The joking ends here.

As the third sun sank, the vines seemed to lose their strength. One after another, they retreated beneath the earth. Night Frost took Andi and Fertini toward the location of the rift.

“This is where the rift should be. But why can’t we see even a trace of it?”

Fertini relayed Andi’s words to Night Frost. Night Frost understood at once. She casually made up a few lines and told Andi her guess.

Andi fell into deep thought. In her eyes, Night Frost was the Calamity Dragon. A dragon bearing such a noble title had no reason to deceive her.

If this really was where the rift had been, then in theory, traces of its tear should still be visible even after ten or twenty years. The damage caused by the void to its surroundings was practically irreversible.

Yet everything here was as fresh as new.

It was as if someone had deliberately covered it up.

“Everything here is burying the rift. They don’t want the creatures of this world to pass through it and reach another world.”

But what difference was there between doing nothing and waiting for death?

“Aren’t you waiting for your companions? Didn’t you say several of them went to the Elven race?”

Andi shook her head and revealed her palm.

Four patterned marks had once covered it. But now, not a single one remained.

With those four marks, Andi could contact each Sorceress who had traveled to the Forest of Elves. She had contacted them at regular intervals, four times in total.

But at the other end of every call, there had been nothing but chaos.

Without a doubt, something had happened to them.

Not one of them had survived.

Andi had no intention of waiting for them anymore. Compared to reaching another world, whether they lived or died was utterly unimportant.

Before leaving, Andi had summoned every Sorceress. If the rift appeared, they were to gather here immediately and enter the spatial rift.

She believed those young-looking Sorceresses could carry out her orders without the slightest mistake.

“I’m ready. We can start at any time.”

The method of tearing open a rift was simple, yet difficult.

The simple part was tearing it open.

The difficult part was tearing open a rift that had been sealed for so long.

Night Frost nodded. Even she could begin whenever she wished.

When Fertini heard that the two of them were about to tear open the rift, she hurried far away. She was terrified of being caught in the aftermath.

Like the Sorceress they had encountered before, Andi had a semitransparent Magic Stone embedded in her chest.

She compressed the Abyssal Aura within her body. Once it reached a certain limit, she released it.

The Magic Stone in her chest burst into Black Flame.

Dense Abyssal Aura coiled around her body. As it spread outward, it formed her Magic Armor.

The armor was filled with a mysterious, shadowy charm. Deep black was its primary color, like the darkest twilight in the night sky. It gave off a solemn, dignified feeling.

The skirt was broad and layered with thin veils, creating a sense of depth and movement. Each layer was slightly translucent, revealing the faint sheen of skin beneath and adding a touch of sensuality and mystery.

Andi’s aura wasn’t particularly powerful.

Even if she didn’t reveal it herself, Night Frost could still tell that Andi’s abilities weren’t related to combat. Reaching this level had probably taken her quite a few special methods.

Night Frost was suddenly somewhat reluctant to unseal herself.

When Andi unsealed her power, she released an intense amount of Abyssal Aura. But their systems were different.

Andi used Abyssal Aura.

Night Frost used a mixture of the two.

Besides, Night Frost was a dragon now. She wasn’t a Magic Maiden or a Sorceress. Unsealing herself would inevitably make Andi suspicious.

But Night Frost was a dragon now.

Although she possessed only half the title of Calamity Dragon, she could still use the Calamity Dragon’s power even if she couldn’t use the abilities of a Magic Maiden.

She had already left humanity behind the moment she entered Chapter Three.

Night Frost stretched out her hand.

Dark scales covered her fair palm. Her nails extended outward, and her entire hand drew closer to the shape of a dragon’s claw.

That was the limit of what she could do without unsealing herself.

The aura erupting from her body was no weaker than Andi’s.

In fact, it was even slightly stronger.

According to the theory from the Lower Realm, tearing open an Abyssal Rift required a sufficient amount of Abyssal Aura.

And now, with Andi present, they shouldn’t lack any.

The two of them divided the work.

Andi would inject the Abyssal Aura.

Night Frost would tear open the rift.

Andi’s strength wasn’t particularly high, but the Abyssal Aura within her seemed endless, like a river flowing from a distant source.

If she had been in the Lower Realm, tearing open an Abyssal Rift would probably have been easy.

Unfortunately, this was the Mythic Abyss.

Both Mana and Abyssal Aura were unnaturally dense here. Worse, they were currently in an open area.

Even opening the rift by the width of a hair was difficult.

Night Frost had no idea how such a massive rift had originally been torn open here.

As long as Andi reopened the rift even slightly, Night Frost would use all her strength to pull it apart.

Li Dogegg and the Eye Orb kept watch over their surroundings. If anything happened, they would immediately warn Night Frost.

Andi’s Abyssal Aura gathered beneath the forest.

At this moment, the Abyssal Aura here had already grown denser than the Mana. It forced a large amount of Mana to either side.

In theory, there was more than enough Mana in this place.

Yet the rift still showed no reaction at all.

Andi began to wonder if this was really the location of the rift. Otherwise, with such dense Abyssal Aura, the space should have begun to ripple long ago.

But Night Frost’s gaze remained firm.

She believed Li Dogegg had no reason to deceive her. She also felt that the Abyssal Aura was sufficient. The rift should have opened by now.

And yet, there was still no movement.

The Eye Orb found it strange as well.

He looked around. The only thing that seemed unusual was the vegetation on the ground.

That had been what he and Night Frost found strange when they first arrived.

These trees were too new. There were no traces of void power acting upon their surfaces.

“Night Frost, attack the trees below. Use Black Flame!”

The Eye Orb believed that, since they couldn’t find the problem, everything they were doing was pointless.

He couldn’t think of any useful solution. But if they beat down everything suspicious, they would at least know whether something was wrong.

Night Frost told Andi to maintain her output.

A wisp of Black Flame appeared in her palm. Empowered by the Sorceress power and Abyssal Aura within her body, it condensed into an enormous sphere of fire.

Night Frost gathered all her strength and hurled it toward the forest below.

The massive fireball fell from the sky and slammed into the forest. One towering tree after another was burned to ashes.

The impact left a deep crater in the ground.

When the dust and smoke cleared, Night Frost could finally see what lay beneath—

The tumor-like growths hidden in the soil fled outward because of the Black Flame. But they left behind a tangled mass of roots.

Those roots didn’t grow downward.

They extended diagonally upward.

Night Frost followed their direction with her gaze, but she found nothing. The mass of roots seemed to have no end, as if it had simply vanished.

After thinking for a moment, the Eye Orb reached a conclusion.

“These tumor-like growths must be sending the vines into the void through some method we don’t understand. The space beyond the void should be crawling with vines. They’re the real reason the rift hasn’t opened.”

Night Frost believed the Eye Orb’s guess was correct.

These vines hadn’t even spared the void.

Once again, Night Frost felt how troublesome they were.

She made her decision at once and added more fuel to the vines.

The flames spread along the vines and advanced into the void.

As long as they burned away the section beneath them, the vines behind the rift should loosen. Then, with the rift’s own tension, they ought to be able to tear open a gap in space.

But the tumor-like growths all around them refused to accept that.

They had spent so long extending their roots into the void. How could they allow Night Frost to burn everything away in just a few minutes?

The Calamity Dragon’s flames were certainly terrifying.

But Night Frost hadn’t reached that level yet.

With this single wisp of Black Flame, how many tumor-like growths could she kill?

One?

A hundred?

Ten thousand?

As long as they kept her here, there would be no Calamity Dragon left in this world.

The tumor-like growths no longer intended to flee.

They were afraid of the Calamity Dragon, of course. But there was only one Calamity Dragon.

As for them, they covered every forest throughout the Abyss. Their numbers were impossible to count.

If each one lashed Night Frost once, they could beat her to death.

The tumor-like growths seemed to lose their fear.

Their vines dragged other vines toward Night Frost. Their strength was weak, but their resolve was firm.

So what if she was the Calamity Dragon?

So what if she killed countless tumors?

So what if she was powerful?

They would slaughter her and show her exactly how it was done!

Night Frost’s lips twitched.

Why was the style of these tumor-like growths so different from those in the Forest of Elves?

The tumor-like growths in the Forest of Elves were unbelievably strong. Each one could contend with Chapter Three alone.

The ones here weren’t very powerful, but they gave Night Frost the feeling of a righteous army.

If Night Frost could have known what they were thinking, she would definitely have complained.

Just who was the villain here?

Originally, Night Frost hadn’t planned to attack these annoying creatures.

But they had surrounded her themselves and were interfering with her great return.

In that case, she had no choice but to wipe them all out!

The vines seemed to sense the aura rising from Night Frost’s body.

Once again, they scattered in every direction.

Night Frost froze completely.

What the hell were these tumor-like things doing?

Taking advantage of the opportunity, Night Frost ordered the Sorceresses beneath her feet to retreat toward the scorched earth. She instructed them not to come any closer.

Fertini also understood that a major battle was about to begin. She obediently carried out Night Frost’s orders.

This time, the tumor-like growths didn’t flee.

They used their vines to break through the trees and burrow into their trunks.

Very soon, the trees came alive.

They gathered toward Night Frost once more.

“I didn’t expect you to be this clever. But tree bark won’t stop my flames.”

That was what she said.

But the flames would burn the bark first.

The tumor-like growths were hiding in the deepest parts, and the bark gave them a chance to approach Night Frost.

At this moment, the ground beneath Night Frost’s feet had become a sea of flames.

The charred bark was flung into the air from the ground upward. The tumor-like growths inside burst through the bark and swung their vines toward Night Frost.

There were simply too many of them.

Night Frost could crush them with a single pinch of empty space.

But killing one group of tumor-like growths couldn’t stop the endless army pouring toward her.

“This is getting really troublesome…”

At that moment, Andi called out.

The rift, which had been silent for a long time, finally tore open a gap.