"M-Me?!"
"Roji?!"
The rejection was written far more clearly on Eve's face than on Rosenitte's. Still facing each other like that, Eve and Rosenitte both made awkward, uncomfortable expressions.
Rosenitte was the first to sharply turn her head away. She directed her refusal at Brigitte.
"Monsters are pouring out over there. And you want me to go in there? No. I don't want to. I'm not going."
Brigitte spoke without even sparing Rosenitte a glance.
"I don't care whether it's Derrick or Roji. Eve, do as you please."
"I'm saying I don't want to go because it's dangerous."
"Come to think of it, you'll have to take a knight order with you as well. In that case, from my side, I'd be more grateful if you took Roji."
"Excuse me, Betty Unnie. I said I don't want to. I'm not going!"
"Derrick's knight order is also my knight order, so how could I entrust it to you, Eve?"
"Are you listening to me?!"
Pretending not to hear Rosenitte's shrill voice at all, Brigitte looked only at Eve as she spoke. This kind of blatant dismissal and disregard was something Rosenitte had never experienced in her life.
'What is this? I'm the White Rose of the Empire. How can she do this to me?'
In the political arena, the social world's prestige meant nothing. Being treated like a mere tool to be traded depending on conditions made Rosenitte tremble with humiliation.
Meanwhile, Eve was agonizing deeply as she looked at Rosenitte.
'Taking her is right. It is… but...'
A creeping revulsion and disgust rose from the pit of her stomach, tormenting Eve. She felt like sighing.
"There's no time. Choose quickly. Derrick, or Roji?"
'Ah… do you really have to make me say it out loud?'
The answer was already decided.
Eve opened her mouth reluctantly. Separate from how sick it made her feel, her judgment faithfully followed reason.
"Give me Roji— no, I'll take Roji."
She almost bit her tongue, speaking without thinking.
And so, Rosenitte's affiliation—trembling as if furious—was decided.
Brigitte snorted and asked,
"You said three days. What supplies do you need?"
"Please give me one wagon."
"Fine. Will you give the orders yourself?"
"Yes."
In that moment, Eve thought—ironically—that this might have been the most sister-like, almost warm conversation she'd ever had with Brigitte.
Shaking off her personal feelings, Eve moved. She abandoned the carriage, took Snowlette's horse, and swung up into the saddle.
"My lie—"
"It's okay, Viscount Lucciad. Go on ahead and wait. I'll be going in first."
After exchanging a gentle farewell glance with Anais, Eve looked forward. Then she commanded in a strong voice.
"Jingbeol and Baegya will enter through the gate. Byeokhyeol and Hwanyeom will support from the rear—help us break through."
The knight orders began to move in perfect unison. Jingbeol and Baegya carved a path and drove into the gate.
The breakthrough gained speed quickly. Along with the knights, three horses also charged forward. One carried Eve, one carried Mikael, and one carried Sylvestian with Rosenitte riding together.
Just as the entire party was being sucked into the gate—
The cube that served as the gate's key was pulled out.
Grrrrrk—
With a vibration that felt like it would rattle skulls, the seal moved rapidly, seeking to return to its original place.
As the gap narrowed, the monsters forced themselves forward even more desperately.
Black wings and limbs—sometimes even heads—were crushed as they slammed into the closing space.
Koo-woong!
At last, the gate interlocked shut behind them.
Eve closed her eyes in the foul, murky air—then opened them again. It was time to face the world beyond the wall.
Chapter 28. The Mid-Grade Homunculi and the Exiles' Village
The Gray Wall outpost base—Dandelion.
Though it was called an outpost base, it didn't even properly have walls or watchtowers. To speak plainly, this place was nothing more than a village surrounded by a wooden palisade.
With almost no outside support, they had to survive through self-sufficiency, so they couldn't devote themselves solely to military activity either.
The soldiers made up of mid-grade homunculi were closer to a militia than an army, and they were constantly busy going out into the monsters' land to fight, hunt, and gather.
The human exiles stayed in the village and handled activities other than combat. Using the resources the homunculi brought back, they repaired buildings, made food, and cultivated famine crops and medicinal herbs.
Setting aside the fact that it was a place where life constantly hung by a thread, the village's infrastructure and standard of living were far superior to that of the low-grade homunculi's village.
That was because the mid-grade homunculi of Dandelion were permitted to use magic, and the human exiles could use alchemy.
In fact, about half of the humans here were people who had been confined in Dandelion due to the charges their ancestors had committed hundreds of years ago.
And that charge was the stigma of being "witches."
There had once been a time on the continent when gods existed, and holy power worked miracles.
Back then, alchemy was regarded not as a field of study, but as an impure, demonic sorcery. The greed of priests who wanted to strengthen their theocracy gave birth to a frenzied witch-hunt.
At the time, the Kingdom of Hadelamid—still only a kingdom, and too busy minding the temple's gaze—could not fully stop it.
Its best option was to propose exile instead of cruel burning at the stake; that was the most the kingdom could do.
In those days, people could still live where they were exiled. Because there were no Demon Dragons in the world then, Dandelion was nothing more than an ordinary village.
The tragedy began when Ambroksa—a Lord-class Demon Dragon—was sealed near Dandelion, turning the region into a lair of monsters.
Overnight, Dandelion was called an outpost base and was forced into battles of life and death.
As "support," each year they sent a small amount of food and weapons—along with young homunculi who knew nothing of the world.
In the natives' eyes, those homunculi, too, were exiles.
Shared hardship in a harsh environment naturally brought people closer.
The homunculi didn't know how to fight together in coordinated unity, but they quickly learned how to live in cooperation with others.
That was the background behind the formation of a certain level of bond and collective consciousness within Dandelion.
For as many as three hundred years, the human exiles and mid-grade homunculi had struggled for survival, barely holding on.
But now, it seemed that history was about to come to an end.
"Is the end coming...?"
"Ah… it's over now..."
Watching the black monster army surge in, homunculi and humans sighed together.
Every year right after the summer rainy season they endured a difficult time, but never before had so many monsters surged in that they blackened the very field of view like this.
'Even if we fight with everything we have… we can't win anyway.'
Seeing the black mass filling not only the forest's edge but even the sky, the residents lost their will to fight.
Even the mid-grade homunculi—trained to fight—lowered their weapons to the ground.
"O god, please save us."
A human exile said it.
They weren't calling upon the god who had driven them out to begin with. That god from those days had long since abandoned the world and left.
In a harsh environment, humans sought something to rely on spiritually.
Dandelion was no exception. A folk belief had been passed down: someday, a being would appear to save the outpost base.
Among the humans, a few who had strongly inherited talent for alchemy and magic fanned the flames of this atmosphere.
Claiming it was prophecy, they went around shouting, "Soon, the King of humans and homunculi will appear!"
"O savior, please..."
The atmosphere of wishing for a miracle spread rapidly.
All the humans and homunculi gathered in the square turned their eyes away from the horrifying front—and looked to the rear instead.
In their view, the towering Gray Wall and the gate were looking down at them.
But before long, the residents' eyes sank into despair.
A door that never opened except when supplies and homunculi were coming in.
That wasn't a door. It was a "wall," a shape that deceived people like a door, doing nothing but torturing them with hope.
Clang.
An iron sword slipped from someone's hand and plunged to the ground. What did it mean for a soldier to throw away their weapon?
With that metallic sound as the signal, despair spread like a plague.
Crack—!
Creak—!
Right then, the palisade collapsed. The monster army began to flood into the village.
"U-Uaaagh!"
Human screams full of pain and the monsters' bone-chilling roars blended together, turning the village into a living hell.
'So this is how we die in the end.'
They were fated to become offerings to this horrifying demonic pandemonium. Everyone's eyes sank like they were being swallowed by a swamp.
And then, at that very moment—
Grrrrrk!
A rumbling of the earth—one they had felt before—reached them.
The residents of Dandelion turned back to the rear again, and their eyes widened to their limits.
The gate, which had seemed like it would exist forever as a wall—
Now, exceptionally, it was opening a gap.
Kiiieeeek!
It seemed the monsters' desire to escape the Demon Dragon's land was even stronger than humans'.
As soon as the passage to the outside world opened, the black monster army changed targets and shifted its course.
The monsters' instinct to escape through a gap in a gate that wasn't even fully open yet was ferocious.
They shoved and trampled each other, frantically burrowing toward the Labyrinth.
Thanks to that, many of Dandelion's residents barely managed to survive.
But they quickly realized they still couldn't feel relief.
"T-The sky...!"
The distant sky was packed with black dots. Every one of them was a winged monster.
As if the gate itself were summoning them, even more monsters were pouring into Dandelion.
A few with quick judgment shouted,
"I-If a bottleneck happens here, this place will become a wasteland!"
"Abandon the village and run— huh?"
Then another abnormality occurred at the gate.
The monsters trying to escape through it were gradually pushed back—until, finally, beings that were entering in the opposite direction appeared as well.
The residents of Dandelion doubted their own eyes.
Beings that, against the monsters' onslaught, were deliberately entering this hellish land—
They were an armed knight order.
Strong fighters—looking to number at least forty—cut down monsters as they advanced without hesitation.
They handled even monsters that were difficult for mid-grade homunculi to face with ease, widening the front line. The monsters could be seen faltering and being pushed back.
'R-Relief troops? Really?'
It was the miracle they had longed for, yet it didn't feel real.
Around then, even three horses—likely carrying commanders—entered the outpost base.
As that happened, the gate closed.
Koo-woooong!
They'd been standing there, stunned by the appearance of these unfamiliar beings—
When a cry that shook the sky snapped the residents of Dandelion back to themselves.
The aerial monsters were no longer mere dots; they were close enough for their shapes to be recognized.
Someone pointed to one part of the sky, face turning pale, and shouted,
"T-That is…! A Balrog! There's a Balrog!"
There was even a powerful monster one would rarely encounter.
But the long-awaited relief troops were too busy executing the ground monsters—and didn't even spare attention for the monsters covering the sky.
'Hey! Look up, will you!'
Just as Dandelion's residents were about to despair at their narrow field of view—
Among the reinforcements, there was a girl whose presence stood out.