Chapter 229: Spoils of War

With just a casual glance, Allen could confirm that Oin was right; this Sixteenth Hall must have once been home to many quite noble figures. In many places here, the carvings still retained traces of gold, and even on the ground Allen stepped upon, one could see streaks paved with silver.

Moreover, next to these streaks were large, deep depressions; it was clearly the Orcish that occupied this place who had gouged the silver-paved ground into such a state.

Presumably, during the height of Durin's Folk, this place must have truly been paved with silver and roofed with gold—it was truly wealthy.

However, after searching for a period of time, Allen discovered that every room here, without exception, had suffered the looting of the Orcish.

The doors that should have been tightly shut had all been violently broken open, and inside the stone halls carved with intricate patterns, anything that could be destroyed bore the marks of blades and swords.

That is not to mention anything worth taking; what remained were nothing more than some broken containers.

Watching all this, the excitement on Oin's face quickly turned to sorrow, followed by visible anger; this was grief for the fate of the kingdom, and also rage at the barbaric acts of the Orcish.

Allen, walking to the side, clearly saw Oin's expression; he could only sigh helplessly and gently pat Oin on the shoulder, signaling him to stay calm and never do anything impulsive.

One had to know that his small team was operating right under the noses of two groups of Orcish, allowing for not even the slightest mistake; even a single angry roar would alert hundreds or thousands of enemies.

Of course, Allen did not feel good either; although he had some mental preparation, he was still very disappointed. If no spoils could be found in the place where Durin's Line resided, then it would likely be even harder in the other halls.

But what Allen had not considered was that most Orcish, when looting these halls, were often barbaric and irritable, because they needed to move faster than their companions to snatch more, better, and more desirable items.

Therefore, when these bandits looted the Sixteenth Hall, they only used the strange-looking blades in their hands to destroy everything they could see, then took away all the valuable items, leaving behind a mess, but they did not search particularly carefully.

As for the Dwarves, they were a race obsessed with wealth, and most of them possessed some architectural skills, not to mention the royal family of Durin's Folk; whether in mining, metalwork, or stone architecture, they were the best among their kin.

And royal members possessing these natural instincts would, of course, not place all their wealth out in the open.

There would always be some who hid the things they particularly liked in secret places, to admire them quietly when the night was deep and quiet.

Therefore, when Oin, having steadied his mind, came to a rather magnificent stone hall and, through light tapping, pushed open a stone door on the dark yet smooth wall, Allen revealed a quite surprised expression.

He truly had not expected that the Dwarves had such a trick, and because it was in their own home, these secret chambers did not require any keys to open like the back door of the Lonely Mountain; as long as one found the right mechanism and gave it a light push, the stone door would open.

And the scene behind the stone door finally brought the group the joy of their first harvest since setting out.

Not to mention the jewelry and treasures displayed on the shelves, just those sets of silver armor, plus numerous weapons and shields of the same color, made Allen feel that his trip had not been in vain.

When Moria still produced Mithril, the price of this special metal in the outside world was like ten times that of gold, and it was indeed very precious; but for the royal family of Durin's Folk who occupied Khazad-dum, this actually did not count for much.

Just as Thror, who once ruled the Lonely Mountain, would not lack gold and jewelry, the Dwarves who possessed the entire Mithril vein at the time did not lack Mithril either—at least not at the beginning; otherwise, why would Thorin give a piece of Mithril Chainmail to Bilbo?

One must know that this Mithril Armor was crafted by the Dwarves in the Lonely Mountain, at a time when they no longer had a way to obtain Mithril.

And in this not-particularly-large treasure room, Allen also found a letter opener made of Mithril on a wooden table; having been placed there for a thousand years, it was still as good as new, with a sharp blade and a shining body.

This could not help but make Allen silently complain in his heart: just how wealthy were the Dwarves of Durin's Folk who once occupied Moria? Paving the floor with silver and roofing with gold was one thing, but using such precious Mithril for daily necessities was a bit wasteful.

Moreover, in the Sixteenth Hall, there were many stone halls like the one Allen was in, and there were even larger and more magnificent ones; he wondered if there were secret chambers hiding wealth there just like this one.

But regardless, in the coming period, Allen's team would likely be busy; the items in this secret chamber alone were enough for them to make two trips back to the First Hall.

When the group first decided to explore Moria, it was not just Allen's team that set out; Holimion and Ori, with twelve Twilight Knights, also began exploring downward from the Second Hall.

Their goal was very clear: to head straight for the Armory located in the Third Valley. According to Ori, there should be very few Orcish there, but Allen knew that a greater danger existed there—the Balrog.

Before setting out, Allen had used his ability to check the location of that monster, but after consuming a large amount of Dinar, the information he obtained was very unclear; the scene he saw was a spark of fire in the midst of vast darkness.

This was a bad result, but also not-bad news; it meant that the Balrog's current location was very far from Allen, at the very least in the extremely deep underground. However, just in case, he still had Holimion take away all the Sapphire Rune Bows.

Because Allen knew that although the Balrog's size was huge, its movement speed was actually very, very fast; he had no certainty about exactly how fast, but making a little more preparation was never wrong.

Allen did not expect to rely on the bit of frost power from the Sapphire Rune Bows to defeat the Balrog, but if that fallen Maia were truly alerted, the arrows carrying ice could at least delay the Balrog's pursuit, and at the very least, it could buy the group some time to prepare and run.

As for Dain, he needed to remain in the First Hall to command the twenty-plus Elven Rangers left behind, guarding the gate of Moria and the Khazad-dum Bridge to ensure the group's retreat would not be cut off by the Orcish, especially the Khazad-dum Bridge.

At first, Dain was unwilling to accept this task, hoping instead to explore the upper levels of Khazad-dum with Allen to see the former kingdom of Durin's Folk; moreover, Dain Ironfoot, who had lived for over a hundred and fifty years, had never commanded Elves, which made him feel a bit strange.

But the task of guarding the retreat for the group was a very important matter, and the Elves, who had never lived in the mountains, also needed a Dwarf as an assistant to deal with potential accidents in the time to come; that was always much more appropriate than leaving only the Elves.

Furthermore, although the Elves following Allen were also called Noldor, they were not the native race of Middle-earth; they knew nothing about the affairs between Dwarves, Humans, and Elves, and they did not care.

Since Allen hoped they would temporarily follow Dain's command, they, as personal guards, had no thoughts of rejection.

By the end of the meeting, under Allen's insistence, Dain finally accepted the task.

And after Allen and Holimion set out, he also placed the focus of defense on the Khazad-dum Bridge, arranging several sharp-eyed Noldor Rangers at the entrance of the Second Hall to keep a constant watch on the movements within the hall.

In the two or three days since the two teams left, the Second Hall had not been particularly peaceful; there were always some sneaky fellows moving in twos and threes, coming out from various passages in the hall and then quietly heading toward the Moria gate.

Dain adopted a strategy of killing all these Orcish who wanted to go out to forage, and had the Elves transport all the corpses to the Dimrill Dale for burial, so as not to let their rotting stench alert other Orcish.

As for the main force of the Orcish, Dain had not seen them yet.

After all, the two groups of Orcish occupying Moria were currently fighting in the upper levels, trying to decide a winner there, so they likely did not have much manpower to send to watch the gate; and ever since the "War of the Dwarves and Orcs", no one had been willing to approach this place at all.

Not to mention Moria, even those willing to enter the Dimrill Dale were very rare; after all, the Redhorn Gate was also a place frequently raided by the Orcish, and this passage connecting Eriador and Rhovanion had long been broken.

Therefore, there had been no major accidents in the past few days.

However, when Allen appeared in the Second Hall with his team, carrying large and small bags, Dain was extremely surprised; he knew that the ancestors had been very hurried when they withdrew from Moria and must have left behind a large amount of wealth.

But this place had been vacant for nearly a thousand years, and those barbaric Orcish who were keen on looting had raided the entire Khazad-dum more than once; to be able to find so much wealth at this time was indeed unexpected.

However, a large harvest was always a good thing; although Durin's Folk, who occupied the Lonely Mountain, did not lack wealth, they did not have many Mithril reserves, and this precious metal was naturally the more the better. Moreover, before the entire team set out, the result he negotiated with Allen on behalf of Thorin was a seven-to-three split of the spoils.

They would take thirty percent, and Allen would take seventy percent; in Dain's view, this was a relatively reasonable distribution plan, after all, the plan was proposed by Allen, and most of the troops were Allen's personal guards.

Moreover, the Cloaks on their bodies, the supplies consumed during the journey, and the horses stored in Lothlorien were all prepared by Allen; it could be said that Allen bore the greatest risk in this exploration.

Whoever bears the higher risk takes more spoils—this simple truth the Dwarves still understood, especially Dain, who was wiser than others among the Dwarves.

In Allen's view, this distribution plan was also acceptable; after all, the resources he wanted to obtain were all things belonging to Durin's Folk a thousand years ago. Although the Dwarves voluntarily abandoned Khazad-dum because of the Balrog, they had never said they would voluntarily give up the ownership of those riches.

Moreover, when Dain and Allen were discussing the terms, they specifically stated one point: if the expedition found heirlooms belonging to Durin's Folk, they must be distributed to the Dwarves, and the Dwarves would also give up a portion of their own spoils to thank Allen for finding their treasures during this adventure.

In fact, when the treasure room was discovered in the Sixteenth Hall, Allen had already begun to use his ability to search for the heirloom of Durin's Folk, Durin's Axe.

In his memory, Balin, who had once briefly retaken Moria, had found this treasure, so theoretically, this axe should still be in Moria.

But Allen, who found Durin's Axe very quickly, revealed a very strange expression on his face; he had originally thought that Durin's Axe, like the many treasures he had discovered, was stored in some secret chamber.

But the truth was not so; that short-handled battle axe, which should have been emitting a silver light, was now pitch-black and treated as an ordinary piece of loot, thrown casually among a pile of armor unsuitable for Orcish use; it could be said to be completely inconspicuous.

It was just that the stone room containing the spoils was full of chaotic Orcish, and a tall but dark-faced fellow was sitting on a ridiculous yet very rare throne, thinking.

To say it was ridiculous was because the throne was built from many pieces of Dwarven armor, and it was clearly very perfunctory in its construction, looking crooked and misshapen; there were also a dozen Dwarven helmets casually stuck on wooden sticks as decorations for the throne.

It was just that the surfaces, which should have been silver-bright, had all been turned into a pitch-black color by the Orcish.

As for why it is rare, it is because Allen knows that the entire throne is likely armor made of Mithril, only the Orcish have not mastered the method of processing Mithril and have no way to remelt the armor.

And this dark-faced Orcish chieftain is unwilling to offer all of his spoils to Sauron, who is far away in Mordor, which is why he built such a strange throne to flaunt his status.

And the heirloom of Durin's Folk, that Durin's Axe, is stuck there on the back of the throne as a decoration; it truly has no dignity at all.

However, if Allen wants to obtain it, I am afraid it will truly take some effort.