The expedition's preparations took three additional days to properly organize, Diablo insisting on thorough readiness despite his own growing impatience to pursue this newly discovered lead before the organization had any opportunity to relocate their operations in response to the captured cultists' extended detention. Vherrow volunteered to join the core investigative party alongside Natsu's group, his considerable experience navigating the northern territories proving genuinely valuable for planning the journey's practical logistics."Frosthold sits roughly a week's travel north," Vherrow explained, spreading detailed maps across the manor's study table during their final planning session before departure. "The terrain grows considerably harsher the further we travel, genuine winter conditions regardless of the season, given the region's peculiar, persistent climate.""Any settlements along the route?" Leo asked, studying the map's sparse markings with his usual practical attention.

They debated their options through the remainder of the afternoon, the distant construction site's continued activity visible from their concealed vantage point as the group weighed the genuine risks of immediate action against the potential cost of delay. Diablo found himself torn between his own protective instincts toward the group he'd come to trust completely and the mounting evidence that waiting for proper reinforcement might allow this massive construction to reach dangerous completion."I don't think we can wait for Reese's contingent," Natsu said finally, breaking a long stretch of careful, considered silence. "Not if that thing's as close to finished as it looks.""I agree with the assessment," Diablo said, "but I'm not comfortable committing all of us to a direct confrontation against numbers we don't fully understand, in territory we've never properly explored.""Then let's not confront them directly," Akeno suggested, working through the practical alternative with her us

The crystalline structure's surface fractured visibly as the accumulated, unstable energy continued its catastrophic escalation, dark tendrils of corrupted mana lashing outward in increasingly wide, dangerous arcs that forced everyone across the battlefield to abandon their individual engagements in favor of desperate, immediate evasion."What's actually happening?" Natsu called out, barely avoiding a lashing tendril that scorched a deep furrow into the snow-covered ground where he'd been standing moments earlier."The connection's destabilizing entirely," Diablo said, his own considerable senses straining to properly assess the genuine scope of the mounting catastrophe. "Not sealing, not simply collapsing safely, but actively tearing itself apart."The Architect, his earlier fanatical composure entirely abandoned in favor of genuine, mounting horror, stumbled backward from the structure's increasingly violent instability. "This shouldn't be happening," he said, voice carrying despera