​Mirabella placed her palm on Grace’s shoulder, her touch firm and grounding, and slowly took the notebook from her trembling hands.

​She flipped through the remaining pages, scanning the blood-flecked paper, seeing nothing else. "That was the last entry." She said, her voice a calm anchor in the sea of Grace’s despair.

​"She is alive, right?" Grace asked, looking up at Mirabella with desperate, tear-filled eyes, seeking any shred of hope.

​Mirabella held her jaw, her mind dissecting the grim evidence. "I can’t say for sure. But the last place she wrote this is in the bunker... This notebook can’t later appear in her room." She said.

​"So you mean someone took it up here? That means they left the bunker." Carl said, catching onto the thread. He turned to Grace, a bright smile breaking through the gloom. "Your sister is still alive!" He yelled.

​"I won’t be so sure about that." Mirabella said flatly, popping the bubble of his enthusiasm in an instant. Her words stunned Carl and Grace.

​’At least be hopeful,’ Carl thought in surprise, taken aback by his captain’s blunt, unyielding pragmatism.

​"I am just stating the logic." Mirabella continued, pacing slightly as she laid out the grim mechanics of the siege. "She said the monster who attacked them was a humanoid creature with tentacles all over its body. And she also said the head security yelled at them to open the door, while your dad refused... This means the monster followed them to the bunker."

​She turned to the two, her eyes sharp. "I can tell this monster is powerful, so why didn’t it just kill the two men, but followed them? Of course, it wanted to know their hideout. Not only that, she also said it looked at the camera... This monster discovered they’re inside that bunker, and it will do anything possible to get inside... There is always one exit in a bunker, so how can they escape?" She gave a logical explanation, systematically closing off the avenues of an easy miracle, her words stunning the two into a heavy silence.

"...!!"

​Seeing the absolute devastation on Grace’s face, Mirabella softened her tone, shifting from the grim reality to the slim probability of survival. She turned to Grace. "I am not saying your sister is dead. This notebook being up here proves she survived the bunker... I will say the monster destroyed the bunker, and your mother risked her life to protect your sister, who ran back to the mansion with her diary. Not knowing what to do, and out of fear, she activated her Galaxy bracelet and entered the Space."

​"You’re saying she is inside the Galaxy space?" Grace asked in surprise, a spark of genuine hope reigniting in her chest. The system might have provided the ultimate sanctuary.

​"That’s the only logical explanation... If she is inside the gate, we will know after three months, when the academy receives new students from the first server." Mirabella paused, purposefully not saying the word if again, cementing the theory as their working objective, and changed the topic to the immediate physical threat. "I say we should first check this bunker out, we might get some clues from there."

​"Yeah, that’s a good idea... Grace." Carl turned to Grace, offering a reassuring nod.

​"Alright... The doorway is in the basement." She muttered in a low voice, wiping the last of her tears away and hardening her resolve.

​"You guys standing outside, you also heard everything, so we all will be heading to the bunker." Mirabella said, turning her head to the door without even raising her voice.

​As if on cue, Rose and the rest showed themselves, stepping out from the ruined corridor where they had been silently keeping watch and listening to the heartbreaking revelation.

​"Okay, Don’t worry Grace. We will help you!" Precious said with a determined expression, gripping her weapon tightly.

​"Yes."

"We are also here to help."

​The rest added, the Dragon Academy team solidifying their bond. They weren’t just fighting for survival anymore; they were fighting for each other’s fragments of home.

​"Thank you, all of you. It’s this way." Grace said, drawing a steady breath and walking past the group, who silently followed behind her into the deeper, darker bowels of the estate.

​Mirabella lingered for a fraction of a second. She looked at the notebook in her hand, staring at the dark blood stains on it, and exhaled softly.

​’I have been detecting you for so long, but I can’t pinpoint your location... Maybe I will get a clue in the bunker,’ She said inwardly, her senses tingling with the faint, suffocating presence of something alien hiding just beyond the veil of reality. She slipped the diary into her spatial storage and followed, leaving the room.

__

​In the dead silence that followed their departure, the shadows warped. A thick, pulsating black tentacle moved seamlessly inside the ruined plaster of the wall of the room, and vanished without a sound.

____

​[Basement.]

​The Nine stopped inside the huge basement, the air here stale and heavy with the scent of decay and damp concrete. They were moving their gazes around the dimmed, subterranean space.

​"Rose." Mirabella called, sensing the oppressive darkness.

​"On it!"

​Rose stepped forward and raised her legendary class staff. The energy in the room swirled, and the next moment, the tip glowed brightly, casting a brilliant, magical luminescence that instantly illuminated the whole basement.

​"Huh?!"

​".....?!"

"....!"

​Everyone was stunned, a collective gasp echoing in the enclosed space. They were staring at the black spiderwebs all over the place. These weren’t normal arachnid silk; one web was as thick as a human hand, woven from a dark, tar-like substance that seemed to actively absorb Rose’s magical light.

​"What is this?" David asked in surprise, stepping forward. Raising his hand before him, a complex, glowing runic circle appeared in the air. He sent a concentrated burst of elemental fire towards the webs, expecting them to instantly incinerate, but to his shock, nothing happened. The flames just washed over the black material and died out.

​"I can’t burn this with a rune?" He muttered in surprise, his confidence in his magical output shaken.

​"Leave it to me!" Kent yelled, stepping up to act as the vanguard. He raised his heavy legendary class sword, channeling his aura into the blade, and strike down with enough force to shatter boulders. But to his profound shock, the heavy steel rebounded violently. It didn’t even leave a scratch on the web.

​"What the hell is this thing?" He muttered in surprise, staring at his vibrating hands.

​Mirabella raised an eyebrow, her interest thoroughly piqued as Sunder appeared before her in a flash of crimson light. The sentient blade moved on its own, eager to prove its God-class superiority, and strike the web with a concentrated arc of sword aura. The impact rang out like a bell, but it only left a shallow scratch on the dark material.

​"Huh? This is a god class weapon, and it only left a scratch on it?" She muttered in surprise, analyzing the density and molecular structure of the secretion.

​’If only Sunder has returned to its Peak Supreme Class,’ She thought, knowing her weapon was still recovering its former cosmic glory. Realizing they needed an apex-tier edge, she turned to Carl.

​Seeing Mirabella staring at him, Carl instantly understood the unspoken command, and brought out his Supreme Class Angel dagger. The divine, golden aura of the heirloom instantly pushed back the oppressive darkness of the room. He moved towards another thick strand of web, and with a casual downward movement, it easily divided the web, slicing through the abyssal material like slashing through butter.

​Mirabella’s eyes narrowed, her mind making a terrifying calculation. ’You must be kidding me?! A supreme class artifact easily cut this! Whatever created this web is above a great Celestial stage monster.’ She thought in shock. The hierarchy of the higher realms was bleeding into the lower world, and the entity nesting beneath them was a predator that defied all second-world logic.