Nana Toki pushed open the door of the next private room, the hinge sighing like a tired reed, and found Yuzuki tossed on the couch like a discarded doll.

She lay on her side in Di-Guang’s school uniform, out cold, amber light spilling over her like late sun on a shrine, washing her in a strange, holy hush.

She looked like a little white rabbit caught in a snare, all soft fear and helpless tremble under a hunter’s shadow.

So Mo Yao’s crew must’ve grabbed her, dragged her back like a netted fish, and when the craving hit like a snakebite, they dumped her here.

Nana’s gaze swept her clothes like a careful broom over glass, and when nothing seemed disturbed, relief smoothed her chest like a ripple going flat.

“Hey, wake up.” Her voice snapped the air like a twig.

Nana stepped in and nudged her arm, a light tap like rain on a shutter.

“Suo… Sen?” The name slipped out like mist from cold lips.

In the blur between sleep and surfacing, Yuzuki saw the cool girl she knew, a silhouette in the fog like a lighthouse on a gray sea.

That girl stood before her, sharp-cheeked, and smiled like a blade catching light on a clear morning.

“Didn’t get enough sleep? Time to go home.” The warmth in the words ran like tea through chilled fingers.

She always wore that nothing-under-heaven-can-touch-me face, stormproof and sky-bright, as if the world’s claws couldn’t find purchase.

“Hey. Up.” The familiar voice drifted in again like a bell through fog.

Feeling came first, fear fluttering like a moth in her ribs, and then Yuzuki’s lids opened slow as petals, clearing the blur like dawn burning off mist.

“Suo Sen?” Her voice was soft as cotton, small as a sparrow, puzzled like a cloud with no wind. “Why are you here?”

“Why am I here? Why do you think I’m here?” Nana flicked her knuckles against Yuzuki’s head like knocking a ripe gourd. “Look around. Where is this?”

“Here…” The delay hit like thunder after lightning, and Yuzuki’s eyes wandered the strange room like a lost boat on dark water.

Her heart skittered like a trapped bird in a bamboo cage.

Sitting up, she clutched her collar like a shutter against a sudden gust. “Where is this?”

“You don’t remember someone grabbing you?”

“Grabbed?” The word fell like a stone into a well.

Nana stared for a beat, silence stretching thin as ice. Great, she thought, she got snatched and didn’t even feel the net.

“Really don’t remember?” Nana searched her eyes like a lantern scans an alley. “Not even a flicker?”

“Mm… I only remember after school…” Yuzuki held her head like a sore peach and tugged at a thread in the dark. “Someone came for me, told me to go behind the school… tch…”

The rest wouldn’t come, a torn page in rain, and her face twisted like paper under a match.

Sweat beaded on her brow like dew on young leaves.

“If you can’t dredge it up, don’t.” Nana cut the memory loose like a snagged kite. “Let’s go home first.”

This wasn’t a place for tea and small talk; Yuedi Entertainment Club was a nest of Mo Yao’s people, and if they checked the web of cameras, her fingerprints would shine like frost.

“Exit, this way.” A-Bao had the door open like a slit of night, and Nana caught his blank face with a smile like a cat’s paw.

“Helping me like this—won’t that make Mo Yao sulk?” Nana hauled Yuzuki up, and paused beside him like a breeze that chills before it moves on.

“You’re one of the young master’s men. Slipping the young master poison is one thing, but letting go the girl he bled to catch?”

“If no one saw, nothing happened.” A-Bao drew a breath that sunk like a stone in a pond.

“Ha—so honest it loops back to crooked.” Nana patted his shoulder, a friendly thump with a thorn under it, and whisked Yuzuki out of Yuedi like a shadow fading with the lamp.

A-Bao watched her back vanish down the hall like a knife sliding into a sheath, and a cold wind crawled up his spine like winter ivy.

When she slipped from sight, he stepped into the next room; five or six bodies lay heaped like a toppled stack of logs, out cold and slack.

He hesitated, the moment thin as ice, then pulled a syringe from his pocket, the needle glinting like a silver thorn, and moved toward the pile.

…

“By the way, who even grabbed me, and why grab me?” Back home, the questions still spun in Yuzuki’s head like leaves caught in a small whirl.

Her pretty face scrunched up, puzzled like a cat watching snow.

“What, you plan to return the favor once you hear their motive?” Nana sprawled on the share-house sofa like a cat on a sun-warm stone.

“Uh… that’s not what I meant, it’s just—it’s weird anyone would kidnap me, I’m just a normal girl.” Her voice was thin as a wisp of smoke.

“Are you?” Nana bit into a cookie she’d snagged from the downstairs market, crumbs falling like grain, and gave Yuzuki a sidelong look.

A normal girl, huh… The thought drifted across her face like a shadow from a passing cloud.

“How did you even know I’d get kidnapped, and how did you find me?” Yuzuki’s eyes searched her like minnows in clear water.

“Ah… that.” Nana licked a crumb off her lip like a cat stealing cream. “Because I poked the wrong hive.”

“Eh?” The sound popped like a bubble.

“I stirred them up, and they can’t touch me, so they reach for the low-hanging fruit around me—like you. Crack.” She snapped another cookie, the sound sharp as ice.

“As for finding you? Easy. I ticked off that guy at your school—what’s his name, Mo Yao—the one with roots sunk deep in Yuedi, and then, you know, use your head a little.”

“…So I got kidnapped because of you?” Realization bloomed like a lantern lighting from within.

“Yeah. That’s about the size of it.” Nana’s once-blank face curved into a smile like a new moon. “What? Getting scared now?”

“Eh?” Yuzuki blinked, then shook her head, the motion small as a willow leaf. “No, just… a bit surprised.”

“You’re not afraid they’ll try again?” Nana pointed a bitten cookie at her like a stubby dagger, mischief glinting like foxfire.

“I’m not.” The answer landed like a pebble on still water. “Because Suo Sen will come save me, right?”

“Mm?” Nana’s hand froze midair like a bird paused between wingbeats.

“Suo Sen wouldn’t leave me, would she?” Yuzuki cupped her hands over her heart like sheltering a candle, cheeks pink as dawn, her smile gentle as spring rain. “Like a knight—cool and brave.”

[Hidden Quest: An Ordinary Fairy Tale (Completed!)]

Before Nana Toki even sensed it, the System ticked the box in silence, like a seal pressed on warm wax.