The Rebirth of Evelyn Knox

Cecilia had obviously not been very happy about having to retreat so soon after tasting the rapid growth from the abuse of their team synergy and Amara's buffs, but since they had all agreed to follow Evelyn's instructions before entering the forest, she could only helplessly do as she was told.     

Of course, Evelyn understood their emotions, as she herself had made it seem like they were going to be hunting in the Wonderland of Doom for weeks, but now they were going back just after getting started. Maybe even Amara felt a little disappointed, though she didn't show it on her face.     

Surprisingly, the one who cared the least was their youngest member, Vivian, who had treated it as a fun picnic from the start. She had never expected them to let her try setting the forest on fire anyway, so she wasn't disappointed.     

Evelyn coughed awkwardly as they finally arrived back at the White Lily Palace, barely resisting the urge to just dash to her room and start browsing the loot. "We'll go back to hunt regularly, don't worry!"     

Having already pushed the Gilmore sisters back into their room while telling them to wait for her to come discuss something, Cecilia finally showed her true colors once she was alone with her best friend.     

She rubbed her hands greedily with a grin. "We made so much experience and loot today, I can't believe it! Going this way, not to mention us, even that maid of yours is going to shoot right up into the sky, you know? No wait, uh, her contribution is probably the biggest in our growth, so I can't say that… Anyway! You just have to let me know when you're ready to go again."     

Needless to say, Cecilia's attitude towards their exploration of the Wonderland of Doom had already done a complete one-eighty. It was no surprise, really, considering how Evelyn was able to not only steer them clear from the bigger threats, but also lead them directly to suitable 'prey'. Moreover, with Amara's buffs, they could be hunting all day and not feel exhausted at all!     

Thinking about how most people relied on boring passive gains from cultivating in their own rooms, Cecilia couldn't help but shake her head ruefully. 'If they knew what my little wifey can do… they'll probably go crazy.'     

Of course, if the pink haired girl knew that Cecilia was still referring to her like that after being reprimanded so many times, she'd go crazy too.     

Blissfully unaware of her friend's thoughts, however, Evelyn nodded. "Sure. By the way, make sure you inquire about the prices of all the materials we gathered, alright? I don't wanna be scammed again."     

The ash blonde tilted her head in confusion. "Again?"     

Evelyn sighed. "Right. The last time I was with Aurora, I had no idea about the market rate for the monster she killed, so the auction guy probably scammed us pretty bad."     

Cecilia couldn't help but gape in shock. "H-He must have been quite gutsy to scam you in front of Aurora. Although most people think her attitude is quite easygoing, no one really dares to take the chance. After all, their life is on the line."     

The pink haired girl rolled her eyes. "Is that why you bully her all the time?"     

The ash blonde coughed. "Hey, I don't come under 'most people', you know? I know she's actually very forgiving, as long as you don't do something to really provoke her. Plus, as the best friend of her most treasured disciple, is there anymore more invincible to her wrath than I?"     

Evelyn chuckled. "You know, I've always been a little curious… how exactly did you first find out? You've been pestering her since even before she took me in as a student, right?"     

Cecilia looked a little embarrassed as she scratched her cheek. "Actually… when I first met her, I had no idea who she was, and she reminded me so much of you. Cute and adorable, but always pretending to be cold. Assuming she was a junior, I just kept at it for a few days."     

Evelyn rolled her eyes. "Shouldn't you have stopped when you found out, though?"     

"Ehehe…"     

Evelyn had to commend her friend's luck. With this kind of attitude, it really was a surprise how she managed to survive unscathed for so long. "Anyway, forget it. Just get find out what you can about the materials. We can sell what looks like it won't be very useful to us and fetches good value to get some extra funds on the way back to the forest next time."     

Cecilia patted her chest with pride. "No worries, with Cecilia information facility at your service, I'll get you a complete list of all the market rates for what we got! We can roughly estimate their worth from then, round it up and down to our grade. Wait a minute… you plan to keep some stuff?"     

The pink haired girl nodded. Not to mention things that could be of use to herself, such as the corpse of the toxic beast, even things that weren't selling for good enough price were better off just staying in her inventory. They could always be useful later. "Of course, if it doesn't look worth selling, it's better to keep it for ourselves."     

"Are you sure? I mean, won't you… run low on space?"     

Evelyn could tell from Cecilia's tentative tone that she felt a little hesitant while asking, and she just shook her head with a smile. "Don't worry about it."     

The ash blonde nodded. Although it was absurd just how much her friend had been able to store in her spatial artifact, if she said that she had no trouble keeping more, it must be so.      

Seeing how her friend was about to rush off into her room, Cecilia couldn't help but reach out to hold her back by the hand. "Little Eve… um, don't take this the wrong way, but you should… really keep in mind how much carrying capacity you show people."     

Feeling a little embarrassed, the ash blonde coughed. "I-I guess yours must be an extremely high-grade spatial artifact, and while it's okay to show it in front of us, I'm… worried that people will get greedy if you show it off in the guild. Y-You know what I mean, right?"     

The pink haired girl smiled. It always made her feel a little weird whenever she saw her friends worry for her, but… it wasn't a bad feeling. "Don't worry. I'll keep it in mind."     

Although when compared to Cecilia, Amara and Vivian weren't nearly as surprised by either Evelyn's storage capacity or the efficiency of farming experience in the Wonderland of Doom, the ash blonde felt that the two of them needed to be properly educated to make sure that they didn't expose these things in front of outsiders.     

With Evelyn's attitude, she wouldn't bother doing such things herself, so Cecilia of course had to take up the job.     

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Finally free from Cecilia, Evelyn entered her room and settled Ruru on the bed, where she continued dozing off after exhausting herself in the forest. Of course, Bree took it as an opportunity to cuddle with the usually standoffish little fox in her human form, treating her as a glorified plush toy.     

Evelyn couldn't help but giggle. "Don't wake her up, okay? Ruru worked really hard today."     

"Okay, mama."     

Evelyn ruffled the little girl's blonde hair, and then froze as she realized how used to it she had gotten recently. '… Aunt Bree's not gonna kill me when she regains her memory, right?'     

Thinking about it… wasn't it all her own choice? Anyway, she can't blame it on her, definitely not. 'Plus, I'm just an innocent little eight-year-old kid. You can't blame me for anything.'     

She shook her head in amusement before shifting her focus to the 'Heart of the Earth'. Being an ownerless item, she didn't have much trouble binding it to herself, and shortly after, the contents of the spatial artifact were finally revealed.     

Unlike Evelyn, who just shoved whatever interesting thing she found right into her inventory, even the worthless knickknacks, Craig had obviously been much more picky with what he put in there despite the relatively 'large' size of the spatial storage. In fact, with more than half the space being empty, he had either used a lot of things up while lost in the forest, or he was just way too picky with what he put in.     

It wasn't possible to use her probe skill while simply viewing the contents of the spatial artifact, and Evelyn could only see what they looked like. She still had to take the items out one by one to check what they really were.     

Of course, the first thing she took out were the bunch of suspicious-looking bags. "I hope that sick pervert isn't storing people's body parts or something in there…"     

Evelyn completely ignored the fact that her own inventory wasn't just full of animal corpses, but also those of the prince and a professor.     

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