Caron’s gaze passed over Vinny and landed on Fennia and Amisha behind him.

“You two—are you second-years, or first-year underclassmen?” Caron seemed a little dazzled by the looks of the two girls. His eyes lingered on Amisha—especially on Amisha’s eyes—for a bit longer before he asked.

“Upperclassman Caron, my name is Fennia Cassius. This is my childhood friend and closest friend, Amisha Merif. We’re both first-year students,” Fennia answered.

“Oh, so you’re first-year underclassmen?” Caron nodded, indicating he understood.

“Yes. Upperclassman Caron... you seem pretty familiar with Vinny?” Fennia looked at Caron, then at Vinny.

“Familiar? If you mean only in the sense of ‘familiar,’ then sure.” With those words, Caron had already made the subtext plain.

“Come to think of it—Cassius and Merif. Your families both belong to the Church of the Dawn, right?” Caron asked.

“Yes. Our families do belong to the Church. My family is a monastic knight family of the Church of the Dawn,” Fennia said.

“Mhm. I’ve heard of the Cassius Family. A very impressive knight family—your ancestors even produced a 【Champion Knights】 member of the Church of the Dawn, right?” Caron nodded in acknowledgement.

“Yes.”

“And then the Merif family—if I’m not mistaken, underclassman Amisha, your ancestors produced a grand archbishop of the Church, right?” Caron shifted his gaze to Amisha.

“Mhm. Yes, upperclassman.” Amisha’s soft, pliant voice had no emotional rise or fall. She nodded, and—whether intentionally or not—quietly moved her eyes aside, avoiding eye contact with Caron.

Vinny listened to their conversation from the side. He didn’t know if it was just his imagination, but he felt like Caron suddenly steering the talk into Amisha and Fennia’s family backgrounds and household affairs was... a little too deliberate.

“You also stumbled into this world by mistake, got lost, and have been getting attacked by monsters nonstop, right? Still, for two childhood friends to find each other... that’s at least one small mercy in the middle of misfortune.” Caron nodded.

“Yes. Upperclassman Caron, our strength isn’t much, but fortunately, even in a moment of crisis like this, we still managed to meet each other,” Fennia nodded.

“That’s good. Don’t worry—so long as I’m here, nothing will happen to you,” Caron said with calm composure, like he’d already become the backbone of the team.

“What are you planning to do next?” Caron asked.

“We’re planning to go take a look at the ruins altar in the center. Maybe that’s the key to getting out of here,” Vinny answered.

“Oh? The altar in the center of the forest? I was thinking the same. I believe that place has something like a magic formation laid on it,” Caron mused.

“Before we’ve escaped danger—before we’ve left this place crawling with threats—I think we need to work together, clench five fingers into a fist, instead of each fighting alone.” Then, Caron suddenly changed the direction of his words.

“So before that, I have to make this clear, so nobody has a knot in their heart. Vinny, I hope we can let bygones be bygones. This isn’t the time for personal grudges to affect our unity—or even cause infighting,” Caron said with a lofty, righteous air.

Vinny raised an eyebrow. That was exactly what he’d been worried about. He hadn’t expected it to come out of this guy’s mouth first.

Now it made him look like the petty one who couldn’t read the situation.

“That’s what I want too, upperclassman Caron.”

“Good. Looks like we’ve reached a temporary agreement.” Caron nodded.

Fennia and Amisha’s gazes moved back «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» and forth between Vinny and Caron. Anyone could tell there were grudges between them—and not small ones, either. Not something a few sentences could ever sum up.

But Caron was right. Unity mattered most right now. No one wanted to keep going on this topic and make the relationship even stiffer.

“Amisha, don’t be afraid. We’ll definitely get out,” Fennia said, tightly gripping Amisha’s hand. “Now we have four people—and we even have upperclassman Caron. We’ll definitely turn danger into safety.”

“......” Amisha said nothing. She only quietly glanced in Caron’s direction and didn’t speak.

The four continued toward the ruins altar. Along the way, they ran into many monster attacks in the forest. The most common were bud-head monsters, then vine-rhinos, and there were also some things that burrowed out of the ground—heads like seeds. If you got close, they would explode on their own. Vinny couldn’t even count how many of those things he’d dealt with.

But as time passed, Vinny also realized how important alchemy potions that restored mana were. There was no way to instantly fill a chunk of mana, but one sip could continuously accelerate mana recovery—recovering throughout the fight. You could get a lot back that way. If he’d been drinking the whole time and kept himself in a constant accelerated recovery state, he’d probably have recovered enough mana by now for one [Congealed-Ice Shackles]. If the mana potion was higher-grade, the effect would be even better.

After fighting continuously for so long, Fennia and Amisha had already completely run out of mana earlier. On this stretch they’d been responsible for the rear, basically phoning it in—Fennia protecting Amisha, using her sword to clean up the monsters that Vinny and Caron had already battered down and that got too close. But even that was a struggle for her. As the enemies grew stronger and stronger and the battle level rose higher and higher, relying on pure physical cutting would only feel more and more weak.

Basically, it had been Vinny and Caron doing the heavy lifting the whole way.

Vinny also realized what it meant for him to be without Frostfang. He had never fought such continuous, high-intensity battles before. In a situation like this, sustained combat capability was especially important.

Without Frostfang, he could only deal with any monster using magic. He couldn’t afford to conserve mana. His mana was draining rapidly. Even as someone in the Magus realm, it was starting to wear him down.

Otherwise what—was he supposed to coat himself in [Armor Fortress] and punch everything to death??

[Icefang’s Roar] had terrifyingly overwhelming power that could even produce an over-tier effect, but the price paid was just as heavy. Being without Frostfang for so long was an enormous blow to the wielder’s combat strength—especially for someone used to casually throwing out a [Rimefrost Full-Moon Slash].

The group fought their way through at last, and finally saw the ruins altar ahead.

The four approached the altar carefully. They found that monsters were everywhere in the forest, but there were none at all on this altar—which immediately felt strange.

When they reached the center of the altar, a white ceramic tile etched with carved patterns stood there, and embedded in it was an exquisite dark-gold-handled snake-tongue dagger.

After searching around the altar without finding anything, and confirming there were no monsters lying in ambush, the group moved to the center.

None of the four went near the tile at first. Caron stopped everyone and casually tossed a pebble toward the tile. The pebble rolled into the tile smoothly and nothing happened. Only then did Caron walk forward with ease.

“There’s nothing abnormal around here, and there aren’t any switches. If we have to say what looks like a switch...” Caron looked at the dark-gold snake-tongue dagger embedded in the tile’s groove.

Only that.

Vinny and the two girls also walked up. Reaching the carved tile, Vinny squatted down and examined the finely crafted snake-tongue dagger in detail.

He exchanged a look with Fennia and Amisha behind him.

“You two step back. I’ll see if this dagger can be pulled out.” What Vinny meant was that he was worried pulling it out might trigger some mechanism.

At that, Caron stepped back a few paces, but Amisha and Fennia didn’t.

“What? Is there something else?” Vinny looked at Amisha and Fennia in confusion.

“We should stay here,” Fennia said. “That way, if you pull it out and something happens, we can respond.”

“Respond to what? We’d just all get unlucky together. Both of you, back up. I’ll do it alone.” Vinny rolled his eyes.

Hearing that, Fennia and Amisha could only comply with Vinny’s words and retreat.

And what none of them noticed was that Caron watched this scene, and something in his expression shifted almost imperceptibly. His brows knit for a moment—then quickly relaxed.

Vinny stayed alert to his surroundings. He gripped the dagger’s handle and tugged upward. There was a bit of resistance, but not much.

So Vinny pulled up with force and easily drew the snake-tongue dagger out.

In an instant, everyone stood on guard, afraid some trap had been triggered. A moment passed.

Nothing happened.

The group hesitated, then gathered together—and at that moment, the altar’s floor bricks flipped open into hollow cavities, releasing waves of green gas.

“Damn it! Cover your mouths and noses!” Caron shouted.

In truth, he didn’t need to shout. The moment they saw poison gas pouring out of the ground, everyone covered their mouths and noses and ran outward.

Vinny also reflexively threw the snake-tongue dagger away, covered his mouth and nose, and bolted. In the rush of chaotic footsteps, they suddenly heard Caron’s shout.

“You! Vinny, what are you doing?!”

“?” A huge question mark popped over Vinny’s head as he ran like hell.

What did that mean?

What did he mean, what was Vinny doing? Was Caron having another episode again??

Vinny didn’t understand what was wrong with him this time.

Not long after, everyone escaped off the altar.

“Just now... what happened? What’s wrong with upperclassman Caron?” Fennia looked utterly confused.

Amisha hesitated, then pointed toward a direction not far away.

Fennia’s eyes followed—and she saw Caron crouched there, one hand bracing his sword against the ground, his face twisted in pain.

A dagger was stuck in his back.

It was the same dark-gold-handled snake-tongue dagger Vinny had pulled out of the altar.

“Upperclassman Caron? What happened to you?!” Fennia and Amisha hurried over to check on him.

“Careful! That dagger... it’s poisoned!” Caron forced the words out through pain.

“What exactly happened?!” Fennia still couldn’t figure out what was going on. One moment the dagger was in Vinny’s hand, and the next it was buried in Caron’s back—how??

“Vinny. That guy Vinny! ...Just now, when the smoke was thick...” Caron didn’t continue, but Fennia and Amisha both understood what he meant.

“What happened? What are you shouting about?” At that moment, Vinny also emerged from the green poison fog. He was still covering his mouth and nose as he looked at the three of them, his expression full of bafflement.

“Vinny, you bastard—taking advantage of a moment like this to ambush me. Were you trying to use this chance to kill me?!” Caron bared his teeth as he questioned Vinny. “I thought you’d change, but your mind is still just as vicious!”

“???” Vinny’s face was filled with question marks. “No, man—what are you talking about?”

“Still trying to keep acting? Your acting really is good,” Caron said coldly through pain.

“What acting? What’s wrong with you?!” Only then did Vinny notice the snake-tongue dagger stuck in Caron’s back—and the way Amisha and Fennia were staring at him. In an instant, he understood what this was about.

“How did you get stabbed by that dagger?” Vinny looked genuinely confused.

“Heh. Yeah. How did I get stabbed by this dagger? You shouldn’t know better than anyone?” Caron said with icy sharpness. “Earlier—who was holding this dagger?”

“But when I ran out just now, I threw it away.” Vinny frowned.

“You say you threw it away—did you? Or do you think I picked it up myself and stabbed it into my own back? You’re full of lies. Do you think something like that is even possible?!” Caron snapped.

“But you can’t just say I did it.” Vinny walked over. “Be reasonable. Why would I do something like this right now?”

“Isn’t that something I should ask you?!” Caron glared at Vinny.

“Wait—there are way too many problems with this. If I wanted to ambush you, would I really have to use the dagger that was just in my hands? Do I not know that if it ends up in your back, I’m the biggest suspect?!” Vinny looked a little speechless.

“Setting that aside—are you okay?”

“Stop the fake concern! How I am—don’t you know?!” Caron clenched his fist. “Good thing I wore soft armor under my uniform. It only scraped my skin. If I hadn’t been wearing under-armor, someone might’ve gotten what they wanted!”

“No, how do I even explain this to you? If I really wanted to ambush you—really wanted to harm you—why would I use some unknown dagger like this, where I haven’t even tested the killing power?” Vinny said with a strange expression. “If I stab you with it, I don’t even know if it can take your life. Why would I use that to stab you? Am I sick in the head?”

“So what you’re saying is... I stabbed myself?” Caron shot back.

“Upperclassman Caron, it’s true that I was holding this dagger before, but I absolutely didn’t stab you.” Vinny raised an eyebrow. “I’m not like certain people—always looking for gloves to do the dirty work for them.”