Lucimia trembled, dread slick as cold rain, her eyes locked on the scene unraveling before her.

No. Absolutely wrong. Something’s off, like a cracked bell in a quiet temple.

Last time, when they replaced the whole city, was there a summoning rite like this? That rite was due tomorrow, when they’d be chasing Lucimia.

And another crack in the pattern—Elyssus only appears after it eats the souls of the replaced, those octopus-things that hunt for souls. This time, the script breaks.

It hadn’t devoured a single octopus-thing, yet violet flesh bled through the air, and two tentacles slid out like ink in water.

It couldn’t do that in the last loop.

Hee-hee-hee-hee—!

Elyssus smiled, a mask torn and twisted, a grin that skittered like spiders.

It opened its maw and inhaled the town’s octopi like a black tide, Bazeroth included.

Hee-hee-hee.

With them swallowed, it set its gaze on Lucimia, cold as moonlight on a blade.

Lucimia jolted—stone crept over her limbs—her body stiffened like a statue struck by frost.

Heh heh heh, ha ha ha—!

The room warped; furniture rippled and reshaped into black laughing faces, circling her like carrion crows, pouring a smog of laughter into her ears.

Lucimia’s chest tightened; even a deep breath felt thin, like trying to drink air through a reed.

Eyes wide, she stared up at that giant shadow in the sky, a mountain of ink bending low.

Elyssus leaned down, its gaze like a thorn, meeting hers in a high-low crossing of sightlines.

Hee-hee-hee, you’re… Lucimia, right? Surprise? Hee-hee-hee~

Its voice was both sharp and deep, a saw blade humming under a drum. Every word dripped mockery like acid rain.

Lucimia understood, a cold lantern flaring in her mind.

Elyssus, like her, had clashed with Yuna’s Reversion. Its memory stayed. Like how the magic she learned last loop still worked in this one.

It—Elyssus—had carried the summoning energy from the last loop into the second as well.

That’s why, before it devoured any octopi, when Bazeroth was condensing the orb, the final phantom from the previous loop appeared outright.

The thought struck like a mallet; Lucimia’s skull rang.

She clenched her fists; nails bit flesh; thin lines of blood welled. Her arms tautened and twitched. Her teeth chattered; her face blanched, like someone swallowed by an abyss.

No. Reversion. Now.

Yuna! she shouted, voice a flare in storm fog.

Yuna’s mind wasn’t fully devoured; she forced herself up from the undertow. Her eyelids twitched like moth wings, trying to open.

Elyssus moved. It refused Reversion. A colossal tentacle rose, its tip needle-sharp, driving straight for Yuna like a spear of night.

Lucimia lunged to stop it, but petrification chained her limbs. Desperate, she bit her tongue hard. Blood flooded her mouth, iron-heavy. She spat twice, scarlet splashing like crushed berries.

Pain burned a path; movement returned like thawed rivers.

No time to wipe the blood, she flung her magic wide. Every usable element gathered like storm clouds. A shield bloomed behind her, and she sprinted for Yuna.

In a heartbeat, the board flipped.

Tentacle, Lucimia, Yuna—three points snapped into a single line like stars on a string.

The tentacle tip kissed her shield, paused for a single beat, then punched through. It pierced her chest with a cold flower of agony, drove on into Yuna’s abdomen, and pinned Yuna to the floor like a butterfly.

…Cough.

Lucimia spat blood, red as crushed pomegranates.

Yuna did the same, two flowers fallen on winter stone.

Both had taken mortal wounds; crimson pooled on the floor like a growing lake. Death’s shoe was already at the threshold—yet both exhaled in relief.

Yuna’s eyes opened. White light flooded the room like dawn breaking through snow.

Oh dear, one step too late. This ability is truly troublesome. See the light, and it triggers. What a pain, hee-hee-hee.

The octopus-thing had failed, yet Elyssus sounded delighted, like a child finding a sharper knife.

As Lucimia’s consciousness dissolved, she heard Elyssus’s last whisper, thin as a silk thread:

Come. Let’s keep playing, Lucimia. I look forward to our match. Hee-hee-hee…

…

Darkness swallowed her sight. Limbs vanished into numb sea. Her mind sank like a stone, pressure heavy as the deep. Her heart faltered, then dropped from the sky—thundering, painful, too fast. Lucimia’s eyes snapped open.

Ha… ha… ha…

She gasped, breath rough as sand, and sat up instinctively. Her hand pressed her chest; phantom pain flickered like a dying ember.

She tugged open the white dress and glanced inside.

Unmarked. Skin still winter-pale.

No iron taste in her mouth. Reversion had worked.

She looked around. Her room again. Her bed again—except Yuna lay beside her this time.

Both of them were panting, breaths crossing like steam.

If a stranger walked in now, they’d surely misunderstand.

Yuna… Lucimia’s voice was thin, a thread in mist.

Ha… mm… Yuna answered between breaths.

They fell silent. When their breathing dulled and steadied, Lucimia finally spoke.

What day did you set the time?

The first… day, Yuna said, climbing up slow, like ivy. The first day of the last loop.

I see.

So Yuna had rewound to the morning she learned she was a Dark Deity.

Light was already greying the window, dawn like watered ink.

Lucimia bit her finger, thinking, thoughts pooling like rain in a basin.

The Holy Water is definitely wrong. That’s settled. And it must be Authority Power–level. Otherwise, her parents wouldn’t have been affected.

Then question one: where did Authority Power Holy Water come from?

She knew the octopi’s purpose now. Replace others, sacrifice souls, refuel Elyssus, so Elyssus can descend into the world.

Also, Elyssus, like Lucimia, carries memory—inherits gains from the last loop into the next, like seeds carried by wind.

Which means the current Elyssus already holds energy from two loops. If the rite starts again, even without absorbing octopi, it’ll appear as that phantom with two tentacles.

No. Those tentacles were prizes from last loop’s feeding. This loop should add new ones, like thorns on a growing vine.

Does that mean if Elyssus absorbs energy again, and Lucimia uses Reversion again, she’ll be feeding its descent each time?

Until the meter fills, and it fully steps into this world like a storm breaking the shore?

Damn…

Lucimia’s head throbbed, drums in a narrow room.

What used to be her golden cheat—Reversion—now felt like Elyssus’s golden cheat instead.