It took but a few moments before the elevator returned. Found within were two figures, Auguste and Henrietta, both unharmed as far as the eyes could tell.

"Looks like it's safe," Auguste announced.

Trusting in his words, the rest entered the elevator in two groups, one consisting of Auguste, Henrietta, and Finn, while the other consisted of Gladiolus, Morganna, and Elaine. While the elevator had been proven to be safe, they still took care to not have every single member stuff into a small space.

Descending to the floor below, the Henrietta Company was greeted by yet another hallway. Going forward to scout the area out and returning soon after, Auguste and Gladiolus confirmed the area ahead to be safe and led them forward. Eventually, they arrived before a set of doors that slid aside on their own as the party approached. Once past the door, they found themselves in a dark room that lit up by itself as soon as they entered. With the lights on, they spotted what seemed to be an array of chairs and some very strange looking desks. Of the chairs and desks, one in particular stood out, as it was of a most elevated position. If one were to sit upon it, they would be able to overlook the entire room from that position.

"Plenty of seats here, but I don't think it's a mess hall," Henrietta commented.

"Looks more like an office to me," Elaine chimed in.

"It's a bridge," explained Gladiolus. "From here, the captain commands the ship."

"I found it hard to believe when you said that this ruin was a ship, but now that I'm inside, I can't say I'm any more convinced," Morganna commented, feeling rather confounded. This was not what she thought a ship would look like. She had only read about them in books, but she was under the impression that they were more at home on water and were made of a more buoyant material.

"Aye, this is no ship," said Henrietta, "not any I've ever seen anyways."

"You've seen a ship before, Henri?" Auguste was surprised.

"Of course I have. I've been all over the five kingdoms, a ship or two is nothing unusual to me," said Henrietta as she puffed out her chest proudly.

"But you've never seen ones like this before?"

"Nope. The ships I know are all made of wood. Smells kind of bad too. This one is made of metal and is strangely clean. On top of it all, they're supposed to float on water, not burrow into the ground."

The moment she mentioned it, Auguste began to notice it as well. On this 'ship', there was not a speck of dirt or even dust in its halls, all except for the footprints they've been tracking, of course. Even if it had been sealed for god knows how long, there should still be some dust, right? How very strange. Is there perhaps something here cleaning it all up? If so, would they be hostile?

"Um, so what now?" Finn asked. They seemed to have arrived at their destination, but they weren't sure what they were going to do from this point onwards.

"I'll try accessing one of the terminals," said Gladiolus as he started to mess around with the strange bits on one of the desks. "The rest of you can take a break if you want, just don't touch anything."

"Alright! Lunchtime!" Henrietta happily declared, oblivious to Auguste's troubling thoughts.

Auguste, in turn, could only shrug. He can worry about it as much as he wants, but he won't get far on an empty stomach.

And so, the rest of the party sat around and began munching down on their rations. While they've brought a small pot with them, since they're in an enclosed space, they decided not to have Morganna deep fry their dried meat and ate them as if.

"Say, you remember back in that forest, you know, the one near Iotas Tria?"

The one who brought up the question was Auguste, apparently remembering something while watching Morganna feed her pet Slime.

"The one around the stone circle, where we found the Slimes and Mimics?"

"Right. Didn't we fight another witch back there? I just now remembered that she had some pretty crazy earth magic. Maybe we should have taken her catalyst with us."

"You're realizing that now?" Morganna spoke with an accusatory tone, prompting Auguste to turn away.

"W-well, what could I say, it was dark and we were in a hurry, and after that, the forest became a prohibited area. So that was a shame, but what I really wanted to ask is, maybe you could make one like it? It was made with a bundle to roots, right? Shouldn't be too hard to find."

Morganna sighed, not bothering to hide her exasperation.

"It's not that easy. Sure, if you want to be able to create a few grains of dirt, then I suppose any old root would be fine. However, if you want a catalyst of the quality we've seen, we're going to have to find an extremely old tree, a couple of hundred years old at least, that has grown in soil rich in minerals. It is only after a tree had spent years absorbing the minerals from the ground will its Ether bear strong memories of the soil. In other words, what we left behind there was a rather rare item."

"Well now that you put it like that, I'm starting to feel kind of bad."

"Well, it's fine. Whoever she was, that witch clearly worked hard to create that catalyst. I'd feel bad to just take it from her like that."

Not to mention, Morganna couldn't expect those that were not witches to understand the value of a catalyst anyways. She should have been the one to take note, but she was suffering from a high fever brought on by the Rebound, so there wasn't much she could have done either.

"You say that, but, you know, the staff that you *borrowed*?" Auguste pointed towards the ashen staff leaning against Morganna's shoulder.

"Like I said, I borrowed it, I'll return it in due time."

"So it's fine as long as you return it, huh."

"It's her fault to begin with," said Morganna turning her head away. "I wouldn't have to resort to this if she weren't so uptight."

Auguste wasn't sure what the problem between Morganna and her master was. Every time she was brought up, Morganna tended to complain about her master's teaching methods and how unsatisfactory it was. It was Auguste's assumption that this master of her probably had her own reasons but he could never be sure since he didn't know much about how witches do things to being with. He did get the impression that Morganna felt that her master was overprotective, to the point of not wanting her to leave the vicinity of the cabin they lived in. Still, knowing the dangers of the Abyssal Arts, who knows how far is far enough.

In time, Gladiolus was done fiddling with the glowing desks and rejoined the group.

"It appears that most of the ship is still functioning. However, to allow those in the village to enter this place, we will have to head down to the security room to alter some of the security protocols."

"Okay, let's head there then. You know the way, right?" Auguste stood up, eager to go.

"I do, but I do not have the clearance to enter it."

"Any other way?"

"I'm afraid not." Gladiolus shook his head before falling silent.

Auguste tilted his head, expecting Gladiolus to continue, to propose a plan for an alternate course perhaps. Strangely, however, Gladiolus seemed to be having a difficult time getting to that part of the conversation.

"Gladiolus? What do we do now?" Auguste asked out of impatience.

"We could find someone with the clearance to access the room and have them open the doors for us."

"But I thought the Orcus are incapable of even entering this ship," Morganna made mention. "Can they enter this 'security room' you're talking about?"

"I'm not talking about those in the village."

"Then... Outside of the Dungeon? I guess there ought to be more Alva wandering about. Do you know any? Then again, if we could just go outside, we wouldn't be doing this."

"No, not that either. I haven't seen another Alva for the last hundred years."

"Then?" Morganna furrowed her brow, unable to think of what could possibly be on Gladiolus' mind.

"According to the chieftain, there should still be some remaining on this ship, Alva who have been sleeping to this very day."

"That's one heck of a long nap," Henrietta commented. "This hunk of metal is like over a thousand years old, right? Can the Alva even live that long?"

"We have, or had, our ways. The chambers should be at the center of the ship, where it is most protected."

"I reckon you know the way there too?" Auguste asked.

"I would hope so."

"Looks like we've got a plan then. Shall we go?"

Looking to the rest of the party, Auguste found no objections. He was starting to find it becoming a habit now, for him to gauge to opinions of the party members.

Damn, he thought to himself, this was supposed to be Henrietta's job.

***

End of Chapter 68