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As the unique sensation of teleportation faded away, all that surrounded me was thick smoke.

I arrived here following the ominous call of “Mommmmmmm!” but everything was enveloped in an opaque mist.

The smoke twisted and turned, deceiving my senses like the domain of an external being.

There was a faint scent in the smoke, as if something was burning.

I quickly scanned my surroundings.

The scene that faintly appeared through the smoke was pure chaos.

It looked as if a war had broken out, with ruins spread out before my eyes as if bombed.

The ground seemed to have caved in from the impact of the bombardment, and I heard cracks as I fell from the air during teleportation.

The outlines of collapsed buildings were revealed through the smoke.

These were buildings that seemed out of place in modern times.

There were no visible rebar, just huge rocks stacked together.

Though completely wrecked and collapsed, it was a style of architecture that felt vaguely familiar.

On the ground were shards of broken glass and mirrors, along with dust and ashes.

This place was truly a battlefield.

At that moment, I felt a faint flicker of firewood among the ruins thick with smoke.

The weak light emitted by humans.

And within that light, familiar faces emerged.

“Yellow Detective…?”

The detective and his juniors, along with the Golden Horn Reaper, gradually became visible through the smoke.

I was a bit puzzled by the sudden appearance of the yellow detective, but seeing the Golden Horn Reaper nearby made the situation clear.

The Golden Horn Reaper had called for me.

Since the first runaway reaper had continued to hang out with the detective team, it made sense that they were here.

The Golden Horn Reaper spotted me and waved cheerfully.

“Mom!”

But I had no time to reciprocate that greeting.

After all, there were two concerning objects behind the Golden Horn Reaper.

“Yerin…?”

The first was an object dressed in a mix of black and white that resembled Mini Yerin.

At a glance, it might be mistaken for Yerin, but it was clearly not human.

One eye was shattered like glass, and instead of the golden firewood Yerin possessed, it held tasteless white firewood.

If the original Yerin was the golden Yerin, then this fake Yerin could be called the white Yerin.

And beyond that fake Yerin, a second object was visible.

The long-sought object, the Man of the Lamp, was there.

The moment I faced him, tension coursed through my body.

The Man of the Lamp, confronted up close, appeared much stronger than I had anticipated.

Though he didn’t look like an external being at first glance, my instincts warned me not to let my guard down against this formidable opponent.

I thought he was weak since he was running away from me…

Ah.

*

The eyes of Junior No. 2 were filled with tension.

Her gaze was fixed on the fierce battle unfolding in the smoke.

Her attached reaper, the Golden Horn Reaper, had already leaped into the middle of the battlefield with the Gray Reaper.

Meanwhile, squishy white hungry ghosts gathered around Junior No. 2, taking up position as if to protect her in place of the Golden Horn Reaper.

The beginning of the battle started with the surrounding environment shifting.

The ground, once turned to rubble from shelling and bullets, was suddenly transformed into white marshmallow, and the air, once filled with choking smoke, was now infused with the sweet aroma of hot chocolate.

From this sweet earth, countless Mini Reapers sprang up and charged towards the Man of the Lamp.

The first attack was made by a golden reaper known as the Swordmaster, who had previously been featured on international social media.

The golden energy from the swing of his sword sliced through the space and flew towards the Man of the Lamp.

But astonishingly, as soon as that powerful blow reached the Man of the Lamp, it disappeared like a mirage.

There was an immense force that any ordinary person could feel in that strike, yet it had no effect at all?

If there hadn’t been a crack in the space left by that strike, I would have thought it was all a figment of imagination.

‘!’

For some reason, a momentary look of confusion crossed the expressionless face of the Swordmaster golden reaper, just as it did for the Gray Reaper.

Right then, the Gray Reaper moved.

The Gray Reaper donned a halo of golden light and fused the Golden Horn Reaper, the Swordmaster golden reaper, and the suddenly appearing Golden Cloaked Reaper into one.

From that fusion emerged a golden reaper that appeared to dominate the battlefield with overwhelming energy.

Golden auroras shimmered in the sky, and endless golden flames flowed down from that golden wave.

The cape fluttering behind him danced towards the sky, appearing to connect with the shimmering auroras above.

And the sword gripped by the golden reaper unleashed continuous strikes that seemed to slice the sky in half.

It was overwhelming.

No matter how powerful the object, it seemed natural to be reduced to minced meat by such an attack.

The smoke filling the ruins was all scattered by the golden strikes, and the surroundings were completely filled with marshmallow.

Junior No. 2 was left spellbound by the overwhelming scene.

Could the Golden Horn Reaper actually win like this?

It was such an incredible and one-sided attack that Junior No. 2 couldn’t help but think so.

But contrary to her expectations, smoke slowly began to rise from the completely shattered center of the space as the Man of the Lamp walked out intact.

Then the Man of the Lamp opened his mouth and shouted magic that Junior No. 2 could not comprehend.

[ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■. ]

At that moment, the Gray Reaper pulled back all the Mini Reapers with a grave expression.

The three fused golden reapers also separated and retreated behind the Gray Reaper.

The Golden Horn Reaper returned to Junior No. 2 looking extremely exhausted after the skirmish.

Junior No. 2 slowly stroked the worn-out Golden Horn Reaper while gazing at the Gray Reaper.

Just then, a small voice was heard near her.

“Umm….”

When Junior No. 2 turned her head, the yellow detective, who seemed to be dead asleep, was slowly opening his eyes.

*

[You cannot injure me.]

As the Man of the Lamp approached, saying that, it felt like something was tightening around me.

I tried to look at the Man of the Lamp using my ‘eyes,’ but no matter how hard I looked, I couldn’t see his conditions for destruction.

It felt like something was obstructing my ability to confirm the destruction conditions.

‘Umm…’

I vaguely intuited how I might be able to see the conditions.

Perhaps I could see it if I used the ‘Halo of Death’ or donned the flesh of the Black Giant.

But I didn’t know how to use ‘Halo of Death,’ and I didn’t want to oddly wear the corpse of the Black Giant.

Ever since I gathered all seven months, I felt that calling the Black Giant would instantly shatter everything.

I wore the Halo of Space, continuously cutting through space, but none of it reached the Man of the Lamp.

It was as if my inability to injure the Man of the Lamp was ‘the rule of this world.’

I felt as if I were fighting an external being in the realm of an external being.

Yet, despite the surroundings already being filled with the Mini Reaper Garden, such phenomena still occurred?

I flipped the space around completely, or tried to push the Man of the Lamp away with the whole space, yet nothing worked.

[You cannot kill me with your power.]

The Man of the Lamp stopped walking and said that to me.

[Do not oppose me.]

[If you do, I can easily kill you.]

Then, as the Man of the Lamp snapped his fingers, the space I occupied began to crumble.

As if to tear space apart with the Halo of Space.

In an instant, one of my hands shattered, and startled by the unexpected counterattack, I distanced myself from the Man of the Lamp.

[Is it so? Have you forgotten our contract…?]

Snap. Snap. Snap.

With each snap of the Man of the Lamp’s fingers, my limbs were severed along with the space.

Though I quickly regenerated with firewood, it was an unreasonable situation where only one side’s attacks were effective.

‘Do I really have to summon the Black Giant?’

As I began to think along those lines, the Man of the Lamp stopped snapping his fingers and sent out magic.

[Once again, I say. Do not attack me.]

[You must live until the end and witness the end created by humans themselves.]

And just as the Man of the Lamp snapped his fingers one last time, the space I occupied began to crumble completely.

As if to tear space apart with the Halo of Space.

In an instant, my entire body was destroyed, and I opened my eyes in the Mini Reaper Valhalla.

‘Strong.’

Should I really summon the Black Giant?

As I lay in Valhalla, lost in thought, an old dream suddenly came to mind.

The dream of the blue girl contracting with the magical book.

It was a significant dream, one I had reflected on with some meaning, but had long since pushed to the back of my mind.