"If I truly intended to keep you away from danger completely, I wouldn’t have handed you one of the most important roles in the clan."

She nodded slightly, finally agreeing.

"Yes... Yes, that was rather surprising."

"I’m trusting you with the lives of the clan’s combat forces. That alone should tell you I don’t see you as weak."

Her grip around my hands loosened slightly after that.

"But right now," I added, "the settlement still needs someone reliable here while the others are outside leveling up. Especially with the barrier activating for the first time."

Zarah stared at me quietly for another moment before narrowing her eyes again.

"You really know how to make things sound reasonable."

"Because they are reasonable."

I held both her hands gently.

"So just for today," I said, "stay here and keep things under control for me."

Zarah stayed quiet for a few seconds, clearly thinking about it before finally answering.

"Fine."

I immediately let out a breath of relief. But then she added:

"You have to return early."

"I do not like sleeping alone anymore."

My eyes instinctively shifted toward Ariel before returning to her.

"...Is that why you cuddled the fox the entire night?"

"Yes," Zarah answered without even trying to deny it. "You hadn’t returned yet, and she was warm."

I frowned immediately.

"I don’t like sleeping alone, either."

Zarah noticed my expression almost instantly.

Then, to my complete lack of preparation, she reached up and lightly palmed my cheek.

"Then return quickly," she said softly. "You don’t want me spending the night with someone else, do you?"

For a second, my brain completely stopped working again. Then my eyes widened in horror.

"By someone... who exactly do you mean?"

Zarah blinked at me.

"Granny Flogga or Talia, of course," she replied casually. "Why?"

I immediately exhaled in relief.

"No, it’s nothing."

For a second there, I genuinely thought she meant another male goblin or something equally horrifying. If that ever happened, I didn’t care who it was. He was dead. Absolutely dead.

I was going to kill him repeatedly, throw him out of the clan, which would unlink him from the graveyard, and roast him alive until he was nothing but charcoal.

Zarah stared at me a moment longer, her eyes narrowing slightly as though she could somehow tell exactly where my thoughts had started drifting.

Before I could say anything else, she leaned forward and kissed me lightly on the lips, the sudden warmth instantly pulling me out of my thoughts and back to reality. Then, without another word, she turned and walked away.

I shook my head lightly afterward, the kiss leaving me in a noticeably better mood, before turning back toward Ariel again.

We still had somewhere to be.

I stretched my hand toward her, intending to use [Warp] to transport us directly toward the area where she had encountered the wolves earlier. But Ariel immediately refused my hands.

Instead, the fox leaped lightly upward and landed on my shoulder with practiced ease, her tails brushing lightly behind me as she settled herself there comfortably.

"...You could’ve just taken my hand," I muttered.

"Hmph."

Ariel settled herself on my shoulder with an annoyed expression as if she was doing me a favor by allowing it.

Honestly, I half expected my shoulder to dip from the impact. Not because she was large, but because, for some reason, I assumed she’d weigh more. Instead, she was surprisingly light. Maybe a little too light considering her size and power.

’Good for me, though.’

The last thing I needed was to spend the entire trip moving around lopsided because of a heavy fox spirit sitting on me.

Once she settled properly, I activated [Warp]. And the world distorted briefly around us before the clan vanished from sight.

Some time later, we were already deep into the journey toward the area Ariel had described earlier.

The forest around us had grown darker and far denser compared to the regions near the clan. Moonlight barely managed to pass through the thick canopy overhead, leaving large sections of the terrain swallowed in shadow.

Ariel occasionally pointed directions from my shoulder while I moved through the forest at high speed, using short bursts of [Warp] whenever the terrain became too difficult or when we needed to cover large distances quickly.

According to her, the creatures carrying the crystals were part of a pack of high-level wolves she had encountered while hunting previously. She had managed to kill several of them for experience gains before things went wrong. Then their alpha appeared. And apparently, that was enough to make even Ariel retreat immediately because it was simply beyond her level at the time.

That honestly made me even more excited.

It had been, what... a full day since I last properly fought a powerful monster?

Somehow, that already felt strange to me.

I needed stronger opponents. Needed more experience.

Especially after hearing about the King’s Games and the kinds of monsters that would apparently appear there. If ordinary high-level beasts already felt dangerous now, then the creatures leading those hordes would probably be on an entirely different level.

Which meant I couldn’t afford to slow down. Not even for a moment.

So while we were heading out for the crystals first and foremost...

I fully intended to sharpen my blade along the way as well.

With Ariel guiding the way from my shoulder, we finally arrived at the location she had mentioned earlier.

A massive cave entrance stood before us, partially hidden behind thick trees and jagged rock formations. The surrounding area felt unnaturally quiet compared to the rest of the forest, almost as if smaller creatures instinctively avoided getting too close to this place.

By now, it was fully dark.

Moonlight barely reached the cave entrance, leaving the inside swallowed in complete shadow. But honestly, that didn’t bother me much anymore.

What actually bothered me was something else entirely.

I stared at the cave entrance for a moment before narrowing my eyes slightly.

"...How far did you travel exactly?"

It had taken us almost two hours to reach this place, even while using [Warp] repeatedly to shorten the distance. Which meant Ariel somehow traveled all the way here alone previously.

That made me curious, but more frustrated.

"Why didn’t you tell me the location was this far away?"

Ariel glanced down at me lazily.

"You didn’t ask."