Arthur stared at his system interface.

The countdown mocked him with clinical precision, numbers ticking down like a doomsday clock nobody could stop.

[2nd Trial: Outlander Invasion]

[Time Remaining: 4 Days, 07 Hours, 43 Minutes, 18 Seconds]

Four days.

That's all they had left before whatever "Outlander" meant came crashing through dimensional barriers with hostile intent.

His hand supported his chin as he leaned forward in his seat, eyes tracking the seconds falling away one by one.

The word itself bothered him.

Outlander.

Not demon, not monster, not corrupted entity.

Something from beyond their understanding of reality itself.

After countless centuries of existence, after witnessing the merge of dimensions and the birth of the Reformed Earth, the system still managed to present mysteries that eluded even his accumulated knowledge.

The Voice of the World, as some called it.

An omnipresent force that governed the new rules of existence with absolute authority and zero explanation.

It gave power, assigned trials, distributed rewards and punishments with mathematical fairness.

But never once had it bothered explaining its own origins or true purpose.

Arthur made his umpteenth sigh of the day.

Under his leadership and alongside the Knights of the Round Table, they'd prepared as thoroughly as possible.

Supply lines established, defensive formations coordinated, emergency protocols distributed to civilian populations.

Every hero in Legendor had been briefed, every military force placed on high alert.

They'd done everything within their capabilities.

And yet the unknown nature of the threat made all those preparations feel inadequate.

How do you defend against something you can't define?

The sound of footsteps approached from the hallway outside his office.

Arthur recognized the gait immediately.

Measured, confident, belonging to someone who'd walked battlefields for lifetimes.

The door opened without a preamble.

Siegfried entered wearing his signature modern suit that looked completely out of place in the medieval aesthetic surrounding them.

The dark broadsword Gram rested in its sheath across his back, and his glasses caught the light as he surveyed the room with sharp eyes.

He paused when he noticed Arthur's expression.

"Still sighing, I see."

The observation came with a wry smile that suggested he'd been watching this pattern repeat for days.

Arthur straightened slightly and gestured toward an empty chair.

"The trial approaches, and we're no closer to understanding what we're facing. Of course I'm sighing."

Siegfried took the offered seat with practiced efficiency.

His expression shifted to something more serious as he adjusted his glasses with one finger.

"The trial isn't the only concern, is it? The Obsidian Covenant's movements have been escalating."

"Exactly."

Arthur's frown deepened.

The cult had been operating with increasing boldness lately, their coordinated attacks on sanctuaries just the most visible example of their expanding influence.

Reports came in daily about corrupted dungeons, destabilized leylines, monster populations exhibiting abnormal behavior.

All of it pointed to a larger scheme being executed with frightening precision.

Siegfried leaned back and crossed one leg over the other.

"Actually, that's why I'm here. We have news on that front."

Arthur's attention sharpened immediately.

"Go on."

"We managed to locate and eliminate two of their operational hideouts over the past forty-eight hours."

Siegfried's tone remained neutral, clinical even, as he delivered the report.

"Both facilities were manufacturing sites. They'd been producing the compounds responsible for the accelerated monster mutations we've been tracking in corrupted dungeons."

"Casualties?"

"Minor injuries, no deaths. Our strike teams executed the operations cleanly."

Relief flickered across Arthur's features for a brief moment before caution reasserted itself.

Clean operations were good news, but he knew Siegfried well enough to recognize when more complicated information was coming.

"However..."

There it was.

"We attempted to interrogate the facility supervisors. Standard procedure to extract information about their command structure and locate the main headquarters."

Siegfried paused, his expression darkening slightly.

"Before any of them could speak a single word, they all died simultaneously."

Arthur's eyes narrowed.

"Poison? Self-termination protocols?"

"Neither. Their souls were directly destroyed. No physical injuries whatsoever, no toxins in their systems, no magical residue indicating attack spells."

The hero's hand moved in a gesture that conveyed both frustration and clinical interest.

"Whatever killed them operated on a level that bypassed conventional defenses entirely. One moment they were alive and preparing to answer questions, the next their bodies were empty shells."

Silence settled over the office as Arthur processed the implications.

Soul-death without physical trauma required either divine intervention or access to magic so advanced it bordered on the conceptual.

The Obsidian Covenant clearly had resources that went far beyond standard cultist operations.

"So we gained nothing."

"Not quite nothing."

Siegfried reached into his jacket and withdrew a small object wrapped in protective cloth.

He stood and crossed to Arthur's desk, carefully unwrapping the item before placing it down between them.

A dark orb sat there, maybe the size of a fist.

Swirling shadows moved within its surface like living malevolence, and the energy radiating from it felt wrong on an instinctive level.

Arthur's blue eyes studied the object with intense focus.

"This is?"

"The cultists call it an Evolution Orb."

Siegfried adjusted his glasses again, a habit that signaled his analytical mind was working through complex variables.

"But as you can see, it's definitely a harmful booster."

Arthur picked up the orb carefully, turning it over in his hands while examining the patterns of energy flowing through its structure.

Siegfried continued his explanation.

"The compound is designed to be forcefully injected into monster cores. It accelerates their growth exponentially, pushing them through multiple evolutionary stages in a fraction of the normal timeframe."

"And the side effects?"

"Catastrophic. The accelerated evolution destabilizes their physical forms. They gain tremendous power rapidly, but their bodies can't sustain the changes. Eventually they burn out and die, usually after reaching a peak state far beyond their natural capabilities."

Arthur set the orb down and closed his eyes, focusing his senses inward.

His consciousness extended into the object's structure, probing deeper than surface observations could reach.

There.

Hidden beneath layers of corrupted mana and malevolent intent, a thread of connection.

A program woven into the orb's fundamental design, linking it to something distant.

His eyes snapped open.

"The orb is laced with a connection program at its deepest level."

Siegfried's expression sharpened immediately.

"Then... you mean?"

"Yes."

Arthur's voice carried grim certainty.

"It's connected to the 'great revival' the Obsidian Covenant keeps referencing in their rhetoric."

The pieces fell into place with horrible clarity.

Force monsters to evolve rapidly, push them to peak states that would normally take decades or centuries to achieve naturally, then harvest the power released when their bodies finally collapse under the strain.

That energy, channeled through the connection embedded in these orbs, would flow directly to wherever the Covenant was gathering power.

For what purpose remained unclear, but nothing good came from cults harvesting massive quantities of corrupted spiritual energy.

"They're using the monsters as fuel."

Siegfried's voice carried disgust beneath the clinical tone.

"Cultivating power sources and harvesting them at optimal moments."

"Precisely."

The two heroes fell silent, contemplating the implications.

How many of these orbs had been distributed?

How many dungeons had been seeded with accelerated evolution protocols?

How much power had the Covenant already gathered?

Arthur's expression shifted slightly, and to Siegfried's surprise, a small chuckle escaped him.

"Looks like I need to give my thanks once more to Mr. Nero Walker then."

Siegfried nodded calmly.

The mysterious summoner who'd been tearing through corrupted dungeons with frightening efficiency over the past weeks had inadvertently been sabotaging the Covenant's harvesting operation.

Every monster killed before reaching peak evolution meant less power flowing to their unknown ritual.

The timing couldn't have been more fortunate.

Arthur stood, straightening his formal attire with practiced efficiency.

"Tomorrow is the grand celebration for the Inquisition's representative arrival. It seems we'll have a chance to meet and thank Mr. Walker's group in person, regardless of their original intentions for the mass dungeon clearing."

The celebration served multiple purposes beyond honoring their guests.

It would boost morale among Legendor's population before the trial's arrival, provide opportunities for intelligence gathering, and create neutral ground where various factions could interact without immediate hostility.

Good and bad actors alike would attend.

Which made it the perfect environment for recruitment, alliance building, and identifying potential threats hiding among the crowds.

Arthur moved toward the door with purposeful strides.

His hand had just touched the handle when voices filtered through from the hallway outside.

He pulled the door open and found himself face-to-face with an unexpected visitor.

Joanna stood there, her white and gold robes immaculate as always.

Beside her, a silver-haired angel watched with sharp golden eyes who had the same stern expression as the priestess beside her.

Arthur's surprise lasted only a moment before his diplomatic instincts kicked in.

He'd been expecting to see the priestess tomorrow at the celebration, not tonight during private strategic discussions.

But before he could offer a proper greeting, he noticed Joanna's expression.

The usual warmth and gentle composure had been replaced by something far more serious.

Tension radiated from her posture, and her eyes carried an urgency that suggested whatever brought her here couldn't wait for formal channels.

The angel beside her looked equally grave.

Wait, an angel…?

Who is this—

But before Arthur could ask, Joanna's mouth opened.

The words that came out hit like a physical blow.

"I might have found the First Saintess."

Silence crashed through the office.

Arthur felt his thoughts screech to a halt as the implications detonated across his consciousness.

Behind him, Siegfried's hand moved reflexively toward Gram's hilt before stopping.

The First Saintess.

The betrayer of the First Hero.

The prophesied harbinger of catastrophic darkness.

It seems they finally found a lead to her.

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