The Magic Institution was a house with roots sunk deep into time, its corridors smelling of the Underworld’s hush. Its reach rose like a mountain range, enough to meet the Church eye to eye.

People said it only surged after the Second World War, like a river in flood after a broken dam. Before that, the Clan Head held the depths like an old tree gripping rock, until seven branches split and a young force finally stood up.

It couldn’t erase the Church like flame erases paper, yet it could still parry the blade and hold the line.

But after the recent Clan Head war, the Institution bled strength like autumn leaves falling. It could no longer pin the Church in place. If the Church wished, it could carve out a swath of the Underworld like a plow through wet earth, and even the Clan Head might be too late to stop it.

If that day came, the sky would bear only the Church’s sun. The rules of the Underworld would be rewritten like wind erasing tracks in sand.

For a realm balanced on counterweight and tether, that shift would be an earthquake underfoot, and peril in every shadow.

The source ran back to the birth of Artifact Spirits. Since the Second Soul Artifact appeared, the Underworld had trembled like water under thunder. No—maybe the tremor began when the First Vessel Soul cracked dawn open.

The Second Soul Artifact was engineered by the Church, a thing that could shed skin and take monstrous form, and the maker gave it a name like a bell: Elana.

Judging from Mizuki’s borrowed miracles, the Second Soul Artifact was easy to understand and hard to swallow. It was a cheat, a loaded die glittering in the dark.

The First Vessel Soul was the Church’s earliest work, once meant for the Magic Institution, yet finally handed to the Underworld’s filthiest standard-bearer. It looked plain as stone by a path, early-cast and unassuming. In truth, its power was the breaking of space, the hand that could twist rooms and halls like soft wire, so long as the wielder’s craft was precise as a needle.

Yun Shi seldom used it, and so the blade looked dull. She favored the iron of her own body, the fist and foot tempered by training.

Beyond that, Yun Shi still held a hidden card like winter frost under fallen leaves, so she walked low-key, cool and quiet.

What made an Artifact Spirit truly frightening was the fog around it. It held unknowns like a night sea; no one could name its whole reach.

There were only two Artifact Spirits in play, and both carried power as elusive as smoke on wind.

Mizuki didn’t know Yun Shi’s true name, yet she knew her weight. Even without the Artifact Spirit’s storm, that woman could face a hundred like a lone pine bracing a gale.

The stronger the figure, the harder the chase. Still, that was her only north star, so she kept her eyes up and her feet moving.

“Is it power I need...?”

She stared at her hands like a sailor reading his palms for weather, and drifted in fog.

In Britain, she moved like a ghost through postcards. A trip meant for joy tasted of ash; foreign streets offered color, and she walked them colorless. Sham watched, troubled like a sister at the bedside.

“Mizuki...”

“Ah—sorry, Sham, I zoned out...”

The apology came thin and breathless, like a leaf in wind.

She knew she was off. She couldn’t name the why, and that made the ache colder.

“If you don’t like this, we can go back to Japan,” Sham sighed, the sound like rain easing heat. She bent instead of breaking; with Mizuki in this shape, play felt wrong. Better to go home and smooth the heart’s wrinkles.

Mizuki lived in the Outer World. Family waited like lamps in a window. Sham wouldn’t chain her. If Mizuki spoke of home, Sham would open the door.

“No, it’s fine. I’m okay. Let’s stay in London.”

She smiled and refused, soft but steady, like a cup set down without a clink. She wouldn’t be willful now. Before the Underworld, she might’ve accepted. After all she’d walked, she’d learned to hold herself straight.

Besides, Sham’s mother was in London, a hearth rarely visited. To cut that time short would be unkind, like snuffing a candle you didn’t light. They had stayed in Japan for a while, but home is home, and walls remember your name.

So Mizuki held her ground.

“Are you troubled, Mizuki?”

“...”

“Fine. If you don’t want to say, I—”

“That’s not it. I... want to talk. You’re my most important friend, Sham. I think I can say it.”

She shook her head and met Sham’s eyes, honest as clear water.

“Mizuki...”

“It’s because of you that I learned the shape of things. Without you, I might be dead. I might have lived blind to the world’s dark, and I’d never have...”

Met her.

The last words jammed like a bead in a narrow thread. Her cheeks warmed; her heart clenched like a fist.

The memory that cut deepest was the first doorway into the Underworld. Back then, Sham—

Smiled as she came to pull Mizuki from the pit...

Confessed everything with guilt dragging her voice...

Ran with her through alley and night, footsore and breathless...

Warned her, with a straight face, about the cruelty in those depths, and still, Mizuki chose to face it...

She couldn’t forget. That carefree girl, all play and sunlight, had stepped in when Mizuki needed a hand most, and offered her palm.

Those days were carved into her like names on a tree.

“I’m really glad I met you, Sham.”

No reason needed. Just glad, like spring for spring’s own sake.

“So don’t worry about my feelings. That’s enough.”

This was Miyuki Kiseki’s own matter.

She couldn’t let others step inside the ring.

“Are you looking down on me, Mizuki?”

Sham’s face cooled like a shadow crossing glass; her voice dropped low.

“Eh...?”

“Why do you think I saved you? Not just to rescue some stranger. You’re my friend. You think I did it for a laugh? If I’m your friend, why won’t you tell me?”

“I...”

“I don’t get it. Where did that sun-bright, hot-blooded Mizuki go? Why bottle it up? You know I hate that. Right now, with me, you can spill everything. I can take it!”

“Sham—”

“Stand up. You’re not the type to choke on silence. You already chose. You can do this. You can walk in my place, Miyuki Kiseki!”

It was the first time she called her full name. The sound cracked the fog like dawn through frost.

Right—Mizuki had comrades. Many hands, many shoulders. People she could lean on like trees in a grove.

Thinking she had to solve it alone was foolish. She didn’t need to chain herself to the worst road. There were other paths, and the map was wide.

“Thank you, Sham.”

Mizuki smiled, the cleanest, faultless smile, bright as wash hung under sun.

She knew what to do.

“I want to know where that ‘Swordmaster’ lady is.”

She would change.

...

Mizuki ran, as if the wind were a tide pushing her back. She didn’t care. Even when her legs went numb, she didn’t stop. She couldn’t.

Breath turned ragged like torn cloth. Feet numbed to wood. Her heart thudded to a halt and then kicked again. Each inhale scraped like sand.

But—

Her resolve burned steady, a lamp cupped in two hands, untouchable by draft or dark.

In her mind stood a figure in a black cloak, a silhouette like a crow on snow. Her smile, her face, all of it empty as a mask.

One day, Mizuki would fill it. She’d paint it in colors until everyone saw, and it would be the truest her.

She would chase. She would change. She would strip off every borrowed skin.

For that, she needed power.

She flung the door wide. The bang rang like a bell and startled the blonde woman inside. The woman turned, and saw Mizuki bent, palms on shaking knees, dragging breath like a fish to water.

“What is it, Demon Sovereign?”

She was an ice queen at heart; calm refroze her in a blink.

“...Please let me change.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m begging you. Tell me how to get the power to change.”

Mizuki’s gaze was iron set in wood. The blonde’s face was blank as marble. They faced each other like two blades on a table.

A new storm gathered over the eaves.

...

The Church’s grand hall glittered, every facet catching light like frost on stone. Step inside and you could mistake it for heaven, sweet and cold.

A girl walked the aisle in quiet steps, composure wrapped around her like silk. Her silver hair fell to her waist, a strand of starlight; the white nun’s dress traced young curves like chalk over marble; her slightly melancholy eyes held a hush like a chapel at dusk.

From the far end, a girl about her age approached, footsteps soft as rain. The silver-haired girl stopped just then, as if cued by an unseen hand.

“Welcome, Rebecca.”

The other girl smiled, a crescent moon in lamplight.

She returned the smile.

“I’m late. I’m sorry.”

The chandelier’s crystals burned like small stars, and the decor pinned light on only these two. Under that glow, they looked flawless, like painted saints come to life.

The world’s unfolding grew harder to read, like weather shifting behind veils.