Unedited*

Once again, he sighed.

Putting aside the fact that it had been night just before he entered the Cursed Land and that it was now daytime here, he decided to focus on what lay ahead.

Survive. Or, rather, search.

"If you’re lost, find a river or a small stream and walk along its banks. Sooner or later you’ll find civilization," he told himself, recalling the sayings of the land.

For now, he wasn’t going to venture into the seemingly endless forests ahead of him, since he didn’t know what kind of beasts might be in this place and wanted to be prepared.

After walking for quite a while, he stopped. He looked at the sky, the water, the trees...

Everything was the same.

"I’ve been wondering, but... where the hell is the Desolate Temple?"

--

Ever since things took a turn with his plans, Owen has tended to arrive early for meetings and at his office. Not because he’s being forced to, but because he needs to stay on top of everything so that his 101st Regiment doesn’t disappear once again.

That’s why his workload has increased.

Just as he arrives early at his office, he leaves late.

Today was one of those days when he was leaving late.

Knock, knock, knock. The sound of the door pulled him out of his final minutes of work, so he looked up.

’Informant?’ he thought when he saw who it was. "Come in," he replied.

A man dressed in black stepped inside. "Sir, there’s something to report."

"You wouldn’t be here if there weren’t," Owen replied sarcastically.

"I’m sorry." The man lowered his head, realizing he’d wasted words on nonsense—something an informant of his caliber shouldn’t do.

Owen shrugged off his guilt. "Just carry on; I was just joking around a bit."

"All right." The informant nodded. "Young Lord Edward has entered a Cursed Land."

"Oh?" Owen raised his eyebrows. "I heard from him that he had a pending mission, something personal. I didn’t think it involved a Cursed Land. Which Cursed Land is it? Maybe I can figure out what he’s looking for."

The informant smiled slightly. "It’s... the Flawed Undead Cursed Land he entered when you gave him that mission to kill three Wights."

Owen raised his eyebrows, puzzled. "What’s he doing there?"

The man shook his head. "The last thing I saw was him going into the Chief’s office, but I couldn’t see any further because he became alert at that moment and I had to back away. But he hasn’t come out of there."

’How strange.’ Owen tidied up all the papers scattered across his desk and then put on his cloak.

"Let’s go," he said.

The informant followed him.

On the way, he called several trusted generals to follow him.

.

"There’s no one here, Sir Owen." The generals searched the Chief’s office from top to bottom but found nothing.

Owen nodded. He was the only one who had found something odd.

"How many people have found the Chief’s room before?" he asked.

One of the generals stepped forward to speak, as he was in charge of this area. "About three people, sir."

"Could any of them have killed the Chief?"

"No, sir."

"That time the boss turned up dead and Edward fought his way up to his lair, so we can say he found the lair..."

"The lesser undead going berserk. The current chaos in the dungeon... The boss hasn’t shown up again..."

Owen couldn’t help but connect all these dots.

’Edward killed the Boss at that moment, didn’t he?’

’In fact, the reason Edward didn’t hesitate to join the 101st Regiment is because it’s the only way he has to fight Varhat. Why would Varhat want him? He’s a pure Lux, according to Gideon, so his magic and power must be impressive.’

’That being the case, and knowing the reasons why the Red Moon Cave was investigating him, I can say with certainty that on that day, he was the one who killed the Death Knight in a peculiar way. He used that mysterious magic that erases existence.’

"They call it ’The Magic of the End.’ That would explain why Varhat is searching for it so fervently."

"And it would explain..."

Owen looked at the enormous door. It was closed, but he could tell it had been opened recently, as the rust on the hinges had been disturbed.

’Why he was able to open that door. What’s on the other side?’ He stepped forward and looked closely at the door.

"Bring special tools to try to open this or, at least, find out what’s behind this rust," he said after looking at it for a while.

The generals and informants immediately set to work on it.

They used various tools to try to pick the lock or remove the hinges to open the door, since they didn’t have the key. They tried various magical tools... It didn’t work.

With Owen’s permission, they tried to break it open, attacked it with magic, and even attempted to use explosives. They destroyed a good portion of the boss’s room, but the door remained intact.

After so many failed attempts, they shook their heads. "It’s unbelievable—it doesn’t look like it, but this door is hermetically sealed."

Owen had already noticed. So he had to give up.

"Secure the area and investigate this entire Cursed Land. Inform the Academy and its affiliated forces that, starting today, I, Owen, will be closing off access to this place for a while. Don’t give any further explanations," Owen said.

"Yes, sir!"

In less than two hours, a full contingent of powerful but trustworthy people was in place, guarding the gate and investigating the entire Cursed Land.

Owen didn’t leave the area. Instead, he watched it from afar alongside Gideon.

"I’m counting on you to keep a close eye on him. I’m curious to know how he found the key to get in there and what’s behind that door. But with all the traitors running around lately, I can’t trust just anyone," Owen said.

Gideon nodded. "Don’t worry, Master. I’ve got it covered."

--

One hour later.

Edward lifted his head and looked up at the sky... No matter how he looked at it, none of this seemed to be a temple.

The sun was shining brightly, the trees were tall and thick, the river flowed steadily, and the air was cool. There were no buildings in the mountains, at least not in sight. And on the river’s horizon, there was only more river.

All of this had him confused.

However, he suddenly frowned and looked down at his feet. The color of the earth hadn’t changed one bit in quite some time.

There didn’t seem to be any traces of anything either, but upon taking a closer look at the entire area he had walked through, he noticed a slight difference.

The dust here was stirred up unevenly by his footsteps. Perhaps it was due to the river’s strong currents.

He had been working with the 101st Regiment for a week. Although he usually operated alone, he had carried out several missions with other groups from the Regiment. Somehow, he had learned a little about the Intelligence Group and even picked up a couple of spells.

’If it rises unevenly all along the path, then I can find traces of other beings along the rest of the way.’ 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

His logic was sound.

He crouched down and touched the reeds growing beneath his feet. Their growth wasn’t uneven; it was uniform. They were all the same size. It wasn’t unusual, but in a place as desolate as this, with so much water, it was. If they were growing, it meant someone had cut them before, though there were no traces of it.

He ran his hand along them to the right and then to the left... Then he performed what appeared to be a strange ritual with his eyes closed, moving his hand in circles in front of him as he moved slowly.

It wasn’t a ritual; he was simply trying to find irregularities in the bark of the reeds.

He wanted to find signs that someone might have passed through here, to kick up the dust in that uneven way just as he had done all along.

After more than five minutes of performing those movements, he stopped and looked at a section of the forest he was searching.

Without a second thought, he summoned his Wind Winged Serpent. "Find it for me," he whispered.

Then he cast a wind spell: [Wind Dust Search.]

If the mark were on the ground, he would use his Earth Winged Serpent’s Search in the Dust; it would be more efficient and precise. But this was a variant of that spell belonging to the Wind attribute.

It was at its maximum E-Rank level. It was very good at finding things located at a certain height above the ground that contained residual dust.

The Winged Serpent shook itself slightly, spun around several times, and then circled three times over the spot where Edward had cast the spell.

It immediately seemed to smile and opened its small mouth, which quickly grew to about 45 centimeters in size. The wind burst from its mouth in that instant like a serpent twisting through the air and traveled a great distance, marking a path.

It was heading toward the center of the great forest.

"In the end, I had to go in there..." Edward sighed and stood up.

Without giving it much thought, he began walking toward the interior of the vast forest.