Lucimia opened her eyes again, dawn sliding over her lashes like silk. She rose, smoothed her hair like a dark river, washed, ate, and stepped out.

She didn’t look flustered, not even a ripple. Victory sat in her palm like a folded fan; her board was finally set.

On the street, people flowed like a slow river. Her heart was a snarl of threads, tight and warm, stubborn and soft.

“Fine, I’ll give you all a hand,” she murmured, voice light as mist. “It’s not my style, but my wish stays the same—an easy, idle life.”

She found an empty nook where shadows pooled like ink. She breathed, and her Teleportation Magic bloomed like a door of light.

Val Town.

The red‑haired girl, Desty, sat in Robin’s parlor, steam curling from hot tea like white vines.

After Bazeroth died, she became an executor. She led church hands toward the Town of Tranquility for an Exorcism Ritual, steady as a march.

Suddenly, the parlor window pushed open with a soft gasp, like a startled bird.

Desty snapped alert. Porcelain smashed like ice on stone. Her sword hissed free like a silver fish.

“Who?”

She spun. A black‑haired girl hovered beyond the window, quiet as a moonlit leaf.

“Black hair?” Desty frowned, sword low but ready. She stepped close and saw Lucimia’s face, pale jade under the sky.

“You’re… with the Lancelot Family?”

“Yes.” Lucimia nodded, a bell tapped once.

“Uh… why are you here? Weren’t we going to you?” Desty eased, the blade returning like a tide.

“Oh, I’m here to pick you up,” Lucimia said, a smile curving like a cat’s tail. “Happy?”

“Pick us up?” Desty’s brow filled with question marks, like rain dots on glass. “We’re far from the Town of Tranquility. How?”

“Heh.” Lucimia’s pride shone like lacquer. “With my Teleportation Magic, of course.”

“But it isn’t free. You’ll pay a tiny fee. Not money—just what you’ve always been doing.”

Elyssus returned to the void, a sea of ink without stars. Restless pricks ran under its skin like ants.

Why was Lucimia so sure she could end it in one round? And that last jab—daring it to start the Magic Array?

The advantage felt like a blade in her hand, not its own. Doubt rose like cold fog.

Start it, or not?

It checked the weave. After Reversion, the Magic Array’s progress had climbed to ninety‑five percent, a scale tipping its way like a falling plum.

Yet unease gnawed like mice behind a wall. That final line had cracked its calm; a first, and it hated it.

“Wait!”

A thought surfaced like a fish. Was she playing mind games—spooks and shadows—to foul its mood and stall for time?

Possible. So ignore it, and start the array?

But her calm didn’t look staged. Her confidence felt like iron under silk.

Elyssus bent its head in the void, tentacles flicking behind like whips in a wind, baring its frayed mood.

“Watch her first.” It chose caution like a closed fan.

It rode an octopus, then melted the octopus into the floor, sliding like a shadow toward Lucimia’s home.

The bedroom was empty as a husk. In the dining room, it found her—Lucimia sharing a lazy breakfast with her parents, steam floating like ghosts.

As if pricked by instinct, she turned. Her eyes met Elyssus through the floor, lamps in a well.

“Heh.” Lucimia smiled. She flicked a shrimp head to the tiles, quick as a pebble.

The shrimp head rolled, bumping to a stop before Elyssus like a tossed bone.

Puzzled, Elyssus glanced up. Lucimia arched a brow, a bowstring tensioned.

“Lucimia, don’t throw things around,” her mother chided, voice soft as a broom.

“Oh, I know,” Lucimia replied. “I was thinking—if we owned a pet, and I tossed it like this, would it jump to catch?”

“A pet? You want one?” Her mother paused, then warmed like sunlight. “Not impossible. Company is good.”

“Really? Great.” Lucimia’s joy chimed like porcelain.

“Lu…ci…mia…” Elyssus shook with rage, voice quivering like a struck drum. It knew the hint. Pet.

Fine. You’ve angered the octopus. Do you think I won’t start the Magic Array?

It shot Lucimia a venomous look, then its shape blurred and vanished like smoke.

Back in the void, Elyssus summoned its followers. Rows of shadows knelt like wheat.

Finish the Magic Array, then open it at once. Not a breath’s delay.

They obeyed and dissolved like ink in water. The void fell quiet as a sealed jar.

It waited, coiled, refusing the thought that Lucimia had any real blade. Let her try.

After a while.

“Hm?”

A thread tugged its sense. The Bazeroth line responded, like a dead bell ringing.

Bazeroth was dead. Why answer now?

It looked up—and saw the one who shouldn’t be here.

Lucimia.

“Lucimia!” Elyssus roared, voice like iron tearing. “How did you come here?”

Lucimia kept her smile, brushed her hair like silk. “How? You called a follower. I answered.”

“You? A follower? You think I’ll buy that?”

“Fair. I’m not your follower.” She spread her hands, light as dust. “After I devoured Bazeroth, I swallowed his link to you. So I came.”

“Heh. Then why are you here?” Elyssus’ words chilled like black glass. “Trash talk? I already ordered every follower worldwide to start the Magic Array. You’ll vanish, Lucimia.”

“No. I won’t. You will.” Lucimia raised one finger, a needle of calm.

“Heh, sure. Show me.”

Lucimia’s mouth tilted. Her whisper was a pebble in a well. “Devouring.”

“Devouring?” Elyssus barked a laugh, sharp as salt. “You think you can devour me? My Deception Power fools your Devouring. How will you eat me, madwoman?”

“Mm. I might be mad to try this,” she said, nodding at herself, eyes cool as winter water.

“You’re right. My mastery trails yours. Your Authority Power control outstrips mine. If we collide head‑on, my Devouring fails.”

“Two Authorities that clash—either the stronger takes effect, or they suppress each other. You’re too far ahead, so yours triggers first.”

“But even the strong have a moment when Authority fails—when the user doesn’t use it.”

She paused, breath steady as a held fan.

“For example—erasing existence. Earlier, you didn’t know I had it. You were unguarded. Your Authority isn’t passive; it’s active. So my Devouring of existence triggered several times. Only now do you guard on purpose.”

“And I get why we talk about proficiency. Devouring doesn’t think for you. You add the clauses—devour existence, devour magic. Do nothing, and nothing fires.”

“So?” Elyssus frowned, fog in its mind like damp wool.

Not use Authority? Impossible. If she tries to devour it, it will use it.

“So? I made you not use it.”

“?”

Boom.

A rolling thunderstorm rose. The void trembled like a drumhead, and a vast pull opened like an unseen whirlpool.

“What?!” Elyssus jolted. Something tugged its body, a hook in deep water.

From where? What’s devouring?

“Wait—don’t tell me…”

Yes. The whole void was a mouth of the Fuzzy Orb, a dark maw. Elyssus was being dragged by that pull, inch by inch.

“Damn!” Elyssus hurled its Deception Power, a cold wind that lied to laws. The suction thinned, but it didn’t end; the pull still chewed.

Shock split it like lightning through a tree.

“No!! Lucimia! How did you do this? Why!”

It raged, Deception Power flaring to cheat Devouring. Lucimia lifted a hand and spilled more shadows, black petals falling.

They tug‑of‑warred. Sweat beaded her brow like dew; it ran, and she didn’t blink.

“Heh… Elyssus, you want to know?” Lucimia broke the silence, voice a cool blade.

“Remember when I pierced two followers’ hearts to force you out?”

“What?”

“I gambled you were riding them. I sent a Fuzzy Orb with an Erosion effect into your body. You didn’t know, so you didn’t use your Authority.”

“You only deceived death and deceived Devouring then, right?”

Elyssus’ face went dark as a storm shelf. The hook of realization bit deep.

“The first time, I didn’t go all in. I feared you’d catch it. The second time—Ritch—I sent it fully.”

“Erosion is the condition. It becomes the path to Devouring. You taught me that when you used tricks to read my memories for your deceptions. Good lesson.”

“With the effect pre‑triggered, the Fuzzy Orb hid inside you, nibbling grain by grain. Then, when I faced you, failure turned into suppression.”

“Heh heh heh…”

Elyssus laughed, brittle as frost. “You think you can devour me? You underestimate me. You can’t. Never.”

It poured more Authority. Its octopus body jerked back an inch, like a fish ripping free of a net.

“Tss…”

Pain hammered Lucimia’s skull, nerves twanging like snapped strings. Real pain, bright as ice.

She gritted her teeth, words squeezed like wine. “Elyssus… I never planned to devour you.”

“I’m guessing you’re spamming it—deceive death, deceive Devouring life. Right?”

"Heh. You bit the hook. I never meant to devour your life—only your Authority Power, and you yourself. My goal was to seal you, like a lidded jar."

A spike of cold ran through Elyssus. "What?!"

He rushed to scan his Authority Power. Deception Power remained, a dim candle. But Disguise Power was gone, like ink rinsed off stone.

"Wait… the creeping gnaw…"

Right—Lucimia set the Fuzzy Orb to moth-eat his Authority Power, thread by thread.

She learned it from him, a mirror turned back on its maker.

Elyssus taints Holy Water, a dark dye seeping slow. Time takes over—identity swapped, flesh remade—until the target becomes an octopus.

Lucimia mirrored him—she hid the Fuzzy Orb inside her attack spell, smuggling it into Elyssus’s body, like a dagger in silk.

And she had more than one Fuzzy Orb, beads on a hidden string.

"Devouring." Lucimia amped the Devouring Authority, a tide pulling stronger.

The Fuzzy Orb’s pull surged; Elyssus’s body was dragged fully into its maw, a whirlpool swallowing a lone boat.

Lucimia’s Devouring Authority ate flesh and soul. Elyssus’s art was to lie—cheat death, cheat presence, cheat the fact of energy being devoured, cards facedown.

So the blades never crossed. Two rivers ran parallel—no clash; both effects stood, side by side.

"Lucimia! So you caged me—so what? My believers already triggered the Magic Array. Once I absorb that energy, you die! You just slipped through a loophole. Your true body’s using Authority Power in the real world, so I can’t bring my full weight to bear on you. Don’t get cocky!"

Elyssus spat the words, thrashing like a chained tide.

"True… but I have a way to settle that. And you, Elyssus—this is your cue to exit the stage." The curtain dropped in her voice.

She finished, and the Fuzzy Orb’s mouth snapped shut, a trap-jaw clamping. Elyssus was swallowed whole.

Not his life, not his existence—he wasn’t erased. He was caged inside the Fuzzy Orb. Or rather, inside Lucimia’s mind, a locked room in a storm-tossed house.

"Raaah—!! Lucimia! I’ll kill you! I’ll hack you, slice you, mince you!!" Elyssus raged, a mad drum pounding inside her skull.

"Tsk… noisy." Lucimia clutched her head. A lead weight settled there; her inner compass spun in fog; dizziness drifted like mist.

As expected, caging Elyssus inside the Fuzzy Orb hit her hard, waves pushing back at the shore.

But there was no other way. Lucimia couldn’t think of another cage for him; this was the only rope she had. She didn’t even know how the Dark Deities were banished before, a boat crossing without a map.

"Heh. Elyssus the Deceiver—aren’t you the self-styled God of Deception? Don’t you love swapping people out with your octopus trick? Your turn to taste that bitter tea."

Lucimia forced her spirit upright. Drowsiness dragged at her; strength bled thin; her lantern burned low.

"Disguise." She breathed the word, a needle sliding through silk.

Soon, several tentacles slid out from behind her and from under her skirt, seaweed reaching for current.

Moments later, the first summoning ritual lit. The void realm cracked like glass; a rift tore open before her.

Lucimia rubbed her temples, straightened, let out a breath like winter smoke. She stepped toward the rift and slipped through.

"Hah… I can’t fool you, Elyssus. But I can fool your believers and your Evil Entities. Now, I am Elyssus. I am the true—God of Deception."