After that, I told Martin everything that had happened before the regression.

Wandering inside the rift, the detection item not working, and about the Queen that wouldn’t extinguish no matter how much we tried to put it out.

Since Martin already knew early on that I had the ability to regress, he listened to my words without doubt.

Having convinced him smoothly, I then presented the countermeasures I had prepared.

“Taking all the members in will only be a hindrance. We should only bring those who can use water abilities. And—”

While looking steadily at Martin, I carefully brought up something that he was sure to oppose.

“This time, I will take charge of the attack at the forefront.”

“……”

“Your Majesty’s ability didn’t work at all against the Queen. It was the same flame ability after all. Rather, the two flames intertwined and caused our members to suffer. I also wasted mana protecting the members from that heat.”

Even after hearing my persuasion, Martin frowned, seemingly reluctant.

“But the Empress is—”

“I know, that I’m not alone. Still, there’s no other option. The Queen was strong. It will be impossible for any member other than me to hunt that monster.”

I could say this with certainty because I had just seen the Queen with my own eyes before regressing.

The only one who could defeat that monster at present would be me.

Martin was limited in dealing damage to the Queen due to his ability, and the same was true for other members.

Even members with water abilities would deplete their mana trying to block the heat if they engaged in close combat with the Queen.

I had to step up, having an attribute opposite to flame and no shortage of mana.

I offered some words of comfort to my husband, who still couldn’t shake off his worries.

“There’s a saying, isn’t there? Mothers are strong.”

“……”

“I was strong even when I wasn’t a mother. Now that I am one, I’ve become even stronger.”

Even without being a mother, those with many responsibilities tend to become strong.

I too had accumulated responsibilities, so I was stronger than when I was alone.

I had no choice but to become strong.

After pondering my words, Martin let out a long sigh.

“Alright then. This time, I’ll entrust everything to the Empress.”

As always, he believed in me, and thus the second attempt to hunt the last Queen began.

After receiving command authority from Martin, I explained in detail to the members the strategy I had in mind.

After confirming that they had fully understood my words, we finally entered the rift.

Following the same path we had taken earlier, sure enough, after not long a member reported.

“As Your Majesty said, the detection item is showing anomalies now.”

The detection item shown by the member was malfunctioning and spinning in circles, just like during the first attempt.

Which meant…

“The Queen is scattered nearby. In the form of small flames.”

The faces of the members who heard my muttering hardened with tension.

I informed them in a low voice.

“If we give it time, the Queen’s flames will start to surround us. Before that—”

After saying that much, I took a deep breath, then shouted.

“Attack!”

Hearing my order, the water ability users began extinguishing the nearby flames.

During the first attempt, we were dumbfounded not knowing how the situation was unfolding and ended up surrounded by flames.

This time, we took the initiative to control the situation before being surrounded.

Thanks to this, the members were still maintaining their composure, and we were able to save a lot of mana.

Just as we were in the midst of controlling the situation, someone shouted.

“The Queen has revealed itself!”

It appeared much slower during the first attempt than now.

Having failed to surround us, it seemed the other side was also getting impatient.

The Queen, revealing itself early, began shooting flames towards us.

“Block it!”

Hearing my order, the water ability users blocked the Queen’s flames.

If Martin had stepped up to block it like before, the surroundings would have surely become a hell of fire.

So this time, I entrusted the defense to the water ability users, and it was the right decision.

“They’re effectively blocking the attacks.”

Martin, who was observing from the side, approached saying those words.

Then he asked.

“But just blocking won’t catch the Queen. Do you have a plan for what comes next?”

“Of course, I’ve planned everything for what comes next. Since it’s a battle for me alone from here on, I didn’t bother explaining it to everyone.”

“…Are you going to attack the Queen alone?”

I nodded at the question filled with concern.

“Yes, but I don’t intend to rush into that chaos unfolding up front.”

As I said, the front line was truly chaotic at the moment.

Hot steam was rising where the flames poured out by the Queen collided with the water walls created by our ability users.

If I tried to push through there, I would end up with burns all over my body.

I turned my gaze away from that chaos and looked in another direction.

To the west, where there was a low hill.

“I’m going there.”

“…To that hill? But there’s nothing there… Empress? Empress!”

Martin called out anxiously as I headed in an odd direction, ignoring the Queen at the front, but I ignored him.

I also ignored the knights’ attempts to stop me and continued towards the western hill.

Then suddenly, a huge flame rose up from the hill where there had been nothing before.

Seeing that sight, I murmured softly.

“As expected.”

As expected, the Queen’s main body was over there.

During the first attempt, we had sprayed water at the Queen several times.

But the Queen did not perish, and easily rose up again through other flames.

Martin also said he had tried to cut the Queen, but couldn’t because it had no physical form.

Putting those facts together in my mind, this thought suddenly occurred to me.

What if all the forms of the Queen we had seen were actually fake?

That’s why our attacks didn’t work, and the Queen’s real body was in another safe place?

Perhaps the Queen had the ability to shape flames.

So it shaped flames into its own form, then set them up like scarecrows in front of us to make us attack in vain.

Then where would the Queen’s real body be?

I pondered this point deeply, and finally found the answer.

The western hill.

The Queen had poured out attacks from where it could most effectively disrupt our formation.

As if ‘looking down’ on the battle situation from a high place.

And there was only one place here where you could overlook the entire area.

Whoosh—

As I continued climbing to the top of the western hill, the Queen’s main body finally appeared, rising up like a flame.

Unlike the illusions we had faced below, this main body would have a core.

If that core was shattered, the Queen would perish.

Perhaps because of this, the Queen also tried to block my approach with a desperate attitude different from before.

“Tsk.”

Blocked by a wall of flames that rose up before my eyes, I clicked my tongue once and swung my sword.

Infusing the sword with cold energy once.

And then twice.

After swinging it twice like that, the central part of the flame wall dissipated, opening a path.

I continued running through that gap.

Now the remaining distance to reach the Queen was about twenty steps.

The Queen urgently shot out a sphere made of flames towards me as I approached right in front of it.

It was the attack that had taken my life during the first attempt.

Back then, I had crumbled to ashes pitifully, but—

Tap!

This time I dodged it.

I leapt up with all my might, jumping over the flame sphere flying towards me.

After rotating my body once in midair, I landed right in front of the Queen.

The Queen raised its arms as if to defend itself, but it was an unnecessary action.

I had no intention of directly cutting that body made of flames in the first place.

“Cutting flames with a sword isn’t a very smart thing to do. It’s no different from swinging a sword at empty air.”

Swinging a blade at flames would only scorch the blade.

I didn’t want to do the laborious task of frantically slashing at the flames to find the core floating somewhere in the Queen’s body.

There was an easier way.

Stab—

First, I stabbed my sword into the ground.

Then I infused it with cold energy.

A wall of ice began to rise from the ground, surrounding us.

The wall, formed in a hemisphere shape like an overturned bowl, completely enclosed me and the Queen, trapping us in a sealed room.

In that trapped state, the Queen spoke a short word in awkward Imperial language again.

“Dark… da-dark…”

“Yes, it’s dark here. There’s no light except for the glow coming from your body. But that’s not the only thing missing.”

I’m not sure if it understands my words.

Still, since it’s the last monster, I explained with a generous heart.

“Here, not only is there no light, there’s also very little air. And without air, flames can’t continue to burn. People also die without air.”

“Air…”

“Yes, let’s see what happens first in this airless space. Whether your flames go out or I die from lack of oxygen.”

After that, I raised my sword, and the final Queen also drew up its ability.

The heat of battle to extinguish each other’s lives soon filled that small space.

“The ice wall is breaking!”

One of the members anxiously watching the ice chamber created by Yulia shouted those words.

As he said, the solid ice wall was cracking and someone’s form could be faintly seen through the wall from the inside.