Lev fell silent for a few seconds, then dropped through the gaping hole and landed on the first floor like a stone through fog.

The soldiers downstairs hurried up, their questions still hanging in the air like trailing smoke.

The same ones from the office spoke first. “Commander Lev, the target—”

“Got away.” Lev’s voice was cool, like frost on steel. “Did you see anything?”

“…Sorry, no. I only saw you smash them with the iron ball. Dust billowed, and when it cleared, it was just… this.”

Lev didn’t answer. He crouched and studied two shattered wooden chairs, like a hunter reading broken reeds by a river.

He reached out and picked up a splinter, turning it under the light like a dull shard of moon.

“…It’s just ordinary wood.”

He scanned the scene again, found nothing useful, and moved to toss the piece aside like a pebble from a path.

Right then, the wood warped in his palm and became a Fuzzy Orb, fur black as midnight moss.

Lev’s huge frame actually flinched, a mountain shuddering at a sudden crack.

The orb’s maw yawned wide and bit down his whole hand, then slid up his arm, Devouring like a tide eating shore.

“Tch!” Panic finally flickered in him, a cold prickle under armor. He felt the danger like a thorn at his throat.

He acted at once. He ripped a greatsword from a nearby soldier and swung at his own wrist.

Clang—!

The blade rang bright, cutting through the gauntlet, cutting through Lev’s right hand. Blood surged like a spring bursting from rock.

Deprived of its meal, the Fuzzy Orb dropped, smudged into a shadow, and seeped into the floor like ink in water.

“Commander!” The soldiers recoiled, fear rippling like wind through grass.

Lev raised his left hand for silence, palm steady as a stop-sign in a storm.

He ignored his wound, glanced at the floor, then at the hole overhead, thoughts circling like crows.

He’d been wondering how Lucimia had carved a hole from nowhere. Now a guess took shape, doubt clinging like mist. “This is… Devouring…?”

“Commander, your injury…? And those two girls…” a soldier asked, voice tight as a drawn bow.

“Don’t worry. I can fix it.” Lev met their eyes, voice flat as stone. “They ran—fine. We can confirm they have a Blessing. Odds are high. If they aren’t Plague Followers, they’re followers of another Dark Deity. Put out their warrants.”

“Yes, sir.”

Lev turned toward the innkeeper, dragging the iron ball with his left hand. It scraped over wood like thunder rolling over a cliff.

“Uh… hahahaha…” The innkeeper’s laugh was thin, but sweat beaded on his brow like dew before dawn. He tried to salvage it, words tumbling like loose nails. “I really didn’t see the black-haired girl. I only saw the red-haired one. She booked the room. I don’t know the rest. You didn’t ask, right?”

Lev stopped. His tone dropped cold as winter water. “Take him.”

The innkeeper spread his hands, helpless as a scarecrow in the rain.

—

Two mosquitoes slipped out of the city, then stopped in a stand of trees and became girls again, shapes settling like leaves after wind.

Lucimia and Desty touched down, steady as cats on a wall.

“Wow. What kind of magic was that? An illusion?” Desty dusted off her clothes, curiosity bright as a lantern. No gasp about the inn brawl, just questions about Lucimia’s tricks.

She didn’t know Lucimia’s magic had been suppressed. She only thought Lucimia had found a way to break the Teleportation Array.

“…Sort of,” Lucimia said, a guilty tremor under her voice like a hidden brook.

It wasn’t magic. It was Elyssus’s Disguise Power.

When Lev’s last iron ball came in, about to crush them, Lucimia timed her Disguise Power. She turned the two of them into dust-smoke, like ash blown from a fire.

At the same time, she formed a Fuzzy Orb behind them. She disguised the orb as a shattered wooden chair, while she and Desty melted into the smoke, then slipped away as mosquitoes, quick as sparks.

Why the chair? Simple. If it looked like broken bricks, Lev wouldn’t bother touching it. A chair that hadn’t been there would draw his eye.

Once he came close, or put a hand on the plank, the Fuzzy Orb would snap shut and Devour him whole, like a trap in tall grass.

Elyssus’s Authority Power was truly handy, a chisel that fits any lock.

But that was the ideal. With Lev’s strength, he’d react in an instant. His final move made Lucimia sigh, a grudging praise like iron ringing—what a man.

He cut his own hand without blinking, didn’t even cry out. Steel in the bone, salt in the blood.

Don’t blame Lucimia. He struck first, gave her no chance to speak—words crushed like petals under boots.

Lev’s attacks left no room, one strike following the next like waves that don’t let you breathe. Fighting him felt suffocating.

If Lucimia hadn’t reacted fast, if Desty hadn’t played along, they might’ve been caught clean, like fish in a net.

She felt wronged, a knot in the chest like a tightened sash.

You’re with the Independents. You want humans to stand on their own against Evil Entities and Dark Deities. I believe that too. So why attack me?

Ignore Plague Followers, and come straight for me? Really?

How is that tolerable?

She hadn’t wanted a clash. But after taking that hit, running without answer would look clownish, like paint left in the rain.

The more she thought, the hotter she got, anger rising like steam. She tossed a Fuzzy Orb to give Lev a lesson.

It was a warning, not a vendetta. Besides, Lucimia had Reversion. If anything went wrong, she’d roll time back like a scroll.

And truth be told, she had lit the fuse herself. From Lev’s angle, he had to find Plague Followers, and the first thread was her—the suspected point on the map. He could only pull that thread. He had no choice.

“Sigh… The course of history’s shifted too much.” Lucimia rubbed her temples, thoughts circling like moths. “Last time, monsters invaded on the night of the fourth day. Now it’s only the second…”

Another thorn pricked her mind. That black Cross of Lev’s—what was it, to shut her magic down completely?

She snapped back and cast again, urgency like a spark on dry straw.

Mana flowed in her channels once more, a river finding its bed. Lucimia loosed an ice spike, and it slammed into the ground with a clean crack.

“What is it? More enemies?” Desty gripped her sword, eyes fixed on the impact point like a falcon on prey.

“No. I’m testing magic.” Lucimia kept the truth behind her teeth like a sealed letter. Explaining the Disguise Power was messy. Letting Desty know she had a Dark Deity’s Blessing—who knew how she’d react?

Better to avoid trouble. Better to say nothing.

She lowered her hand and looked at her palm, a faint frown folding like a paper fan.

It works now… That was under five minutes. Does that Cross only suppress magic for five minutes? Or is it range-bound?