Bottom line: the real problem looms like a storm cloud—how to face Exorcism Day the day after tomorrow.

It won’t be a quick smokescreen like this morning, no fog to hide in.

As for how to respond… I probably need to dive deep, like sinking into a black lake, into knowledge of the Dark Deity and the Church.

Mother barred that gate like iron; she never wanted me to shoulder a dangerous duty like the clan or my brothers.

And I truly had no taste for it—my heart drifted like a cat on a warm windowsill, wanting comfort, food, play, and easy days—so I never sought those lessons.

But if I don’t learn, the lock won’t yield; no key, no way out. I have to start gathering knowledge, grain by grain, like picking rice from a sack.

With that thought beating like a drum, Lucimia drew a breath, stood up, and said to her parents, “Father, Mother, there’s something I want to tell you.”

Their gazes swung toward her like twin lamps in the dusk.

She read their faces—both smiling like winter sun—her chest loosened a little, and she went on, “I want you… to teach me about the Dark Deity and the Church…”

Her voice thinned like mist, and her eyes kept flicking to their faces.

“Great! That’s wonderful!” Her father lit up like a festival lantern and said at once, “Know yourself and your enemy, and you’ll guard yourself better. You could become a proud Holy Knight like your brother.”

Alvis still hoped his daughter would carry the family torch, a flame passed hand to hand.

Smack!

“No. Absolutely not!”

Mother’s palm cracked against the table; a glass toppled, milk slid across the wood like a pale river, then spilled off the corner to pool on the floor.

Father and Lucimia both jolted like deer in tall grass.

Mother’s face iced over; her eyes pinned Lucimia like nails, her lips turned down, the gentle smile freezing into a cellar of cold in a heartbeat.

Lucimia had never seen Mother so fearsome, a frost she didn’t know could fall.

Even Father’s laugh froze mid-bloom; he rubbed the back of his head, caught between words like a fish in a net.

It wasn’t that Father had no say—he ran most things—but on this one matter, Mother’s voice hammered like iron.

“You didn’t care before. Why do you want it now?” Her low question rolled in like thunder.

“Because…” Lucimia pinched her skirt hem, fingers tight as claws.

She couldn’t blurt out the raw truth—I’m the Dark Deity, and I need to learn enough to slip past the Purification Deity’s Authority Power and keep hiding.

Under Mother’s doubt, no good excuse came; she let one fall like a pebble, “Maybe… because I grew up.”

“Lucimia!”

That only stoked Mother’s fire; she stood and strode over, a storm crossing the room. Lucimia blinked in confusion, and then Mother’s fingers pinched her cheek and twisted, hard.

“Ow—ow—ow!” Lucimia’s cry rose like a kettle.

“Hurt? You know pain?” Mother’s chest heaved like bellows. “This little twist makes you cry, and you want to touch the Dark Deity? Be a Holy Knight?”

Lucimia’s heart drooped like a wilted flower—I never said I wanted to be a Holy Knight.

And—didn’t you just praise someone for becoming one so young?

“Lucimia, do you know how dangerous the Dark Deity is? Touch it once and you never peel it off—you get watched and watched, until it swallows you whole. Dying might be mercy; some Holy Knights live worse than death, do you understand?”

Before Lucimia could speak, Mother kept twisting with one hand and tapped a finger on Lucimia’s little forehead with the other, each point like a drumbeat. “Do you know our family died to the Dark Deity, one by one? Your uncle did, your aunt did! Your elder brother died because of it—did you forget? There are four of us left, do you know that? Father, Mother, you, and your second brother—he’s out chasing the Dark Deity too. The end of that road speaks for itself. Look at other nobles, rising like the morning sun—us? We’re fading like a guttering candle. Keep dying, and no one will be left. Do you understand?”

She spilled it all in a single breath, then let go of Lucimia’s cheek and drew air in great gulps, like a swimmer breaking the surface.

Lucimia rubbed her reddened cheek, heat blooming like a plum, and stared at Mother, lost.

Yes—she had two brothers. Her elder brother fell to the Dark Deity; her second brother left home to hunt the truth of that death.

Mother sank into Lucimia’s chair as if the wood could carry her grief. “I only want you far from danger. I want you to live a plain, steady life like a river at dawn; when you’re grown, marry a man and be content, can’t you? Let our family stop touching the Dark Deity at all, wouldn’t that be good? Those Holy Knights who chase it—how many end well?”

She spoke that line to Father too, a plea thrown like a rope.

Alvis reached out, then pulled back, fingers hovering like moths—caught between the ancestors’ will and the clean sense of his partner’s words.

Lucimia kept her mouth shut, a door closed against a storm.

It was the first time she’d seen Mother like this. The old Mother wore kindness like spring on her face, her care steady as a hearth. Since Lucimia reincarnated into this house, Mother held her in her palm, never once raising a hand—today was the first strike, the first time Lucimia saw Mother flushed with anger.

She saw those ice-cold eyes, heard the shout like thunder, felt the pinch like thorns—and then saw it, the tear beading at the corner of Mother’s eye like dew.

“Eh?” Lucimia blinked, startled.

“Fine. If you want to learn, go,” Mother said, and the words broke as tears spilled like rain. “All of you go—your elder brother, your second brother, and you, Lucimia. Leave me, all of you. Just… leave.”

She covered her face with both hands, and sobbing rippled through the dining room like wind in reeds.

…

Words failed; silence pooled like a dark pond.

Lucimia felt it then—she could read Mother’s heart, heavy as a stone. Mother wanted a simple, quiet life, the same wish flickering in Lucimia’s chest.

Her children would die one by one if this path continued; any mother would live under a sky of anxiety and loss.

Outside Exorcism Day, ordinary folk stiffen at the sight of a Holy Knight—the armor is a banner that the Dark Deity haunts nearby. And the Knights themselves, steeped too long in that shadow, fray at the edges, madness gnawing like rats.

People respect those guardians, yes—but they don’t want to stand close to a cliff’s edge.

Lucimia looked around. A fallen glass like a felled tree, milk flowing like a pale stream, utensils scattered like birds, a sobbing voice like winter rain.

A peaceful breakfast cracked like porcelain—ruined by a single word of hers.

That wasn’t what she wanted.

Suddenly, her cheek no longer throbbed; the pain thinned like smoke.

She walked to Mother, bent down, and spoke softly, a hush like snow, “I’m sorry, Mother. I won’t get involved.”

She bowed, turned, and stepped out of the dining room, her figure drifting like a leaf.

Behind her, the sobbing thinned with distance, fading like rain down a long street.