In a small house on the outskirts of one of the many Devil cities, an old man was seated in front of a blazing flame, holding rare minerals and quietly bringing them close to the fire, melting them before using them as forging materials.

This old man was a blacksmith renowned throughout the city, known for his excellent craftsmanship and never making mistakes.

However, the blazing fire before him suddenly surged in temperature, destroying the minerals that the old man was trying to melt.

The old man didn't pay attention to this failure but instead raised his head and looked outside the window with an expression of shock, anger, and most importantly, doubt.

Just like Liora had theorized, the puppets of the elderly Devil indeed did not share their memories.

As such, the moment she eliminated his puppets in the ruined city, the remaining puppets immediately noticed it, but they didn't understand what had happened.

Seated silently in the room, the elderly Devil felt a chill run down his back when he noticed that the number of severed connections was growing bigger as his intuition warned him of danger.

Without hesitation, he waved his hand and extinguished the flames, then began packing up his belongings, preparing to flee.

Even though doing so because of a mere premonition would make other Devils mock him for his cautiousness, it was exactly because of such caution that the elderly Devil had lived for so long.

Just when he had finished packing everything and was about to exit his house and escape, though, an extremely powerful demonic aura rushed towards his residence.

Before he could react, the owner of this demonic aura stood right above his house, and, following a surge in their aura, attacked it.

With a thunderous bang, the elderly Devil felt the whole building tremble as the roof was instantly destroyed, and a large gap formed on the floor right below it.

Through the opening, the elderly Devil finally came face to face with the unknown opponent.

It was a beautiful woman, with crimson hair and scarlet eyes, wearing a black exoskeleton-like armor that clung to her body. A pair of shadowy wings flapped behind her back, allowing her to float in the air, as she lowered her head and gazed straight at him.

The moment his eyes fell on that woman, the elderly Devil felt a roar rush through his mind, and he froze in place.

Seeing this, the unfamiliar woman didn't give him any time to recover.

Darkness coiled around her arms and turned into an elegant black spear, which she clutched tightly with her right hand.

After she adjusted her posture, she hurled it in his direction.

The rugged spear shuttled through the air, and as if teleporting, appeared before the elderly Devil and pierced through his body.

The pain jolted the elderly Devil awake, but it was already too late.

"Who? Who is it?", were his final doubts before his vitality depleted.

Witnessing this scene, Liora remained emotionless, showing no signs of having killed her biggest enemy.

"It's the fourteenth one...", she whispered, and the meaning of her words was quite shocking.

Surprisingly, this was not the first elderly Devil that she had killed after the battle in the ruined city, and before him, there had been more than a dozen such puppets.

The way she managed to track them down was fairly simple, but also quite ingenious.

Using the elderly Devil puppet she had captured in the "Holy" City, she had used Soul Tear to place a tracking mark on his soul.

Although this operation was not complicated, only requiring some knowledge of Devil Runes and an ability that could directly target souls, it was more than enough for Liora to sense the elderly Devil's puppets.

After all, even though every puppet could be considered a different person, no matter what, they still possessed a small part of the real elderly Devil's soul and aura.

As such, this method was surprisingly effective.

"Unfortunately, I still can't differentiate between the elderly Devil's puppets and his true form."

"Otherwise, I could have gone and killed him rather than wasting time hunting down all his puppets.", Liora thought, feeling quite regretful.

However, she still wasn't planning to give up and let the elderly Devil go.

Sooner or later, she would find his original body. It was only a matter of time. Liora had no reason to stop, especially now that she was so close to victory.

Just when Liora was making sure that she had broken the puppet and was preparing to leave the city, though, a person arrived, stopping not far from her.

It was a dog-headed Devil with a pair of huge ears that twitched continuously, as if they were constantly absorbing the surrounding sounds and parsing through them.

His dog face flashed with anger as he faced Liora, looking ready to attack her at the slightest disagreement.

"Who are you? Why are you killing my subjects?"

A somewhat familiar set of words escaped his mouth, but the moment he took a deeper look at Liora, his face changed.

"Red hair, red eyes, and such a powerful aura... could it be her?", the Dog Devil thought, his pupils shrinking as he slowly realized.

Liora didn't know that her hunting the Unknown had already spread throughout the Crucible.

Although she had only taken action a dozen times so far, every single time was within the cities' walls, and as such, some curious people had noticed her.

Coupled with the traces she left behind—unwilling to waste any amount of time destroying the evidence—many smart Devils had already guessed what was happening.

The Dog Devil, although weak, had quite an extensive network of connections and had also heard some rumors.

Now, seeing a person who strongly resembled the protagonist of those rumors, it wasn't difficult for him to put two and two together.

"May I ask? Are you Lady Crimson—", he opened his mouth and tried to speak, while he subconsciously took a few steps back.

However, just when he was mid-speech, he was rudely interrupted.

"Get lost!", Liora's chilling words rang directly in his ears, and before he could react, his body was catapulted away, sent straight through several buildings before it finally came to a stop.

Glancing coldly at this scene, Liora didn't care enough to confirm whether he was dead or not.

After she took another look at the many threads in her field of vision, she selected one of them at random and chose to follow it.

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