Chapter 177: Who is the root cause of the world’s destruction?

Clutching his heavy wallet, Roland once again ran through the bustling market, searching incessantly for Rhynes’s trace.

For some reason, he felt that Rhynes’s unexplained disappearance was unusual; the lack of any sign of her made him increasingly anxious.

“Miss Rhynes, where on earth have you gone?”

However, as he walked quickly through the crowd, a sudden sharp pain shot through the middle finger of his right hand, as if his finger had caught on something.

“Hmm?”

Roland looked down at his right hand in confusion, finding nothing unusual, yet after a gentle wave, he still felt as if something was constricting his finger.

Although the current situation allowed no time for distractions, Roland narrowed his eyes to stare intently at his finger.

Then, he discovered a tiny red thread wrapped around his finger, with the other end extending outward, winding through the crowded streets until it was lost to sight.

“Where did this come from…?”

Roland reached out with his left hand to touch the red thread, but he felt nothing, meaning this thread was not a physical object in reality, but something like magic.

“Magic…”

Roland immediately recalled what he had told Rhynes earlier regarding the meaning of the knot.

“It represents the bond between people, like a red thread connecting them to each other…”

“Could it be that if I follow this red thread, I’ll find Miss Rhynes?”

With a mindset of giving it a try, Roland followed the red thread, tracing it through the market and circling several times, mostly through places he had just walked past.

After running back to the accessory shop where he had been with Rhynes, the thread finally extended into a dark, nearby alley.

Without hesitation, Roland plunged into the alley, turning several corners in the narrow passage until he finally came to a dead end.

The red thread extended onto the wall and vanished.

Looking confused, Roland raised his right hand to gently touch the wall, which trembled as a void rift suddenly distorted, staring at Roland like a giant eye, which sent a chill down his spine.

Roland instinctively took a step back, but the void rift didn’t care about his reaction and directly sucked in the Roland who had accidentally awakened it.

Unable to react in time, Roland was swallowed by the void rift.

After a fit of dizziness, Roland slammed hard onto the cold ground.

Ignoring the pain in his body, Roland hurriedly climbed up and scanned his surroundings.

Though it was incredibly dim, thanks to the cyan light emitted by mysterious ores in the distance, Roland could see that he was inside an underground grotto.

“Where exactly is this…?”

The red thread in his hand still extended toward the end of the grotto, so Roland ignored everything else and quickly ran toward the depths.

As he advanced, the light from the ores grew brighter and brighter, until finally, he reached an incredibly vast cavern.

Whether it was the ground beneath his feet or the stalactites hanging overhead, everything emitted a faint blue glow.

And in the center of this vast cavern, a massive purple magic circle stood upright on the earth like a Ferris wheel.

A blonde witch was suspended in the center of this purple circle; seeing her eyes closed and her body motionless, she had likely long since lost consciousness.

Undoubtedly, the blonde witch bound within the magic circle was the Miss Rhynes he had been desperately searching for.

The red thread in his hand extended all the way to Rhynes’s limp right hand.

He never expected that the red thread magic Rhynes had secretly left on him would truly become her lifeline.

Seeing this, Roland’s face filled with shock, and he was about to run over to rescue her, but then he noticed a small figure standing beside the massive magic circle.

It was a short, white-haired boy, looking to be about twelve or thirteen years old, yet his gaze was cold, as if he had experienced far too much.

Noticing Roland’s sudden intrusion, the white-haired boy turned to stare at the shocked Roland.

“Oh? Since when has my concealment magic become so poor that an irrelevant person could break in so quickly?”

After muttering to himself, the boy shouted at Roland.

“Hey, this isn’t a place you should be! Go back the way you came immediately, and I can pretend this never happened, otherwise…”

“Who the hell are you? Why have you kidnapped Miss Rhynes?”

Facing the boy’s threat, Roland showed no fear; instead, he drew the sword from his waist and prepared for battle while interrogating the boy.

“Oh? It seems you’re not an irrelevant person after all!”

The boy’s brow furrowed in displeasure.

“Are you here to save this person? While your courage is admirable, I won’t allow you to rescue the root of the world’s destruction!”

“The root of the world’s destruction? Wait, what are you talking about?”

Hearing the boy call Rhynes the source of the end of the world, Roland looked utterly bewildered, unable to comprehend the meaning behind those words.

“Hmph, a mortal incapable of peering into the Root—I might as well tell you: this person harbors the power to destroy the entire world within her.”

“If she isn’t eliminated quickly, this world will eventually perish by her hand.”

“Do you want the people you protect to fall into misery and feel utter despair for the future?”

The boy’s words left Roland speechless; he began to doubt his own righteousness, and the sword in his hand trembled with indecision.

“Hmph, a mortal who cannot see the Root of all things naturally wouldn’t understand, but I don’t blame you; you should be thanking me for saving you all from an apocalypse.”

“Fine, now that you know how dangerous she is, stop getting in my way; my Annihilation Magic has no room for bystanders wandering around!”

With that, the white-haired boy turned away to continue preparing his so-called Annihilation Magic; he seemed intent on using a powerful finishing move to completely erase Rhynes’s body and soul.

It didn’t matter if Roland stood there dazed; the boy felt no obligation to save everyone.

Hearing the boy’s words, Roland’s face was filled with shock, his worldview shattered, and his thoughts stalled.

‘Miss Rhynes is the source of the world’s destruction? How is that possible? How could she do something so unforgivable?’

‘After all, she just showed me that brilliant smile!’

‘How could a girl capable of such a happy smile ever harbor thoughts of destroying the world?’

Memories of his time with Rhynes flooded back into his mind, and remembering the smile he would never forget, Roland clenched his fists.

Even if everything the other party said was true, he could not stand by and do nothing for Rhynes.

He finally understood why he had joined the Holy Knights—it was to protect smiles full of happiness like hers!

Miss Rhynes was someone he had to protect!

He would absolutely not abandon her and leave her alone because of this!

With this thought, Roland steeled his resolve, gripped his sword tightly, and rushed toward the white-haired boy.

“Even if Miss Rhynes really is the root of the world’s destruction, I will save her; I won’t let you hurt her!”

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