The moment the Magic Crystal Stone in her pocket cracked, Mira was at the table, slotting the orphanage kids’ new blooms into damp floral foam, when a surge of mana hit like an icy fist to the heart.

First came disbelief, sharp as a snapped bowstring.

How? She’d gone out several times with no trouble, then the first time she let go, chaos? Was it just Anta bumping the crystal by accident? The thought rose like smoke, but Mira wouldn’t gamble on smoke.

She snatched the wall-hung sword, pressed her elven ears flat against her cheeks, and didn’t bother with the door. One step, she vaulted the window, then raced the eaves, feet drumming tile like rain on a ridge, cutting the path toward the crystal’s last ping.

It was the right call—the worst of her forecasts was breaking over them like a dark tide.

“Anta, there’s so many… let’s run!”

A small voice trembled from the alley. Copato clung to the sleeve of the purple-haired girl beside her, fear making her words shiver. The figures around them laughed, warped and wet.

“H-hey! B-big b-bro, th-this l-l-little… g-girl! Th-think! Th-they still g-g-got… ch-choices!”

“Hahahahahaha! You h-hurt… hurt our… oh! Our brother! Still wanna run?!”

“So… so much pain, so much pain… heh-heh—hahaha!!”

The broken cackle was nightmare-thin. A dozen shadows hemmed Anta and Copato in; some with heads tilted and shoulders slack, others hunched at the waist like corpses propped upright. All shared one thing—milk-white eyes rolled back, the light of reason drowned like stars in fog.

Copato recoiled, spine hitting the wall’s cold stone—no retreat left. The pack saw it too; veins marbled their whites as if excitement bled in. The fattest Nacha tribesman reached for Copato’s hair.

“Get away!”

“Yowl!”

A thread of deep violet cut the alley, near invisible, like a night tide under moon.

Anta stepped in front of Copato. The fat Nacha man screamed, snatching his hand back, the skin scored by a charred line.

“Pain, pain! It hurts! It hurts! It hur—hur—hurts!!”

His palm sizzled, the acid nature chewing with vicious instinct. Yet it didn’t scare him off. His howl climbed, twisted into pleasure-laughter; fever lit his gaze as he stared at Anta.

“Pain, pain, sweet, good! I—I’ll eat you… eat you both… up!! Hahahahaha!!”

“…Maniac! Get back!”

The reaction was wrong in a way that scraped the bones. The little blue-haired catgirl screamed, all child and terror.

Anta was steadier. Her left hand leveled the black-violet magic dagger; her right hand gripped Copato’s shaking fingers.

“We’ll be fine. Don’t be scared.”

Her voice trembled too, but resolve held like iron under silk. Copato stared at her back, still afraid. “But—they—they…”

“Don’t be scared,” Anta repeated, lowering her voice, firm as a vow. “By the name of Bonai… I’ll protect you.”

She narrowed her eyes. Every spell she’d learned since that day, every lesson battle had carved, flickered through her mind. Her small hand set her blade for a guard-to-counter, ready to meet the charge.

A trained stance in a child should’ve made any normal thug hesitate, if not blink in surprise. These creatures weren’t normal.

“Rr—roar, roar!”

They howled and threw all honor to dust, a dozen bodies lunging at two kids. Anta spoke fast and low; four deep violet magic arrows spun into being around her—her current limit. Each chose the biggest threat. Before they closed, the bolts hit shoulders and knees with needle precision, breaking stride, dumping bodies into the dirt.

That was a trick she’d gleaned watching Tigalin challenge Mira. First time out, it worked like a charm. Any proper magic tutor would’ve itched to take her in.

But four only stopped four. The rest didn’t learn from the crash; they kept coming. Anta bit down on fear, stretched her magic dagger longer, and braced to trade wounds—

“Get down.”

The voice slid in cold as frost, and joy flashed across Anta’s face. She dropped the hard-won long blade, yanked Copato down, and met the full-body buzz that lifts every hair like storm grass.

If they tingled, the chargers took a gale. In one breath, they didn’t even have time to scream before they slammed into walls. Bones cracked with blunt pops, like firecrackers detonating under a porcelain bowl—only louder, heavier. Arcs still danced over them on the ground, bright snakes biting meat.

Seconds passed. Ozone bloomed, and the stink of scorched cloth and skin rose like bad incense. The one who did it didn’t even look back. She sheathed the blade, turned, and crouched before Anta and Copato.

“How are you? Any injuries?”

Mira’s voice carried rare urgency. Her hands checked them head to toe. Only Anta’s clothes were sliced open at the hem. She exhaled, the tightness easing. “You’re okay now. You’re safe.”

She soothed Copato’s hair with a palm, then glanced at the calmer Anta. “What happened just now?”

“I don’t know… they suddenly boxed us in.” Anta thought, a crease of confusion on her small face. “They said stuff like ‘so it was here’ and ‘the script,’ but I couldn’t make sense of it. Then one ran at us. I hit him with magic. They got mad and turned… like that.”

Mira nodded. Outside the alley she’d heard their babble too—like a drunk chorus circling a bottle.

“Teacher!!!!”

“…Mm?” Mira’s thoughts cracked under the sudden squeal. For a heartbeat she readied for danger, then saw only Copato, starry-eyed and shining.

“Teacher, you were super—super cool!” She mimed Mira’s draw, mouth making the sizzle-cut of current—whoosh, zzzt—“One swish and they all flew! How’d you do that? Can I do it someday?”

“Oh, that?” Mira chuckled, palm light on her hair. “Keep working, and you absolutely can.”

The shaking had been shock at Mira’s entrance more than fear. Anta had seen Mira and Adelaide cut loose before—top human power like twin comets. For Copato, this was the first sunrise.

Her worship, though, rubbed someone the wrong way. Anta let her hand fall, turned aside, and muttered under breath.

“Of course Big Sis Mira’s cool. Hmph…”

“Hm? Anta was super cool too.” Copato tilted her head, then grinned and copied Anta’s dagger stance. “Especially that line—‘By the name of Bonai, I swear I’ll protect you.’ So cool!”

“Uh!” Anta’s face went tomato-red. She flapped in panic and cut the mimicry short. “Enough! Don’t say it!”

“What? It was cool! Someday I’ll stand in front of you and say it too. By the name of Copato, I swear I’ll protect you—”

As the two little ones bickered back to normal, Mira’s heart loosened like a knot undone. Her mind drifted to other threads—the surname “Bonai” Copato had just said…

Bonai… why does that ring a bell?

Her thought snapped again—not from their chatter, but from the sound behind her.

The moment she heard bodies rise, mira’s hand found her hilt. She pivoted, stance settling like winter steel, ready to put them back down.

A dozen eyes met hers. They didn’t charge. They shrieked and fled, tails tucked, into the alley’s deeper dark.

“Ha! Bad guys ran with their tails between their legs!”

Copato pulled a face at their backs. Mira didn’t relax. She watched the retreat, a frown deepening.

…?

Something was off.

She’d hit hard so these brawny Nacha tribesmen would stay down. She trusted her control. For a normal human, that would be lethal. Even with bodies blessed by the gods, they shouldn’t rise so fast—let alone run like nothing burned.

A glint at the edge of her vision gave the answer.

A half-empty glass vial lay there. Mira’s brow knit as she picked it up. She tipped it to the sun. Saliva ringed the mouth, fresh, like someone jettisoned it mid-panic.

More than the spit, the residue on the inner wall mattered.

A pale gray liquid clung, viscous, like the spinal serum Adelaide once offered to sharpen wakefulness—only murkier. Mira’s pupils tightened. She’d seen something closer.

She brought it to her nose. A heavy, layered fragrance punched up, laced with a sinister tang.

She knew that scent. Varie had shown it to her. It was the Stimulant Elixir the radicals gave to Hos and Tela—the public reason the Elves imposed a lockdown.

But… how?

According to Varie’s digging, the radicals lost their source. Truth was, they never knew where it came from. The Politician confessed the elixir just appeared in a warehouse. After that batch ran dry, no new stock ever came.

It sounded like nonsense, but Varie and the chieftain couldn’t prove he lied. And not just them. Even with the Carne Family’s iron seal on Sanda, the Elves never turned up another vial.

After all that fruitless hunting, she’d just found one in a random alley, in a random hand.

Coincidence?

Coincidence, again—coincidence.

A bad omen rose in Mira’s chest like cold mist; today had seen too many “coincidences.”

What unnerved her more wasn’t chance itself; this elixir was stained with material from Soul Devourer Sormaidon, like soot swirled into milk.

The logic was flimsy as spider silk.

Yet her gut tugged like a hidden thread: this elixir’s source might link to her sister’s strangeness after Soul Devourer Sormaidon was slain.

If that was true—even by a sliver—Mira wouldn’t drop this thread.

She’d worry it like a hound on a scent.

She turned; before she could speak, Anta nodded, quiet as moonlight, as if he’d read her heart.

“I’ll take Copato back, Sister Mira. Don’t worry.”

His voice held steady like a rope cinched tight.

“Mm. Stay on the main road with people, under the lanterns. Don’t delay. Go straight back to the orphanage.”

Mira tossed Anta a fresh tracking Magic Crystal Stone, glinting like a small star.

She turned, left a quick “I’ll be back soon,” and slipped into the dark like ink in water.