“Purification Power…” A heavy stone settled in Nirael’s chest. “From another angle, Purification drags things back to their origin. It restrains us. She can even erase the Disguise Power you’ve Devoured.”

“Mm…” Lucimia heard and felt a chill spread like frost on glass. “Each ability is more outrageous than the last.”

“What do we do?” Desty stared up as the blue ring in the sky began to descend like a cold halo. Tension tightened in her like a drawn bow.

The Inquisitor’s expanding ring spread over the pillars of light, then pressed down. To Lucimia, it looked like a hydraulic ram lowering, an iron sky coming to crush them. If it fell on them, the ending would be ugly.

“Try breaking out.” Lucimia pointed back the way they came. “Run there.”

“Got it.”

Desty urged the horse. Hooves struck sparks like flint. Up close, they saw a faint, semi‑transparent blue veil stretched between the two beams.

“It carries the effect of Purification Power too,” Lucimia said, eyes narrowing like a blade’s edge.

“What now? Can your Devouring bite a gap?” Desty watched the blue ring dropping, a grinding millstone coming closer. Her pulse raced.

“It can… but they’re pumping energy nonstop. If I start Devouring, it turns into an Authority Power duel. That drags time. Can’t do it.” Lucimia’s decision snapped into place like a lock.

She turned to Nirael. “Can we go underground?”

“No.” Nirael shook her head, her calm like winter bark. “The mice show me blue rings rising from below.”

“A pincer…” Lucimia’s brows knit, a storm-line darkening.

As they faltered, the woman above spoke again. “Stop wasting effort. The Purification Deity’s might isn’t something you Dark Deities can resist. Accept judgment. Purify!”

She raised her staff. Power rippled out like a tidal surge. The sky-ring dropped faster, a visible cascade crashing down. Under their fearful gaze, the ring slammed, merged with the one below, and flared in sapphire light.

When the glare thinned, the woman looked down—an empty clearing, a stage with no actors.

“Hm?” Her frown cut a crease. She had felt a hit, yet something grated, a wrong note she couldn’t name.

Besides, what the Purification Deity lent her wouldn’t turn foes to dust. It cripples them into husks, easy to capture and sacrifice.

“Something’s off.” She couldn’t imagine how they’d slipped a beast-trap like this.

This was a Magic Array wrought by countless Purification Knights. Each beam was upheld by at least twenty knights and mages.

This time, it was her turn to stall, mind snagged like cloth on thorns.

Then a Purification mage sent a distant whisper. “Inquisitor! Left side!”

“What?!”

She whipped her head. At the forest gate, the mounted fake Gene sprang from the saddle, and midair burst apart—spilling swarms of worms and rats that poured toward the left wall like a dark river.

On the other side, Lucimia—seated behind Desty—recalled the second horse she’d disguised as a cat. She stuck out her tongue, tugged a lower eyelid, and pulled a face at the woman.

“Bleh~”

Lucimia even cast her taunt through Teleportation Magic’s whisper-path, letting the woman hear it clear as a bell.

That shattered the woman’s composure. The Magic Array she prized had been undone like silk with a pluck, and she’d been kept blind. Her hand on the staff shook, a trembling reed.

She fired beam after beam, spears of light stabbing down. Desty’s horse slipped past each one like a fish through reeds.

“Unforgivable…” She drew a breath sharp as ice and lunged in pursuit.

Watching the woman flying, Desty asked, worry a stone skipping in her voice, “Why’s she safe in the air?”

“She’s Ment’s hired help. No way the array targets her,” Lucimia replied, cool as moonlight. “That sensing Magic Array likely marks friend from foe.”

“Makes sense.” Desty nodded, then let out a breath. “Good thing you used the Fuzzy Orb to disguise our stand‑ins first. Let the doubles scout. Otherwise that array would’ve been brutal.”

“Yeah.” The memory brushed Lucimia’s spine like a cold hand.

From the start, she’d used the Fuzzy Orb to make a fake Desty, fake mounts, and a second fake Gene. The doubles took the path, while the real pair slipped round the town’s edge and entered from the far side.

Through the doubles, she sensed the array’s terror. That continuous output wouldn’t break quick. It demanded time. But drag it out, and the ring would press you flat, turning you into a useless shell who knows nothing and can do nothing.

Lucimia judged the best counter was to burst out before the beams fully linked. But if she could think it, they could too. There’d be counters laid like hidden snares.

“Think it through, Purification Power is terrifying.” She breathed the words like a sigh through reeds.

“Lucimia, ahead!”

While she spoke, Desty’s warning cut in. Smoke bloomed ahead, thick as storm clouds.

“Ment’s making his move. Perfect. Get ready to Teleport. Our feint’s done.”

“Okay.”

As their words fell, a pair of pitch‑black, hollow eyes opened inside the smoke—two wells of night. A low voice seeped out. “Lucimia… you’ll pay for what you’ve done.”

“Oh, will I?” Lucimia’s smile lifted, a crescent blade. “Try me.”

“Hmph.” Ment snorted. White smoke surged at them like a tidal veil. “Once I forbid your abilities, let’s see if you still strut.”

His threat skimmed off Lucimia like rain on lacquer. She leaned to Desty’s ear and whispered, “Ready.”

Desty let go of the reins. Lucimia laced her fingers with Desty’s, and Teleportation Magic sparked to life, a dawn flaring between palms.

“What?!” Ment saw light gather on the two girls and flinched, a hunter realizing he’d stepped into a snare.

“Heh.” Lucimia’s laugh was soft and razor-smooth. “I win, Ment. Put you next to Elyssus, and you don’t even compare.”

Light wrapped them. In the next heartbeat, they vanished. The smoke didn’t touch them; the forbidding never took hold.

Without its riders, the horse rippled and shrank into a black Fuzzy Orb. It sprang up, jaws clamped shut, and its body began to blaze.

At that instant, the pursuing Inquisitor reached the spot. She saw the Orb, and alarm cracked her voice. “Self‑detonation!”

She tried to turn back, but the moment had already fled. The Orb held Lucimia’s spell, and the blast carved a crater in the earth. The Inquisitor was hurled away, her guarding forearms shredded, blood like red rain spattering the sky.