Chapter 252: On The Sidelines
Kouske stared at the huge cave in silent contemplation. Normally, he liked to explore a place, understand the lore behind it and examine each tiny thing in detail.
But now was not the time for it. He shook his head and forced himself to scan through everything in this cave hurriedly.
Except for the greenish black moss that covered the walls and the numerous skeletons chained to the same, nothing else of value seemed to be there.
No matter how much he looked, this was all that he could find.
"Okay. I should go to the next one." He wiped the sweat off of his forehead, and then letting out a long sigh, he opened the huge iron door again.
This time he was truly pushing his luck. From this side of the door, he couldn't exactly see where Liam's concentration lay. He also couldn't hear anything.
The best he could do was push open the door slightly, creating a small slit of space through which he could peer outside and see what was happening.
Luckily for him, Liam seemed to be still engrossed in fighting the death knights. He also did not look like he had figured out anything yet, and his full attention was on the fight.
But the number of enemies surrounding him had once again gone down. He was slowly but steadily overpowering them and defeating them.
At this rate, he might only have a few more minutes left. After that, the number of death knights would definitely be too little to keep this monster completely occupied.
He hurriedly dunked in another invisibility potion and then stepped out of the door. There were only two more caves in the vicinity, and the tunnel seemed to end here.
There was simply no other option.
"The quest item has to be in one of these two places," Kouske mumbled to himself.
The fight was currently focused near the central cave, so Kouske walked around the group and arrived at the leftmost cave.
He once again had to apply a lot of force to push open this door, and the rusted door finally gave away.
He quietly slipped in and closed the door behind him, this time leaving a small opening and not fully shutting down the door.
He then observed the vast space in front of him. It was old, dusty, and covered with cobwebs, but just like the other room, this room also was unique.
But this one did not have creepy skeletons and weird sacrificial mud tables. Instead, there were numerous cauldrons, inscription desks, forging stations, and even an old furnace structure.
Though at first glance, these looked like ordinary items, albeit covered in dust and sand, Kouske knew that they possibly couldn't be so simple.
He started anxiously looking around in a hurry as any minute now, Liam could bang open the door and barge inside.
Just the mere thought of it made him nervous. He quickened his pace and started pocketing everything he could get his hands on.
Some of the cauldrons even had leftover substances within them, to his surprise. These could potentially be rare treasures or high-grade medicinal pills.
Kouske did not have the time to see what was useful and what was not useful and tossed every single item in the cave into his inventory.
It was good that they had recently emptied all the contents in the warehouse.
So he now had plenty of space to accommodate all the random things, even items that could potentially only be trash.
Soon he was done rummaging through this cave as well, and the only leftover was the moss covering the walls.
"Could this be a rare herb too?"
Just in case, Kouske scraped some moss off of the wall and tossed it into his inventory as well.
He didn't have the time necessary to harvest all the moss, but seeing that this tunnel was full of it, he didn't bother with it.
At least for now, the quest item had the maximum priority. It was a Kingdom quest and these were extremely rare and the rewards equally generous
He couldn't possibly squat on the ground and leisurely scrape off all the moss in this place with the monster outside the cave and his quest incomplete.
No, he had to act quickly and stealthily and leave this place before the other party realized his presence.
So far, everything had gone his way, so Kouske was now a lot more confident and less nervous.
In the beginning, when they had been ordered to come here immediately, even though their levels were too low, he had been extremely skeptical.
But in hindsight, seeing how things were turning out now, this had been the best possible decision.
He did not even have to deal with anything personally.
Liam by himself had already taken care of all the mobs in this place, and other possible hurdles, thereby leaving him free to take the actual treasure.
Kouske was usually a calm person, but even he couldn't contain his excitement this time. Leeching off of someone else's hard work was an exhilarating feeling.
Chuckling nervously, he wiped the sweat off of his forehead and peered outside to see if the coast was clear.
Liam was still busy fighting, so he dunked in the invisibility potion and stepped out.
But before leaving, he again turned to check if he had indeed cleaned out everything from the room without missing anything.
He was doing things in a rush, so he did not want to make careless mistakes and leave the important treasure to the enemy while only pocketing useless trinkets.
"Alright, it looks good." He nodded in contentment after taking one to three looks. Anyway, this did not seem to be the room he was seeking.
The item that his quest needed for completion was probably in the central cave room.
He closed the huge door as quietly as possible and then walked out to tip-toe towards the last and final cave room.
