“Sigh… This should be it,” Illyan muttered to himself as he stared through Neddard’s telescope, aiming at the night sky.

  There, several stars were aligned. Rather, it would be an understatement to say there were only several of them.

  The few that were at the center of the diagram were the brightest and closest stars, which were few in number. On the other hand, tens of less bright or more distant stars connected the entire diagram together.

  It took Illyan several hours to record all of them and include them in his calcutions.

  However, the effort paid off as he finally knew how to open the citadel.

  The guards, who saw him suddenly finish writing with a quill on parchment, tried to look at it but didn’t understand any of it, so they gave up.

  Afterward, Illyan carefully stored all of the documents into one of his bags.

  If everything went according to pn, these documents would be brought by one of the surveilling guards to the city, where Arun or someone else would finish Illyan’s job.

  As for the reason for that…

  They were too far away and wouldn’t be caught up in the aftermath…

  Swish

  The sound of an arrow resounded in everyone’s ears and pierced through the trunk near them before they could react.

  It wasn’t an enemy.

  When one of the guards took a careful look at it, his face turned ugly as he yelled out.

  “Shit, it’s red! Retreat!”

  The arrow had a red rag tied to it, fluttering in the wind.

  It was a signal made by the surveilnce team, who observed them and their vicinity for any unforeseeable incidents.

  Just like now.

  “Roooaaargh!” A thunderous roar resounded as the ground began to shake in a constant rhythm.

  “Quickly, we need to get out of here!” one of the guards yelled as he forcibly took Illyan into his arms, intending to run with him.

  He was a little confused about how Illyan was so heavy but couldn’t dwell on the thought for long as they tried to run down the slope.

  Unfortunately, at that moment, a dark figure emerged from the vegetation of the valley, running in their direction.

  The guards saw the figure but decided not to engage, knowing it was just a scapegoat trying to lure a bigger enemy.

  However, the figure didn’t let them go so easily and started weaving its hands into different gestures before a coalescence of mana shaped into a sphere appeared in its palms, aimed at them.

  “Shit, it’s an acolyte, take cover!” one of the guards roared, but it was too te.

  The mana sphere shot toward them at high speed, giving them little time to dodge.

  That didn’t stop them from running in different directions to limit the damage it could cause to the entire group.

  However, one of them suddenly realized something as he looked to his right, where the guard holding Illyan was.

  “Fuck! He’s aiming at the schor!”

  Nothing could be done.

  The guard holding Illyan could only grit his teeth as he used his body to shield him.

  He muttered some incantations, but there were no outward changes, so Illyan didn’t know what kind of spell it was.

  Crunch

  But no matter what spell it was, it didn’t help as the impact of the mana sphere split his body open.

  “Agh!” Illyan was next to bear the brunt as the sphere bsted him down the mountain in a different direction from the other guards, while ‘accidentally’ letting go of his bag full of the writings regarding the citadel door…

  “To hell with this! Take the bag at least.”

  One of the guards ran toward the bag and grabbed it, running as fast as he could.

  They were also careful to watch the acolyte behind them, but it seemed that he had disappeared.

  Instead, a new danger appeared, not from behind but from above.

  An entire tree trunk flew through the sky at high speed, falling in the direction they were running.

  “Wha—” The rge trunk squashed three of the guards to death while the others didn’t even bother to look back.

  “Run faster! We’ll be safe in the city!”

  There was a certain hope that if they managed to return to the city, they would survive.

  “Roooar!” However, their hopes grew dimmer as they heard the cracking of trees getting closer to them at high speed.

  In the end, one of them couldn’t resist the temptation to turn around, only for his face to turn pale.

  The Mountain Troll was charging at them at full speed, enraged, as its long arms threw everything within reach at them.

  But now, it was close enough to pick up speed even more.

  “We are doomed…”

  ……..

  “Ugh…”

  Illyan, who was at this moment buried deep in a snow pit at the bottom of the mountain, gasped for breath before digging his way up. It took him a second to realize which direction was up and which was down, as he was several meters deep in the snow.

  Fortunately, the bits of flesh and blood from the guard holding him slowly fell off his body, revealing where gravity had let them fall. He started digging in the opposite direction and, in a minute or so, finally pushed his body out of the snow.

  He didn’t move as he climbed onto one of the trees and rested, waiting for something.

  Not long after that, a figure appeared in front of him, coming from Galdur Mountain...

  The figure was exactly the same as the one who had shot Illyan down with the mana sphere.

  However, Illyan didn’t move, nor did he show any kind of surprise or panic.

  “Sigh… Was this kind of scheme really needed?” The figure revealed her face as she put down her hood.

  It was none other than Aurelia. But she was different in some way. Her pimples were covered in makeup while her beautiful hair was completely dark in color.

  “I needed this cover; otherwise, I would eventually be suspected in one way or another. If everything goes according to pn, I will return with some injuries to the city in a few days. If worst comes to worst, then my identity as physician Kaoran will end here. It’s as simple as that. What about you? Did you make a proper cover for yourself? You said you had it all prepared,” Illyan said calmly.

  Both of them had decided that to visit all four of the nodes, they would need considerable time to travel to all the areas. This would obviously be suspicious to the people in the city observing everyone.

  Illyan could disappear for a few hours without anyone caring too much, but if he went missing for more than a day, he would be listed as missing immediately, especially since he was quite important.

  The same applied to Aurelia, who was being watched by some of her father’s men.

  “Don’t worry. I have someone to substitute for me. She’s completely reliable. She’ll lie in bed most of the time, as others think I spend most of my time in it incapable of leaving,” Aurelia shrugged her shoulders as if she wasn’t worried.

  After all, even her father didn’t know she could run around like this doing all kinds of things.

  “Alright, that’s reassuring. By the way, how did you change the color of your hair?” Seeing her pitch-bck hair made Illyan wonder how she had changed it.

  “I mixed several herbs to make a temporary dye to turn my hair bck. After all, my hair is too striking not to mask it.”

  “Hmm… You didn’t use it in the forest back then.”

  “Well, obviously. It was time-consuming to do this. Back then, those guys didn’t know me, so it was a waste of time. Even if they could recognize me, they wouldn’t have left that forest alive that day. When I go all out, I should be able to fight even Aziro,” Aurelia’s face glowed with pride as she said it.

  “Whatever. Since we’re done here, let’s hurry up.”

  “You’re right. We should at least arrive at the first node faster than those guards who followed us would return to the city.”

  Aurelia nodded as they prepared to leave.

  Before that, however, Illyan took a knife and started to shave off his hair.

  Aurelia looked at him with curiosity, but since she had already seen him in his regur disguise, she didn’t say anything.

  Once he was fully bald, he stabbed his face several times.

  “Give me the robe, please.” Then, without a change of expression, he turned to Aurelia with his hand reaching out.

  “Here you go. It was a good idea to take the white robe instead of the bck one. That one seemed to be a robe of good quality.” Aurelia ughed when she saw him take off the torn white robe and put on the old gray robe.

  “Well, these white robes were part of the physician’s pack, so even if they get torn or destroyed, I wouldn’t care too much.” Illyan shrugged his shoulders as they finally set off and sped into the wilderness, leaving behind all the mess for others to find…

  ……..

  Meanwhile, on the other side of Galdur Mountain…

  Blood covered the snow, and torn parts of human bodies were sprawled on the ground or hung from the surrounding trees.

  It was the pce where the troll had finally caught up to the guards.

  These men were professionals compared to normal guards, as some of them had learned breathing techniques while others had even learned spells.

  However, in front of the raging troll, it wasn’t enough.

  They were torn apart before they could even resist.

  Now, all ten of them were dead. Most had been eaten, leaving behind only a few bits of flesh.

  “Damn it… What went wrong? Why did that bastard lure the troll toward them?”

  The silence of the haunting scene was broken as one of two guards who had been watching from afar got closer to investigate.

  Both of them had waited several minutes after the troll left, but they were still cautious as they looked around and listened for any sounds.

  “It’s obviously someone who wanted to interrupt Mr. Brynjar’s pns. Maybe Aziro knew something about this? If that’s the case, the trap they prepared for him would be a total catastrophe! We need to go tell them, Kar!”

  The other guard panicked, fearing the consequences this could lead to.

  “Wait, no. Jamal, we need to look for the schor first! Without him, we won’t be able to open the door.” But Kar, who was rational despite compining before, shook his head in refusal.

  He didn’t want to be the one who ruined his cn master’s big pns.

  “No. Maybe we won’t need to look for him to open the doors. Come here and look.” As Jamal walked around investigating, he stopped and called for Kar to come closer.

  “What? Oh—” When Kar came closer, he saw a bag hanging on one of the trees. It was the very same bag Illyan had worn on his way there.

  “How did it get there?” Kar muttered to himself as he stared at the bag.

  Jamal didn’t wait. He jumped up, grabbed the bag, and immediately checked its contents, relieved to find the documents.

  While he didn’t know much about the contents themselves, he was pretty sure Illyan had finished the puzzle, as they had pnned to leave right before the troll attacked.

  “Maybe one of the guards took it with them and then threw it away to keep it from harm! They were loyal men, after all.”

  “Oh, so that’s the case! They were great! When I return home, I’ll tell the wife and kids to pray for them when the three gods receive them… Wait, what about the schor? Do we still look for him?”

  “No way. The troll could still be wandering around. You can tell your family to pray for him, too. He’s useless now that he’s finished his work. We’ll just say he died with the guards…”

  Once they decided this, they sped off toward the city without looking back. The blood would surely lure some of the beasts or even monsters, and they weren’t interested in seeing them after completing their task...