Yuel was in quite high spirits after his first battle alongside the Sect. Today was the day he would meet the mages, those who had fought on the other front of the war.
Although he had previously looked into the minds of the mages, he had different plans—plans he would act on first.
He had also taken possession of the crystallized bears that once belonged to the enemy.
There used to be only three crystallized bears, but now the number had risen to fourteen.
The Sect, on the other hand, had lost many wendigos after the war—too many had died. As a result, along with a few captives taken from the enemy side and the mages, the Sect now numbered only fifty-two people.
On the back of the crystallized mammoth stood six distinct structures.
One guard post, multi-storied buildings extending to the right and left and clinging to the cliffs like they might fall off the mammoth's legs, a large mansion built in the center of the mammoth's back, and two other buildings near the mammoth's rear.
Normally, about five hundred people resided on the crystallized mammoth. Now, they were only fifty-one. For this reason, Yuel wanted to claim the entire mansion for himself.
Since the entire Sect was already under Yuel's control, no one objected.
At first, Yuel had enjoyed manipulating the Sect, but later, when he realized he couldn't form real bonds or friendships with anyone, he began to retreat from that path.
The Sect might never return to what it was, and building it without manipulation may not even be possible.
Still, he could make exceptions for a few individuals. And that's what Yuel did.
Instead of breaking the minds of two mages, he simply erased their memories.
This meant he wouldn't be able to learn magic from them and might end up with a weaker team, but at least he could befriend them, and the months he would spend on the mammoth could become more enjoyable.
So, he decided not to touch those two… or rather, he already had—but he would fix it.
Sitting in his favorite room in the mansion, Yuel felt secretly pleased with himself for making such plans behind everyone's back. Since he had always been alone until now, he wasn't exactly the best at socializing. Even though he often talked with Null when he got bored, he still needed to make new friends.
Yuel was still just a child, and it was perfectly normal for a child to want to socialize. His only social interaction in the past eight and a half years had been with Aria, Onur, and Shiro—two of whom had died, and the last one had betrayed him. Truthfully, all of that had been deeply traumatic.
Yuel was saddened by the situation, yes, but he didn't cry. He wasn't that type. As awful as this was, he had experienced far worse.
The furniture in his luxurious room was all made of wood. The mansion evoked Victorian-era architecture and furniture, though it also included habits not found in that era, such as doors and drawers.
The doors were designed for beings much taller than humans—wendigos, to be precise. Although they often appeared human-sized due to their hunched posture, their average height was actually around 2.5 meters.
Their hands were more twisted than human hands, and they had only four fingers, so the doorknobs and drawer handles were designed differently—grips suited to their anatomy. Moreover, because of their horns at head height, chandeliers weren't used to avoid accidents.
Despite such small architectural distinctions, the overall design closely resembled Victorian style.
Yuel sat on his chair in the room and sipped his water.
It was at that moment that he realized his greatest mistake.
Exploration.
Yuel wasn't exploring.
Undergarden was filled with countless plants and dhunes. He needed to explore them. Doing so would make his daily life much more comfortable. For example, right now, he was wearing a thick coat made of a white, root-like material with an unknown origin. Instead, he could have gotten himself a proper shirt—or even some kind of armor?
Wendigos had magic related to transformation. There was no race better suited to crafting armor or weapons than them.
Their only drawbacks were their intellect and instincts—but Yuel compensated for that. After all, they were all under his command now.
After calmly pondering all of this in his room, Yuel looked at the papers in front of him. These documents were all his responsibility to examine...
"Lumen, please take care of these. Thank you..."
Just then, the door opened and Lumen entered—the so-called leader of the Sect.
"Of course, my lord," he said and began reviewing the paperwork.
Even though Yuel had claimed to compensate for the intelligence gap of the wendigos, it was beginning to seem like the opposite was true.
He didn't dwell on that thought any further and left the room. He walked through the mansion's corridors adorned with red carpets and finally arrived at the room where the mages were staying.
As he had decided in the room where he wasted all his time thinking instead of handling the paperwork…
Though he had initially manipulated and brainwashed them… now, he chose to erase all their memories instead.
Yuel looked at the two robed mages lying in bed. Though both were in human form… one of them… one of them was more human.
When Yuel had first encountered the wendigos, he had thought they were human—but all of them had used transformation magic without killing a real human in the process.
One of the mages before him, however, had actually killed a human girl and created a transformation using her real, living tissues.
Transformations made without killing a human always had flaws—their tissue and color didn't look convincing. But this one... looked real.
For a moment, he almost believed the person in front of him was truly human.
But she wasn't. He knew that.
Yuel sat on the wooden chair next to the bed and placed his right hand on it—after all, the ones whose memories he wanted to erase were lying on that bed.
He possessed the Fracture Bloodscript, which meant as long as he had sufficient imagination and mana, he could shatter their minds however he wanted—and memories were in the same category.
Yuel imagined.
He imagined their minds as being made of several round pieces of glass. He focused on the glass and located the section where memories resided. Then he reached for it and delivered a massive punch. Throwing both punches cost him nearly all his mana—after all, the mind-washing he used on the wendigos had to be renewed every two weeks since it wasn't permanent, but this memory-erasing act was eternal. Those memories would never return, and such permanence demanded more mana.
Technically, he didn't need to place his hand on the bed—but doing so helped him visualize it more clearly. After all, the Bloodscript required two conditions: having the necessary fuel (mana, percentages, or pacts) and being able to visualize/imagine it.
After erasing their memories with his Bloodscript, Yuel saw their eyes twitch and slowly open.
They were clearly confused—they had no idea what had happened. They had no memories at all.
Of course, Yuel would fabricate a story for them. His plan was to pretend to be the benevolent leader of a wendigo Sect and claim he had found them outside in the cold. Of course, it wasn't very believable—but these two had no memories. They wouldn't even know what was normal or abnormal.
Still, Yuel didn't feel like dealing with their complete ignorance. Explaining everything one by one would be too tiring. He could assign that job to a few wendigos instead.
So, Yuel left the room.
In the corridor, he directed two wendigos he encountered to that room.
He, on the other hand, went outside for some fresh air.
They were likely still in the cold mist... So why did it feel so warm?
Yuel quickly ran to the driver's cabin and looked outside.
On the ground lay something resembling the root of a massive tree—giant in size and metallic gray.
Etched into it were blue, neon-colored technological symbols—mostly lines or polygons with sharp angles.
There was no snow around it. Instead, the environment looked almost tropical.
It covered an area four times the size of the mammoth and was surrounded by several massive hills—like a forest nestled in the heart of a mountain range.
This tree root emitted an incredible amount of heat, enabling the growth of tropical trees and plants in this otherwise frigid region.
But where did this root come from?
If he had to piece it together...
That colossal, mirrored tree depicted on the cathedral wall... It really did exist somewhere in Undergarden—but where?
Humanity had explored everywhere, so it had to be somewhere unseen.
That left only one option.
Fogbound Grave.
The sun of Undergarden... was actually a giant tree.