“Have you heard? They say after the Demon Chaos Age came a darkness so deep no living thing dared write it down. The continent was abandoned by the gods. Even the Abyss drew back. No high-born creature from any greater world dared descend to ours.”

“Darkness? Darker than the Demon Chaos Age?”

“Yes. A collapse of morality. A night so black no creature dared set it to ink.”

“You’re lying. If no one wrote it, how do you know it existed?”

Darkness held its breath like a sealed tomb. Then a voice returned, low as wind through a crypt. “Because I survived it. I saw the world torn by the Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts. I can still taste that age.”

“The Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts?”

“They’re horrors beyond the Demon King, more vicious, more depraved. But they were too terrible. A mysterious goddess sealed them. She ended that fearful age. She ended that rot.”

“A goddess? The Goddess of Light?”

“No. A mystery. No title. No face. She streaked across the sky like a meteor, sealed the Twelve, and vanished.”

Augustine was a fallen noble, another moth circling the candle of survival. Like the others, he sold off his ancestors’ relics, burning through heritage like dry leaves.

Then fate rolled an egg into his hands. He found it in the family reliquary, a dust-choked egg, silent as a stone.

He didn’t think twice. He ran to the kitchen, stoked the fire, heated the pan until it glowed like sunset iron. He cracked the shell—and no yolk spilled. A tiny white kitten crawled out of the shards.

And of course, Augustine tried to fry it.

“Damn you, you mortal who’s never heard of protecting rare species! Do you know who you almost ate? Under the stars, I’m the last White Cat. I’m a cosmic-level protected species, and you wanted me sunny-side up?”

The instant the White Cat hit the pan, its fur exploded like dandelion fluff in a gale. It blurred faster than Augustine’s eyes, springing free of the oil-sputtering hell.

After that, the self-proclaimed ancient creature stuck to Augustine like a shadow at noon.

“Lord Cat, are the Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts really that scary? At worst, they destroy the world, right?” Augustine doubted the cat’s tales. In all history, nothing felt darker than the era ruled by the Demon King.

Perched on Augustine’s head, the White Cat tapped his skull with a plush paw. “Kid, don’t scoff. You need to know—death is release much of the time. Destruction doesn’t terrify as many as you think. The Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts, forged by the First Cult? That’s madness past words. Think: under their torment, what kind of despair drove the living to let that chapter drown in time so their descendants would never know?”

It made a kind of sense, yet Augustine refused to buy it.

“Lord Cat, how do I get Alice from the academy to date me? Teach me some ancient magic. If I cast it on campus, she’ll fall for me for sure.”

The White Cat could only shake its head, whiskers drooping. “You hormone-addled human. Do you even know this world is teetering on the edge of night?”

“I know, I know. The world’s about to end. You’ve come to choose a savior. He and his buddies brave a thousand trials, beat the root of all ruin, save the world. Right? Every bard sings the same.”

Augustine was sixteen, maybe seventeen. His short silver hair flashed like fish scales in sun. Rumor said a thread of elven blood ran in his line. Which elf no one knew.

“Kid, parts of the Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts have already slipped their seals. And you’re telling me tales. Back then, that enigmatic goddess used this old cat as the core of the seal. If I’ve woken, it means the Twelve have woken. This world is drifting back to that dark age of moral rot.”

A song rose over the town, uncoiling like mist. It was so sad, so heavy, like lovers at the cliff-edge of parting, like love turned to hate when love went too far.

The language was strange to Augustine, a river of syllables he’d never heard. But he felt the meaning in his bones. The theme was love—lovers’ love, sweet and star-lit, vows under the constellations, kisses on warm cheeks.

But it was illusion, a gauze veil. The romance tore. Cold reality bared its teeth. You wandered, lost in fog.

“Kid, wake up!” The White Cat raked three lines of fire across Augustine’s cheek. Blood stung. His eyes cleared.

“Lord Cat, what’s happening?” The bustling street in his eyes was gone. In its place, a crawl of horrors—human-sized insects swarming like a living tide.

Wrong. All wrong.

“One of the Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts—Saya’s Song. Its melody drowns minds in another world. While they wander there, their bodies turn to insects. Unless we haul them back, they stay that way.”

The White Cat trembled atop Augustine’s head, a leaf in a storm. The Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts were real. That darkness the world chose to forget was real.

“Go. Now. We can save them later. We don’t know what else is here. If a crueler artifact shows up, it’s over. Find cover first. Confirm what we’re facing. Then we plan.”

The cat knew the boy wanted to save Alice from the academy. But it was right. Saya’s Song had no direct bite; the cat could resist it for a while. If another of the Twelve was near, they were dead.

So it had to hammer the point home. Otherwise the kid would charge off after Alice and die like a moth in a brazier.

Augustine gritted his teeth. He knew the cat was right. But youth runs on hot blood. He sprinted across the street without looking back, straight toward the academy.

“Kid, you’re insane. Even if you find this Alice, she’s almost certainly an insect. Can you even tell which?”

Cold seeped into Augustine’s heart. Everywhere he looked: rippling masses of insects, human-high, scuttling down the avenue. No saving them? That cute girl, turned into such a hideous thing?

“No. No way. I didn’t turn into an insect, so Alice might not either. And she’s the Headmaster’s granddaughter. The Headmaster’s a twelve-star mage, almost a Magister. He’ll keep her safe.”

He clung to the words, but his tears betrayed him. The White Cat had said it: in that dark age, even the gods of the Divine Realm abandoned this continent, tainted by the Twelve. What could a twelve-star mage do? He was spared only because the White Cat shielded him.

He reached the academy. It was a hive of crawling bodies.

With one last shred of hope, he burst into the Headmaster’s office. He flung the door open. Insects. Nothing but insects.

“Alice—you’re Alice!” They were all insects, but Augustine’s gut pulled like a compass. He knew. He felt it. That ugly insect was Alice.

“Move! Kid, move! I sense the aura of another artifact!” The White Cat grabbed Augustine and bolted. Hard to imagine a tiny white cat dragging a human, but it did, like a falling star hooked to a kite.

While they ran, Augustine glimpsed the highest tower. A girl in a leaf-green dress stood there, arms spread wide, eyes closed, as if embracing the town. A jade bracelet circled her wrist. The song poured from her mouth.

“Damn you—it’s you. You’re the one turning everyone into insects…”

The song thinned, like smoke in wind. When the White Cat finally stopped, Augustine folded in on himself and wept, small as a fallen leaf.

“Human boy, you like this Alice so much. If she can’t turn back, will you still love her? Will you love a hideous insect?”

“I…”

Augustine said nothing for a long time.

“Hmph. As expected. That’s human love. Come on, kid. Let’s find somewhere the Twelve Divine Demon Artifacts can’t reach. Live the rest of your life in peace. Time washes all things away.”