“That’s it for today.”

“You too?”

“Me too.”

“You are senior warriors and you can’t even last for 10 minutes? Tsk, you fools.”

“Shut up. I’m fortunate not to be overwhelmed in 10 seconds.”

The lifespan of the half-draconians was 150 years. Their natural physical abilities were so excellent that they rarely died of illnesses or accidents. However, the half-draconians didn’t have a high population. It was barely maintained at 300 people for the past millennium. Was it because they killed each other at the festival (ranking competition) that ranked their kin?

No. It could be seen from the effect of the contract between Grid and Hao that the aggressiveness of the half-draconians was somewhat repressed among those of the same race. It was surprisingly rare for a festival to cause casualties. Even so, the reason for the small population of the half-draconians was simple.

Their breeding capacity was low. There were too many fetuses that died because they couldn’t bear the evil blood of Bunhelier flowing through the mother’s body. That’s right. 30 out of 300—the reason why Helena was chased by a small number of half-draconians, 10% of the population, was because they were faithful to the instincts of racial reproduction. Her unborn baby would resemble Helena and would be strong enough to handle Bunhelier’s blood.

“Can Helena set a new record today?”

“It won’t be easy... To increase the record, she has to enter a new realm. Such enlightenment is impossible in a day or two.”

“I hope she is patient and doesn’t overdo it.”

Juless, Zepiro, Caspar, Nabalt, and Helga—they were five out of only 20 senior warriors across the entire half-draconian race. Nevertheless, they failed to break through the beginning of the seventh ridge. If they worked together then they could easily break through but for half-draconians, fights should be done on their own. There was no concept of cooperation.

They looked at the top of the mountain in the distance. The sun seemed to explode. Every time a red light flashed in the gray sky, there was the faint sound of an explosion through the blizzard. By now, hell would’ve unfolded on the field. Half of the high peaks would’ve been smashed and Helena would be the only living creature on the land.

Duguen, duguen, dugeun.

The hearts of the senior warriors thumped. They imagined Helena slaughtering the top monsters and their trust and affection toward her were infinitely large. They wanted to pair up with Helena no matter what. They wanted to be picked by her to father her child and carve their mark on the world.

‘...I have to be strong.’

This wasn’t the time to be absent-minded. They needed to fight, gain experience, and build up their skills on the sixth ridge.

‘I haven’t had a drink for a long time.’

It was around the time for Jad to come back. He said he would come back with 100 wagons of alcohol so their mouths were already watering. The five senior warriors wiped the saliva that flowed at the thought of the man-made alcohol. They waited for the wagon procession at the beginning of the sixth ridge. More than an hour passed and they felt a bit anxious because they couldn’t see any signs of the procession.

“Did they get delayed by monsters?”

“What are you talking about? 15 low-grade and five intermediate warriors were sent to the third ridge to escort the procession. How could they be delayed by monsters?”

“Were they slowed by the sanju?”

“They clearly know how to avoid the sanju. How can this be?”

“Hmm... It is better to go out and meet them.”

Caspar, the most cautious of the five senior warriors, stepped forward. He was reminded of the weakness of the human race. There were only a handful of strong humans such as the grandmaster, the dukes, and the single-digit Red Knights. Most humans were infinitely weak so it was highly likely they were holding back the warriors.

‘It will be hard for Jad to fight while protecting the humans dragging the wagons.’

A few wagons might be lost. He didn’t want this to happen.

Flap. He spread out his wings and started to glide down. He moved in an instant from the summit of the sixth ridge to the middle of the fifth ridge and examined the traces in his surroundings, but the white snow was clean without any traces. There were no human footprints, let alone the hooves of horses.

‘Are they still only on the fourth ridge?’

After investigating the traces, Caspar flew to the top of the fifth ridge and spread open his wings again. He waited for the proper wind direction and descended toward the fourth ridge.

“......”

There were few movements on the fourth ridge. It was only infested with miscellaneous monsters. It was strange. After dealing with the sacrifice sent by Frontier, they needed to order the lord to collect the wine, food, and clothing and prepare the wagons. Based on these miscellaneous processes, it was normal to arrive at the fifth ridge by now yet they hadn’t even reached the fourth ridge.

‘Did the event take that long?’

He couldn’t rule out the possibility that the sacrificial lamb sent by Frontier had unexpected skills. Didn’t Helena always tell them? It would be arrogant to evaluate human abilities based on the empire.

‘There was the exception of the Undefeated King. It wouldn’t be strange if it takes longer than expected.’

Caspar was reminded of the record of the Undefeated King, the person who confounded the empire a long time ago. Nevertheless, he didn’t take into account the loss of his kin. His assessment was that there were too many exaggerations in Madra’s record. It was natural. What idiot in the world would believe that a human slaughtered hundreds of thousands of imperial forces on his own? Even if this was a real person, the possibility of someone like the Undefeated King being in Frontier was close to zero.

Caspar killed the monsters like they were moths and passed the summit of the fourth ridge to reach the middle of the third ridge.

“...!”

Suddenly, an avalanche occurred. Hundreds of snowballs rolled down from the top like a tsunami. The even more spectacular thing was the fact that the volume of the snowballs was growing every minute. Caspar got goosebumps. He realized that his dragon scales would be useless in front of the huge snowballs containing rocks. He would be killed the moment he collided with a snowball.

“Bah!”

The half-draconians weren’t the type to succumb to nature. Caspar snorted to get rid of his fear and spread his wings to fly up. He got motion sickness from the shaking scenery. The snowballs that grew to over 10 meters in volume passed just by the soles of his feet and he could feel their temperature.

“Kuoock...!”

How much time passed? The avalanche stopped as he floated in the sky. Hundreds of snowballs fell from the top to the ground, creating a new mountain.

‘Was it aimed at me?’

The timing of the avalanche was too exquisite to be coincidental. Anxiety rose in Caspar’s heart as he looked at the top of the tranquil mountain. Did Jad’s party get hit in Frontier? Did the humans deliberately cause an avalanche here when they knew the half-draconians were coming? What happened to his kin who had gone to meet Jad?

...He didn’t have such anxieties or suspicions. Caspar didn’t even consider that this was a man-made situation. The sanju existed on each ridge. They were monsters that even Helena was troubled by.

‘The long procession of wagons might’ve caught the attention of the sanju, the master of the mountains.’

The sanju disliked outsiders who entered their home. The half-draconians knew this fact since they first arrived at the mountain ridge. Thus, they memorized the location of the sanju’s lairs and avoided these places as much as possible. This was only possible because they had a handful of elites.

Ordinary humans didn’t have the ability to evade the gaze of the sanju. Jad’s group would’ve led the procession to avoid the lairs of the sanju but the slow and noisy procession of humans might’ve caught the sanju’s attention. If the sanju woke up...

‘The procession would be wiped out.’

Additionally, he would be in danger. The sanju of the Chaos Mountains were beasts mentioned in ancient myths. They were weak compared to the hydra but they were strong and difficult to deal with in their domain. It happened when Caspar was in a hurry to escape from here...

There was a loud noise and a sanju fell down from the top of the mountain. It was also at a tremendous speed.

‘What?’

Caspar was frightened when he met the red and furious eyes of the falling sanju. He never dreamed that the sanju would leave its lair to attack him.

“Dammit!”

Caspar hastily transformed. His body size increased and scales appeared all over his body as he prepared for the attack of the sanju. However, the sanju just passed by Caspar. Then it hit the ground. The creature huddled in the small mountain made by the snowballs and flinched.

“...!”

Caspar belatedly noticed that the gray fur of the sanju was completely dyed red and his eyes widened. The sanju’s fur was completely covered with blood. The sanju was moaning while dying.

‘What?’

In the sanju’s territory, there were rules that were one-sidedly advantageous to the sanju. This was why Helena and her 30 followers decided they couldn’t harm the sanju and avoided them. Nevertheless, the sanju started turning to gray ash. A beast from the myths was dying quietly.

Caspar doubted if he was seeing correctly. He was wary that he had already been cursed by the sanju.

It happened as Caspar’s chaos was reaching the peak...

“How boring.”

A light shone and a man appeared. He gave off a sense of alienation too strange for a human. This smell...

“...A vampire?”

Why was a vampire here? Wasn’t this race cursed so they couldn’t leave their realm? The silver-haired man turned his attention to the vigilant Caspar. Then he smiled and reached out to the sky.

"Here."

Flash!

A magic circle was drawn in the air in an instant and turned red. A dozen humans fell down from the magic circle along with the light. The surrounded Caspar’s tension skyrocketed.

“Aaaack!”

“This is crazy! We can’t fly!”

However, more than half of the humans who surrounded Caspar crashed into the ground. There were a few humans who couldn’t fly who still maintained their dignity. One human hurriedly planted a tree and hung from the branches while another spread out silver wings and slowly descended.

Only two of the people surrounding Caspar maintained a complete flight. It was the unidentified vampire and a black-haired human.

Caspar regained his composure and asked the two people, “Who are you?”

“Shouldn’t you swing your fists before asking a question? A half-draconian is moving his mouth before his hands?”

“...!”

Caspar’s instincts that had been suppressed by being flustered and feeling wary were now seething. He felt a strong sense of struggle toward the silver-haired vampire who was speaking arrogantly to him and swung his claws. However, his claws were shattered and scattered as powder before they even reached the vampire. Caspar was trapped in a storm of sharp winds.

The vampire’s voice could be heard over the storm, “Do you know who I am?”

"How should I know?"

“I showed you this magic yet you don’t know who I am? You are a village lizard who isn’t very knowledgeable.”

“...!”

Caspar’s heart sank. The most arrogant being in the world. The only vampire to have studied human magic. Only one existence came to mind. “B-Braham?”

The storm that surrounded Caspar became violent. He turned to gray ash and became nutrients for Braham’s party. All the items he dropped quietly filled the inventory of the party leader, Grid.