even he couldn't hide the curiosity in his voice.
Ethael stood silently behind us, her eyes gleaming with a faint crimson glow beneath her hood. The twin daggers strapped to her thighs pulsed softly with mana, like a heartbeat in perfect rhythm with her breath.
> "There are guards stationed every twenty meters along the walls," she reported. "Rotations occur roughly every fifteen minutes. Their patterns are inefficient. I detect no magical barriers—no wards, no traps, not even anti-stealth runes."
That confirmed what my racial detection was already telling me.
The entire perimeter was clean. No anti-spy wards, no detection enchantments—just plain, human vigilance.
How… quaint.
I closed my eyes briefly, feeling my body shift as I activated the racial morph function.
My physical form shimmered, dissolving into liquid black before reforming into a tall, slender silhouette—skin translucent gray, eyes faintly glowing like cold embers.
My shadow stretched across the ground, darker than the night around it.
The form of a Shadow, one of the racial templates stored in my Doppelgänger data library—a race specialized in stealth and infiltration.
The sensation was immediate.
The world felt lighter.
My body, now weightless and almost incorporeal, moved with a grace that defied physics. The ground no longer resisted my steps; even the air seemed to flow differently against my skin.
Echo followed suit. His form melted into a similar figure—though slightly shorter, more angular. His own shadow fused with mine as he tested his movement, vanishing and reappearing like a ripple across dark water.
> "Efficient transformation," he murmured. "This form's sensitivity to light mana is lower than expected. Excellent for espionage."
I smirked faintly. "Stay close, and don't draw attention. We're here for information, not a massacre."
Ethael tilted her head slightly. "Understood, my lord. Shall I maintain my human form?"
I nodded. "Yes. Someone needs to pass for a civilian if things go wrong."
---
We made our way down the slope, cloaking ourselves in layered illusion and racial concealment spells. The closer we approached the outer wall, the more apparent it became—this city wasn't ready for entities like us.
Two guards leaned lazily against their halberds near the gate, barely glancing at the road. Their armor was mismatched—more ceremonial than functional.
"Pathetic," Echo whispered, barely audible.
I didn't reply. With a flick of my fingers, I triggered [Silent Step], the world muffling around me. My shadow merged with the ground, and we moved—fluid, seamless, invisible.
In less than a breath, we reached the base of the wall.
From there, Echo used [Phantom Grip] to form spectral handholds along the stone. We climbed effortlessly, the city's torches reflecting faintly off our gray skin like water against obsidian.
When we reached the top, the guards still hadn't moved.
We slipped past them and dropped silently onto the other side.
And just like that—we were inside.
---
From the streets below, the city of E-Rantel unfolded like a medieval tapestry.
Stone buildings, timbered roofs, cobblestone roads illuminated by mana lamps. The faint scent of bread and oil filled the air, along with the murmur of late-night chatter from taverns near the outer ring.
It was so… normal.
No artificial shine. No digital haze. No system text floating above anyone's head.
It felt like a real city.
> "It's… alive," Ethael murmured softly, almost to herself.
For a moment, I watched her expression—soft, bewildered.
She had no idea that, once upon a time, she was nothing more than data in a server.
And now, she looked like a real person—breathing, thinking, feeling.
I couldn't bring myself to tell her otherwise.
---
We moved deeper into the city, following the flow of the roads.
From what we could observe, E-Rantel was designed for defense—a layered fortress. The outer ring housed the commoners: markets, workshops, and taverns. The middle ring appeared more organized, likely for military and administration. The innermost ring… that was our target.
We crossed the outer ring quickly, blending into the narrow alleys and rooftops.
At one point, a patrol passed within arm's reach of us—five armored soldiers in red and silver tabards, bearing the crest of a lion. Their footsteps echoed through the street, but none of them looked our way.
We could have walked right through them, and they wouldn't have noticed.
> "Security pattern unchanged," Echo whispered through our link.
"No magical interference detected. Proceeding to the second wall."
We reached the second wall in minutes. This one was thicker, patrolled by more guards—but still primitive. No mana signatures. No wards.
We scaled it as easily as the first.
The inner ring was quieter. The streets here were wide, the buildings larger and cleaner. Lamps glowed with steady light magic instead of flickering flame. The architecture was refined—this was clearly where nobles or officers lived.
And beyond that, visible even from a distance, loomed the third wall.
Smooth, polished stone reinforced with iron plates. Watchtowers dotted its perimeter.
I exhaled slowly. "That's the one. The administrative quarter."
---
Getting past the third wall took longer.
Guards here were alert, their mana signatures stronger—several of them even carried enchanted weapons.
But against an illusionist with access to racial stealth and class-based invisibility layering, "alert" meant nothing.
Echo and I cloaked both ourselves and Ethael in multiple overlapping fields—[Perfect Silence], [Refraction Veil], and the passive [Dark Reflection] from our Shadow forms.
We waited for the right moment—when a patrol rounded the far corner—and then scaled the wall in absolute silence.
At the top, I scanned for traps again. Nothing. Not even a basic detection glyph.
It almost felt too easy.
We dropped into the courtyard beyond, landing silently behind a low parapet.
Ahead of us stood a large stone building—the kind of place that screamed authority. Its walls were lined with glass windows and lanterns, several of which were still lit despite the late hour.
The sigil carved above the door depicted a lion and sword—a symbol of the Re-Estize Kingdom.
> "There," I murmured. "Central administration."
Ethael nodded. "I count six guards at the front, two on the roof, and a clerk visible through the east window."
Echo tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing. "Shall I disable them?"
"Quietly," I said. "No deaths."
He vanished instantly, his body dissolving into mist. Within seconds, the two rooftop guards collapsed soundlessly, their consciousness slipping away like smoke. Then the others—one by one—fell, lulled into a deep, magic-induced slumber.
When the last one dropped, I nodded. "Move."
---
Inside, the air smelled faintly of parchment and candle wax.
Bookshelves lined the walls; scrolls and ledgers stacked in neat rows. The faint sound of scratching quills came from deeper inside.
Echo moved ahead first, gliding like liquid shadow between the desks.
When we reached the central archive, a lone clerk sat hunched over a pile of documents. He didn't even look up before Echo's gloved hand touched his neck, releasing a soft burst of sleep magic.
The man slumped forward silently, his quill snapping in two.
I gestured for the others to begin searching.
"HIME, are you receiving?" I whispered through my message link.
Her voice echoed faintly in my mind.
> "Affirmative, Ren-sama. Signal clear. Proceeding with real-time data synchronization."
"Good. Start recording."
We began rifling through the stacks, careful not to disturb the room more than necessary. Most of the documents were written in a common human language—something the translation systems still seemed to support.
Echo skimmed a set of maps. "Three concentric walls, as expected. Defensive architecture matches late medieval human design. No indication of advanced technology."
Ethael found a stack of papers labeled with military insignias. "The guards are organized under a structure called the Royal Army of Re-Estize. They maintain a border garrison with something called the Baharuth Empire. Sounds like rival nations."
That caught my attention. "Empire, you said?"
She nodded. "Yes, my lord. It appears this city—E-Rantel—is a border fortress between the Re-Estize Kingdom and the Baharuth Empire. Frequent conflicts. Large-scale warfare noted every few years."
Echo handed me a map—aged parchment, edges yellowed.
At the center, E-Rantel was marked in bold ink, surrounded by dense forests and plains. To the east, the Baharuth Empire's territory stretched like a scar, while to the west lay the heartlands of Re-Estize.
"Interesting," I murmured. "So this is where we ended up… a world with kingdoms, empires, and war."
HIME's voice resonated faintly through the link.
> "Ren-sama, that name—E-Rantel—matches several instances from archived Yggdrasil lore files. However, the current geographic and environmental data does not match any known in-game configuration. This is not the same digital environment."
I froze briefly. "Meaning?"
> "Meaning… this is not Yggdrasil's server. It's something else."
Her voice faded.
I exhaled, staring down at the parchment map in my hands.
The lines, the ink, even the texture—it felt real. Too real.
If this was a simulation, it was beyond anything Yggdrasil ever allowed.
But I pushed the thought aside. For now, I needed information, not existential philosophy.
---
After several more minutes of searching, we compiled what we could:
City Name: E-Rantel.
Location: A border fortress city belonging to the Kingdom of Re-Estize.
Neighboring Power: The Baharuth Empire.
Political Condition: Ongoing tension; peace treaties occasionally signed, often broken.
Defensive Capability: Moderate. Strong walls, average troop discipline. Minimal magic.
Magical Infrastructure: Low-tier. Only minor enchantments in use; no evidence of divine or world-tier artifacts.
It wasn't much, but it was enough to build a framework.
I leaned against the desk, fingers tapping idly against the parchment.
"So this is the world we're in," I murmured. "A world that thinks it's medieval—but with traces of magic. And somehow, it mirrors Yggdrasil's lore… just imperfectly."
Ethael glanced up. "What should we do now, my lord?"
I thought for a moment, then smiled faintly.
"We blend in. We watch. And we learn everything we can about this world—starting with the people who run it."
Echo inclined his head. "Understood. Shall I establish infiltration points among the local guilds?"
"Not yet," I said. "First, we confirm how much of Yggdrasil still exists here. We may not be the only ones who arrived."
Ethael nodded. "Then our next target is…?"
"The city's archive deeper in the capital offices," I replied, eyes narrowing. "The records of adventurers, nobles, and—if we're lucky—anything related to foreign entities."
We moved deeper into the building, past the silent clerk and the rows of sleeping guards, vanishing once more into the darkness.
Somewhere in the distance, the city bells began to toll midnight.
And for the first time in a long time, I felt the same thrill I had as a twelve-year-old boy sitting in his room, uncovering secrets no one else had found.
Only now… it wasn't a game anymore.
It was the beginning of something far greater.
---
End of Chapter 46 – Shadows over E-Rantel