Big Dog, Big Dog! Chew Already!

Silver Wolf ignored the faintly probing looks around her and walked straight up to the statue.

She raised her head.

The statue was tall and solemn. Its stone face had been weathered by the years until it was somewhat blurred, but the hand extended forward remained intact.

In its palm lay a blank card.

"Empty?"

She frowned slightly. The data streams in her goggles rapidly scanned the card's surface. It was like a truly blank card, clean to an excessive degree.

As if the manufacturer had forgotten to print it.

Silver Wolf teleported the card into her palm and stared silently at it for a long while.

Just then, Windchaser suddenly lowered her voice behind her. "Um... something seems off about them."

Only then did Silver Wolf look around. The residents who had been standing in the streets moments ago had somehow drawn much closer.

Most of them wore veils of various colors. Some stood beneath the trees, some by the eaves, and some had already stopped behind them.

Everyone's gaze rested on Silver Wolf.

There was no hostility in their eyes, but there was wariness.

An elderly woman with slightly pointed ears and a gray veil finally stepped forward.

"May I ask..." She bent at the waist. "How did you all come here?"

Without another word, Silver Wolf directly summoned Phanes.

A silver-blue light screen instantly unfolded in the air.

Phanes's projection appeared. There was no explanation, but the instant the projection manifested—

Thud!

The surrounding crowd nearly knelt at the same time, their movements so synchronized that it was almost eerie. The elderly woman even pressed her forehead to the ground.

Phanes's gaze swept over everyone.

Only then did Phanes speak. "These are our honored guests. She is also the Abyss's nemesis. Do not show them any discourtesy."

Then Phanes disappeared.

At last, the elderly woman obediently offered a polite greeting. "Thank you, esteemed guests, for honoring this place with your presence."

"But forgive my bluntness, this is not a tourist attraction."

Silver Wolf nodded. "I know. This is the World Tree Core, right?"

"..."

"Forget the pleasantries. I'm here to investigate something. If anything unusual has happened recently, just tell me directly."

Silver Wolf waved a hand and glanced at the timid elderly woman beside her.

"The Forest Moon God has also left me with a blessing. You look like Their followers too. What, are you heretics?"

The elderly woman hurriedly shook her head. Afraid to argue, she could only deny it with all her might. "N-No, we meant no offense."

The people gathered nearby immediately dispersed in a flurry. Seeing that Silver Wolf was not truly angry, the elderly woman finally slunk away as well.

Only then did Windchaser timidly speak up. "Uh... Wolf Venerable, why did you suddenly get so fierce?"

Silver Wolf watched the elderly woman's retreating back. "Don't worry about it. Just be yourself."

"Okay..."

Vernacular Poet also stared at the direction the elderly woman had vanished in. "Is there a problem?"

Silver Wolf did not answer. Instead, she recounted what they had experienced together earlier. "Do you remember what happened inside the World Tree? We met the Forest Moon God."

"Yeah." Windchaser nodded.

"How is that connected?" Vernacular Poet asked thoughtfully.

Silver Wolf said, "I suspect There's still a backup of Them in the World Tree."

Before Silver Wolf fully understood the relationship between the moon and Elation, she had always overlooked the core of the technology Phanes had given her:

[An efficient, specific, low-cost body-alteration technology with extradimensional and temporal authority.]

With this technology, she could perform operations similar to Return to Silence. In the real world within the game, she had actually always been a backup, while her true body had remained in Kawaba Mutsumi's reality.

And Goddess of Life Sephinia had previously told her that the Forest Moon governed Space-Time, while Phanes governed fate.

Setting aside why Phanes possessed Space-Time authority, if Silver Wolf could accomplish such things through Aether Editing and a portion of that authority...

Then had the Forest Moon God also left behind a backup before, or was the one we met a backup?

Vernacular Poet fell silent in thought. They had previously learned about the authorities held by gods as well.

Windchaser had not followed the train of thought, but nodding was the right move anyway.

Sunken Crow asked coldly, "But the World Tree was corrupted. Would Their backup still be inside the World Tree?"

Silver Wolf shook her head. "I don't know. But the answer is hidden in the riddle itself. Their name has already told us the answer."

With that, Silver Wolf took the lead and walked straight toward the World Tree.

Windchaser and the others hurried after her.

After Silver Wolf stepped up to it, she said, "You should remember the person who fought you in the World Tree, right?"

"Yeah. Lumina was the World Tree's other half. After being corrupted by the Abyss, she fought us."

"Exactly. But she did let us enter its interior before. Thanks to her actions, we can enter the World Tree's interior again now." As Silver Wolf spoke, she pressed the confirm button.

Then everyone was teleported inside in an instant.

Inside the World Tree, it was no longer like before. It was more like entering a space haphazardly stitched together.

The space had lost its original shape.

Interwoven branches stretched out in every direction like countless enormous blood vessels.

Some branches passed straight through the void, while others suddenly bent back only a few meters away from them. Even up, down, left, and right had lost their meaning.

Windchaser had barely taken one step when her whole body suddenly drifted sideways. "Whoa—!"

Vernacular Poet reached out and grabbed her, only to be dragged into a spin himself the next second. "Don't struggle!"

"Ah! I didn't mean to!"

Sunken Crow tried to grab both of them.

As a result, all three of them started spinning together.

Silver Wolf stood where she was and watched for a few seconds.

"You three..." She sighed. "Never mind."

A data field swiftly spread through the surroundings, forcefully marking the originally chaotic space in her eyes.

In an instant, the disorderly space gradually became normal in the eyes of the three of them as well.

The four continued forward.

An anomaly appeared ahead. At a glance, everything there was frozen in place.

It was as if, within the entire World Tree, only that small region had been paused.

"What is that?" Silver Wolf stared at the completely motionless space. "Come on. Let's take a look."

"I hope we don't have to fight a BOSS~" Windchaser clasped her hands together and silently prayed.

Vernacular Poet did not understand why Windchaser had suddenly said that. "What are you afraid of? We have the Wolf Venerable."

"You're not the one tanking!" Windchaser punched Vernacular Poet in the back. "I have to tank the monsters and deal damage, okay?!"

Then Silver Wolf led everyone toward that frozen Space-Time.

As they approached, the data in Silver Wolf's goggles began to jump wildly.

[Historical Node]

[Time Stability: 99.99%]

[Space Stability: 99.99%]

[Record Integrity: High]

Silver Wolf's eyes lit up slightly. She pressed confirm, and the space instantly collapsed.

When they opened their eyes again.

They were all stunned.

The moon was no longer the moon they had just come to understand.

The gray-white wilderness had vanished, replaced by an endless forest.

Silver-green grass blanketed the earth. Gigantic trees stretched from the distance to the horizon, and the air even carried the damp scent of soil.

Windchaser subconsciously crouched down. "This..."

She reached out to touch the plants on the ground, but her fingertips passed straight through them. "I can't touch them?"

Silver Wolf glanced at her. "Because this is only a recording."

Vernacular Poet nodded. "Then it seems we're here to observe what happened before?"

"We'll take it one step at a time. We can only uncover clues bit by bit."

Just then—

A sharp shout suddenly came from the distance.

"The sky!"

"Look at the sky!"

Immediately afterward, chaos erupted in the forest.

Some people ran frantically.

Some clutched their children and rushed into their homes.

Some fell to their knees in the grass.

"Go tell the Lord!"

"Tell the Goddess!"

"The Abyss—!"

"It's here!"

Silver Wolf and the others looked up at the same time.

The next second, everyone fell silent.

A mass of slowly writhing darkness hung above them. It looked like a gigantic mouth large enough to cover the entire sky, its black edges constantly squirming.

It was as if it were gradually devouring the moon, while beneath that darkness, countless Abyssal fissures spread across the edge of the forest.

More and more Abyssal fissures spread outward. Black patterns cut through the forest, and wherever they passed, the trees rapidly withered.

The silver-green grass turned ash-black, and the light in the sky began to dim little by little.

"Glutton...?"