"Right then, where shall I start?" Nan Tian asked.

"How about why she's split up with the faction then. With her older sister being the hero, surely they should have stayed in Britain no?" Shiro replied.

"Sure. In the beginning, back in the UK, Qin Lan's family were quite passive in terms of combat. They would focus on healing along with keeping everyone safe. In order to defeat the monsters without actually focusing on combat orientated classes, they started to study contracts and ways they could 'tame' monsters. Eventually, after a few generations of research, Qin Lan's grandfather had the biggest success when he proved that he could tame monsters and use them as bodyguards while making sure that the monsters didn't harm any humans in the process unless they were physically attacked.

"With this accomplishment, they were getting a little ahead of themselves as they started to expand and help more people. Naturally, their actions caused quite a few eyes to focus towards them. Several large factions that were spread across the world at that point were very curious about his talent at taming monsters so they would send envoys to 'negotiate.' With the old man's personality, these negotiations were naturally rejected as he didn't want this technique that his family had spent generations on perfecting to be used in war. While he was hopeful about the human's nature, he also knew how they would strive for war and total control." Nan Tian explained.

Shiro had quite a few questions but decided to be patient and listen to the end.

"As negotiations continued to fail, the factions started to become annoyed. With such a powerful weapon in his hand, the old man refused to hand it over 'for the good of humanity', making them 'traitors to the cause.' Naturally, with his course of action, a war broke out and their family was scattered. Normally, you would think that the Victoria family would be able to put up a decent fight before losing but that's wrong. It was completely one sided in the Victoria family's favour. Within his armada of contracted beasts, was a mythical beast much like your daughter, Yin." Nan Tian smiled.

"He had a beast similar to a phoenix?" Shiro raised her eyebrows.

"Yes. Within his contracts, he had a Hydra under his control. With the Hydra's skillset of controlling the elements, it was basically an untouchable god in those times. Unfortunately, there was a traitor in his family. His son's eldest daughter had started to tamper with the contracts, making it so that the monsters would turn against the Hydra. This was ultimately what had led to the defeat of the Victoria family. There are quite a few theories on why Rachel had betrayed the Victoria family but the family believes that Rachel had betrayed them due to personal greed and what the other factions had offered her." Nan Tian shrugged.

"Hmm… I feel like there's more to this." Shiro frowned.

"Of course there is. If it was just greed and what the other family had offered her, I doubt she would turn her back to an easy victory. But here's my personal theory after doing a bit of research. The hydra that the grandfather had made a contract with, actually agreed on serving the family for a few generations and the younger sister was apparently the next contractor. There were signs to point out that the older sister would always fidget or get nervous whenever people would talk about the future. I'm guessing that she somehow knew what was coming and wanted to be contracted with the hydra herself to guarantee her safety." Nan Tian said while Shiro couldn't help but nod her head. It was indeed plausible if this was the cause.

Making herself comfortable, she listened to his stories while keeping a note on anything that might be helpful in the future.

As this was happening, Estrella immediately found out the problem after jumping through a few dimensions in order to shorten her travel time.

From within her personal realm, she could see small splits and fissures in the air.

Understanding that this was clearly the sign of unstable space, Estrella furrowed her brows and waved her hand.

Inserting some of her mana into the splits, she managed to widen it just big enough so that she could peek through to see what's on the other side.

However, the moment she peeked through, she immediately felt a presence search for her location. Quickly backing away from the fissure, she returned it to its original state.

Taking a deep breath, Estrella noticed that she had started to sweat from that short encounter.

'What could be on the other side of this fissure…' She thought with a frown

Shaking her head, Estrella started to patrol the area so that she could figure out how large this foreign space was. With the fissures as nodes for her to guess the area, she realised the area of this foreign space was much bigger than what she had expected.

Not only that, but it was also expanding with every second so she needed to hurry back and tell Shiro this news.

Furrowing her brows one more time with the fissure, she decided to create a small holographic bird of sorts before forcing it through the fissures. That way, she could establish a small area of influence within this realm for her to access at a later date.

Jumping into her portal, she started to make her way back to the village.

Not too long after she had left the area, a figure flickered to where she had tampered with the fissure and frowned.

"Strange… I didn't see a split being opened here… I suppose the technique is still relatively unexplored so some mistakes are bound to happen." He shook his head and repaired the fissure.

Looking around the area for a moment, the figure flickered away.

###

"Hmm… that sounds pretty suspicious." Shiro furrowed her brows after hearing what Estrella had reported.

"Did you see anything past the fissure?" She asked.

"I was barely able to get a glance before someone tried to track me down. However, I did catch a glimpse of snow so the area in this foreign space is most definitely a cold environment." Estrella replied.

"This is indeed a problem. Has Keiko come back yet?" Shiro turned towards Nan Tian since she was still hindered in terms of sensing the area with her mana.

"Not yet. I can't sense her within my range." Nan Tian shook his head as Shiro frowned.

"Estrella, go to the north and look for Keiko. If you find her, ask her to come back. If you don't within 30 minutes, come back and we'll form a search party." Shiro ordered.

Nodding her head, Estrella immediately left the area. 

"Do you think it's the Frozen Imperial Mountains?" Nan Tian asked.

"Most likely. Though I've never heard of a dungeon expanding in size. The only scenario I can think of where it's slightly similar is when a mutated dungeon is not cleared on time and the monsters start spilling out into the cities. When that happens, they start to expand their territory and make a community of monsters which is hard to completely clear out. This was quite common in the early days but once people started to get more powerful, these occurrences have become less common." Nan Tian replied.

"Mn, but this is a manmade dungeon so we can't use common logic. Unfortunately, one of my friends who had succeeded in making dungeons is no longer alive so I can't ask her for any information." Shiro sighed.

"Well it's not too much of a worry. Since it's still a dungeon in the end, there's a big possibility that it must adhere to some basic principles. We can use that as our guide." Nan Tian smiled.

"True… With the space expanding at the rate that Estrella had described, I'd say we have about 2 days' worth of time before it reaches this village. Tomorrow, I'm planning to do some experiments so that I can recover faster." Shiro massaged her eyes while laying her body across the bed.

"Oh? Your body is in no condition to be using mana often though. How are you going to experiment properly?" Nan Tian asked with concern.

"You're going to help me. If you don't mind of course." Shiro smiled while glancing towards him.

"It'll be my pleasure."

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