Someone who could decisively wipe out her entire clan.

Someone obsessed with power and achievement.

Someone who had schemed and struggled her way to the very gates of authority, only waiting for the chance to fully spread her wings.

And then, at the exact moment her ambitions burned brightest, she was told:

There would never be war again.

Not only was there no war, there were no dungeons left to grind levels either.

If players wanted to grow stronger now, the only remaining methods were learning and personal insight.

It was like playing a game halfway through, only for the monster-killing mechanic to suddenly be deleted. From then on, leveling up could only be done through peaceful side activities.

Even though BS Rita never stated it outright, every player understood.

These hundred years existed so Divine Game players could strengthen themselves and spend time with their people.

The BS Adjudicator hated meaningless war.

As a result, every leader, including Maple Syrup, signed a hundred-year ceasefire agreement.

To most players, the message was obvious.

War would return eventually.

Just not for another hundred years.

For now, it was a time for recovery and rebuilding.

For players who preferred peaceful lives, this was wonderful news.

But for ambitious people like Zoey, it was torture.

Zoey had already imagined herself one day becoming the supreme owl emperor. She had imagined sitting at the same table as BS Rita, discussing world-level affairs as an equal.

And then, right when her career ambitions were at their peak, someone suddenly announced that it was over.

All of it.

Zoey simply could not accept it.

Even though Maple Syrup had not revoked her authority, every soldier had already gone home to live normal lives.

At that point, whether the authority remained or not hardly mattered.

True, Zoey’s lifespan had already extended dramatically after becoming an oak owl and raising her level.

She did not actually care about waiting a mere hundred years.

But she absolutely could not endure such boring days.

And after tasting power, she could no longer settle down and quietly run businesses either.

So after spending several leisurely months in Polar Day City, Zoey decided to do something exciting.

She wanted Maple Syrup to send people hunting her down.

That was the situation in a nutshell.

To summarize in one sentence:

The child had officially entered her rebellious phase.

But Rita sensed something hidden beneath this reckless behavior.

Zoey was not remotely worried Maple Syrup would actually kill her.

In fact, she was completely certain Maple Syrup would agonize over that letter.

Only children who were loved could afford to be this willful.

Rita could barely remember how the original Zoey reacted after suffering grievances within The Lopez Family.

Did she scheme and maneuver against others?

Did she shout angrily about her unwillingness to accept her fate?

Or did she endure silently while slowly seizing power?

But surely she would never have simply left behind a letter and run away from home.

How had she become more childish after finally obtaining the authority she always wanted?

Rita had wandered through timelines for thousands of years and written countless stories.

Following the faint thread she sensed beneath the surface, she finally uncovered the truth behind it all.

She said firmly,

"Even though you still call her Maple Mu, neither you nor Maple Cang nor Maple Burn ever truly treated her as Maple Mu, right?"

Otherwise, Zoey would never have dared flip the table this confidently.

Because deep down, everyone understood the truth.

They all knew she and Maple Mu were not the same person.

Even though Zoey walked through Lania Kaia under the name Maple Mu, her existence resembled an old photograph hanging on a wall.

She brought emotional comfort to Maple Syrup and Maple Cang.

But she was never a replacement.

Sure enough, Maple Syrup frowned on the other side of the screen and replied in a tone that sounded both obvious and helpless.

"Because she isn’t."

"She isn’t Maple Mu, and Maple Mu isn’t her."

Rita stopped walking.

Ahead on the street, a woman carrying a bag of vegetables was walking toward her.

The woman’s face looked strikingly similar to Zoey’s, but her gentle smile and peaceful eyes carried a warmth Zoey would never possess.

Rita did not remember many ordinary people.

But she remembered this one.

Because during Zoey’s extermination of her clan, this had been the only person she spared.

Back then, Eclipse had deliberately kept the woman alive as insurance.

Just in case Zoey ever turned against BS someday.

Perhaps this woman would become her weakness.

The woman passed by Rita while chatting happily with someone beside her.

"Really? My daughter is very well-behaved too... Ah, although she hates when I call her obedient."

Her voice gradually faded into the distance.

Rita looked back toward Maple Syrup, who already seemed ready to end the call.

"When Lania Kaia invaded BS back then, did Zoey ever go to the battlefield?"

"Or take any logistical role?"

"No," Maple Syrup answered directly, clearly disdaining lies.

Then she added with equal parts irritation and amusement,

"She suffered an ’accidental severe injury and coma’ during that period."

"Maple Cang used even SSS-rank healing skills and still couldn’t cure her."

"Lania Kaia fought BS for however long, and she remained ’comatose’ for exactly that long."

"If Maple Burn hadn’t secretly brought her food, she probably would’ve starved to death in bed."

"That’s enough, then." Rita’s tone softened slightly.

"I’ll send her a pass."

"If she’s bored out of her mind, she can come visit BS."

Although Rita deliberately used the word "visit" rather than "return," both Maple Syrup and Mistblade sensed the pity hidden within her words.

Mistblade spoke quietly.

"How many World Sighs have you written exactly?"

"You used to become soft-hearted after writing them too, but not like this."

It almost felt...

Almost as though she had gained a trace of divinity.

As if, so long as nobody crossed a certain line, she could forgive and tolerate nearly anything.

Rita smiled faintly.

"Why not call it saint syndrome instead?"

Maple Syrup groaned.

"Are you praising yourself again using weird terms nobody else understands?"

Rita blanked for a brief moment before blinking and laughing softly.

"It is a pretty good term."

After witnessing the vastness of worlds and the helplessness of fate, she naturally developed a kind of compassion toward all living things.

Her grudge with Zoey had already ended in the fire that burned down the estate.

After ending the call with Maple Syrup, Rita sent a BS travel pass to Zoey in distant Lania Kaia.

Using it, Zoey could freely teleport between BS and Lania Kaia.

As for whether Zoey still remembered she had family and weakness waiting for her in BS...

Or whether she would ever return to see them...

That no longer concerned Rita.

After playing several rounds of mahjong, she left the increasingly addicted Mistblade and Nivalis behind in the mahjong parlor and departed for other timelines herself.

She decided to grant the beings of those timelines the same hundred years.

This was not solely about the Adjudicator game.

It was also about the final confrontation.

If the enemy intended to prune timelines away, then she would preserve them instead.

Floating high above Starsea, Rita looked down across the countless worlds below.

A thought suddenly crossed her mind.

Had the one who now controlled that authority once been merely another member of these countless races too?