The 30-degree slope is not easy to walk. Fortunately, people like Qin Lun are not ordinary people. Even though a few of them suffered minor injuries, they were fine with the support of their companions. The passage was not long, and the whole team saw the end of the passage without going far.
"Put out all the torches!" Kelly frowned slightly and waved her hands back.
Everyone extinguished the torches as they said, and there were not many objections. At this time, as they went deeper into the passage, a bright light appeared in front of them, and the brightness was far higher than that of the previous furnace area.
The reason why there is light in the melting furnace area is due to the transmission of external light on the ice wall, but the light here seems a bit unusual.
"Could it be that the descendants of the Santana dwarves still live here?" A strange thought floated in everyone's mind.
"Lol, go ahead and have a look!" Stark's heart moved, and he softly ordered the thieves in the group.
Kelly looked back at the two of them, but didn't say anything to stop them. Her strength is the strongest among all of them, otherwise she would not be at the forefront. However, Martial Daoists are not as good as thieves in scouting. Since there is plenty of light here, the job of scouting is naturally left to professionals.
Of course, even so, Longer didn't need to do the investigation alone. An elf ranger beside Mileras stepped forward consciously as his backup. The elf ranger not only has night vision ability, but also has a long-standing scouting ability to detect traps, which just happens to learn from human thieves.
Not long after the two left, the elf ranger turned back excitedly and waved to the team below, signaling that there was no danger ahead.
"Wow!" Walking up the passage to the top and looking at the scenery ahead, many people in the team exclaimed from the bottom of their hearts.
At the end of this passage, there is a huge open fort gate. The fort gate also has the massive and imposing architectural style of Iron Star Fort. The half-closed door is a heavy stone door with a thickness of five feet.
A row of half-meter-high iron wheels are installed under the stone gate. Although at first glance, the rusty spots on it have long been connected to the ground and the stone gate, it can still be seen that these things were originally the pulleys of the stone gate.
The entire fort gate is more than 20 meters high and about 30 meters wide, and there is a dwarf stone statue more than 30 meters high on the left and right. The stone statue has a solemn face, looking forward, wearing a cloak, bare-chested, with hands folded and pressing a resident double-edged battle axe.
Even after thousands of years, the two dwarf stone statues are still full of oppression, the long beards on the cheeks and the muscle lines of the arms are clearly identifiable. The dust all over the body not only did not cover the majesty of the stone statues, but set them off more solemnly, like warriors who had just returned from the battlefield. Perhaps only the mottled and fine cracks on the stone statue revealed some traces of time.
There is a pair of starry sky stone carvings on the top of the castle gate. Although the ancient Santana dwarves lived in the mountainside, they still seem to worship the mysterious space, and carved a starry sky stone carving above the castle gate.
"Steel stars!" Qin Lun looked up at the somewhat dilapidated ancient stone inscriptions in the center of the starry sky, with a flicker of enthusiasm in his eyes.
Standing in front of this huge dwarf castle gate, everyone felt a heavy vicissitudes of life blowing towards their faces, couldn't help holding their breath, and fell silent.
After a while, everyone who recovered from the shock finally remembered to check the situation inside the fort gate. At this time, Qin Lun and others discovered where the light source here came from.
"It's a naturally formed luminous stone!" Mileras said, pointing to the glowing stones inlaid around the fort gate.
Qin Lun scanned the surroundings and found that the fort gate should be the main entrance of Iron Star Fort. The surrounding area is not only connected with the passage from the furnace area, but also has several larger and wider stone corridors beside it.
Some of the passages go up, some go down, and the passages extending upwards are estimated to connect the transportation between Iron Star Fort and the outside of the mountain range, while the passages going down should be connected to other furnace areas or ore storage areas.
"Did the two of you go into the castle to check?" Unlike the other women in the team who were obsessed with the dwarven ruins, Robin was still clear-headed, and reached out to ask Longer and the elf ranger carefully.
"No, I just took a few glances outside the door." Longer and the elf ranger looked at each other and shook their heads slightly, "However, judging from the environment inside, there are no traces of living creatures, and there are dust and ashes everywhere. .Maybe we are the first visitors here in thousands of years.”
"Then let's go in and have a look. However, I will trouble you two to explore the way and see if there are any traps and defensive devices inside!" Robin pondered for a moment, then waved the two of them to leave.
After crossing the gate of Iron Star Fort, a huge square appeared in front of everyone. After arriving here, Qin Lun and others finally saw a building that fit the characteristics of a dwarf.
The square has an oval shape as a whole, and rows of stone houses stand neatly around it. However, it can be seen that the stone house here does not seem to be a residential area, but a business area in the castle. Some stone houses with relatively complete structures still have some unique signboards hanging in front of the door.
On some signboards that are not seriously damaged, easy-to-understand signs can be seen on them. For example: the symbol of hammer and iron felt, the symbol of sword and shield, the symbol of bow and arrow and armor, etc.
What surprised Qin Lun was that he actually saw the sign of stacked gold coins on the signboard of a certain large building.
"A credit office? Or a bank? Thousands of years ago, the Santana dwarves had the germination of the financial industry?" Qin Lun curled his lips, and couldn't help admiring the brilliant civilization created by the Santana dwarves.
There is a huge circular fountain in the center of the dwarf square. The fountain has seven floors from bottom to top, from big to small, like a small tower cake. Of course, this fountain thousands of years ago has long since ceased to produce water, and now the dust accumulated in it is probably several feet thick.
The drainage system in Iron Star Castle is very developed. In front of some complete buildings, most people can see the canals covered with stone slabs passing around the house. The dome and stone wall above this square are also inlaid with many luminous stones, but because the square is too large, it looks a little dark.
Thousands of years ago, there must have been other magic lights here, at least at dawn, the inside of the castle was as bright as day as the outside of the mountains.
Everyone in the team dispersed at this time, and started searching in this square. Mileras and a few elf rangers were exploring the history of the ruins, while the male apostle wanted to find some precious items left by the Santana dwarves.
Of course, whether it is an apostle or a plot elf, there is another kind of character in the team that cannot be seen through. That is Elistine, Nicole, Kelly, female creatures that are purely idle and curious.
In fact, after seeing clearly that there was no threat to this square, even Robin, the normally shrewd and capable head of the Lost Newcomers Group, began to move closer to the big-chested and brainless attributes.
"Filar, look, look, I found an artifact of the Santana dwarf!"
"Elisten, that's just a hammer without a wooden handle, or a waste product that has rusted into iron slag..."
"Filar, look, look, jewel..."
"Well, this... is not a waste product! However, there is still a gap between broken glass beads and precious stones..."
"Filar, look, look..."
"Elisten, collect it slowly first, and I'll watch it together later, okay? Be good..." Qin Lun felt his face was about to cramp, gritted his teeth expressionlessly, started the Wind Walk, and walked far away. Leaving the group of female creatures who gave up treatment.
After a long while, Qin Lun could finally conclude that they should not be able to find any valuable items in the ruins. Judging from the few buildings he inspected, except for the dust, the rest of the room was empty and clean. It can be seen that the dwarves of Iron Star Castle evacuated in an orderly manner.
As for the reason why they abandoned Iron Star Fort, it has been too long, and unless written records can be found, it is impossible to find out clearly. Qin Lun thought, it was nothing more than the decline of the underground fire veins, and the dwarves could no longer be used for forging, or there were more threats from foreign enemies near the Alamer Mountains.
"Huh? No!" Kelly, who was hanging out with Robin, suddenly had her ears tremble, and a strange look appeared on her face.
"Sister Kelly, what's the matter?" Robin put away the smile on his face and asked in surprise.
"I really wanted to hear something just now...it's gone now!" Kelly frowned, and said uncertainly, "You... gather the team quickly, I heard it again!"
"Hmm!" Robin's expression quickly became serious.
Although she didn't hear anything herself, she has developed a good habit with Kelly for a long time. Martial arts masters have sharp ears and eyes, and their facial features are much sharper than other combat professions without special skills. The Lost Newcomers have relied on Kelly's ears more than once to avoid potential dangers.
"Captain Robin, what's the matter?" Everyone quickly gathered in one place. Although Mileras and the others were still reluctant to part with them, everyone still knew that safety was the most important thing.
"Miss Kelly seems to have heard some unusual movements!" Robin explained softly to everyone.
After hearing Robin's explanation, everyone quieted down, breathed lightly, and waited for Kelly's feedback.
"Over there! Stark follows me, the two elf princes and the auxiliary professions are in the middle, and the thief and the ranger are behind!" After listening for a while, Kelly finally changed her face slightly, and rushed towards the south passage of the Dwarf Square. .
Stark opened his mouth, but didn't speak. As soon as he kicked his feet, he followed Kelly closely. Although he is not as strong as Kelly, he is also a veteran second-tier powerhouse, and he is an MT profession with strong defense, so he naturally wants to be a vanguard.
Since entering Iron Star Fort, he has gained 0.205% more exploration speed. Although there is no mission plot, the extra rewards for world exploration speed are not small. What's more, this time the rewards are doubled, and the contribution points that can be obtained are no less than a main storyline.
Of course, it can be accumulated to 0.205%, which also includes the contributions of other fortress members. After they found some clues, most of them let Stark contact first, so that he could get the main world exploration speed.
The sudden change made Qin Lun a little surprised. He took a step back calmly and let Elisine beside him cover him. Black and red targets and silver dials suddenly appeared in the pupils of both eyes, and the perception lines quickly penetrated into the corridor in front of Kelly like flying tentacles.
The scenery made of countless black and white lines flew across Qin Lun's retina, and finally stopped in a space at the end of the corridor.
"Oh?! Interesting!" After seeing the scene in front of him clearly, Qin Lun lowered his head slightly, with a weird smile on his lips.