Allison stayed in one of the houses near Evangeline's hideout. There was no way that many people could climb down the well and cram into her little room, so they had set up camp here instead. It was close to the wall, snow falling heavily outside, the air sharp with cold. Inside, though, the real chill came from the constant arguments.

"Are we seriously going to protect that bastard?" Gilbert asked, his hand tight around the hatchet he carried.

Luke had been dragged into the house as a prisoner, bound so tightly upstairs he could barely move. Most of Haven had wanted to kill him the second they saw his face. But Allison had given her order: no one laid a hand on Luke. She had unfinished business with him.

No one dared push back, because she had spoken as Allison Rhiannon. Her voice left no space for debate, clipped and authoritative. After killing the Orc Lord and saving their lives, she had earned that weight. To many, she was already a leader. They obeyed her in public. But here, in the quiet of this cramped house, the defiance bled out.

Through it all, Mason stayed silent. This wasn't his fight; he had come too late to carry the same grudges.

Allison laid out her reasons. Why Luke wasn't just the monster they thought he was. Why he had been as wronged as any of them. Evangeline had helped her sharpen the argument, but it wasn't easy. Not after Luke himself had all but painted the target on his back, claiming he'd killed Angelica and threatening to cut down anyone in his way before vanishing. Explaining his side of the story was… complicated.

"Why should we listen to him at all?" Miranda asked, arms crossed.

"He killed a Warden when he was still low-level," Evangeline said. "Then he crossed to the other side of the tutorial and survived there for months. No one else has ever done that."

Gilbert slammed his hatchet onto the table and leaned forward, glaring at them.

"And that's supposed to impress me? So he killed a Warden, so what? We can do that now. He went to the other side of the tutorial? Big deal. We can go too. Nothing's stopping us anymore."

Eugene, who had been sitting quietly in the corner, pushed himself to his feet.

"He really killed a Warden back then?" he asked, skeptical. "If he did, it was dumb luck. And even if it wasn't, he's nothing compared to us now. We don't need him. Not as a guide, not for anything. He's locked upstairs, probably pissing himself right now."

Allison exhaled, long and tired. The arguments went in circles, no end in sight. She glanced at Evangeline and nodded toward the stairs. Enough was enough. It was time to bring Luke down and settle this before they lost the night entirely.

"From this point on, time is against us," Allison said, her tone cutting through the noise. "We can't waste it arguing. Don't trust him? Fine. Then trust me. Understand this: conquering the fortress is our priority."

Moments later, Evangeline descended the stairs with Luke in tow. The bickering didn't stop, but Allison knew she had to put more steel in her voice. The others couldn't be allowed to spiral.

The meeting carried on, turning to updates and the one question everyone wanted answered: what lay beyond, on the other side of the tutorial.

"What does the serpent look like? How big is it?" Gilbert asked.

They were talking about the Beast Lord.

Evangeline hesitated before answering. "In terms of length… about the size of a subway train."

"And exactly how long is that supposed to be?" Dustin pressed.

"Somewhere between five hundred and a thousand feet," Mason muttered, grim-faced.

"Shit," Gilbert wiped the sweat from his brow. "The Orc Lord was bad enough. How the hell do you kill something that size?"

This Lord wasn't just a problem, it was a nightmare, far worse than the Orc Lord had ever been. Killing that monster had already pushed them to their limits. Now they were staring at the idea of a colossal serpent. No one in the room looked confident. They all knew what it meant. They had just returned from the expedition; they knew exactly how brutal these fights could be.

"I already killed it," Luke said.

For a heartbeat Allison thought she'd misheard him. But then she caught the faint smile on his face, the calm way he said it, too matter-of-fact to be a bluff.

He killed the Beast Lord? How?

"You really killed it?" Evangeline's voice was level, but her eyes sharpened with curiosity.

"Yes." No hesitation, no wavering.

"Bullshit," Dustin, the bald giant, growled, folding his arms across his chest. "He's lying."

"It took all of us to bring down the Orc Lord. There's no way he took out the Beast Lord on his own," Gilbert added, suspicion dripping from every word.

But Allison knew. He wasn't lying. Luke never would about something like that. He had killed it. Alone.

During her trek back through the forest, Allison had told herself she'd gloat to Luke when they finally met again, pretend the Orc Lord had been an easy kill, just to rub it in. But now, knowing he had slain the Beast Lord single-handedly, that petty competition she never voiced was already lost.

The meeting dragged on, tense and uncertain, until Luke finally stepped out of the house. Shortly after, Allison followed, and the group pressed on toward the fortress of the second mechanism. They moved through the Wild Zone in silence, careful and alert.

"You really believe he killed the Beast Lord?" Eugene asked as he caught up to her, pushing through the undergrowth at her side.

"That fang he carries is proof enough," Allison replied. "Even if he won't say what reward he got for it."

"I've been thinking with Quinn," Eugene said. "The monster's a serpent. Snakes shed skin. Wouldn't be hard to grab a piece it left behind near the capital. He could be faking it, just to impress us. Or intimidate us."

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Allison's pace quickened. "No. He killed it. Only an idiot like him would be reckless enough to try something like that alone."

***

They had finally reached the fortress of the second mechanism. Tonight, they would enter. Inside her tent, Allison sat alone, the faint clanging of steel echoing from outside. Smiths worked tirelessly through the cold, forging new metal shields and repairing the ones battered during the battle with the Orc Lord.

In front of her rested a massive block of ice. She had conjured it herself, shaping it with mana. Lifting her katana, she began to carve. Each strike was swift, precise, the blade slicing away layer after layer of frozen crystal.

It was one of the ways she advanced her profession as a Sculptor. She had chosen it herself, one of the few ties she still allowed between her bloodline and her craft. She'd started small, wood, then clay, eventually stone. As a magical profession, Sculpting rewarded not brute force but calm, patience, and delicate control. Skills that doubled as anchors against her volatile draconic emotions. A lumberjack split trees, a miner shattered stone, but her art was different. It demanded vision. To sculpt, she first had to see the form within, then coax it into existence.

Her dedication had granted her a mutation of profession, evolving into an Ice Sculptor. With it came new creations, new powers drawn directly from her bloodline.

[Heart of the Ice Dragon (Ancient)]: A bloodline skill passed down through the Rhiannon clan, one of the oldest among the Ice Dragons. Upon awakening this power, the heir's heart cools, transforming into a core of eternal winter that fuels every frost-bound spell with the cruel, lethal force of draconic cold. The bearer inherits both the nobility and the ruthless chill of their kind, amplifying their magic and becoming a true heir to the legacy of the Ice Dragons.

The profession also harmonized with her class, offering techniques that sharpened her use of the katana.

Before her stood a perfect cube of ice, smoothed and polished from the larger block. Sitting cross-legged in front of it, she closed her eyes, placed both palms against its surface, and drew in a deep breath. Sweat trickled down her brow almost instantly. This was delicate work. She wasn't cutting now; she was bending the cube to her will with nothing but magic. The cube shuddered under her touch. She clenched her jaw, lungs tight, mind screaming against the order to empty itself. The more she tried to clear her thoughts, the louder they grew.

Then an old memory surfaced. The cube cracked.

It was the image of someone from her family, a master of ice so skilled they'd developed a kind of telekinesis to control it. The cube splintered further as the memory pressed down. She remembered watching that figure conjure hundreds of blades of ice and, with a single thought, send them tearing into a target.

The cube shattered completely, scattering into shards across the floor.

The memory laughed at her. She was nothing compared to that person. At the same age, they had already achieved the extraordinary. A genius. A prodigy. And Allison… she was a shadow. That memory was one of the many reasons she despised her family.

Frustration simmered, and she pushed to her feet. Enough of that exercise. She focused instead on another.

[Ice Katana Creation (Rare)]: The Ice Sculptor can shape the essence of [Ice] into a temporary blade. While ephemeral, the weapon is as real and sharp as steel, though its power is capped at [Common]. Yet, when imbued with the ancient strength of the [Heart of the Ice Dragon], the katana burns with draconic winter, colder, sharper, deadlier than any mere conjured weapon.

She concentrated on her hand, willing the cold to gather, to solidify. It wasn't as easy as flicking open a system menu; she had to create it herself. The spell was more like a recipe, ingredients, steps, precision.

Slowly, the shape of a katana formed. She wanted it sharper, faster, more brutal. She wanted a blade that appeared instantly, firm and unyielding. The truth was she had only forged a perfect ice katana once, against the Orc Lord, when death clawed at her throat and her dragon heart had awakened. The battlefield had been littered with grotesque ice sculptures, her rage and desperation strengthening her craft in ways she could never replicate on command.

That weapon had been born from luck, fury, circumstance. Not from steady skill. Now, she chased that perfection again. Progress by progress. Slow, but real. Sculpt, create, control, command. It was the only way forward.

***

After finishing her training for the day, Allison had to rejoin the meetings. She couldn't afford to burn through too much mana anyway, the fortress challenge was drawing near.

When she approached the main tent, raised voices carried from inside.

"I'm here," she said as she stepped in.

A small table was cluttered with piles of paper.

"Take one of these. I know you already have a copy, but I wrote out several more and I'm not throwing the work of my beautiful hands into the trash," Evangeline said, sliding a sheet toward her.

Allison didn't need to look to know what it was. For months during their expedition, the Haven group had held meeting after meeting about that same document. A transcription of the fortress event:

[Special Event: Midnight Siege]

Description:

The Midnight Wardens have sensed your presence. Your intrusion has not gone unnoticed. They remained hidden, lurking within the fortress walls, waiting for you to wander deeper into their domain. Now they march, intent on hunting down and eradicating anyone who dares defile their stronghold. Their forces, led by their commander, have begun their assault to reclaim this territory.

Objective: Eliminate the invasion leader and secure control of the fortress.

Status: Event in progress.

(Warning: Access to the mechanism will remain locked until the territory is fully secured. The door will only open upon completion of the event.)

"Everyone out there is reading one right now," Evangeline remarked. "Except Luke, of course. He's got his in the system, same as me."

The notification only triggered once someone approached the mechanism's gate. Anyone who stepped into the fortress without it wouldn't even realize they'd been pulled into an event until the Wardens came for them.

"The strategy's going to be the same as with the Orc Lord, right?" Miranda asked.

"Only this time, we add Evangeline's epic skill into the mix," Mason replied.

"Which means I'll be saving your asses from a lot of trouble," Evangeline said with a smirk as she dropped into a chair.

Dustin leaned against the wall in the corner, silent until now. He was technically a newcomer to Haven, having joined not long after Angelica's death, but most of them already knew him. He'd even shown up a few times at the wall dungeon to lend a hand.

"My ultra-rare seismic skill will carry its weight," he said. "My only concern is that kukri-throwing guy. He's not going to kill us, right?" He let out a laugh.

Evangeline tossed a sketch onto the table: the Warden Captain.

"Invisibility. Backup from the other Wardens. And worst of all, he's smart. That's our enemy," she explained. "The good news is you've all gotten stronger since the last time I saw you. So, are we going in or what? Because after eight years trapped here, patience is the one thing I don't have anymore. I'm more eager than ever."

All their work over the past months had been leading to this. Training until their bodies ached, growing stronger, obtaining a powerful item by killing the Orc Lord. And now, finally, stepping into the fortress.

"Let's go," Allison said.

***

They had gathered everyone who would enter, checked over gear, and distributed the handful of healing potions Evangeline had managed to secure. Everything was ready. Night had fallen, the sky heavy with stars, and fittingly, it was close to midnight.

The camp burned bright with firelight, torches and bonfires throwing long shadows across steel and faces. Allison had been forced to give a speech, something she hated, but there was no way around it. This was no different from the Orc Lord: just as dangerous, and this time their enemy wore armor that could shrug off most blows.

They all knew it wouldn't be easy.

When the moment came, she shouted, and the others roared back with her. She broke into a run, leading the charge, the Haven fighters thundering after her. Luke was only a few steps behind. And the instant they crossed into the fortress, the truth settled in every heart: they would claim this place, or they would die trying.

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