Celeste nudged Freya softly on the shoulder, her voice unusually gentle. "Did something happen in the monster zone?"
Freya didn’t respond at first.
But her eye flickered—just for a moment.
Everyone present felt it. A shift in the air. An emotion too heavy to ignore.
Something absolutely had happened.
Amelia quietly moved closer, her tone soft but firm. She sat beside Freya and gently took one of her hands in her own, squeezing it reassuringly.
"Hey... you can share with us. We’re your friends, Freya."
Freya turned her head slowly, looking at Amelia. Her amethyst eyes shimmered faintly, a glassy film forming over them.
She looked down at their joined hands.
She was holding back, barely holding on.
Evelyn stepped forward, kneeling down beside her. Her voice lacked its usual edge. It was open. Honest. "If you want to cry, just cry. We’re not here to judge. You don’t have to carry it all."
Freya shook her head. "I... don’t deserve to cry."
The words left her like a whisper but struck like a thunderclap.
Even Celeste, who always had something to say, found herself stunned.
"...What?" Evelyn asked, her brows knitting. "What the hell do you mean by that?"
Lilith was the one to regain her calm first. Her golden eyes narrowed with concern, her voice unwavering. "You’ll have to explain that. Then we’ll judge whether or not you deserve it."
Freya met her gaze. She saw no mockery. No pressure. Just understanding. Silent and vast like an ocean.
She wiped at her eyes, inhaling slowly.
"...Okay," she whispered. "I’ll tell you."
Everyone settled in around her—Amelia still holding her hand, Evelyn at her side, Celeste seated cross-legged in front of her, and Lilith quietly listening with a steady presence.
Freya took a deep breath, and when she spoke, her voice was layered—with sincerity, with emotion, and with something heavier.
"I was teleported to a mountainous region... one filled with magma rivers and steaming pits. The air was thick, like breathing through smoke. It was dangerous and volatile. That was the monster zone I landed in."
She paused, trying to steady her breath.
"There were others there too. A few panicked, a few ready to fight. That zone was full of infighting. It’s known... that some students kill others for points. That fear was always there, gnawing at the back of my mind."
She looked up briefly, then back down.
"I almost died. A group of three tried to ambush me during the first few hours. But another group found me. They saved me from a ★★ rank Magma Crawler."
Her lips twitched faintly—half a smile, half a wince.
"I was cautious. But they were kind. One was a healer. Another a knight-type. The third just wanted to survive. We ended up forming a party. Hunting together. Guarding each other’s backs. It wasn’t perfect, but... for a time, we had peace."
Amelia’s grip tightened on her hand.
"We explored carefully. Fought smart. Even managed to down a ★★ Magma Chimera by the end of Day One. Our coordination was getting better. Spirits were high. But..."
"...Everything changed when we heard it."
"’It’?" Celeste asked.
Freya nodded, her expression darkening.
"A sound. Like... a collision between two titans. A quake followed. Not natural. Not a monster’s cry. A sound so deep it made the cliffs shake beneath our feet. We couldn’t ignore it. No one could. Curiosity drove us. We followed it."
She paused. Her fingers trembled slightly.
"And there, across the charred ridge, we saw him. Alone. Standing in front of a ★★★ Echo Drake."
That name silenced them.
"Cassius," Freya said. "He was fighting it. Alone."
Amelia’s breath caught.
"He didn’t just fight it," Freya said slowly. "He overwhelmed it. Controlled the fight. Every move was calculated. Every attack clean. He wasn’t flustered. Wasn’t afraid. It was like watching... a monster kill another monster."
Freya wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, inhaling sharply as if trying to trap her sobs inside her chest. But her voice still wavered when she continued, soft yet raw.
"After some light banter... I invited him to join us."
She looked down at her lap, shoulders hunched.
"I was still suspicious of everyone. I didn’t trust anyone completely—not even the ones who saved me. But I felt... safe around Cassius."
Her voice thinned, almost like she didn’t believe she deserved to say it.
"He accepted. Didn’t say much, just nodded. And after some wandering, we found a cave nestled between some molten cliffs. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for shelter.
Everyone settled inside, resting in groups, but... Cassius stayed outside. Alone. Sitting at the mouth of the cave, watching the horizon like he was expecting something worse."
There was a momentary silence.
No one interrupted her. Not even Celeste.
"The next day, I took the lead. I thought—no—I wanted to do something that mattered. So I came up with a plan to hunt monsters to help everyone raise their scores and secure admissions. But..."
"I was using a map I picked up from another student. It was outdated. Unmarked. I didn’t even know if it was reliable. But I didn’t tell anyone about that."
Amelia’s hand tightened around Freya’s, but she didn’t say a word.
"Cassius warned me," Freya said, her voice softer now. "He told me to tell them. To be honest about it. Said people deserve the truth before they put their lives on the line. And so... I did. I told the group the map might be off, but they trusted me anyway. They still wanted to go."
Her lips trembled again.
"We ended up heading toward what we believed was a low-threat zone. There were no lava pits there, just layers of blackened rock and crevices deep enough to swallow a house. When we arrived, everything seemed quiet. Peaceful even."
"Too peaceful. Then we understood it was a different place Black Ridge Mountain. We had no information about the place but we still moved forward."
Evelyn’s jaw tightened, and Lilith’s fingers curled slightly into fists.
"At first, we encountered nothing but minor serpents. Rank ★ and a few ★★ at most. Cassius took them out without breaking a sweat."
Freya’s voice began to hollow.
She shuddered, visibly.
"A Rank ★★★ serpent burst out from beneath the rocks. Larger than a house, armored in obsidian scales. The kind of monster that shouldn’t have even been there."
Her voice began to shake again.
"The group wasn’t ready. I wasn’t ready."
She closed her eyes tightly.
"But Cassius fought it anyway. Alone. Again. While everyone else scattered, he stayed behind and drew it away. I tried to help, I really did—but it was like watching a force of nature battle another. He killed it."
She looked down at her hands, as if ashamed to touch them.
"Not before some of the group members—people who had become my friends—threw themselves in the way to protect me. They died. Screaming."
Her body began to shake. Tears dripped freely now, sliding down her cheeks as her words became fragmented.
"They died... for me."
Silence. Only the sound of the fountain nearby filled the pause.
No one dared speak. No one could.
But Freya didn’t stop. She forced herself forward, biting down her sobs.
"After that, we tried to run. To regroup. But the mountain... it began to tremble."
Her eyes widened as she relived the moment.
"A quake tore through the ridge. Stones cracked. The sky itself seemed to groan. And from deep within the mountain, something stirred. Something that should never have awakened."
She looked up then. Her voice dropped to a whisper.
"Skyshadow Basilisk."
Every girl in the group went pale.
The name alone made their skin crawl.
"A Rank ★★★★," Lilith muttered, visibly shaken.
Freya nodded slowly. Her face had gone almost lifeless.
"It burst out from the rock like a demon crawling out of hell. Its scales were blacker than night. Its eyes glowed golden. It was massive—half the mountain. And it hissed. Loud enough to split ears and shake the world."
She clutched her arms, as if still feeling the vibrations in her bones.
"Everyone ran. No one even thought about fighting it."
Her eyes softened, filled with something unplaceable. Regret. Admiration. Guilt.
"...he didn’t try to fight it either. Not that time. He picked me up without asking, threw me over his shoulder like a sack, and ran. Through the broken ridges, through falling stones, through everything. He didn’t even look back."
"But he couldn’t save them. The others..."
She looked at them. At the girls gathered around her.
"They followed me. Trusted me. Believed I could lead them to safety. But in the end, every single one of them died."
Her voice shrank to a whisper.
There was silence again.
None of the girls spoke. Not yet.
Freya’s tears streamed freely now. But her voice, though broken, carried resolve.
"I thought I could handle it. That I could lead. That I could be strong. But all I did was lead them to their deaths."
"And I’ve been carrying that ever since."
The sun dipped lower behind the trees. Shadows stretched across the garden.
Amelia was the first to reach out again. She pulled Freya into her arms, no words necessary.
Celeste wiped her own eyes. "You... you really are an idiot," she murmured, voice thick. "But you’re our idiot."
Lilith looked away, her eyes unreadable. "Cassius saved you because he knew what was coming. He probably knew none of them would make it. But he chose to save you. That must mean something."
Evelyn nodded quietly. "And now you’re here. Alive. So stop wasting that life on guilt. Get strong enough to make sure no such happens again. Not to you and not to anyone else."
Freya didn’t respond. The girls came closer and gently hugged her altogether.
Freya’s tears finally stopped.
Not because the pain was gone.
But because it didn’t need to be carried alone anymore.