The next morning.

Ruelle, who woke up early, opened the game screen while lying down. It was a leisurely morning after successfully defeating Balder yesterday.

As she couldn’t check her ranking after the Balder raid, she immediately clicked on the announcement.

Ranked 1st were the Legendary Guild and the Pharaohs Guild together. Smiling contentedly, Ruelle went into the talk board.

Her brow furrowed as she skimmed through the briefly posted messages.

It was different from what she expected, thinking it would be filled with discussions about them.

Curious, she found that the leader of the Legendary Guild had posted a message.

After defeating Balder yesterday, the talk board seemed to have buzzed with discussions about the Pharaohs Guild.

It seemed that someone started stirring trouble, accusing the Legendary Guild of pretending to be impressive while hiding information about the named monster.

People argued that, considering the much smaller number of members in the Pharaohs Guild, they should be considered a higher-ranking guild than the Legendary Guild. Enraged by this, the leader of the Legendary Guild posted a message, threatening to disband the guild if they missed the 1st place.

Due to this post, the board was in chaos.
The Legendary Guild leader made such a bold statement, so the Pharaohs Guild would have to respond in some way. However, as Ruelle didn’t have the authority to write, she could only watch from a distance.

Moreover, since they were in a situation where they would not just disband but be annihilated if they couldn’t be the first to raid Duke Kuran, there was no need for her to intervene.

Ruelle closed the screen and got out of bed.

The Legendary Guild leader had posted the locations, information, and raid strategies for the named monsters they had captured so far, thanks to his explosive statement. While the day of the decisive battle was still far off, she felt anxious as competitors increased their pace.

Careful not to wake Shuna, Ruelle washed up and prepared before heading downstairs.

“You’re up early.”

Colleagues, who she thought might still be sleeping, were rubbing their eyes as they entered the dining area.

“I checked outside the main gate before going to bed yesterday, and it was a mess out there. Although I couldn’t see the monsters, knights were surrounding the mansion like a swarm, attacking in an attempt to breach it.”

Hazen answered while bringing bread, jam, and fruit from the kitchen.

Kite followed Ruelle with tea and interrupted Hazen’s words.
“Many people came out to watch behind the knights. It seems like they’re thinking it’s someone else’s business now, but it’s worrisome because we don’t know how the situation will change. We don’t know when the blades that were aimed at us will turn toward them.”

“So everyone is getting anxious. Who could be the next monster? It can’t be the Duke’s daughter, Maria, right?”

Mitchell shook his head at Raphael’s words.

“You don’t think he turned his own daughter into a monster, do you? I think it might be Caiman Jajak. That seems more plausible, doesn’t it?”

Ruelle recalled the information posted by the Legendary Guild leader earlier.

“We have the letter fragments we obtained when we defeated the monsters, remember?”

Tien opened the bag, checked the fragments, and read them aloud.

“Yes. When we captured Asanik, it said, ‘I made it possible to protect the capital. A hint to my subordinates.’ The fragment we got after capturing Valder says, ‘White hair, entirely black eyes without whites.'”

Ruelle nodded.

“Because of that fragment, it seems like the guild that went ahead of us is stuck and can’t make progress.”

Kite looked at Ruelle with a surprised expression.

“So, does that mean this is false information?”
“No, no. The hints seem accurate. However, it seems like they intentionally discovered the ones with crucial information first. Even if you stick them together and read, there’s hardly any useful information. The only things worth considering are the fourth hidden named from Vincenti and the fragment we got after capturing Valder.”

Hazen agreed.

“That’s right. There were only two posts that could suggest the location or identity of the named bosses. So, where do we get the remaining fragments? We need to gather as many fragments as possible to obtain information about the next monster.”

“To be honest, initially, I thought that defeating a named boss would give hints about hidden named bosses. However, it seems to be the opposite. We actually need to defeat hidden named bosses for hints.”

Ruelle’s words puzzled Raphael, who asked with a perplexed expression.

“But where do we find hidden named bosses? It’s not easy to guess.”

“It’s written on the fragment we got from Asanik. If we speculate the context, it seems like Curan Jajak created monsters to protect the capital and hid hints about them for his subordinates. In other words, by defeating hidden named bosses and collecting letter fragments, we can learn about higher-level monsters and gather seven keys to kill Duke Curan.”