"...!"
Shien shot up from the hot spring, whirled around, and looked in one direction.
There, at some unknown point, a little girl had appeared.
"You?"
Shien froze on the spot.
Clearly, he had never expected the voice from just now to belong to such a little girl.
She looked like a Beastfolk child, dressed in a leather outfit, and appeared to be around thirteen or fourteen years old.
The little girl held a fluffy, mysterious little beast in her arms, blinking her big eyes as she stood at the edge of the hot spring and stared at Shien.
Shien was first stunned by her appearance and age, then his eyes narrowed.
That was because he could sense an incredibly terrifying amount of magic power from the little girl, along with a fierce, baleful aura that seemed capable of crushing heaven and earth.
The feeling was like a world-ending beast had suddenly appeared before him.
Yet this little girl, who possessed such a horrifying aura, stood there with an innocent expression, seemingly curious about Shien as she gazed at him.
To be honest, Shien did not dare shift his gaze away from her either.
After all, before she had spoken, Shien had not noticed her presence at all. That alone was enough to prove she was extraordinary.
One had to know that Shien was no longer who he used to be. His Outer Perception of Heaven could even glimpse the laws governing the natural world, yet he had failed to react before she spoke. That alone was enough to make him wary.
Of course, if he had been fully focused, he would not have failed to sense anything at all. The hot spring had simply been too comfortable, leaving him too relaxed, and he had also been lost in thought,