Terracafe at midnight, the duke’s manor erupted like a hive kicked open by a storm.

To outsiders, it looked like a manhunt for a crowned fugitive, a net drawing tight like iron rain.

But the truth bit harder than a jailbreak, a cold knife pressed under the city’s ribs.

A Demon King had slipped free of any contractor’s leash, and vanished like smoke inside the sleeping streets.

Only Irina and Xi knew the shadow’s true name, so they told the world a dear friend was missing, like a lantern snuffed in sudden wind.

News of a Demon King loose would thunder through the city like summer lightning, so they kept that storm under wraps.

Guilt gnawed first, then resolve—Xi bore part of the blame, and Irina chose silence like a veil across dawn.

“Can’t find him… still can’t!” Frustration surged first, then action—Xi and Irina stood in the manor’s courtyard, night breeze cool as river water.

The manor’s spies had cast lines through Terracafe, pulling up sightings like fish flashing silver, yet no one knew where Ouyang hid.

“Those reports say he’s dodging us on purpose, like a fox in reeds. He’s plotting something foul.” Irina’s voice shivered like a bowed string.

“Your dream—what did you see? Maybe the dream holds his trail, like frost revealing tracks. Everything began with that dream.”

Her ember-red eyes turned, pupils glinting like live coals, and she pinned the key with a stare.

“Dream…” Xi cupped her chin, and memory rose like mist from a river at noon.

Strangely, the scenes stayed sharp as carved jade; usually dreams shatter like thin ice at dawn.

“I dreamed you died—he tore off your limbs like rotten branches, and kicked your head like a ball in an alley.”

“And a little imp crunch-crunched your arm, like a rat on bone.”

“Don’t.” Horror flared first, then reprimand—Irina rapped Xi’s head lightly, a knuckle like a tap on porcelain. “Focus. Where is he?”

“Where?” Xi shut her eyes, and images unfurled like storm banners.

Terracafe in ruins, walls toppled like sandcastles, crowds scattering like startled sparrows, my sister seized like prey.

Sister! The word struck like a bell—my sister died in his bite, and he stood at the clock tower like a hawk on a spire.

“But it was only a dream.” Doubt pooled first, then caution—“Will Ouyang really be there? And that tower’s high as a cliff.”

“No time.” Urgency rose like a flood—“He’s a Demon King. One ritual, and Terracafe drowns like a candle in rain.”

“Even a sliver of hope is a bridge over rapids. We cross it.”

For no reason she could name, Irina’s nerves burned like a drumskin; dread pressed her ribs like hands.

Move. Faster. Her eerie instinct, a wild bird in the chest, had steered her from many traps, and she trusted its wings.

At the top of the clock tower, just as in Xi’s dream, Ouyang stood under the night like a shadow on stone.

A green hexagram pulsed under his feet, like moss-lit glass; at its heart, a green crystal floated and turned like a leaf in eddying water.

“Hericot Crystal…” Ouyang chuckled, the sound dry as rust.

He’d only meant to refresh his gear, to make tomorrow’s trip to the Demon King Palace slick as oil, but a street-stall of junk hid this gem like a pearl in sand.

Hericot—few in this age remembered that clan, a name fallen like autumn leaves.

Once, they bound themselves to Ouyang with a covenant, the whole tribe sworn forever as servants, a chain forged like star-iron.

At his peak, he could call Hericot Clan by name, like thunder calling rain; now he needed the Hericot Crystal as a gate, a reed-boat on the dark river.

As for loyalty, he didn’t worry; his confidence sat like a granite pillar.

The Hericot Clan was a lower race, and time had not given them teeth; they couldn’t tear the contract like a beast breaks a snare.

Betrayal stands on strength; in Ouyang’s eyes they were without it, ants beneath a boot.

Those who served Ouyang directly could be wolf cubs—give them years, and they might snap the leash like twine.

But Hericot were ants; generations scurried and died like grains of sand in a glass, and none grew jaws to bite the master’s hand.

Ninefold seals still remained, and Xi was a keystone like a carved wedge; yet fate felt steadier in his own palms, callused like stone.

Summon strong subordinates, and he had endless ways to break the rest, like water finding cracks in rock.

“Hmph. They all underestimate me.” His voice spread like frost over steel. “At the starry edge, as the last one, I bear the last pride and honor.”

“The most ancient city… its living souls are a full river for my sacrifice.”

…

“Faster, Xi.” Fear surged first, then breath—Irina ran in heavy evening dress, silk dragging like waves, and the street wind cut like knives.

Anxiety scraped Xi’s heart like thorn-vine; the sigil on her right hand burned, a brand hot as coal.

Unknown power wrestled the contract like two storms colliding; could the Demon King be straining free?

Irina caught the glow, and her blood chilled like ice water. “Xi, what did you bind with him?”

“He can resist? Did you skip the Light Goddess’s statue, the vow carved like sunlight?”

“I… don’t know…” Confusion swarmed first, then vertigo—her thoughts tangled like threads, memory fraying with the mark’s strange heat.

“Xi, what’s wrong?” The question fell like a stone in a well.

Heat of crisis, then collapse—Xi folded to the ground, her dress pooling like moonlight.

“Is this fate?” Despair sank first, then bitterness—Irina propped Xi up, her arms shaking like reeds.

Even if they found the Demon King, her strength was a paper shield; the one who could stop him lay senseless like a felled tree.

What a cruel, absurd weave—fate laughed like wind through dead leaves.

“No more future…” She stared at the far clock tower, tall as a spear, and the fight drained from her like rain from a gutter.

Others might still thrash in the net; she was different—she had seen a Demon King’s power, a mountain under night, and knew mortals couldn’t grasp it.

Tap… tap… tap…

A slow footfall approached, like drops counting time on stone.

“Don’t give up… there’s one last hope…” The voice was cool as moonlight, ringing in her ear like silver.

She saw the figure, and words shattered like porcelain. “Bai… Bai…”

“White Elf?” Awe surged first, then caution—her gaze fixed on ears sharp as leaves.

Beastfolk sometimes had pointed ears, but theirs held fur like moss; these were smooth and human-shaped, only tapered, the mark of an elf.

Short white hair lifted in the night wind like ripples, and with one look, Irina felt a breath of the wild—pine, river, snow.

“Among elves, the White Elf is closest to the river of time.” Wonder flickered like candlelight. “Why are you here?”

Elves seldom walked human kingdoms, yet as a duke’s daughter, she’d met them like rare birds.

But a White Elf—legend said they were extinct, a line ended for ten thousand years, a page torn from the book.

“My arrival… is fate’s choice.” The White Elf wore a white dress like dawn mist; her chest rose slightly—female by whisper, not by face.

Elven beauty blurs the line; everyone looks like carved ice and spring water.

She cradled a white-glowing crystal sphere, light pooling like milk. “Hope still exists.”

“Long ago, the Empress used herself as the bridge, sacrificed the White Elf bloodline like snow falling into a river, to cast him beyond time.”

“But a being whose true name cannot be spoken reached in like a hand from the dark, and the Empress spent her life and our line, and failed.”

“Yet she did not wholly fail.” The words were calm as a bell. “She left a backhand like a hidden blade.”

“Take her there, and fate will turn like a wheel.” The White Elf pointed at Xi, finger straight as an arrow.

“Be quick.” She turned toward the clock tower, pace steady as a river’s flow.

Irina couldn’t swallow the lore at once, but faith rose first, then motion—legend walked beside her like starlight, and she chose to believe.

She dragged Xi, teeth clenched like a locked gate, and ran for the tower, every step a drum.

“If we fail, order collapses like cracked glass.” The White Elf’s murmur was soft as drifting snow.

“The sealed Demon King returns to daylight, and in this twilight age, nothing stops them—storms on storms.”

Her white eyes held the crystal like a moon in a bowl. “Worst case, ‘they’ descend again, and twilight sinks into the darkest era.”

“He is the key, the iron to that door, and also the last gambit ‘they’ left, a seed in ash.”

“That door must be sealed forever.” Her voice was quiet as prayer. “The world… is ours.”