For the next two days, Lee Shin-Woo had been constantly jostled while riding on Jin's back, and when he finally looked up from Lee Man Bok's diary, he suddenly realized that...

"This is a bit weird."

"That's a relief. I thought the same."

They were running across a mountainous area. The rugged landscapes befitted a level 4 danger zone, and everywhere they looked, they saw mountains, hills, canyons, and cliffs, so they couldn't figure out exactly where they were without consulting their minimap.

The strange thing was when they actually checked their minimap, it seemed like they hadn't made any progress even though a few hours had passed!

"We should've gotten out by now."

"Are we lost?"

"No, we're not since we’ve been passing by things we haven't seen before. If I have to hazard a guess..."

Surely not, Lee Shin-Woo thought as he extended a hand to sense the flow of mana. Mm, as expected, there was something wrong with it. The inflow rate was too high, causing the existing mana to feel unusually twisted. Even if they took into account that it was a level 4 danger zone, the area was still too dense with concentrated mana.

"I didn't think it was possible, but...the density of mana is so high that the space is naturally expanding."

"Like the training facility?"

"It's expanding much less than the training facility, but yes, it’s still growing rather significantly. I assume that's why it feels like we're not getting anywhere when we look at the minimap."

"It's not a dungeon or even an artificial facility, yet the environment naturally expands. The Empire's really no joke..."

If this could happen, anything was possible in the Empire. Like what they were experiencing right now. The limited space was expanding, and the natural environment thrived within. The space itself was also strangely interconnected. If that wasn’t the case, there must be a subspace hidden somewhere...

"Maybe the Giants' domain is similar to a dungeon or the facility. After all, I've never heard of the Giants' domain from our seniors before..."

"But Shin-Woo, shouldn't we be worrying about getting out of this place, not reaching the Giants' domain?"

"Even I don't know how to cut down space as it expands."

"But at this rate, we'll just be wandering around for the next few days. That's fine with me, but won't it throw a wrench in your plans?"

"Mm..."

It was a fair point. Lee Shin-Woo shrugged and activated his mana. There was something he could fall back on. Mana Bone had leveled up through Bone Reinforcement, and Lee Shin-Woo had gained the ability to resist spatial magic; he definitely remembered seeing the message.

It might've formed naturally, but this is still clearly spatial magic. No...the mana's even more primitive.

He couldn't categorize the mana by element. It had a unique flow, but still bore similarities to mana used for spatial magic. That was exactly what made spatial magic so difficult to sense and resist.

The flow of mana... If I can sense a portion of it and twist it around...

This wasn't something Lee Shin-Woo could resolve by filling the surrounding area with his mana, as there was too vast a ground to cover. Lee Shin-Woo needed to find where the flow of mana was weak—in other words, the part he could break.

"Almost done?"

"It's not that simple."

"You can do it."

Lee Shin-Woo saying it was hard was enough to make Jin give up on figuring out how it worked. He went back to minding his own business, leaving Lee Shin-Woo to think while he continued to run forward.

Jin planned on laughing at Lee Shin-Woo if he were to get them out of here before Lee Shin-Woo could come up with something.

"Ah, so that's what it is."

But unfortunately, Lee Shin-Woo, who was talented in magic, suddenly realized what 'resisting' actually meant.

To be exact, he realized that the way he looked at the world and the mana within it should be changed, as well as how that was linked to spatial magic.

"Yeah... No matter how overpowering the mana controlling this space is, not all of the mana follows that flow. Moreover, from the perspective of the entire world, this flow is nothing more than a single branch. In other words, I need to identify the main current, the original flow of mana."

"Mm, I have no idea what you're saying."

"For example, a checkered coat is extremely popular for a single season, but you have to find the guy who always wears the same plain shirt."

"That makes sense!?"

Lee Shin-Woo's explanation made Jin shake and yell in shock. He simply left Jin alone and earnestly began to look for the plain shirt...the original flow of mana.

And he began to understand what it meant to resist the space's mana. After all, the overlapping mana that twisted and manipulated the space could only be resisted if he classified and detected it!

"But it's still really hard. Damn...!"

"Hey, you know that old-fashioned people usually stick to their habit and don't change."

"Who's the one looking for the plain shirt right now?"

However, Jin's words were actually helpful. Lee Shin-Woo turned his attention from the misleading flow of mana to concentrate on the continuous flow that was hidden.

"Shin-Woo?"

"..."

"Shin-Woo, are you okay?"

Sight alone wasn’t enough, of course. He had to sense the mana with his entire body, and he didn't submit even when the mana threatened to carry him away; Lee Shin-Woo attempted to grasp the other flow of mana that came towards him.

He succeeded even though it was his first attempt. Lee Shin-Woo didn't know how much time had passed as he lost himself in his senses to focus entirely on the mana flow. In reality, the act had taken him hours.

"Are you almost done...?"

"...Yeah, I think I'm done."

At some point, Lee Shin-Woo broke out of his deep musings and opened his eyes wide. It seemed absurd that someone would be able to grasp the concept of space in only a few hours, but it was what Lee Shin-Woo had done.

"Run forward, Jin."

"That's what I've been doing."

"No, it'll be different now."

Lee Shin-Woo placed a hand atop Jin's back and connected their mana together. Lee Shin-Woo had borrowed mana from Jin this way when he was running low in the past.

However, he wasn't borrowing mana this time. Instead, he was combining their mana into one.

"Alright, now the main current of mana will guide us."

"I'm not really sure what's going on, but I guess I'll just run."

Jin replied honestly and ran. Then the surrounding landscape quickly began to change. Jin was, of course, always incredibly fast, and the landscapes always passed in a blur as he galloped, but the scale was different this time. Within the blink of an eye, they flew past mountains, rocks, valleys, and cliffs.

"Wait, what's going on...?"

"It doesn't matter how we move in this space. What does matter is which mana flow we follow."

Lee Shin-Woo's goblin fire swayed tremendously as he explained to the shocked Jin. To be honest, he'd just gotten a feel for it himself, so he couldn’t explain in detail even if he wanted to.

"I don't get it."

"It's tough for me to explain, so just think of it as us taking a shortcut."

It was roughly similar to the way Scar of the Wind (Kaze no Kizu) in Inuyasha worked, where Inuyasha found the rift between yokai auras and swung the Tessaiga at it to release an energy wave. That was what he wanted to say at least, but it seemed like Jin wouldn't understand the reference, so he decided against it.

"Hoo, I feel a lot better now. Our spot on the minimap is finally moving."

"We're getting close to the Giants' domain. As you’ve said, we’ve avoided wasting more time."

Of course, Lee Shin-Woo had checked the chatroom and found out that Ethan Cruz hadn't finished formulating his plan. After all, it wasn't easy to find one of the twelve generals and lead the general to them.

Lee Shin-Woo was more proactively pursuing his goal. He didn’t know when Ethan Cruz would call for them, so he wanted to push on with the task, dealing with all the undead heroes as quickly as possible.

"Is this the right way?"

"Yeah. Run."

The Giants' domain. It'd be great if he could get what he wanted there... Looking up, Lee Shin-Woo's goblin fire swayed tremendously for a moment. There was an incredibly large snow-covered mountain in between their destination and them.

"What's with this all of a sudden...?"

"Should we go another way?"

"Seems like something's inside, right? Let's go a different way."

Normally, Lee Shin-Woo would say, 'It's a chance to raise my Ice Resistance to high rank.' And he would tell Jin to charge forward. However, the situation was different. Regrettably, he thought that avoiding it was the better move.

Plus, with a mountain this distinctive, the other seniors would’ve been lured in.

Lee Shin-Woo opened a private chat with Prince and asked about the snow-covered mountain in the level 4 danger zone. There was way too much he didn't want to reveal to Ethan Cruz, so he avoided the chatroom.

[Prince Altania: A snow-covered mountain? What snow-covered mountain?]

"You don't know about it?"

[Prince Altania: I've never even heard about it. Neither have I heard my seniors talk about it... Wait a sec, I'll ask Lloyd.]

"No, it's fine. I just saw it in passing."

If it were a famous area, Prince would know what he was talking about. As Lee Shin-Woo was concerned about information leak, he spoke curtly to stop her, and Prince acted pompous like always.

[Prince Altania: Seriously... Now you're calling me for such trivial matters? It seems like you really want to hear my voice, but unfortunately, I don’t use my real voice so easily.]

"I'd like to hear it when we meet again."

[Prince Altania: Huh!? Keut...!]

Prince was obviously flustered, and he took the chance to quickly say 'see you later' before leaving the chat. As expected, she was fun to tease. Lee Shin-Woo smiled with delight, and Jin began his 'thorny rodeo' again.

"Hey, stop for a sec."

"I'm not going to stop until you start crying or beg... Huh?"

When Jin, who had been tormenting Lee Shin-Woo with Steel Heart, innocently raised his head...he saw another snow-covered mountain, like the one they'd encountered before.

"Did I go the wrong way?"

"No, you went the right way. We were definitely trying to go around it."

"Then that means there's something wrong with the space again, right? Why are there so many of these things in the level 4 danger zone!?"

It was quite frustrating to Jin, whose original wish was to run without pause. Lee Shin-Woo looked back and gently closed his eyes. When he opened them again to look forward, he shook his head and said, "I don't think it's a different mountain. I think it's all part of one mountain."

"One mountain? So you're saying that we got here because you solved the puzzle?"

"Yeah, to be exact..."

Lee Shin-Woo sensed the flow of mana that led them to the snow-covered mountain. The mana was now fused with Jin’s and Lee Shin-Woo's mana and flowing quite naturally. Even if they were to go another way, the flow of mana would always lead them straight back to this mountain.

"The area we went past was designed to hide this snow-covered mountain... If we hadn’t followed that flow of mana, we'd never have even found this place. It’s completely hidden within a complex criss-cross of mana flows."

"So what do we do now? Should we go up the mountain?"

"That's probably our best bet… It seems to be what we've been looking for."

Lee Shin-Woo checked his minimap once more. A smile of surprise spread on his face.

As expected, the marks indicating the two remaining undead heroes were inside the snow-covered mountain.