Holy Paris, the capital’s grand cathedral loomed like a mountain of stone under a pale sky.

Manstein, Bishop of the Holy Sanctuary, held a goblet like a ruby moon cupped in frost.

He leaned against the Pope’s throne like a lounging cat on marble, eyes shut, savoring wine like dusk on the tongue.

A young maiden bent to his ear like a moth to a candle, whispering smoke-thin words.

Irritation rose like a thorn in his chest before his brow knotted like storm clouds over a cold sea.

He set the cup down with a soft ring like ripples in a pond, took her papers like a knife sheathed in silk, and his gaze frosted over like rime on glass.

“Seems the royal house won’t bow,” he said, his voice a blade laid on ice, “the Elf Race front has gone quiet like an ebbing tide, and our careful setups turned to sand.”

It felt like losing both wager and troops, a net cast wide only to pull up weeds in the rain.

We gained no profit, only burned through Paladins like candles guttering in a draft.

That old monster in the palace advanced in one stroke like thunder climbing a peak, and now their spine is iron and their wings are fat.

Some regions even dared to smash our placements like waves battering a pier, spitting at the Holy Court Church.

Our Paladins coming back from the Elf Race lines met roadblocks like thorns on a black path.

Manstein sighed, a winter wind slipping through reeds.

He crossed to his desk like a shadow over lacquer and opened a book wrapped in oilskin like a snake shedding a dull hide.

The pages held three years of royal shadows like tracks in fresh snow, plans to uproot the Church from the empire like weeds from a garden.

It even mapped military and civil purges like lines carved into bone.

The Ael royal house was reclaiming old prerogatives like a tide licking back lost shoreline.

Parish chapels in the fiefs felt patrol boots multiply like ants on sugar, and petitions flew to the capital like startled birds.

It looked like the crown was finally lifting the knife like a moon rising behind clouds.

Manstein drained his wine like ink down a throat and let gloom settle like ash.

“Good, Ael royals,” he said, his smile a cut leaf on water, “you sit your throne, I wear my miter, and the lake stays still, but you just had to stir mud in the night.”

“Don’t blame us when we flip the table like a storm flipping boats,” he added, closing the book like a lid on a coffin.

He poured again, crimson threading the glass like a river through canyon, and stood by his desk, eyeing a dark-gold globe in the room’s heart like a small sun forged in dusk.

“The royals wanted us for years,” he murmured, voice low as a drum in fog, “but their top strength lagged like winter after harvest, so they fed us power by inches.”

“Now Ael Engler reached Sacred Rank like a pine breaking the snow, and courage fills their bellies like fire.”

His tone went light as dust, yet it hid a hook like a fishbone under milk.

“In that case, the old man can’t be left alive,” he said, words flat as slate, “cut their pillar like an axe to a beam, and the Holy Sanctuary thrives like wheat after rain.”

“Even if I step down, I still grip this nation like a hand around a reins.”

His eyes narrowed like shutters against noon. “From today, our Holy Sanctuary will hold every royal heir like a falcon on a glove.”

“They can learn magic or martial skill like boys learn to swim, but they must never pass Sacred Rank, and if they do, we kill like frost kills grass.”

“A royal heir must not pass forty, and if he does, let him lie quiet in his grave like a stone in a riverbed.”

The taste of vengeance rose like iron in his mouth before the sky itself seemed to sink like a lid.

A giant hand pressed down from above like a mountain, smashing the roof like clay under a hammer and tossing books and beams like leaves in a gale.

The study turned to chaos like a kicked anthill, smoke coiling up like snakes from a pit.

A long hand slid from the smoke like a spear through mist, reaching straight for Manstein’s throat like a hawk stooping on a hare.

Manstein’s focus snapped taut like a drawn bow, and he slipped aside like a fish flashing through reeds.

He whispered a spell, words falling like beads, and a great gold magic array bloomed underfoot like a sunflower, sweeping the air clean like wind over a plain.

He stared into the thinning smoke like a hunter into trees.

Birand dusted his shoulders like ash off a black coat and shook his leg like a man getting rid of burrs.

Manstein blinked once, confusion flickering like lightning behind glass, and spoke before thought cooled like ink on paper. “Who are you?”

Birand smiled, gentle as spring rain on slate. “Only a few hundred years,” he said, his tone a bell with rust, “and a Bishop of the Holy Sanctuary can’t place my face.”

“That’s a joke,” he added, the word sharp as a reed flute.

“You—” Manstein peered, then recognition struck like a spark in dry tinder; this was the Hero who slipped into the palace like a thief of dawn and helped Ael Engler break through.

His hands came together like a prayer turned blade.

Golden light poured to his palms like rivers to a basin, and torrents of gold power roared toward Birand like floodwater down a gorge.

Birand nodded with open praise like sun on steel. “Not bad,” he said, voice warm as tea, “you learned my sacred-aura siphoning array better than the others.”

He snapped his fingers, a spark in still air, and every mote of sacred aura in the room froze like snow caught mid-fall.

In that heartbeat, Birand seized the opening like a falcon seizing a rabbit, flipped the array like a banner in wind, and wrenched out the aura Manstein had gathered, along with Manstein’s own, like a tide sucking sand from underfoot.

Manstein’s face flushed red like wine over fire, and bile surged like a wave; he almost spat blood like a struck drum, then threw up a shield of sacred light like glass under noon.

Birand smiled again, a crescent like a knife, and reached out like lightning through branches, breaking layer after layer of defense like shells under a boot, and clamped Manstein’s throat with one hand like iron on bark.

His smile thinned to nothing like sun behind storm, and a chill rose off him like night off a lake.

The sunny air vanished like a lantern blown out, and a Fiend stood in its place like a shadow with teeth.

He hoisted Manstein by the collar like lifting a wet pelt and spoke with a curl of lips like a hook. “You know why I came,” he said, voice soft as snow, “hand over what I want.”

Manstein wiped the blood on his lip like smearing rust and gave a cold laugh like a knife on bone. “What use is it to you?” he said, voice dry as old parchment. “You’re no longer the Hero, and you can’t reach the Celestial Realm.”

Birand shrugged like a bird shrugging rain from feathers. “I don’t care for your chatter,” he said, tone flat as stone. “Whether I get in is my business, not yours.”

Manstein smiled colder, a crescent moon over ice. “Then whether I give it or not is mine,” he said, words like pebbles in a stream. “Kill me, and you’ll never find it.”

Birand paused, silence coiling like smoke, then shook his head with a small laugh like wind in reeds. “Bishop,” he said, voice calm as a millpond, “when did I say I’d kill you?”

“Oh?” Manstein kept the cold smile like frost on pine.

“There are plenty of ways to make you wish for death,” Birand said, voice light as a feather and sharp as a needle. “Killing is dull like stale bread.”

“Your Church tortures scapegoat mortals like wolves gnawing bone,” he added, eyes like winter stars. “Anything you can’t imagine, Birand can do.”

“…You’re a Fiend,” Manstein said after a breath, a small laugh like a knife’s click.

Birand stiffened for a blink like a deer catching a scent, then his fingers tightened like a vise, and he snapped the neck before him like twig over a knee.

He glanced at the still-pristine desk like an island after storm and smiled. “Likewise,” he murmured, voice smooth as silk. “You’re not bad either.”

He turned and looked at another Manstein not far away, smiling with mockery like a fox’s grin. “You mastered this trick,” he said, words light as dust, “so you must have killed and tortured plenty like a mill grinding grain.”

“Which of us looks more like a Fiend is still fog over a river.”

“Hahaha, right,” Manstein said, playing with his goblet like a cat with string. “I did inherit the notes you left, and I made them bloom like rot on wood.”

“This move was for Engler,” he added, grin thin as paper, “and you spoiled it early like a stone through glass.”

“Are you with him?”

Birand didn’t answer; he just watched with amusement like a man at a puppet show.

Manstein shook his head and smiled like oil on water. “Hero,” he said, voice smooth as wine, “why don’t we make a deal?”

“Oh? Let’s hear it,” Birand said, his laughter soft as bells; this man was interesting like a snake in a teahouse.

Back then, Birand had found a Bloodkin trick that regrew flesh like moss over stone, a miracle for warriors like rain on drought.

He ordered many caught like bats in nets, but results were thin like soup, and war dragged his sleeves like hands in mud, so he shelved it.

The work’s greatest fruit was a body split to pieces like seeds, each bit regrowing slow like shoots, yet dying at fist-size like frost-bitten buds.

Then the war ended like a drum falling quiet, and his interest cooled like tea, so he handed the research to specialists like tools to smiths.

One man gave Birand a notion like a thorn in cloth: if every piece of the body held a soul like flame in lanterns, would revival be a step away?

It sounded like nonsense, a castle of sand in wind.

It would need too many lives like coins poured into a bottomless jar to prove if Bloodkin tricks fit other races.

They tried living dissection and worse like knives in daylight; that’s why Birand called him a Fiend like a brand on the brow.

Manstein had improved that power like ink darkened twice, and Birand hadn’t known.

For Manstein, as long as a vessel existed like jars in a cellar, he could revive without end like waves on a shore.

Birand clasped his hands behind his back like a lord on a balcony and smiled at Manstein like sun on snow.

Manstein smiled back like a silk fan. “Hero, you want the Celestial Realm?”

Birand replied in kind, voice easy as wind. “Bishop, you want the Celestial Realm?”

They traded a look and a laugh like two knives chiming.

“Then we can talk,” Birand said, voice smooth as river stone. “Name your terms.”

Manstein drained his wine like sleep down a well, pointed at a couch he had dug from rubble like a treasure from sand, and smiled. “Let’s sit and talk.”

Birand lifted a hand and slapped the Manstein before him flat like a fly, blood fanning the room like red rain, then paused with a sigh like air from a bellows. “Pity,” he said, voice dull as lead. “Still not the real body.”

The study door opened like a mouth, and another Manstein walked out like a reflection stepping from a pond. “Hero, don’t be impulsive,” he said, smile like lacquer. “Let’s not end our cooperation early.”

Birand’s laugh was cold as frost on iron. “Good,” he said, words clipped like nails. “Now you qualify to talk terms with me.”

Manstein chuckled and kept his smile like a lantern under eaves.

“Where do we talk?” Birand asked, glancing at the wreck like a trash heap under rain. “We can’t sit in this dump.”

“Of course not,” Manstein said, eyes narrowed like slits and smile steady as paint. “Relax. Follow me, and I’ll show you a few things like stars behind a curtain.”

“Oh?” Interest stirred in Birand like wind in bamboo, and he followed at an unhurried pace like a cat down a moonlit wall.