The half-dead guard guided us to a nearby building with all the strength he had, as his life depended on it.

It was a normal stone house from inside and out—fully furnished with two rooms, a hall, and a bathroom. The guard bolted straight to one of the bedrooms and pulled out the third book from the bookshelf mounted on the wall.

Following the cracking and moving sounds of metallic gears, the bed slowly slid into the wall, revealing a descending underground path beneath.

"I have... shown you... the way... so please don't kill..."

The guard fell unconscious from his injuries before he could complete his statement.

Ignoring him, the two of us descended the path and reached tunnels similar to the ones in Forlorn City.

"Ume, are you feeling alright?" I asked. "You didn't consume Soul Stones to replenish your Soulforce."

"But I did—slurp... slurp—when you were sleeping," she replied, attacking the ice cone.

"Mmm~ so cold! This ice cream is also cold—slurp... slurp—but it tastes different from the previous one."

"It's because ice cream comes in different flavours. The one you are eating is strawberry, and the previous one was chocolate."

"Oh really?" she exclaimed in excitement. "Then how many flavours does ice cream have?"

"I'm not completely sure, but it should be at least fifty."

"Whoah! So many! I want to taste them all!" she announced, raising her ice cone.

"Let's taste them together," I chuckled, patting her head.

After a couple of minutes, we arrived before the large metallic gate being guarded by two men—one holding a long rod in his hand while the other guarded a furnace burning with blue flame.

Not wanting to waste our time on them, I struck them unconscious as soon as we reached, while Ume unsealed the gates with her great magical knowledge.

Even after using Eyes of the Fallen, I had to use a source to decrypt these inscriptions, yet Ume unlocked these doors with just a few patterns.

"Your knowledge in sealing techniques is really incredible," I said, giving her dual thumbs up in acknowledgment.

"Hehe~ my mother taught me sealing magic," Ume replied, her face carrying a sad visage.

I was about to speak up, but then a flustered voice came from inside.

"Wh-who are you? How did you open the door?" a guard demanded, pointing his weapon at me.

Behind him was a village with thousands of scrambling houses filled with slaves carrying dead expressions.

I was scanning the area to count the number of enemies, but before I could even begin the count, Ume spoke up.

"There are a total of fifty guards here. And none of them is a Sage."

"Only fifty?" I sighed. "Well, she brought most of them to fight us, so it's understandable."

"Oy, redhead! I asked you a que—"

Bam!

My fist landed on his guts, stopping him mid-sentence.

In the next instant, I ran through the area like a storming flood, wiping out all the remaining forty-nine guards in the blink of an eye.

"Ume, may you take care of things here while I battle the beast inside?" I asked, pointing at the scared slaves who were staring at us in fear.

Ume nodded to my proposal, so I went straight toward the wall where four large tunnels were dug.

"Hmm, according to Nyx's diary, this should be the way," I murmured, entering the tunnel at the very corner of the wall.

After walking for over dozens of miles, I finally reached before the large metallic gate engraved with the face of a boar-shaped beast.

"This must be it."

A faint smile appeared on my face as I drew the ranked one key from the inventory and put it into the hole.

The key slowly vanished into the hole, and a blue flaming energy radiated from the gate, making the boar engraving glow like a real figure.

The double doors of the gate slowly opened, echoing a heavy metallic hum.

From inside, rays of bright blue light burst out, lighting up the entire tunnel.

Thump...

Thump...

Thump...

My heart cried with intense beating, surging the blood to every part of my body.

Ding...

"Bloodline Resonance is activated!"

"Aghh, I absolutely hate this feeling," I muttered, holding my chest as I entered inside.

The hall beyond the gate was over five times larger than the one in Forlorn City, stretching over a dozen miles to the front.

The side walls were made of Soul Stone crystals, each radiating the same kind of energy as the small stone that floated on the teleportation array. The humming sound echoing from these crystals was so intense that I couldn't hear any other sound beside it.

I moved my hand toward one of the crystals, murmuring with wide eyes,

"D-don't tell me—"

"Grrrrrr!"

As I was about to touch the crystal, the sound of an animal growl echoed from the front.

I turned and found an elephant-sized boar with terrifying tusks double my size glaring at me.

It skidded its front foot on the ground and bolted at me like a truck driven by a drunken driver.

"Since this is a beast from a Rank-1 gate, it must be stronger than that Drathion," I murmured, drawing my sword. "I should go full power from the start if I want to kill it without injuries."

As it reached closer, I raised Vajra with both hands, channeling the Soulforce into its blade.

The sword transformed into a razor-sharp pillar of golden light, thunder roaring violently around it.

"Sword Aura: Lightning Slash!"

As I descended the blade, a lightning arc, thin as a sheet of paper and as high as the cave's ceiling, surged forward and passed vertically straight through the center of the boar's body.

However, the boar didn't slow one bit and reached a nail's length closer to me.

"What the heck! The attack... didn't work?"

Shockingly, the boar suddenly vanished from the front, and a loud thud resounded from the back.

I turned and found the boar's body lying behind me, split into two flawless halves that passed by either side of me.

The precision with which 'Lightning Slash' cut the boar was so sharp that it didn't even realize it had been sliced until it lurched forward helplessly.

In the next moment, another crashing noise echoed from the front as the 'Lightning Slash' I had unleashed struck the crystals ahead.

"Alert! 20% Soulforce consumed!"

"Huh? Is that it?"

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