The flight this time was a rather short one. Junichiro judged he was somewhere in Scotland... maybe. Geography had never been his thing. Either way he was still somewhere in Britain since he hadn't crossed any large bodies of water to leave the island nation. He was circling a small mountain range, or maybe a collection of giant hills. He didn't know when terrain went from 'big hills' to 'small mountains.' Either way, Excalibur Ruler was located either on or under one of the central... he was just going to refer to them as mountains.
He carefully drove the ATV down until he gently landed it on the rough ground near the area he believed Excalibur Ruler was hidden. He briefly wondered if he was about to find yet another dragon hoard. He hoped so!
A quick shout down into the back of the ATV had Mittelt joining him outside. She looked around to get her bearings and then focused on Junichiro, "So it's around here?"
He nodded and looked at the compass in his hand, "My guess is it's hidden under the mountains somehow, but that's just a guess based on stereotypes and tropes."
Mittelt snorted, "That means you're probably right."
They both laughed at that a bit. Once they finished, Mittelt's wings appeared on her back and she proceeded to stretch them, "We'll fly around and check the compass to see where the item is exactly as far as X and Y go. From there we can figure out Z."
Junichiro nodded sent a burst of magical power into the boots on his feet. The enchantments embedded in the footwear sprang to life and caused two small wings to appear on each boot near the ankle. Mittelt looked down at the boots and snickered, "I hope Hermes sees those one day."
Junichiro rolled his eyes and promised to make something else to let himself fly until he got his own wings, maybe. He decided he'd spend some time to make a sword in Sword Birth that granted the user the power of flight. He could make it a small sword and shape it like a ring easy enough. That should put an end to the Hermes jokes and potential lawsuits from said god.
It took some time but the pair eventually arrived in the area where the compass began spinning in a circle indicating they were directly above the sword. Looking down they could see they were directly over one of the steeper slopes on one of the mountains. It would be a rather treacherous spot for any normal person to traverse. The pair just floated down while keeping the compass centered on the treasure.
Without a word, Junichiro began using the exact same method he'd used to dig down to the scabbard. A hole quickly opened up and plunged down. Both of them flew down at a casual pace while he continued to dig and provided magical light when it became necessary. After digging down roughly five hundred meters, Junichiro addressed Mittelt, "How high up would you say that slope was when we started to dig?"
"Mmmmm roughly four hundred meters."
"We're definitely under the mountains then."
Just as he spoke, the latest section to be dug out went directly into a wide open area. Junichiro chuckled ruefully, "Trope confirmed."
Mittelt snickered along with the joke. They quickly lowered themselves into the area and were surprised at what they discovered. First and foremost, they were definitely not inside of another cave containing a dragon's hoard. Instead, they found themselves located inside of an underground cathedral. The place had clearly been made by skilled hands. Even with his expert eyes, Junichiro couldn't spot any visible flaws that couldn't be attributed to time. Upon landing and looking closer, he couldn't even find any tool marks upon the stone.
Mittelt looked around with a small frown, "This place... I think I know what this place is."
Junichiro looked at Mittelt curiously prompting her to continue, "I don't know what the term the church used is, but it's a cache of sorts. During the war there were rumors that the church officials felt some items needed to be hidden, protected, preserved, or saved for later use. The rumor went that they took some of their more powerful things that had no current possible users and hid them in special locations. When someone worthy was found, they would be give the location where the potential user would undergo trials of some sort to claim the item in question."
As she spoke, they examined the area and could see only one 'correct' entrance, their entrance through the ceiling obviously being the 'wrong' method. As the place looked like a complete church, including pews, Jesus on a cross, a lectern, and an altar, all carved from the stone. The place had clearly been well planned out in advance before any work began. Everything was a 'single piece' meaning nothing could be moved and had been carved where it was.
It was only after looking over the entire place that they followed the compass to where it was pointing. Naturally, it was pointing at the altar. Mittelt snorted, "Typical."
Junichiro nodded in agreement, though that didn't stop him from pulling out various wands and performing magical scans on the altar to check for anything nefarious. One could never be too careful when raiding a religious site. His prudence proved worthwhile as he detected several weakened enchantments layered onto the altar. Much like the chest he'd found the scabbard in, time had weakened the protections on the altar.
He was beginning to see a theme in the enchanting done by people, other than himself. His enchantments were always rooted by a rune sequence of some sort. Even if the runes were minimal, they were always there. The reason for this was simple, it prevented the enchantments from fading away over time. The right sequence could even boost the effect of an enchantment or go so far as to make the enchantment stronger over time.
However, the two major enchanted items he'd run across, so far, had their enchantments layered directly on them. This worked, obviously, and could last a fairly long time, also obviously, but just as obviously would lose strength over time as the enchantments weakened due to not having a proper anchor to keep them attached and fed with additional power over time. The enchantments that had protected Avalon and now Ruler, had been cast by very powerful individuals, but even so that power still faded with time.