"Frondier, shouldn't we go back now?"
"I think I'm going to forget the way back soon."
"......Ah, right. I forgot."
Frondier's expression crumpled.
He looked around the interior of the Manggot and said,
"This place can't be fully explored in a few days."
The Manggot was originally a place where humans hid, taking advantage of its labyrinthine terrain.
"I remember the way we came."
Frondier had the Workshop. The route was already saved.
However, only Frondier remembered the path they had taken so far. If they got separated here, it wouldn't be easy for the others to find the exit.
The further they went, the harder it would get.
"I thought we'd just wander around the outside and come out, but we've come in deeper than I expected. Let's go back."
Frondier nodded at Lily's words.
He turned around and headed back the way they came,
And stopped abruptly.
'...We came in deep. Really deep.'
As Lily said, they were steadily moving towards the inner part of the Manggot.
They hadn't encountered a dead end or ended up in the same place twice.
They had reached this point without ever getting lost.
'Is that even possible? The Manggot's people were able to survive because it was a maze that was difficult to penetrate into the deeper parts.'
Frondier paused for a moment and then said,
"Sorry. I want to investigate this place a bit more. You guys go ahead and rest."
The three looked at each other at Frondier's words and nodded.
Frondier had something to check, and they didn't want to interfere.
Elodie said, and the three said goodbye to Frondier before heading back the way they came.
Frondier was left alone. He exhaled lightly and carefully retraced his steps.
'The leader was obviously me. It's the path I walked. If the fact that we haven't been blocked and have been able to progress so far isn't a coincidence, the reason lies with me.'
Frondier retraced the path he had taken. Which way he turned at forks, what criteria he used to choose.
'Criteria... No, I didn't have any criteria. This place doesn't have any easy-to-understand signs, and if I had made a careless choice, we would have been blocked right away.'
And if he had been conscious of where and how to go, there would be no need to recall it now.
Frondier definitely moved his feet without thinking deeply.
His eyes narrowed suspiciously.
"Have I been here before?"
His memory remained, so his steps unconsciously led him inward. If that were the case, he might be able to understand it, but Frondier had obviously never been to the Manggot before.
Perhaps, just maybe, it wasn't a matter of considering the same possibilities.
'Then where did I get the memory...'
Memory. That was a clear keyword. Frondier didn't know this place, but he already knew something that could guide him to the right path.
Frondier started to find his own reasoning absurd.
It was fortunate that he had sent the others away. He could only imagine what they would say if they saw him .
Frondier decided to take a step forward first. Maybe he would find out something if he went a little further.
"...There are words here too."
Frondier checked the ancient languages he occasionally found as he went.
Words whose meaning was still unclear. Not knowing what they meant, Frondier just kept them in his mind.
"Then the left path here is..."
He muttered to himself unconsciously and then,
"...What was I just now?"
He checked the ancient languages written on the wall and was convinced that the left path was the correct one.
'It's not that I saw the ancient languages and decided to turn left, but the moment I saw these ancient languages, I knew that left was the answer.'
Frondier continued onward. The further he went, the more certain he was that the path he had chosen was the correct one.
This wasn't guesswork. It was clearer than intuition.
He knew. The path to the deepest part.
'It's not that I understand the meaning of the ancient languages and move accordingly. I can't interpret them anyway, so I just keep them in my mind. To me, they're just symbols that exist in that location...'
Symbols indicating that ancient languages were marked in that location.
Frondier looked up in surprise.
He understood. He understood what had been guiding him to the correct answer.
It wasn't surprising at all. It was something he used to do in the past. He had just done it unconsciously.
'The ancient languages are symbols. I don't need to know what they mean in the first place. What's important is the location and length. Remember, the ancient languages are written with mana!'
The symbols of the ancient languages, the walls as lines, the path Frondier was walking on as empty space.
'Stupid, this is cheating!'
Frondier knew the way to the deepest part.
He had never been to the Manggot before, but the path was already in his head.
The reason this was possible.
It was because the maze of this Manggot was so similar to something he knew.
The place where Frondier was walking, the interior of the Manggot.
When viewed from above, the walls became lines, the paths became spaces, and the ancient languages became symbols.
It had the form of a rune.