Kjeragandr: [Behemoth Profanity!]

Just as the boss was at his wits' end over this thorny situation, his brothers started urging him again.

[Fourth: Boss! What's going on over there? Why aren't you back yet? We're waiting for you to queue—no, waiting to rendezvous with you!]

[Third: Did Boss run into some trouble?]

[Second: Report the current situation.]

The boss sighed and briefly described the situation over the link:

When he described the little girl's appearance and her determination to protect the unconscious woman regardless of her own safety, Fourth suddenly cried out:

[Fourth: Wait! That appearance, and she cares about Saria... Fuck! Boss, the little girl you're talking about isn't Little Fire Dragon, is she?!]

[Boss: Little Fire Dragon? Will she evolve into Charizard?]

[Fourth: Not that Little Fire Dragon! It's Ifrit! A nickname players gave her in the game! She's a child Saria and Silence care about deeply!]

After Fourth's explanation, the boss finally understood.

[Boss: I see... I was wondering why this kid was so damn stubborn about not leaving.]

[Second: Then the situation is clear. The energy in your body should have stabilized by now, right? Return immediately and avoid further complications.]

The boss looked at his mountain-like body, felt the vast energy still coursing through him, and hesitated.

[Boss: I think... it'd be better to wait for the energy to dissipate naturally.]

The link fell quiet for a moment.

Then Second's speechless voice drifted over.

[Second: Boss... are you seriously planning to just sit there and wait for the energy to slowly dissipate on its own?]

[Boss: What else am I supposed to do? Wasn't the lesson from randomly venting just now enough? I don't want to cause any more damage.]

[Second: ...]

[Third: Boss, why don't you release the energy yourself?]

[Boss: Like I said, I don't want to destroy any—]

Before the boss could finish defending himself, Second cut him off, his voice clearly on the verge of losing it.

[Second: Who told you to destroy the ground?! Why don't you release the flames into the sky? Shoot all that excess energy out like fireworks! Is that so hard?!]

"..."

The boss froze.

First came confusion, then blankness, and finally an expression that gradually became a baffled mixture of shock and sudden realization.

[Boss: ...]

He opened his mouth, but in reality, all that came out was a gurgle of rolling lava.

Right...

Shoot it upward...

Actively discharge the excess energy...

Seeing the boss remain silent for more than ten seconds, Third carefully asked:

[Third: Boss, don't tell me you never thought of that? I thought you were trying to get revenge on them.]

The boss: "..."

At that moment, the mental link sank into deathly silence.

Then Fourth erupted into laughter so violent he nearly choked on it.

[Fourth: Hahahahahahaha!!! Oh god, I can't breathe!]

[Hahahaha! You scratched your head over it forever! You were even worried about hitting the kids! Why didn't you just fire a Majestic Destroyer Flame straight into the sky?! I'm dying!!]

[Pfft—]

Even Second let out a faint, stifled snort.

Third quietly tried to smooth things over. "Maybe Boss was too tense from fighting and didn't think of it for a moment..."

The boss wanted nothing more than to crawl into a crack in the ground. As though trying to conceal his overwhelming embarrassment, he abruptly raised his head and looked toward the sky, gray and murky with dust.

Then he opened his molten maw, large enough to swallow a truck.

"Roar—!!!"

This was no longer a howl of pain, but a roar of unleashed energy!

An incomparably thick pillar of blazing fire erupted from his mouth and shot straight into the heavens.

The pillar connected earth and sky. Wherever it passed, dust was instantly purified, clouds were torn apart and scattered, revealing the stars beyond.

The surging energy within the boss began to drop at an unprecedented rate, while his body visibly stabilized and shrank.

At that moment, Fourth's terrified voice rang out in the link.

[Fourth: Fuck! Boss, stop! Those are starpods up there! This planet's shield!!!]

[Boss: ? Why didn't you say so sooner... cough!]

The boss jolted! Starpods? A shield? He had no idea what those were.

But the concepts of "shield" and "can't hit it" instantly made him realize just how serious this was.

Under Ifrit's dumbfounded gaze, the terrifying giant demon suddenly swung his head around.

"Hummm—"

The pillar of fire that had been shooting vertically toward the starpods transformed into a devastating fan-shaped sweep as his head turned sharply, sweeping diagonally downward at an acute angle to the sky.

It first grazed several unfortunate skyscrapers on the outskirts of Trimounts that lay in its path.

The instant those magnificent buildings touched the edge of the fire pillar, their severed surfaces glowed red-hot, and molten metal dripped down like tears.

But that was only the beginning.

The main body of the fire pillar crossed the city boundary and slammed directly into the mountain range surrounding Trimounts in the distance.

There was no sound.

The instant the fire pillar made contact with the mountain, it pierced straight through it.

Then—

"BOOM—!!!!!"

The deafening sound came a beat late as the entire mountain structure let out a groan of unbearable strain.

Centered on the point of impact, a white tide of light and heat rapidly expanded in all directions!

Mountain peaks collapsed wherever it passed, leveled like sandcastles. Everything was reduced to its most basic particles within that white light, vanishing without a trace.

Night was forcibly driven away in that instant.

A sun of destruction bloomed fiercely beneath the stars.

The terrifying radiation of light instantly illuminated all of Trimounts, and even regions far beyond it, despite the vast distance.

Every corner of the city was lit as brightly as day, while every glass object shattered at once.

Even weakened by distance, the scorching blast swept in like a storm, carrying the reek of searing wind.

Ifrit stood frozen in place, her amber eyes reflecting the rising dawn on the distant horizon.

The mental link was utterly silent.

Several seconds passed before Fourth's dry voice finally sounded, halting and broken.

[Fourth: Boss... if I say I didn't do it on purpose... would you believe me?]

[Boss: ...Do you have any last wishes?]

[Fourth: Boss, you're so nice... so can we still see each other tomorrow?]

[Boss: Heh... You won't be getting even one of those three wishes!!!]

The boss gritted his teeth as he condemned that useless idiot who only ever gave half the information, while in reality, he stiffly stared at the horrifying destruction he had caused.

He had really screwed up this time...

And the sun blooming in the night seared its radiance deep into this ravaged land, as well as into the souls of everyone who witnessed it.

Meanwhile, after effortlessly vaporizing the mountains along Columbia's border, that destructive ray—which had veered from its intended trajectory—

still retained a terrifying degree of penetrating force as it raced deeper into the continent, toward Kjerag.

Kjerag, Mount Karlan.

"Ahh~~ I finally finished it~"

A lazy, satisfied sigh echoed through the tranquil sanctuary.

After slacking off for an entire day, Miss Yara finally closed the popular novel that a certain snow leopard had gathered from who knew where, thoroughly content.

She stretched languidly, her graceful figure unfolding beneath the hazy snowlight.

"Mm~ It's already this late."

Rubbing her slightly sore eyes, Yara looked out at the night, still dark and deep.

"I should go check on Enya. That child has probably kicked off her blanket again."

She tidied up her somewhat lazy appearance and resumed her dignified, holy bearing, then made her way lightly toward the side hall where Saintess Enya lived.

The snow of the sacred mountain remained as white and tranquil as ever, carrying an eternal air of holiness.

Yara walked along the familiar corridor, looking at the scenery outside that had not changed for a thousand years, and could not help sighing softly to herself.

"Even the most beautiful scenery gets tiresome after you've looked at it for so many years..." she murmured, a faint loneliness hidden in her voice.

"I hope that boy from the Silverash Family brings back something more interesting this time..."

Just as Yara was lost in thought, her gaze casually swept across the distant horizon—the area that should have been shrouded in deep night.

A point of light?

Yara narrowed her eyes slightly.

"Hm? Is dawn coming that quickly?" She instinctively looked up at the stars, then immediately dismissed the thought.

"No..."

Rather than disappearing beneath her gaze, the light became brighter and larger at an astonishing speed.

In only a few breaths, it swelled from an unremarkable star into a sun forcibly rising over the horizon!

Yara's eyes widened abruptly. Her dignified expression froze, replaced by long-forgotten shock and fury.

"[Behemoth profanity!]"

The next instant, the sacred and tranquil Mount Karlan underwent a sudden, violent change.

The gentle falling snow transformed in an instant into a savage ice storm capable of tearing steel apart.

The temperature between heaven and earth plunged to the brink of absolute zero, as though even time itself was about to freeze.

At the center of that blizzard that swept away everything, Miss Yara's figure had vanished.

In her place stood an ancient existence that had manifested part of its true form, wielding the authority of extreme cold—Kjeragandr!

It raised its head and let out a long howl. Endless waves of cold, gathered from Kjerag's millennia of faith and the power of ice and snow,

became a visible torrent of pure white that crashed head-on into the incoming ray of destruction.

Ice and fire, two utterly opposed ultimate powers, collided with brutal force above this snowfield that had been tranquil for countless ages.

"Sizzle—BOOM!!!"

The sky seemed to split apart, one half annihilating crimson and the other freezing white.

Yet Kjeragandr had not fully descended after all.

The destructive ray still pierced through the hastily raised tide of cold.

The next instant, it shot straight toward the main peak of Mount Karlan behind Kjeragandr!

"BOOM—!!!!!!!"

All of Kjerag shook violently from the impact.

The awakened people of Kjerag rushed from their homes, following the devastating noise and blinding light to look toward the supreme symbol of their faith—Mount Karlan.

Everyone, whether devout believers or humble mountain folk, froze in place, their faces filled with disbelief, shock, and despair.

Before their vacant eyes, the sacred, snow-covered summit of the holy mountain—untouchable throughout the year—had been brutally shorn of one corner.

A terrifying wound flowing with dark-red lava was branded upon the holy mountain like a blasphemous scar!

Melted snow and magma mixed into a murky mist that curled around the wound, like the holy mountain's soundless wail.

Silence.

A deathly silence blanketed every corner of Kjerag.

No one knew how long passed before a trembling voice broke that suffocating silence and spoke the shared feelings of every Kjerag citizen:

"Kjeragandr above..."

"The holy mountain... our holy mountain!!!"

Their faith had been trampled. Their sacred land had been defiled.

This chaos, which had begun in Trimounts, Columbia, had spread farther and become far more severe than anyone could have imagined.

And the culprit behind all of it—the boss—

still had absolutely no idea where that mouthful of "spit" had landed.

Kjeragandr: "[Behemoth profanity!] You little bastard, just wait... If you ever come to Kjerag, you'll get what's coming to you!!!"