I'll smash you to death!

Inside the sealed chamber, someone watched as the three assailants relentlessly attacked the young soldier, each move meant to kill. Though battered and covered in wounds, the young soldier struggled to evade those nearly impossible strikes, all the while protecting the incapacitated someone and the king behind him. As time wore on—though it hadn’t been long—his stamina drained and blood loss overwhelmed him, causing a subtle misstep.

It was only a small mistake, but in such a critical moment, it all but sealed his fate.

The young soldier could almost sense death approaching, yet he kept his eyes open, never forgetting his duty until the very end.

To protect.

Those two words were the last flicker of thought in his mind as life ebbed away.

The mysterious figure stood in the back, holding his elegant pose. Only after seeing the soldier collapse did a faint smile curl at his lips, his right hand exerting a subtle force as if pressing down on something unseen.

But the anticipated obliteration failed to arrive. Even the three attackers couldn’t advance to finish off the king; their feet were pinned to the floor as if nailed, unable to move, their eyes silently beseeching the mysterious figure for help.

Yet the mysterious figure paid no attention to his subordinates. He remained motionless, staring intently in someone’s direction, as though there lay a five-million cash check.

The specially designed mage-control barrier was utterly destroyed. At the spot where someone and the king stood, a dazzling white light surged upward. An immense power, unlike anything the mysterious figure had ever felt, erupted with the light, effortlessly shattering the barrier that had reduced someone’s fighting ability to nothing. The surrounding earth and walls seemed drawn by the force, slowly fracturing, as countless tiny soil particles gathered toward the energy, submitting to its dominance.

The mysterious figure reacted swiftly, tracing a small magic array in the air. Before this unknown energy could inflict real harm, the best approach was to destroy its source before it could be unleashed! Pressed for time, he hastily sketched a powerful compact array to disrupt someone’s spellcasting.

The small array was quickly completed. Like Lance, the mysterious figure was an electric mage, and the array gleamed golden, reminiscent of a freshly baked wheat cake. Yet this was a deadly wheat cake. With a wave of his hand, the golden magic elements within the “cake” surged wildly, transforming the flat array into a three-dimensional, all-encompassing structure.

With a flick of his wand, a massive bolt of lightning, formed from the “cake,” swept toward someone in an imposing, ruthless assault. The intense current caused the three henchmen, immobilized by someone’s strange energy, to howl in agony, as if being slaughtered. One of them collapsed, charred and lifeless, but the mysterious figure showed no intention of stopping. Instead, he intensified his magic, eyes ignoring every pleading glance from his subordinates, fixed unwaveringly on someone. At this moment, he desired only to hear a sound from her—even a faint cry of pain, a sneer, anything. The worst outcome was exactly what was happening now.

No movement, no sound; yet the energy gathering before him grew ever stronger, undisturbed by his interference, even beginning to threaten him.

Impossible. How could that insignificant girl break through my magic barrier and even exert pressure on me? The mysterious figure’s face twisted in disbelief.

This barrier was the culmination of nearly all his training—a device specifically developed to control human mages and suppress their spellcasting. Each barrier contained the highest-level magical power from top-tier magical beasts. Any human mage with lesser power would be trapped, unable to cast spells (or only harm themselves if they tried), left completely vulnerable.

Yet the mediocre mage before him had shattered one of his precious barriers. Had years of effort been rendered useless, unable to contain even a young girl?

Meanwhile, the same self-doubt plagued someone. When the young soldier fell, she felt as though something detonated in her heart. Since arriving in this world, she had witnessed too many deaths—first staring in shock as Elsa self-destructed to kill the young lady (how many people have already forgotten about her…), then watching countless deaths alongside Ringdrop. She had thought herself accustomed to death, even her own, believing it wouldn’t move her much—just settling the score early, as it were.

But the young soldier collapsed right before her eyes. One moment, he seemed unstoppable, blessed by protagonist’s luck and cheats, and the next, he fell like cannon fodder. Her mind thundered, and a wild urge to tear every enemy apart surged within her.

Instinctively, she clenched her fists. Though she knew the barrier rendered her powerless, she couldn’t control the boiling magic inside her. Using the most straightforward method, she gathered every magic element she could absorb—not caring whether it was a good skill or a useless one, active or passive, she loaded them all into her quick bar, just as she had done long ago as an MMO novice, mashing every key when monsters appeared.

Come, just try to take a step forward—if any of you dare, you’ll never leave this place alive!

She felt as though flames burned in her eyes, unaware that the magic elements she collected had fused together, nor that, upon merging, they received her command and easily broke through the barrier, creeping underground to capture the three who intended to kill the king.

She simply gathered them together by instinct, her mind fixated on hurling a massive magic sphere to obliterate those villains.