Another system panel appeared immediately after the last.

[Temporary Rest Period: 10 Minutes]

[Protective Barrier Activating...]

A low humming sound spread across the ruined courtyard while golden light expanded outward from the broken pillars surrounding the battlefield. The barrier rose rapidly around the circular arena before sealing completely overhead.

Several people instinctively looked upward.

The golden barrier now covered the entire courtyard. Faint runes moved slowly across its surface while black mist outside the walls slammed harmlessly against it before dispersing.

Another notification appeared.

[No hostile entities may enter.]

[Participants may not leave the resting zone until timer completion.]

For the first time since entering the realm, the nonstop pressure disappeared completely. No more footsteps echoed nearby and no more arrows flew through the air.

Helen exhaled heavily. Her shoulders relaxed slightly before she immediately turned toward Zich instead of sitting down herself. Small burns covered parts of her arms while dust clung across her clothes from the earlier impact.

"Are you injured badly?" she asked while stepping closer.

Zich glanced down briefly at the shallow cut across his chest before shrugging once.

"Not really. You got kicked through a pillar, you should be more worried about yourself."

"That was different." Helen frowned. "Besides, I’m far stronger and older than you, so my bones are much more sturdy."

"You think?"

"Nope. I’m certain of it!"

Nearby, Jayden’s expression darkened slightly after seeing her check on Zich first again. His grip around his weapon tightened briefly before he finally spoke.

"You really know how to hide behind other people," he said flatly. "Funny how everyone keeps protecting you while you run around blinking away."

Helen frowned. "He literally helped save your life earlier. Shouldn’t you tell him thank you at least."

Jayden’s jaw clenched slightly after hearing that.

"Surviving is usually better than dying loudly," Zich replied. "You should try it sometime."

For several seconds, Jayden looked like he wanted to continue arguing, but the exhausted state of everyone around them killed the momentum before it properly started.

Not far away, the giant Velhari finally dropped onto a broken stone block while pulling an arrow fragment out of his shoulder armor. His expression looked unpleasant, though this time he avoided commenting about Slimy completely.

Varok slowly approached.

The Velhari leader stopped several meters from Zich before resting the butt of his spear lightly against the ground. Unlike earlier, his eyes carried noticeably more caution and something close to respect.

"How did you notice the hidden commander?" he asked.

Zich calmly wiped blood from the side of his mouth first.

"The statue was too obedient."

Varok raised one eyebrow slightly.

Zich continued, "Everything else in the courtyard looked damaged naturally. That statue reacted every time the formation shifted, but it never moved even slightly out of place. It stood out too much."

The shorter Velhari silently watched him.

Dark hair still covered most of the figure’s eyes, though the attention directed toward Zich’s summons had become noticeably more focused now. Slimy bounced quietly beside Zich while Blood Leech crouched near the broken remains of the Knight Captain.

"You noticed all that during combat?" the giant Velhari finally muttered.

"You were busy getting hit by arrows."

Helen covered her mouth briefly. A laugh almost escaped again.

The giant Velhari’s face twitched visibly after hearing that, but he didn’t comment. Instead, his eyes shifted briefly toward the small blue creature before looking away.

Nearby, Jayden quietly sat against a cracked pillar while cleaning blood from his sword. Although his expression remained cold, his gaze occasionally shifted toward Zich and Helen from the side.

Especially toward Helen.

She still stood closer to Zich than anyone else.

Meanwhile, Zich quietly opened his loot panel again while everyone else recovered. His eyes moved greedily across the rewards while his fingers twitched slightly from the urge to snatch everything for himself.

The Blood Knight Commander Cloak especially caught his attention.

An Elite ranked armor piece this early inside Layer One was absurdly valuable. Even if he sold it later, the amount of money involved would probably make ordinary players faint.

’Mine.’

A small smile almost appeared on his face.

Not far away, Helen finally sat down beside a broken pillar while holding her stomach carefully. The earlier kick clearly hurt far more than she was pretending.

Zich glanced toward her briefly.

"You should drink a potion."

Helen looked toward him and smiled faintly. It was the first time since they met that Zich had asked how she was. Could it be he was finally starting to see her the same way she saw him?

She sighed softly before finally pulling out a recovery potion from her belt pouch. After drinking it slowly, she leaned her head back against the cracked stone behind her.

Varok eventually crouched beside the destroyed Knight Captain while studying the shattered armor pieces carefully. Several sections still leaked black energy slowly despite the commander’s death.

"This realm is stranger than expected," he muttered quietly.

The shorter Velhari finally spoke.

"The formations moved too intelligently. It felt closer to fighting soldiers than undead."

Varok nodded once.

"And the Captain almost completed a battlefield evolution."

Hearing that made even Helen’s face tighten slightly. "If it had finished absorbing everything fully..."

Nobody completed the sentence.

The silence that followed felt heavier than before.

Several minutes passed quietly while the golden timer slowly ticked downward above the courtyard. Outside the barrier, dark fog continued moving around the ruined walls while distant sounds occasionally echoed somewhere deeper inside the realm.

Zich used the time to quietly recover mana while pretending to rest normally.

Inside his mind, however, he was already calculating.

The spirit orb gains from this battle alone had been enormous, and it was now time for either another summon or absorption.

The mere thought sent a jolt of excitement through his body, and if not for the fact that he did not trust anyone here, he would have already slipped into the graveyard.

Eventually, the giant Velhari stretched one arm before looking toward the battlefield loot scattered around the ruined courtyard.

Varok followed his gaze briefly before finally speaking.

"What are we doing about the monster loot? How do we split it?"