How much time had passed since contact with Reinysius was cut off?

“......”

As Penia drove the carriage toward the border, she tried contacting him again and again, but the magic orb refused to connect.

Just as her anxiety began to show clearly on her face, the Sculptor suddenly spoke.

“Hmm—this doesn’t look like a good situation.”

Alon looked at it without a word.

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m just giving a rational assessment.”

The Sculptor added awkwardly under his emotionless gaze.

“You know this already, but even dragons have a hard time dealing with Divine blood. There’s no need to explain that, right? Well, the primordial dragons were a bit stronger, but honestly, the current ones aren’t at that level—”

“Ah, it connected!”

At that moment, Penia’s shout cut off the Sculptor’s words.

A look of confusion appeared on the Sculptor’s face, while Alon shifted his gaze to the magic orb.

Reinysius appeared there.

And he looked completely fine.

[You’re a bit late.]

Reinysius’s calm voice rang out.

“...Are you all right?”

Alon asked, unable to hide the doubt in his voice.

Reinysius nodded immediately.

[Of course.]

“...What happened to the Divine blood?”

[It’s been dealt with.]

The same composed answer.

At that, question marks practically appeared above not only the Sculptor’s head, but Alon’s as well.

Of course, Alon knew that Reinysius was quite strong.

After all, the dragon language possessed by dragonkind was so powerful that it could be considered a superior version of all magic.

But Divine blood—

were beings far more unreasonable than even dragons.

“You dealt with it...?”

[Yes.]

“...Was that even possible?”

Alon asked without thinking.

Reinysius replied as if it were nothing.

[I blasted it with magic relentlessly and used a bit more strength than usual, so I’m a little tired, but it wasn’t impossible. Besides, I had assistance.]

“Assistance?”

[Yes. Didn’t I mention I had something to test? It’s an extension of that.]

With that, Reinysius stepped slightly aside from the magic orb.

Then, for a moment, voices could be heard.

I don’t want to. Why don’t I want to? We can just meet in person. Do we really have to? Just come out and say hello. Ah—

After that brief scuffle of voices, the one who appeared in the magic orb was—

“...Kylrus?”

[...It’s been a while.]

It was Kylrus.

And in human form.

“How?”

[It seems my friend put in some effort.]

After answering Alon’s question like that, Kylrus, as if having nothing more to say, simply slipped out of view of the magic orb.

Reinysius glanced at Kylrus, looking as though he didn’t understand that behavior.

[Of course, aside from Kylrus, the mages also helped. In any case, thanks to that, we were able to deal with the Divine blood.]

He soon wrapped up the conversation.

[We’ll discuss the rest next time.]

“Is something wrong?”

[Part of the city collapsed due to the Divine blood’s intrusion. Fortunately, it didn’t reach the residential areas, so there were no casualties, but if we don’t repair it quickly, it could become a serious problem.]

In short, he needed to go because they were short on manpower.

Leaving those words behind, Reinysius disappeared.

Even after the magic orb disconnected, silence lingered for quite a while.

Then—

“...Lord Alon.”

“What is it, Evan?”

“That tattooed man just now... was that Kylrus?”

Evan asked.

“...? Yes, it was.”

Alon was puzzled that, contrary to expectation, Evan asked about Kylrus rather than the Divine blood.

But Evan, with a serious expression, rubbed his chin.

“No matter how I think about it... isn’t the world unfair...?”

He let out a deep sigh.

Penia looked dumbfounded, while Seollang tilted her head.

The Sculptor, who had been observing the situation alongside Alon’s group—

“...This is a bit unexpected. It should have been close to a standard Divine blood—”

—murmured quietly with an awkward expression.

####

After what could have turned into a serious situation was unexpectedly resolved, Alon was curious how Reinysius had dealt with the Divine blood, but he first spoke with the Sculptor.

“So you’re saying there’s still one avatar left?”

“Well, from what I’ve gathered, yes. Though I don’t know where that one is.”

Alon fell silent for a moment.

If Starlight Root had returned, he might have felt somewhat reassured, but the Allied Kingdoms currently had no Starlight Root.

Soon, Alon let out a quiet sigh.

There was no benefit to worrying about it now.

“So, what was it you wanted to tell me?”

Setting aside his concern, Alon decided to hear the Sculptor out first.

After all, he had been told that the Sculptor had come for another reason.

The Sculptor hesitated for a moment before speaking.

“Divine blood will start descending soon.”

“...How much time do we have?”

“One year. Maybe even sooner.”

Silence fell once again.

If what it said was true, then the situation was clearly bad.

If second-stage Divine blood began pouring down like the first stage had, Alon had no confidence he could stop them.

“However, there’s a problem.”

Just as that line of thought continued, the Sculptor added something new.

“...A problem?”

“Yeah.”

“Didn’t you come to tell me that Divine blood are descending?”

“And why would that be a problem? That’s only natural.”

At that moment, Alon was reminded once again that the being in front of him was Divine blood.

And then—

“...During the next descent of stars, most Divine blood will come down.”

“By most, you mean—”

“All of them, except for the high-tier Divine blood.”

“!”

The Sculptor delivered shocking news to Alon.

““......””

A far heavier silence than before filled the carriage.

Penia and Evan’s eyes widened as if they might pop out.

Only Seollang, with one ear perked up, listened carefully to the Sculptor’s words.

“...Why?”

Calming his surprise, Alon asked.

A complicated expression appeared on the Sculptor’s face.

“A lot of things overlapped.”

“...What do you mean?”

The Sculptor organized its thoughts briefly, then continued.

“First, it’s because of the fragments.”

“The fragments...”

“Obviously, you know where those fragments came from.”

“......”

It was as she said.

He knew exactly why the fragments had been created.

“...So it’s because of the fragments?”

“Mm, strictly speaking, yes. But like I said, things overlapped. Someone forcibly damaged the sky and released the ‘prisoners.’”

“What are you talking about?”

“You don’t know...?”

“I don’t.” 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

“That doesn’t make sense. Any Divine blood would know...”

Alon couldn’t understand the Sculptor’s explanation.

But instead, the Sculptor looked startled by his reaction.

Seeing that Alon truly didn’t know, it stared at him with an unreadable expression before letting out a sigh.

“...I heard the rumors, but it was true? That you gave up both your power and part of your memories just to descend to the surface first?”

“......”

He wanted to ask, Gave up? Me? but there was no reason to discard a narrative that had conveniently been created for him.

So Alon remained silent.

Seeing that, the Sculptor spoke as if it couldn’t be helped.

“To put it simply, the prisoners are the Divine blood who were closest to becoming the ‘victor,’ along with their subordinates.”

“Closest to becoming the victor—”

“Yeah. The one who nearly destroyed this world and came closest to becoming a god. You know—the Divine blood that created the magic you used.”

“!”

“In any case, when they were released, the sky—which should have been properly regulated—was damaged. And because of that—”

“All Divine blood will descend,” Alon finished.

“That’s right. Of course, they won’t be able to use their full power immediately after descending, but that doesn’t change the fact that this world is heading toward destruction.”

Alon closed his mouth.

For now, he understood what would happen going forward.

Whether it was true or not remained to be seen, but there was no reason for the Sculptor to come all this way just to lie to him.

In other words, this story was likely closer to the truth.

And if so, there was only one question Alon needed to resolve at this moment.

“That being the case... why are you telling me all this?”

Why the Sculptor was revealing everything to him.

The Sculptor shrugged.

“Because I was told to help you.”

“...Help me? By whom?”

“Instead of hearing it from me, why don’t you go to Rosario?”

Rather than answering, it made a suggestion.

Alon immediately understood what that meant.

“...! If it’s Rosario—”

“That’s enough. Let’s end the conversation here.”

Cutting off Alon’s words, the Sculptor stood up.

And as if it had nothing more to say—

“Then hear the rest in Rosario.”

—it slipped out of the carriage in an instant and began sinking into the ground.

“Wait—”

“That’s all.”

Even as Alon tried to stop it, the Sculptor gave him no chance and began to disappear—

Crash—!

“!?”

Its head was grabbed.

“Teacher said the conversation isn’t over yet.”

In that instant—

Seollang had seized the Sculptor’s head in one motion.

Seeing Seollang looking down at it, the Sculptor was utterly shocked.

It couldn’t help it.

Was it because of her physical strength?

No.

It had already seen Seollang’s overwhelming power when she subjugated the Descended One.

The reason the Sculptor was shocked was—

‘How is she ignoring the law—!?’

Seollang was ignoring its law.

In this world, law was absolute.

And yet, Seollang was completely disregarding the Sculptor’s law.

With such immense physical strength that it was almost impossible to tell whether it was her own law or not, she was grabbing hold of the avatar that was trying to be absorbed back into the main body.

“Hey, you.”

In the Sculptor’s stunned field of vision, Seollang’s face filled everything.

At some point, she had crouched down and was staring directly into its eyes.

Her expression was deeply strange.

There was none of the sunflower-like smile she showed Alon.

Only—

“Should I find your main body too and drag it out? Or—”

a chillingly expressionless face.

Of course, as Divine blood, fear shouldn’t exist.

To Divine blood, humans were nothing more than tools.

“—should I just crush you?”

And yet, despite that—

“Answer.”

Those eerie golden eyes were unbearably terrifying.

“...I’m sorry...”

Without realizing it, the Sculptor apologized politely.

At that answer, Seollang turned without hesitation and—

“Teacher! # Nоvеlight # It says it still has more time to talk!”

—called out brightly to Alon with a cheerful, sunflower-like smile.

...while still gripping the Sculptor by the hair.

“......”

Naturally, after watching everything that had just happened,

Alon’s expression became complicated.