Right side of the wall.

Lucimia and Desty slipped into view like shadows at dusk, as a worm tore from a meat-ball cocoon and rose like a tower of rot.

It stretched until it matched the wall’s height, shrieked like a kettle on coals, then spat a thick green bile that ate stone like lye.

The fluid crawled downward like a swamp stream, and the wall rotted with it, melting a hole like a gaping mouth that showed a forest of green leaves.

Lucimia dispelled the disguise on one horse like lifting a veil, and she and Desty swung up with the ease of wind over grass.

A woman’s furious shout rolled from behind like thunder over a plain.

“Lucimia, Desty, don’t you dare run!”

Lucimia looked back; the sky behind was a sheet of smoke, rolling like a black tide that crushed hills.

At its front flew the Inquisitor, wounds knit by Healing Magic, like a hawk returned from a storm.

Her face was twisted, anger burning like coals, and her glare pinned Lucimia like a spear.

First time she’d been outplayed; rage was natural as summer lightning.

At the same breath, Instant Movement flared around Lucimia like shattered mirrors, and Purification Knights caged them in like a ring of iron.

Swordmasters bared their long blades like cold moons, while mages gripped staves or gathered light like snow before a fall.

Among them, the one leading was a face she knew—Lev.

Lev dragged his greatsword over stone like a plow, and he paced forward, one grinding step at a time.

Lucimia watched their grand show, blades bristling like a thicket before storm, and she didn’t flinch; she smiled.

“So this is the final duel?”

Lev halted, lifted his chin, and looked up at her, voice cold as winter iron.

“Dark Deity Lucimia, accept judgment.”

“You do love crying thief to catch a thief.” She swept the circle with a hawk’s eye, mind weighing routes like a scale under wind.

Surrounded, with the Inquisitor and Ment racing in from afar like storm riders, and her power capped—yes, the scales tipped against her.

Still, the chill under her ribs eased; if she went for mutual ruin, she’d win, but that was needless blood.

These Purification Knights and mages moved in the fog of lies; they weren’t the knowing hands.

The true culprits were Lev and that Inquisitor, the nails in the coffin.

Lucimia licked her dry lips like thirsty clay, cut Desty a glance, then flung a gale that rose like a white wave.

Unready Swordmasters flew like leaves in sudden wind, thudding to ground, wall, and tree.

The other mages, spooked birds, began their spells, but Lucimia snapped her fingers and cut their magic like severed strings.

Before they could breathe, Frost climbed their shins like shackles, and ice took their legs.

She’d learned this in recent days: with overwhelming control, you could puppet another’s magic like tugging a hidden thread.

That was why Joanna’s Ice Lance at the inn spun midair like a startled swallow and drove back under Lucimia’s will.

As for why her control was that deep? The answer was mist; perhaps she was born under a strange star.

If carving a Magic Array didn’t save mana, she’d be too lazy to carve; she’d simply will, and the world would answer.

“We go.” Lucimia patted Desty’s shoulder like tapping a drum.

“Oh—right.” Desty tightened the reins, heels tapping like rain, and the horse leapt for the hole like an arrow from a bow.

“Hmph.” Lev didn’t use sword art or spell, but drew a small pitch-black Cross and raised it like a dark sun.

“Tch, that annoying thing again.” Lucimia frowned, power gathering in her palm like rime on glass.

They burst through the wall’s mouth into green shade, and ambush fell like crows.

Jet-black heavy-armored soldiers dropped from trees, greatswords chopping like guillotines toward the riders.

“Lucimia!” Desty cried, yanking the reins like a snared line.

“Don’t stop.” Lucimia sent her readied spell skyward like a hammer, battering the falling soldiers like fruit from branches.

They crashed down like broken puppets, but the first strike was spent, and the Cross in Lev’s hand began to glow like swamp-fire.

“Tch. Only one Reversion left.”

She braced to use it, when two green sword-lights flashed like twin comets.

The first cleaved the Cross clean as bamboo, and the second lopped Lev’s arm like a willow limb.

“Who? Reinforcements?” Desty glanced back, curious as a fox.

Lev looked too, eyes narrowing like a wolf scenting blood.

A man dropped from the wall-top and landed with only a sigh of dust, like a leaf kissing earth.

He wore a tea-brown shirt, his face pale as paper, and dead-fish eyes stared at Lev with tidepool emptiness.

“Hart?” Lucimia’s surprise rippled like a pebble in water.

“Hart? Who?” Desty’s confusion fluttered like a moth.

“I told you before—on the merchant ship, there was a Plague Knight and a Purification mage.

The mage was Joanna. The Knight is him, Hart.”

“Huh? Then he’s—”

“He’s here to help us. We ride.”

“Got it.” Desty’s last glance skimmed him like a dragonfly over a pond, and she drove the horse on like wind through reeds.

Hart looked back at Lucimia receding like boats passing on a river.

Lucimia gave a nod like a bell; he answered in kind, then faced forward like a cliff to the tide.

“Who are you?” Lev waited for his severed hand to sprout anew like a twig, and he asked.

“I’m human.” Hart’s tone was flat as stale water.

“Fine.” Lev planted his greatsword like a stake in frozen ground. “Die.”

As the word fell, his aura broke like a storm-front, and he stepped in, blade swinging like a falling cliff.

Hart’s face didn’t change; his eyes were winter ponds without a ripple.

He flicked the incoming steel a glance, raised his straight sword, caught it on lower steel and guard, and stopped it like catching a sliding door.

Clang! Wind lifted his hair like grass on a ridge.

“Huh?” Lev blinked, stunned as a struck gong.

He’d never seen anyone meet his sword head-on; since when did Jaha Town hide a Swordmaster like a tiger in scrub?

While Lev gaped, Hart changed like a river’s bend; his sword turned, and the tip lunged for Lev’s brow like a bee.

Lev twisted aside like a reed in current and let it pass.

Hart didn’t pull back; he chased in, blade scything for Lev’s neck like harvest.

Lev knew he was late; he spun the greatsword, mirroring the angle like a shadow, and cut for Hart.

Both blades drew for the other’s throat in the same breath, like twin snakes.

Hart didn’t flinch; the instant after his sword whipped, he let it go like dropping a husk.

He bent under Lev’s swing like grass in wind, regripped the hilt mid-flow, and cut again with a snap like a bowstring.

“What?!” Lev reeled, mind thrashing like a hooked fish.

Who dares such a move? It demands iron nerves and a surgeon’s hand.

What if the blade slipped like a wet eel? What if the foe smashed it aside like a ram?

But thought was smoke. Hart had already done it.

The edge bit like cold moonlight and sheared through Lev’s neck.

His head thumped to earth like a dropped gourd.