That silver-haired girl who had sent her to the Anqieka Continent...

To be honest, Yumo could no longer remember her face.

Well, it wasn’t that her memory was bad.

Rather, that part of her memory had inexplicably vanished from her mind altogether?!

Now, whenever she tried to recall that silver-haired girl, all she could remember was that she had possessed unbelievably beautiful silver-white hair...

And that her chest had seemed fairly large.

Aside from that, everything else was blurry.

Her appearance, her voice...

All of it was vague and indistinct.

Although Yumo had no idea why, she suspected that during the process of reconstructing her body, the silver-haired girl had altered or sealed away part of her memories for some unknown reason...

But...

None of that really mattered anymore.

After all, Yumo’s ultimate objective was to help the ‘main protagonist group’ complete their trial mission! Once that was done, she would regain her freedom. And according to what the silver-haired girl had promised, after everything was over, she would be allowed to return home!

And so, for the sake of achieving that goal, Yumo had painstakingly devoted herself to it for hundreds of years.

The final stage of the trial was to kill her — to destroy the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons completely and free the entire continent from the shadow of the Abyss Demons.

Well...

Even if the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons were destroyed, her consciousness would still remain intact.

It was basically just going through the motions.

Before reading the mission left behind by the silver-haired girl, Yumo had once considered something very simple.

‘If the final goal is destroying the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons... then when the time comes, couldn’t I just lead the protagonist group inside and let them wreck the place?’

However, she quickly abandoned that unrealistic idea.

The reason was simple.

More than four hundred years ago, while she had been thinking exactly that, several heroes from the Church happened to barge into the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons. So Yumo decided to use them as test subjects to see just how difficult it really was to destroy the Hall.

Of course, several Demon King-class beings had already been stationed nearby. If anything went wrong, they would immediately rush out to protect her and grind those heroes into paste...

But the results proved that arranging Demon King-class guards had been completely unnecessary.

Because those three Saint-tier heroes spent seven days and seven nights unleashing every attack they had!

And not a single damn brick of the Hall came off!!

In the end, after using some so-called ultimate combination attack, they directly exhausted their souls and died on the spot...

Yumo had been utterly dumbfounded watching the whole thing.

And these idiots still had the nerve to brag about how incredible their attacks were?

Heh.

After that incident, Yumo completely gave up on her original unrealistic plan. After all, the protagonist group would probably only be around fifth-tier strength at the beginning. Their attacks against her likely wouldn’t even qualify as scratching an itch.

So!

They needed training!

They needed growth!

They needed leveling!

Oh, right! They also needed equipment!

As the saying goes—

A boss who doesn’t know how to raise the protagonist will never see the Buddha!

Ordinary fifth-tier Abyss Demons probably wouldn’t pose much challenge to the protagonist group. There was no point in that. As for Demon King-class Abyss Demons, they were far too powerful and would simply kill them outright.

And if they got instantly killed, what the hell was the point of playing anymore?!

Sixth-tier Abyss Demons could perhaps serve as decent opponents.

But she couldn’t just keep sending brainless trash mobs at them forever.

A qualified villain needed not only strength, but intelligence as well!

In order to help the protagonist group grow smoothly, Yumo had always planned to create powerful and intelligent mini-bosses to deliver experience points! Combined with several other reasons, she ultimately decided to let the intelligent races of the continent absorb power and become mini-bosses themselves.

And because of that, she began her experiments.

Unfortunately, even now, the results still weren’t ideal.

“Sigh, can’t be helped. If I want the protagonist group to successfully kill me someday, I’ll just have to keep working hard~~”

Yumo sighed helplessly.

“I’m going back to the experiments first. I’ll leave this area to you for now, Limo.”

As soon as she finished speaking, the red orb of light and the purple crystal vanished from the great hall together.

Limo: ...

After listening to Yumo’s lament, Limo unusually didn’t say another word. Instead, she silently hugged her knees and slowly sank into the lake...

More importantly—

The wolf girl’s expression had completely lost the obedient sweetness she displayed in front of Mother earlier.

What replaced it was murderous hostility.

Her widened crimson eyes were bloodshot with savage fury, and her claws dug deeply into her own legs...

The girl seemed to be desperately suppressing the rage inside her.

Little by little, the water of the lake became stained with traces of red.

Unfortunately, Yumo, who had devoted all her attention to improving the crystal, failed to notice the wolf girl’s ‘tiny mood’ at all...

—

Nightfall approached.

High above the eastern region of the Great Winter Forest—

A black-haired man dressed in black soft armor and wearing a dark blue feathered crown rode atop a mighty griffin through the clouds while observing the forest below through a telescope in his hand.

Recalling what he had witnessed earlier, the man couldn’t help feeling fortunate.

‘That thing that was chasing Akat earlier... that giant white wolf...’

That size.

That aura.

And the freezing cold surrounding its body.

That should’ve been Snow Devourer, right?

There were only six Demon King-class Abyss Demons on the entire continent, yet today he had actually encountered one of them?

Fortunately, the marquis had cast three layers of perception-concealing magic on him. Otherwise, if Snow Devourer had noticed him and fired off a Desolation Cannon, wouldn’t he have been reduced to ashes on the spot? A monster of that level could easily wipe out an entire nation.

‘As expected of Lord Marquis. Always so farsighted.’

But while feeling relieved, the black-haired man’s expression gradually turned serious.

The marquis’s order had been to confirm Akat’s condition.

He had to make sure Akat was devoured by Abyss Demons. If Akat somehow failed to encounter them, then the man’s task was to lure one over personally — or simply kill Akat himself.

No matter what, Akat absolutely could not be allowed to return alive.

Thus, from the moment Akat had been thrown into the forest to fend for himself, the man had hidden in the skies above to monitor everything.

After witnessing Akat being toyed with by Snow Devourer, he had naturally concluded that Akat was doomed.

However...

While chasing him... chasing him...

How the hell had the guy suddenly vanished?!

Disappeared without a trace?!

What kind of nonsense was this?!

And not only Akat — even the terrifying Snow Devourer had vanished as well!

The man was utterly stunned. He simply couldn’t understand how two such obvious targets had disappeared so suddenly.

Snow Devourer was one thing. After all, that was a Demon King-class monster. Its movements weren’t something a mere sixth-tier fighter like him could track.

But Akat?!

What the hell was Akat supposed to be?!

Just some fourth-tier brat!

How could a dignified sixth-tier expert and S-rank mercenary like him possibly lose track of someone like that?!

After continuing to search from the air without finding any sign of Akat, the man began questioning his entire life.

And then, suddenly, a bold speculation surfaced in his mind.

‘Wait...?!’

Suddenly avoiding my perception and disappearing...

Could he have passed through some kind of barrier?

According to Church intelligence, there was supposedly an unknown barrier surrounding the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons, preventing outsiders from detecting its existence?!

Could it be—

In an instant, the man revealed an expression of overwhelming excitement!

The confusion in his mind was swept away completely, replaced by indescribable ecstasy.

“Hahahaha!! If I can bring this information back and sell it to an intelligence organization or the Church, I’ll never have to worry about food or money for the rest of my life!!!”

At the thought of this, the smile on his face became even brighter.

However—

As the saying goes, extreme joy breeds sorrow.

Just as the man was drowning in excitement—

A crisp, silver-bell-like voice suddenly echoed beside his ears.

“Bring it back? Sorry, but Mother has no intention of letting you leave.”

Hm?!!

That was...?!

A little girl’s voice?

How was that possible?

This was the Winter Forest!

How could there possibly be a little girl here?!

“Who’s there?!”

In an instant, the man’s expression drastically changed!

A powerful sense of dread spread wildly through his heart!

He hurriedly drew the sword from his waist and spun around toward the direction the voice had come from.

However, after turning around, the man discovered in horror that the source of the voice was not a little girl at all—

But a gigantic phantom so enormous it blotted out the sky itself.

?!!

‘W-What...?!’

Before the man could even comprehend what was happening—

Before he even had time to scream—

Bathed in emerald-green light, the top-ranked S-class mercenary and the griffin beneath him were instantly crushed into a pile of mangled flesh beneath a gigantic claw....