The search team immediately approached Akkia and Cox to continue their report. Leah, who was nearby, also finished her treatment and approached them.

“It seems they barely survived inside the collapsed room. Excessive bleeding is suspected even with the naked eye. Emergency treatment is needed, but.”

The search team continued their report with a troubled expression.

“For that, the doctor would need to enter the mine directly.”

Enter a mine that could collapse again at any moment? The faces of the doctors examining patients around darkened.

“We’ll need volunteers. Are there any doctors willing to enter the mine to check for survivors and provide emergency treatment?”

Akkia’s low voice echoed around, summarizing the situation concisely. But no one stepped forward readily, just glancing at each other.

After all, who would voluntarily enter a mine at risk of collapse? The hesitation of the medical staff was understandable.

“I’ll go with them.”

“Y-Your Grace?”

The Duke quietly expressed his willingness to go together in a situation where no one volunteered. The surroundings stirred at Akkia’s declaration.

“Yes. I’ll prioritize protecting the safety of the medical staff.”

Leah scanned the surroundings. When Akkia expressed his intention to go together, the doctors who seemed to consider briefly shook their heads.

‘Even if the Duke goes, who would step forward?’

It was clear there would be no doctor volunteering without further wait. Leah, looking around, carefully raised her hand.

“I’ll go with you.”

“Nonsense. Why would you follow?”

The Duke frowned at Leah’s unexpected offer.

The chilly atmosphere emanating from his cold red eyes was unusual. As if he was thoroughly angry.

“If you’re going, Your Grace, I should go too. What medical staff works as well with you as I do?”

Of course, it was true given their time together, but Akkia didn’t want to agree with that opinion.

To bring Leah into a potentially dangerous place.

Moreover, Leah’s determined leaf-green eyes were saying she would follow no matter what.

Thus, for the first time, the Duke regretted bringing Leah to Biarritzkal.

.

.

.

The two found survivors shortly after entering the salt mine together.

The injuries weren’t as deep as expected, so Leah quickly finished emergency treatment and sent the patient out first through the search team.

Even the search team members seemed to struggle to exit through the narrow passage that had become cramped after a large room in the mine collapsed.

As the search team and survivor disappeared from view, Leah said.

“Your Grace, let’s head back now.”

It would be disastrous if the mine suddenly collapsed. But the Duke’s expression as he looked around was unusual.

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“It seems strange.”

“What does?”

The Duke approached the mine wall and placed his hand on it. Akkia felt a scorching heat through his palm.

“Isn’t it too hot? I didn’t notice anything unusual coming in, but an abnormally hot heat is rising from the inner walls.”

“……”

“The mine feels like a boiling active volcano.”

Come to think of it, unlike the cool outside air typical of the northern region, the air in the mine was unbearably humid and heavy.

As if to prove this, both of their clothes were soaked with sweat.

“It is a bit strange. This area isn’t hot even in summer.”

The cave should be cooler than the outside temperature. But the deep interior of the cave was as hot and humid as a summer afternoon.

Akkia looked around the unsettling mine interior and said to Leah.

“Leah. You go out first. I’ll look around here a bit more before leaving.”

“What? By yourself, Your Grace? Let me come with you.”

The Duke turned and met Leah’s gaze. Despite his stern look, Leah was unwilling to back down.

In the end, unable to break her stubbornness, Akkia sighed.

“Such stubbornness. Then don’t get distracted, and follow right behind me.”

So the two walked through the narrow passage for quite a while. The mine interior got more stifling the further in they went.

“This is really strange. The inside of a mine shouldn’t be this hot.”

Moreover, oddly enough, water was pooled heavily on the inner floor. Akkia knelt down to examine the water that had now reached their ankles.

“This is……”

Just as the Duke stiffened while looking at the water rising on the floor, the ground suddenly shook, and Leah’s body staggered forward.

“Ah, ah!”

She thought she was going to fall helplessly, but when she opened her eyes, she was in the Duke’s arms.

“Are you alright?”

“Y-Your Grace……”

Akkia’s face, looking visibly tense, came into view. Leah’s trembling voice called out to him briefly.

– Rumble! Boom!

With a deafening sound piercing their ears, the entire mine shook again.

‘N-No way. Is it collapsing?’

As if in disbelief, the two’s gazes intertwined.

“We need to get out of here quickly.”

With Akkia’s words as a signal, the two hurried their steps to escape the mine.

That’s when cracks began to form in the support beams holding up the ceiling with creaking sounds. Leah’s face turned deathly pale as she watched.

“Your Grace, the mine walls look like they’re about to collapse…!”

“Leah!”

Akkia grabbed the hand of the stunned Leah and ran with all his might towards the entrance.

The two people running on the shaking ground stumbled repeatedly, but when they finally reached the entrance, they came to an abrupt halt.

“The entrance…!”

The sound of something collapsing earlier must have been the entrance.

There was definitely a narrow passage when the search team left, but the mine entrance leading outside had long been buried under a pile of rocks.

And then.

– Crash!

Leah, staring blankly at the entrance, was startled by the sound of something collapsing somewhere. The Duke looked around at the open excavation rooms and snatched Leah’s wrist.

“This way!”

The place Akkia led to was Room 0, not far from the entrance.

As they entered the room, they saw a huge boulder crash down on the spot where they had just been.

If Akkia hadn’t led her. If they hadn’t run into the room. They would have been helplessly crushed under that rock.

At that thought, Leah felt goosebumps all over her body. And as the entrance was blocked off, her vision blurred along with the pitch-black darkness that followed.

.

.

.

“Ugh……”

Leah slowly lifted her eyelids, clutching her throbbing head.

“Where is this……”

“Are you conscious?”

As her blurry vision gradually brightened, she saw the Duke sitting at her bedside, looking down at her.

The white salt residue settled on his hair.

And the scratches on his once smooth face seemed to vividly show the accident that had just occurred.

Leah slowly sat up. A single candle faintly illuminated the space beside the rock where the two were sitting.

“Your Grace? Where is this……”

As she asked him while looking around, Akkia answered in a low voice.

“It’s an empty room.”

“An empty room?”

Leah, blinking her eyes, let out a small exclamation as if realizing something.

‘That’s right. We came inside before it collapsed.’

“Is this Room 0?”

“Yes. The first place where excavation was completed.”

In salt mines, after extracting salt, support beams are erected in the empty spaces, which look like rooms, hence called rooms.

From 0 to 5, the higher the number, the more recently the room was completed for excavation.

‘This place didn’t collapse, I guess.’

Fortunately, the room they took shelter in seemed to have escaped major damage.

“Are you hurt anywhere?”

“I’m fine. What about you, Your Grace?”

“As you can see, I’m not badly hurt.”

Like her, the Duke also seemed to have no major injuries except for minor scratches.

Akkia, who had been looking at her like that, got up from his seat.

“As I thought, this place is intact.”

At Akkia’s low words, Leah scanned the surroundings. As he said, Room 0 was relatively intact compared to the other spaces that were in chaos.

“Did you know this place wouldn’t collapse?”

“When I examined the collapsed materials, the support beams in the other rooms were already in a rotted state.”

“The wood was rotted? How is that possible?”

In salt mines, wooden support beams are used instead of iron supports due to the salt.

The wooden materials serving as supports never rot due to the salt content.

‘But the wood was rotted.’

Leah frowned at the unbelievable fact.

“Before coming here, I looked into the ledgers purchased from this place. But there were more than a few strange points.”

“What?”

“As you know, the unit price of a tree is usually about 1 silver coin. But the unit price of the wood used here wasn’t even 50 copper coins.”

“How is that possible? The support beam wood is supposed to be the highest quality wood from Croatia……”

Leah couldn’t finish her sentence as a thought suddenly crossed her mind.

‘Embezzlement.’

Someone must have deliberately used cheaper wood. Reading her expression, Akkia nodded.

“This was a foretold man-made disaster. Probably someone among the managers intentionally diverted the budget.”

“……”

“The salt mine here is like the dark under the lamp in the Duchy of Belarus.”

Leah quietly nodded at his words.

“Then what should we do now?”

“For now, we can only wait for the rescue team to come. Don’t move unnecessarily and stay still. We don’t know how long we’ll be trapped here.”

With no food or anything, conserving energy was the only option. So the two sat staring blankly into space.

How much time had passed like that? Only the sound of water droplets falling from the ceiling as the salt melted could be heard in the deathly silence.

Leah lifted her head buried in her knees and looked at the Duke. He had his eyes closed, leaning against the salt rock, as if lost in thought.

‘Strange.’

Leah swallowed her dry saliva at the incessant thirst that had been tormenting her.

‘Why is it so hot……?’

She had felt it before, but the mine interior was too hot. Leah wiped the sweat dripping from her forehead and frowned.

Her face was already flushed red, and her hair was soaked with sweat. If the Duke wasn’t in front of her, she would have wanted to take off the dress she was wearing right away, it was so hot.

However, unlike Leah, the Duke leaning against the rock with his eyes closed was utterly calm.

‘Am I the only one this hot?’

Leah tried moving to a different spot, wondering if where she was sitting was hot, but nothing changed.

At the repeated sound of fanning, the Duke’s low voice echoed in the cave.

“Stay still. Don’t waste your energy.”

‘How can I stay still?’

It was so hot she couldn’t sit without fanning herself…

Moreover, she had been feeling thirsty, her mouth parched. Finally, unable to bear the heat from her body, Leah said with labored breath.

“Your Grace, I’m too hot.”