Lucimia pushed her tired little legs forward, one hand on rough bark, moving slow like wading through dusk.

Along the way, beasts kept appearing, a forest of eyes in the underbrush. It felt thorny; she was worn and attacks kept pricking close.

But to her shock, each beast saw her, whimpered, tucked its tail, and bolted like smoke in a wind.

She hadn’t seen that coming, not even in her darkest guesses.

“Am I really that scary now?” The thought rose like a chill before she could move.

She had three eyes, ritual lines across her face, and a tail behind her.

Creepy, sure—but enough to make beasts flee like they’d met a natural nemesis?

Some of them looked worse than her, heaps of fangs and matted fur.

If it’s not appearance, then there’s only one thing left.

“So… is it my aura?” Lucimia guessed, the feeling like cold mist clinging to her skin.

She lowered her head, checked herself like counting lanterns in fog, felt no change. Then her gaze dropped to her shadow.

Her shadow was uncanny, no human outline at all, just an uneven stain of black. In that ink, tentacles and a tail seemed to coil, and gaps opened like rows of eyes.

Lucimia fell quiet, breath a thin thread. After a moment, she sighed. “I’m feeling more and more like a monster… sigh.”

She shook her head and brushed the mess aside, mind turning again like a millstone on Ment’s likely tricks.

At the same time, she sketched a plan to destroy the Cross in Erwei City, each step a black chess piece sliding forward.

After this rout, Ment had two roads like a fork at dusk.

First, he could pull energy from the Crosses in Erwei City and Royal Capital Luo, flee the Empire, and hide. Live to fight another day, like embers kept under ash.

If he did that, the Empire would likely fall back into Nirael’s hands, which meant a stout ally for Olivya.

Second, Ment would likely gamble everything—a do-or-die final battle, iron against iron.

To stop Lucimia, he’d have to lay curses in advance, using mediums and rites like trap-threads woven in shadow.

For example, set a snare so she steps and the curse bites.

Or stage a small storm: punks harassing a good woman; Lucimia draws steel and steps in.

Then the grateful woman invites her to eat; Lucimia takes one bite, the curse closes, and she drops like a candle snuffed.

She had to stay sharp against things like that. Without the Purification Deity’s aid, Ment could only work his curses in secret, like needles under silk.

He had another way: drain all energy and force a curse straight on. But then she’d feel the pressure and meet him with Devouring, night against night.

That at best becomes a stalemate. Because Devouring checks Ment’s curses, he’d likely lose, the tide turning against him.

Even if Lucimia won, it would hurt like frostbite. But for Ment, it meant death. He wouldn’t accept that; he wasn’t a retainer dying for his lord—he was the lord. He couldn’t die.

“Mm… in theory, yes. But Ment’s a bag of tricks.” The thought slid in cold before her steps. “He knows what I know. He might go even darker.”

Lucimia limped on, hand to the trunk, mind circling like a hawk over a field.

Could Ment choose another path besides facing her head-on?

Maybe. He could abandon her for now and strike at Nirael in the Royal Capital.

But the outcome wouldn’t change much. With two Crosses’ energy, he could kill Nirael now. And then? He’d still be killed by Lucimia, blade for blade.

She couldn’t find another angle for him. She could say clearly now: Ment had no way to deal with her. Her strength had risen like a swell, while he’d bled away a sea of energy.

Unless Ment teamed up again with the Purification Deity and agreed to be Vosh’s dog, he had no clean line to win.

But Lucimia now understood some of Purification’s methods; her guard was up like a wall. With energy restored and battle power climbing, Purification couldn’t repeat the encirclement at Nach Valley.

Truth be told, the board was set. The road ahead would be lighter, at least lighter than that valley of knives.

After tracing Ment’s likely routes, a wave of vertigo slammed her. Even walking went crooked.

She planted her left hand on the trunk, the other on her head. The dizziness deepened like spinning water, and she half-squatted.

“Ugh… so dizzy…”

Her gaze drifted like a loose leaf. Her palm seemed sunk into the tree, swallowed by wood.

Was it just blurred vision? She yanked back and raised her hand to look, breath tight.

The sight hit her like ice up the spine.

Her left hand and whole upper arm were gone; at the cut, only a mass of black shadow throbbed.

“What’s happening?!”

Terror snapped her awake. Her vision wavered, then steadied like a lantern in wind. She blinked, looked again—her arm was whole.

“…What is going on?”

So strange. She no longer knew what she was turning into, fog where a mirror should be.

“I feel like I have to sleep. I haven’t slept soundly in so long…” She lifted heavy lids and kept walking, steps like stones.

As she walked, the light thinned. A heartbeat ago it was afternoon, the sun hanging like a coin; now it felt pre-dawn, ink spilling across the sky.

Lucimia noticed it at once. Day and night flipped too fast, a wrongness like grit in water.

She stopped and scanned the woods. Suddenly, a broad black shadow spread toward her, swallowing trees and soil, tide pressing straight for her feet.

Panic flashed, sharp as a blade. She turned, ready to run.

But the moment she turned, a girl stood ahead, silent as a figure in a mirror.

The girl had long pitch-black hair, black pupils; beneath the right eye sat another eye. Lines traced her pale face, and a Fuzzy Orb tail swayed behind.

She wore black-toned clothes: a long black dress with patterns, a red ribbon with black trim pinned at her chest, and tall black lace-up boots.

Her eyes were black, yet they glowed faint and ghostly, face blank as moonstone.

Who was that? Wasn’t that Lucimia herself, cut out of shadow?

Hell—why was she seeing herself?