"Frey…"

"Frey…"

Godfrey shot Isolde an exasperated side-eye as she kept musing his newfound nickname. It sounded quite sweet when he heard her utter the name at first, but she had been looking for a reason to say it since they woke up this morning, and now, standing right before a massive blue swirling gate, she still whispered it under her breath.

"Stop it," Godfrey said sharply.

Isolde glanced at him from the corner of her right eye. Her golden-orange iris met his ocean-blue ones as she pouted.

"It just feels so good to say it. Frey." Her lips curled into a charming smile that only made Godfrey shut his eyes and tilt his head upward toward the sky.

Godfrey wore his hoodie; luckily, it was thick enough for the terrain they were about to enter. Aside from his black top, pants, and boots, he also carried his backpack.

Isolde wore a fur-padded jacket over baggy, camouflage cargo pants and boots. She also carried a backpack. Inside the bag was made from a Horde-Cheek chipmunk dungeon beast, giving the bag the ability to store a lot more than what its small size could carry.

Godfrey looked back, his eyes narrowing at the little crowd behind them. Most of them were Dragon officers, with a few members of the family, most notably people like James, Mildred, and Geoffrey, but Isolde's parents were absent.

"Sometimes, I can't get a hold of your parents. They seem quite caring and distant at the same time," he said softly, only Isolde able to hear him.

Isolde just smiled a bit.

"They'd rather watch from afar. They watched my elder brother go in and also came to receive his corpse."

Just then, James approached and placed his hands on Isolde and Godfrey's shoulders. "I know our young couple will survive."

He smiled.

Godfrey narrowed his eyes.

"When you come out, I'll watch them detain you," he whispered into Godfrey's ear, gesturing toward Mildred with his eyes.

"One month is all the authorities need, and they know where you'll be. If you try going deep into the dungeon, you'll die. No Pendragon has cleared it. We don't even know what's in there, and even if you remain at the edge, smooching and doing whatever with my niece here, you'll end up in the hands of the authorities the moment you step out."

James comported himself, though his excitement remained. "No matter what you do, you're trapped."

'Should I execute this man for his threat, Grand Prince?' Godfrey heard Lament's deep voice in his head.

Godfrey shut his eyes. 'No. Let him be. The thought that I'm going to return from this dungeon the same way was a foolish one.'

'His face? I can't see a trace of despair… just what is going on in this young man's mind?' James frowned.

"Step away from him." Isolde's voice rang out, prompting him to tilt his eyes toward her. The dangerous gleam in those eyes made his frown deepen.

He watched as both of them entered the blue gate.

The moment Godfrey went through the gate, he appeared in a forest. It was snowing heavily, and the ground was already covered with loads of snow, the same for the trees. Some branches were tilting downward because of the pile of snow weighing on them.

Godfrey looked back and saw the blue gate still behind him. "I'm still not used to having an option to leave."

Isolde smiled. "You took a lot of risk going into green gate dungeons. Meeting a foe you can't beat in there means death."

"I knew that, but the situation called for dungeons that weren't heavily scrutinized," Godfrey said.

"Yeah," Isolde replied. "I'd assume you also want to clear this dungeon." She looked at him.

"I guess you also want to do the same," Godfrey replied with a smile.

"What's our plan? This place is as big as one of the biggest continents of the past ages, and there's no form of human civilization, so all we have is trees and…" Isolde gleamed as she heard a howl.

"I say we move at day, rest at night while keeping track so we don't get lost. Flying would be much easier, but I have a feeling we'll be attracting too much attention to ourselves. We just entered, and we're already surrounded by a pack of hungry arctic direwolves," Godfrey said as a golden giant bow manifested in his right hand.

Isolde crafted a long spear with sharp triangular tips on both ends. The ice spear was intricately made, a sign that her mastery of the item manifestation skill was insanely high. It looked no different from a real spear made by a master craftsman, just that this one was crafted purely out of ice.

Both of them eyed the huge five-foot-tall white wolves, all of which had blue stripes on their foreheads. There were six of them. They stood a good distance away for a moment before dashing toward them.

Godfrey's eyes gleamed brightly as he nocked the bow with three arrows conjured by the bow itself. The moment he launched it, snow blasted away from his surroundings as all three arrows tore through trees in their way and opened large, bloody holes in three wolves.

On the other hand, Isolde allowed the wolves to surround her before slicing their throats with a circular sweep of her spear.

Their blood froze, and they slumped to the floor.

Both of them looked at each other and began their journey.

"You're much stronger than before. I get that these wolves are just high tiers, but I thought I should be stronger than you now that I have five summons and you have three," Godfrey said.

Isolde looked at him. "Naturally, you should be, but my summons just keep evolving, breaking past the limits of their potential."

"You were also called by the mana tree?"

"Called? No. Were you called?" Isolde asked.

"I wasn't, but Percival and Snow were. I don't know about their current strength now, but they'll be much stronger," Godfrey replied.

Isolde stopped walking. "Does that mean there are others?"

"The possibility is high. The mana tree will keep doing anything for us to evolve, even if it means pushing us past Origin Tier. I mean Adam wrote tiers. If he wrote it, that means someone got to that level and named that tier Origin. Absolute strength, like the mana tree, is reaching a level of strength where no one has ever gotten to or even know about."

"Is that your dream? To achieve absolute strength?" Isolde asked after listening to him.

"I was just talking about that. The moment I'm at peace, I see no further use of getting stronger. With you, my family, and friends safe, why continue this risky path?" Godfrey looked at her.

"You said it yourself. The mana tree will keep pushing for evolution. The moment you relax, it might send something that could destroy the entire planet, something that would ignite that desire to live or protect inside of you," Isolde replied.

After sighing, Godfrey asked again, "So if you didn't eat a fruit, how are your summons evolving?"

"I have a strong feeling it's the doing of my first summon. Nothing else can explain their rise," Isolde replied with flickering eyes. She lifted her spear.

"We're slow. We should quicken our pace."

An hour later, both of them were running away from massive eyeball monsters with lots of tentacles.

Godfrey saw Isolde chuckling as they fled. After killing these beasts several times and watching them rise back up, they discovered these creatures might not be among the norm.

This dungeon was a strange land after all, so the best option was to retreat first as more of them kept coming.

"Why are you laughing?!" Godfrey glared at Isolde.

"It's fun!" Isolde said, spreading out her arms as she nimbly evaded flying tentacles that destroyed thick tree trunks.

Godfrey wanted to be angry, but he found himself laughing. After they ran for a while, the strange beast stopped, watched them, then retracted its long tentacles and rolled away.

Godfrey looked up. "I think we should stay away from trees with black leaves," he said, turning toward Isolde, who sat on a tree root.

"They couldn't kill us. We couldn't kill them. It was just so…" she chuckled when she was almost done with the sentence.

"And you were so confident about their large eyes being their weak point. It was pure acid, and you lost your sword twice."

"You thought the same thing!" Godfrey shot back, but secretly admired seeing Isolde this loosened up. All that political nonsense was far away from them.

***

A week later, Mountain and Tempest patrolled a camp. Within the tent, Godfrey lay down on one side, looking at Isolde, who lay not far from him. She was already asleep.

'It's been a week. We've killed lots of arctic wolves and have just entered the territory of the white bears. They're lord tiers, and I feel we're getting closer to their leader.'

As he thought, his eyes adjusted to Isolde. He stretched his hand after much deliberation and gently touched her cheek.

'They're soft. Wait! I was just pondering about the monsters we've come across, how am I now thinking about Isolde's cheeks?!'

"What are you doing?" Isolde opened her eyes.

Godfrey's breath hitched as his arm froze. Just as he lifted it, Isolde reached out and placed her palm above his own, allowing him to feel the warmth and softness of her cheek with not just one finger but his entire palm.

"I didn't say you should stop."

Godfrey heard his heart slam hard.

The sound of something galloping, accompanied by many other sounds, made both of them swiftly rise to their feet. As they came out of the tent, they saw Tempest and Mountain aiming their weapons at a white-haired elf girl clad in green leather armour with light silver plates at her shoulder and forearm.

Her reindeer collapsed not too far away in its own pool of blood, and she was desperately running toward them.

'Wasn't the elves supposed to be the main threat in this dungeon? If she was desperately running toward them, then she considered them a lesser threat to what was chasing after her!'

....

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