“Shit.”

  Veronica pressed her back against the tree’s rough bark, chest rising and falling as she had run here. She peered around its edge. Sage’s voice still echoed faintly in her head—a warning—but the sight before her told her she was already too late.

  The wagon lay on its side, split wood and shattered wheels scattered across the clearing. Supplies had spilled everywhere. Sacks of grain, cracked pottery, and a few trinkets that looked pitiful in the dirt were littered about.

  The bodies were worse.

  One man, one woman. A third that barely resembled a person at all; he had been crushed into red paste beneath claws that could tear stone apart.

  Her mouth tightened. The thing that had killed them lumbered over the ruined cart.

  A Fellabear.

  They were animals that regular people would have trouble dealing with, much more than a simple boar or forest bear. It was apparent why: towering bulk, armored backs bristling with spines, and extremely territorial. This bear, however, seemed much more vicious. Its fur was mottled with blackened patches that crawled like ink across its skin. Its eyes burned red, and saliva thick as tar dripped from its mouth.

  Demonic corruption.

  It took root when a demon lingered too long, its presence poisoning soil and beast alike—or when blood was swallowed and fused into flesh. Demons would sometimes appear in the world; animals and monsters being corrupted by them wasn’t rare.

  For now, this Fellabear was no longer just an animal. It was an infection on four legs. She couldn’t let it live.

  Veronica peered around the tree a little closer. The beast was munching on something within the wagon. It didn’t take long, however, for it to sense her. Its head snapped up, nostrils flaring. It turned, red eyes locked on her. It had her scent.

  Veronica sighed. Her fingers flexed.

  The growl that followed rolled through the clearing like thunder, rattling branches overhead. The Fellabear heaved forward, claws gouging the dirt as it charged.

  She stepped from behind the tree, naked, unarmed, but not defenseless.

  Not even close.

  On her way here, she had been pulling at the world around her, drawing in external mana. Since she was unattuned to any discipline now, her spells would consume much more mana than normal. But borrowed power could patch the weakness—for a time. It had been years since she’d used this crude method, and her current body could only endure so much.

  Still, she had gathered plenty of mana. Enough to cast a particularly powerful Tier-2 Path of Ruin spell.

  [Mana: 200+141/200 MU]

  Light kindled in her palm, swelling into a blazing knot. Two bright wings of mana flashed behind her hand. She pointed the palm of her hand at the beast. The Fellabear barreled closer, saliva slinging from its jaws, each paw strike shaking the ground.

  A piercing hum emanated from her spell, equally sharp and powerful.

  She launched the spell.

  A torrent of violet-white annihilation tore from her hand in a sweeping cone. It stopped the Fellabear mid-charge. Her magic violently dug into the beast; the air filled with the metallic smell of blood as it clawed its way past its skin. For an instant, its roar split the clearing, embellished with fury, before turning into a pained shrill. The spell she cast was soundless, but the bear’s scream filled the air until it was cut short by the sound of its heavy body hitting the ground.

  When the wave subsided, silence reigned.

  The Fellabear’s body lay ruined, flesh charred and sloughed away, ribs gleaming through blackened meat. It had collapsed forward as though still running, frozen mid-stride. Smoke curled up from its body, and its lifeless eyes stayed closed.

  It had died with one shot.

  Veronica looked down at her arm. There was no tingling sensation; Medusa’s curse really was gone. She could finally cast spells without limits.

  She allowed herself a small, genuine smile.

  Veronica tugged at the collar of her new brown tunic, frowning at how it clung to her shoulders. The fabric smelled of faintly of blood and sweat, but it was better than bare skin.

  She had checked the woman first—though the truth had been plain even from a distance. Crushed throats, broken bones, partially missing, chomped limbs. All of them had obviously died before she arrived. She had searched anyway; fingers checking their wrists, their necks, pupils—but the truth was the same.

  They were all still warm. It hadn’t been long since the Fellabear had attacked. No matter how much she tried to shake them, none of them would be getting up again. Judging by the scene however, she wouldn’t have made it either way, even if she had rushed over earlier.

  She tried to find out who they were. She searched their pockets, but that was a fruitless task.

  No insignias. No identification tucked in belts or pouches. Whoever they were, they had died nameless and empty.

  The wagon, however, told a different story.

  Daggers lined the back in neat rows, far too many for simple travelers. Small vials rattled in a chest, each corked and labeled with crude sigils. All poisons, just by the smell alone. Beneath them, sacks of dried meat, wheels of hard bread, an ominous feeling of stolen provisions. There was drool everywhere. Considering the beast was corrupted by demonic blood, almost everything here was now spoiled and infected.

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  She couldn't really say if it was a good or bad thing that the small stains of blood on her tunic were from the girl, and not the bear. Demon blood was much darker.

  Her lips pressed thin.

  “Bandits,” she muttered. Disguised as harmless merchants, maybe—until they’d picked the wrong route and the wrong predator had found them first.

  Being this far out in the middle of nowhere told her one thing. That they tried to be discreet. Taking a path where they could be hidden. There was no worn road here to indicate a trail.

  She smoothed the hem of her plain, partially torn trousers, glanced once more at the ruined corpses, and exhaled through her nose. Whatever lives they had led, they had ended violently. The Fellabear had only finished what their trade promised.

  She dragged the bodies into a nearby bush and hid them as best she could. It was mainly to cover the woman she had… borrowed the clothes from. Doing it for her, she thought she might as well do it for the man, too. The third body, however—that was out of the question. Their body was more paste than solid. There was no moving them.

  With the situation settled, she stared back in the direction the wagon might have came from.

  She couldn't get much from them, but at least she had clothes now. But she didn't want to stay like this forever, especially since she didn't take the undergarments. Reusing another person’s underwear wasn’t an idea she was fond of.

  Even in the apocalypse, there were some lines she didn’t want to cross.

  For now, at least, she could wander around and explore the forest without being labeled as a forest-dweller or deviant.

  As for the rest of the supplies—there was no need. A wagon here meant it was traveling somewhere. Civilization couldn't have been far. The fact that there were warm bodies here meant that she was back in a world with living people. No need for scooping up ruined scraps now; she just needed to find a path out.

  She could handle being on an empty stomach for a few hours. If needed, she could just kill a random animal and cook it later. Her assistant Viya had made many dishes and meals for her—how hard could it be to cook a wild deer?

  At least, that's what she thought.

  Veronica began walking, her ruined shoes crunching softly against the forest floor. The undergrowth tugged at her ankles, but she pressed forward, her eyes darting between the trees.

  “Think,” she muttered to herself. “Forests like this always lead somewhere, right? Water, trails... something.”

  She paused beside a tree, resting a hand against its rough bark. Her breathing steadied as she tried to recall what lay outside the city she had left behind. Was this forest even familiar? Or had the device sent her somewhere entirely different?

  “Hey, Sage. Where the hell did you send me? Was there always a forest behind Annesheim?”

  [Spatial relocation was not a focal-point of development. Martin tried to calculate precise spatial reversion coordinates, but later deemed it unnecessary compared to other functions. You have instead been teleported to a random coordinate. I cannot confirm your location.]

  With nothing else to go on, she chose a direction where the trees grew thinner, the light more forgiving. Not quite a path, but a place to start.

  She trudged forward; the undergrowth tugged at her legs as the forest remained an unyielding maze of green.

  “Hey. Although Medusa’s Curse is gone, and my magic has been lost…”

  She turned her focus inward, searching for the source of her mana. She could feel it—both of them. But she needed to be certain.

  “…do I still have twin mana cores? They were the only reason I was able to reach the 10th-Tier after all,” she asked aloud.

  [Yes. Your current body still has twin mana cores inside of it. Your maximum MU would have been 100 with a single core, but it is instead 200 MU.]

  “What? Really? Then how come I’m not being affected by Medusa’s Curse?” This was why she wasn’t sure if she still had them, despite sensing them within her body. Perhaps she was just… feeling something that wasn’t there. A phantom pain, like the condition people felt when they lost a limb.

  [I do not have sufficient information to come up with an answer. A plausible hypothesis may be that the temporal rift merged your former body with your current one, keeping some attributes, while removing others.]

  She nodded and continued moving. She didn’t want to ask. This realm of temporal hypotheses was just not her thing. She was more attuned to the arcane and magical understanding. Not… whatever this was. Time-travel was completely foreign to her. For now, she still had twin mana cores, all benefits, no downside. At least, none that were obvious to her.

  Pressing forward, she let her senses remain on high alert, scanning for any sign of civilization.

  Hours seemed to pass, as the forest idly shifted by. Her stomach rumbled with hunger, but there wasn’t anything in sight to eat. She killed an aggressive boar an hour ago, but gave up on trying to cook it. Apparently, raw animals like that had lots of blood. Simply burning it with fire magic didn’t help either.

  Viya, her assistant, handled most of her cooking. Veronica had no idea how to prepare such a thing. Even in the apocalypse, most of her food were preserved provisions, scattered throughout many safe points she guarded across the continent. Never once did she have to cook wild game.

  Especially since most animals had died and become corrupted.

  Sage provided some instructions on how to cook the boar, but it had proved difficult to follow, so she gave up. She’d rather just leave it to an expert. This also made her see butchers and chefs in a whole new light.

  In the end, she made due with wild fruit or berries she found. Luckily, Sage could determine if some of them were poisonous. As for ones it couldn't—she passed them up.

  Time flew by, and the trees grew thinner; the underbrush became less dense. A faint scent of smoke drifted through the air.

  [Veronica. Multiple life-form signatures have been detected northeast of your position. Within 300 meters.]

  She stopped in her tracks, eyes narrowing as she strained to listen. Slowly, she moved forward until finally the voices were carried along faintly on the breeze, low, gruff, and accompanied by the sound of clinking metal. She crept closer to the source, careful to keep her footsteps light. As she drew near, she spotted the source: a group of mercenaries setting up a small camp in a clearing.

  There were five of them, all clad in mismatched armor that had seen better days. Two were tending to the fire, which crackled with the scent of roasting meat. A third was brushing down a horse tethered to a tree, while the remaining two inspected weapons and gear.

  Veronica crouched behind a tree, watching them carefully. Her gaze flicked over their camp, cataloging details. The meat roasting over the fire looked fresh, likely something they had recently caught. Their weapons were well-used but functional, and their horses, though rugged, were in decent condition.

  A sliver of doubt crept into her mind.

  Approaching them was a risk. Her low mana reserves made her vulnerable, and she didn’t trust her younger body to fight as effectively as her older self could have, even with Medusa’s curse. She was a mage through-and-through. Swordsmanship and fist-fighting were not her forte. Would this group be friendly? Or hidden bandits in disguise like before?

  She’d rather avoid killing people; human lives were a luxury, and she knew that.

  She shook the thoughts out of her mind. She needed information—where she was, when she was, and how far she might be from civilization. Worst-case scenario, she reminded herself, she could gather ambient mana from the surroundings to use a few low-tier spells. It wouldn’t be anywhere near her full power, but it might be enough to wound them and escape.

  Caution is recommended. Individuals may be dangerous.

  Gee, thanks, she thought.

  Veronica took a deep breath and stepped out from behind the tree, her hands raised slightly in a gesture of peace. The moment her foot crushed a branch on the forest floor, the mercenaries all snapped towards her like wolves.

  “Who’s there?” barked one of the men by the fire.

  He was stocky. An unkempt beard and a dented breastplate made it clear that the man had years of experience in fighting. His hand was already on the hilt of his sword when the words left his mouth.

  Veronica kept her expression calm, her voice loud, but clear. “I mean no harm. I’m just passing through.”