“Yes, My Lady.”

  Aurora nodded stiffly, her voice hoarse. “I… I understand.”

  She raised a hand, looking at her shoulder armor, now misshapen from the bear’s paw. A flicker of determination entered her eyes.

  “If I feel I am in danger of turning, I will… remove this armor myself and have Ham and Lucien bind me.”

  “Very good.” Pandora showed her approval.

  “But My Lady, you…” Aurora looked up, her face full of worry. “This pce is too dangerous. That monster was…”

  “It’s fine.”

  Pandora hefted the greatsword in her hand. The scarlet light of the bde fshed in the dim woods.

  “I have it under control. And if I encounter a situation I can’t handle, I will retreat immediately.”

  Aurora looked at the ominous red greatsword that had just so easily beheaded the bear and swallowed hard.

  A strange sense of bewilderment washed over her.

  She was supposed to be the knight, the shield. Pandora’s strongest protector.

  But now, she had become her dy’s burden.

  A burden who was protected, saved, and even… pitied.

  Bitterness rose in her throat, a sour taste that drowned her pride.

  “…Yes, My Lady.”

  She finally nodded and turned, dragging her heavy feet back the way they came. Her figure, in the shadows of the gloomy forest, seemed dejected. She even unconsciously ignored a few things… such as… the moment Pandora began to fight, Elsa’s figure had vanished from her sight.

  Pandora watched Aurora’s dejected back and shook her head helplessly.

  There was nothing to be done.

  Although Aurora was her knight, her loyal follower, Pandora herself had the System and had absorbed so much of the “Corpse-Red Mist.” Her strength had leapt to a level Aurora couldn’t even comprehend. It was only natural that she would surpass her own knight.

  If she had the chance, she wouldn’t mind pulling her knight along, letting her share in this opportunity to become stronger.

  But Aurora also had to accept a reality—her growth rate would, very likely, never be able to keep pace with Pandora’s own.

  It was talent. And also… fate.

  Of course, the priority now was to continue following the trail to see what was really behind all this.

  A zombie that had already existed ten years ago…

  A forbidden nd that everyone said should not be entered…

  “Heh.”

  The corner of Pandora’s mouth lifted.

  Unexpectedly, she felt no fear. On the contrary, the sword of Elsa in her hand seemed to sense its master’s excitement. A faint red light pulsed on the bde, emitting a bloodthirsty desire that resonated with it.

  She turned around, refocusing her attention on the deep, gloomy path ahead.

  The appearance of the bear-monster zombie was like a warning, and also like a milestone.

  In the next two-plus hours, Pandora did not encounter a second simir monster.

  The trail, heavy and chaotic, belonging to the zombies, still faintly visible through the woods, leading her ever deeper.

  But that strange feeling in her heart grew stronger and stronger.

  It was a… feeling of being summoned.

  An indescribable pull, as if something from the deepest part of the Forbidden Forest was calling to her. This force wasn’t violent or evil. It was more like a… sense of belonging.

  This feeling, far from making her let down her guard, made her even more vigint. Each of her steps was taken with extreme care. The sword of Elsa in her hand remained in a position where it could be swung at any moment. Her senses, enhanced by the “Corpse-Red Mist,” were pushed to their peak, listening to every stirring of the wind and the grass, discerning every subtle change in the air’s scent.

  However, the danger seemed to have truly come to an end. The snakes and insects had disappeared at some point, and even the distant bird calls from before were gone. The entire world had fallen into an absolute, heart-stopping silence. The spare smoke torches were never even needed.

  Just when Pandora was beginning to wonder if she’d gone the wrong way or gotten lost in this unchanging forest…

  The oppressive wall of green and brown simply… ended.

  The forest was gone.

  In its pce was an exceptionally wide, circur clearing, covered only by a few stubborn bdes of grass and moss.

  And in the center of this clearing… stood a… building?

  Pandora’s footsteps came to an abrupt halt.

  Her mind went bnk. A high-pitched buzz filled her ears.

  She subconsciously rubbed her eyes, thinking it was a hallucination from her long period of intense concentration.

  But the building was still standing there, clear as day.

  It wasn’t any medieval style. No Gothic spires, no Roman arches, not even the simple stone-and-wood structure of the manor.

  It… it was a modern building!?

  Pandora’s pupils contracted violently, a storm of shock surging in her heart…

  How was this possible?!

  The boxy shape. The rge expanses of smooth, ft walls. The structure of steel bars and concrete, exposed to the open air, full of an industrial aesthetic. And even on one side of the building, there was a huge, pieced-together wall of gss, reflecting the light of the sky…

  A curtain wall?

  If… if she took the building in front of her and pced it, unchanged, into the bustling modern city she had come from, no one would find it the least bit out of pce.

  But here… this was the Middle Ages!

  It was the world she had lived in for fourteen whole years, a pure, authentic, feudal, backward medieval world!

  The linen dress on her body, the sword of Elsa in her hand, the peasants in her memory who wore coarse cloth and might never have left their vilges in their entire lives… everything, everything, was telling her a cruel fact—this was the Middle Ages.

  So… what was with this building?

  Could it be… could her fourteen years of experience all be a lie?

  The so-called transmigration, the so-called new life, was it all just a long, vivid… dream?

  No… that’s not right…

  Cold sweat instantly broke out on her forehead and back, soaking her clothes. Her thoughts fell into unprecedented chaos.

  The entire foundation of her new life, the cornerstone of her reality, cracked.

  “My Lady.”

  Elsa’s calm voice sounded in her mind without warning.

  This familiar, intimate voice of the person she trusted most instantly pulled Pandora from the swirling vortex of her chaotic thoughts.

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