Time slid from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
A full twelve hours.
Loki and Astraea had sat in the room the whole half-day, waiting for one thing only—the results.
Click.
The golden door opened slowly.
Alise stepped out, one hand braced on the frame. Exhaustion was written across the face that was usually all sunshine; clearly, this training had been anything but ordinary.
Behind her, Ryuu, Kaguya, and Lyra filed out in the same state—faces drained, unusually quiet, forcing themselves to keep their breaths small and even.
Alive, but barely.
That was the feeling Astraea got from her girls.
"Alise, are you alright?"
Astraea's gentle concern hit them like a shot of tonic; the "barely alive" girls all seemed to revive at once.
"We're okay, Astraea-sama… we're just a little tired…"
Alise drew a slow breath—then realized the air no longer burned hot or bit with cold. Only then did it hit her: they had left that hellish space.
"Tired?"
Astraea blinked. This child had always been a spring of energy. Even after a day's run in the Dungeon, she wore that same bright vigor. To hear her say the words "I'm tired" today…
"Then go rest for today. We'll update tomorrow—"
"No."
Alise cut in before Astraea could finish.
She was dead on her feet—she wanted nothing more than to topple into a bed and pass out—but before that, the numbers had to be updated.
"Let's not delay the update. Astraea-sama, please help me now. No matter what, I want to see how much I grew in just half a day."
Seeing her insistence, Astraea didn't argue. Truth be told, she was just as curious: after that half-day, how far had they come?
Alise quickly shed her top. Astraea pricked her fingertip and pressed divine blood to Alise's back. Her personal status surfaced at once.
Strength: H128 → F312 | Endurance: H177 → F324 | Dexterity: H177 → G289 | Agility: H114 → F303 | Magic: H153 → H154
"!?"
Astraea froze at the outrageous numbers.
Loki leaned in too, eyes widening at the leap in each stat. And this was only half a day.
At this rate, Alise might be ready to cross to Lv. 5 in less than half a month.
Loki nudged the still-stunned Astraea with an elbow. "Astraea—your child is waiting for your verdict."
Snapped back to the moment, Astraea wiped the moisture from her eyes and checked again. No, she wasn't seeing things.
She hadn't expected numbers like this from just twelve hours.
She pressed a sheet to Alise's back to take the imprint, and added a warning. "Alise, when you see it, don't be shocked, and don't scream. Understand?"
"Yes, I understand."
Alise swallowed and took the printout from Astraea-sama.
Her mind blanked at a glance.
And in that instant, she understood exactly why Astraea had said, "Don't be shocked, don't scream."
With growth this insane, how could you not?
"Alise."
"Alise!"
Her brain rebooted. She looked again at the numbers she'd earned in half a day.
"…Holy—"
A crude word slipped out of the ever-cheerful girl. Even Alise couldn't keep it in.
Except for Magic, the smallest jump among the other four stats was over 150 points; the highest had blasted past 200.
Growth? This wasn't growth—this was takeoff.
Catching Kaguya's stunned expression, Alise said nothing and thrust the sheet into her hands.
Kaguya blinked, glanced down, rubbed her eyes, then stared and blurted, "What the—!"
Cooling herself almost immediately, she shoved the imprint at Ryuu and tugged down the collar of her kimono. She couldn't wait a second longer to see her own numbers.
"Astraea-sama, if you would."
"Of course," Astraea said with a smile. She was eager to confirm whether Alise's case was unique.
Strength: H156 → H278 | Endurance: H123 → H298 | Dexterity: H125 → F367 | Agility: H102 → F326 | Magic: H123 → H124
"Not a fluke."
Seeing Kaguya's results, Astraea understood: this explosive surge wasn't an accident.
Accidents don't happen twice in a row.
"This training space does more than I imagined," she thought. "Alise is still Lv. 4, and the effect is already this obvious. Even if the returns shrink at higher levels, it's still more efficient than the Dungeon."
"With this room, ability scores can be pushed to the cap. And with the other door, they can hone team coordination and response to the unexpected."
"This is… close to perfect."
Astraea let out a long breath.
Clearly, from here on, the Loki Familia's growth would be abnormally fast—and their ceiling abnormally high. The deeper they went, the less they would lack for top-tier adventurers; what they would lack, for a time, was only the "deeds" to promote them.
But even that shortage would be temporary.
Once the "challenge space" monsters were cleared in solo attempts, even "deeds" might cease to be a problem.
"I suppose… I've profited on the side as well," she thought, lips curling faintly as she looked at her other children, still stunned into silence.
It was a good thing. From now on, Alise and the others would tread a steadier path—and walk much farther into the future.
(End of Chapter)
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