The moment she stepped into the restaurant, Lucimia caught the lure of hot food, a warm ribbon of scent curling like mist off a river at dawn.

A male waiter came over, smile soft as lamplight. “A table for two?”

“Yes,” Lucimia said with a small nod, calm as a stone in a stream.

“Great. This way, please. We’ve got a spot open.”

He guided Lucimia and Desty to a corner, to a two-top tucked like a shell against the wall.

Once they sat, he handed them menus and said they could call him anytime to order, his tone smooth as a polished plate.

Lucimia thanked him. She didn’t rush the menu. Her gaze drifted across other tables, fishing for clues about the steaming red broth people were sipping.

The surface glowed red as a sunset. Spicy? Maybe. Heat in cold weather was a brazier for the bones.

As she watched, a guest lifted a spoonful. Chunks of tomato rose with a chunk of beef, bright and dark like ember and coal, and vanished into the mouth.

Uh-huh. Tomato beef soup, most likely. She spotted potato, pale as cut moon.

Good. She’d take that.

Lucimia couldn’t handle heat, so the first dish settled like a pebble in her mind.

Drinks needed food to match. She lowered her eyes to the menu, a map of choices spread like fields after rain.

“Charcoal-grilled steak, iron-skillet seared fish, vegetable salad…”

Looked good. Each name had a sizzle, each line a bite of light.

She skimmed the prices. Most were under one silver, a soft ache pricking as she remembered the five-silver wooden comb she’d bought, an unnecessary thorn.

“I’m set. You?” Lucimia closed the menu and glanced at Desty, a quiet question like a nod between sparrows.

The red-haired girl seemed tight with nerves, menu held like a shield. Maybe she couldn’t decide. Maybe taking a free meal felt like sand in her shoe. After a small struggle, she shut it and whispered, “I’ll eat whatever you order.”

Lucimia didn’t push. She raised a hand for the waiter, the motion light as a falling leaf.

“These three,” she said, finger tracing those same three dishes, a clean cut through fog. “And what’s that soup everyone’s drinking?”

It wasn’t on the menu. The dishes were many, a forest of names.

“Not from around here, are you?” the waiter asked, curiosity bright as a match.

Lucimia nodded. She didn’t bother to pretend.

He slipped on his professional smile and explained, each word neat as stacked bowls. “Local specialty. Tomato beef soup. We use marinated beef, then a big pot with sliced onions, diced potatoes, crushed tomatoes. Spices and herbs on top. Simmer it a while. It’s a little sour, very savory, opens the appetite, and warms you right up.”

“Oh? Then we’ll take enough for two. And two small bowls.”

“No problem.”

While they waited, Lucimia propped her chin on one hand. Thoughts drifted like snow and then began to knot.

Tomorrow morning, she’d get intel on the blonde woman. She’d learn whether the Time Ability User with acceleration was still alive, or already just a shadow.

If dead, she’d drop this town and leave, like slipping out before dawn. Better to tell the captain a day early.

In the last Reversion, night of the fourth day, monsters swarmed Jaha Town. Town shattered, people scattered like leaves in a storm.

Now those monsters were cleared by Lucimia’s hand. If someone had driven them, what would that someone do once they found their beasts gone? With a hole torn in the plan, how would they stitch it?

And who had driven the monsters at all?

In the corpses, she’d seen blood-red worms, writhing like threads of fever. Maybe the Plague God had his hooks in them. Or maybe a Plague Knight pulled the strings.

Their creed was simple and cold: open the gates, never lock down, let sickness spread unbound, and pray disaster would sate the god’s fury.

So they were likely to do this again. Use monsters to batter the gate, to make the city kneel.

And she still hadn’t pinned what, in the last Reversion, made her fall sick. Was it Devouring the boy Dory’s disease? Or that locked gaze with the blood-red worm?

The illness had surged fast. Too fast, like fire licking dry grass.

Wait. Fast?

A jolt ran through her. Her propping hand lowered. Her spine straightened, taut as a bowstring.

What if the reason the sickness bloomed so quickly… was the touch of accelerated time?

There’d been others there. No—one other. The girl with the pale green hair. The true Time Ability User. She had been there. She hadn’t died. She’d sped up the disease inside Lucimia, like wind whipping coals to flame.

But… wasn’t she a Sacrifice? By rights, she should’ve died.

Unless she was a Plague Knight. If she served the Plague God, her acceleration would turn contagion into wildfire.

Hiding in this town?

The thought startled Lucimia, a cold splash in a warm room.

The more she traced it, the cleaner it clicked, bead to bead on one thread. No seams. No cracks.

Only one snag: the pale-green-haired girl had been in the Fog Domain. Why was she alive, and why was she in Jaha Town?

No answer yet. Another possibility unfurled like smoke.

Maybe she’d joined hands with Gendi, helping the Plague God spread disease.

Shebelle would be with the Independents. Luring Lucimia here to deal with the crisis might be her way of throwing a spear from the shadows.

Fine. Maybe.

With the scraps she had, Lucimia sketched the board. Big shapes, hard lines.

But it wasn’t her war. She only needed one fact bright as a lantern: the pale-green-haired girl might still be alive, and she might be in Jaha Town. Lucimia would find her, Devour her ability, and leave. Everything else could burn or bloom without her.

If the monster plan had failed, they’d try another. She could strike first, or sit still and let them play their hand, then use Reversion to slip behind time and seize the girl early.

“Ladies, here’s your steak and…”

Her thoughts paused as the dishes arrived, heat and scent rolling in like a tide.

The steak still sizzled, a little storm on iron, and the waiter set it before Lucimia. The other plate, seared fish with a skin crisp as fallen leaves, landed in front of Desty.

Lucimia leaned in and breathed. The fish smelled wild and clean, with a bright edge of spice. It was split open but not cut through, butterflied and spread like wings, white flesh exposed. A thin green sauce brushed the top like moss on stone.

Desty’s eyes went round. She swallowed, then grabbed the knife and fork with a child’s urgency.

“And your tomato beef soup,” the waiter said, placing a brimming bowl between them. He split it into two small bowls, steam lifting like white silk.

“Enjoy your meal.”

“Thanks.”

Once he left, Lucimia sliced off a cube of beef and popped it into her mouth.

“Mmph—mm.” A small sound, like a cat by a stove.

The beef was rich on its own, fat warm as a hearth. Oil glazed her lips, a glossy shine like morning dew.

Not bad at all.

She wiped her mouth, then dipped a wooden ladle and filled her bowl with the soup—beef, potato, tomato, and a pinch of scallions riding the surface like little green boats.

She blew across the steam and took a careful sip.

Tomato hit first, bold as a bell, with a bright sour spark and a savory depth. It tugged the appetite open like a door.

After a few sips, warmth spread through her chest, slow and sure, a small sun lighting the winter inside.