“See it now?”

“I see it… can’t believe Ment’s dead. The Purification Deity plans to slay other Dark Deities to break the seal—terrifying.” Rexi sank into the snow, breath a pale mist.

Lucimia had just opened her memory of meeting Vosh for Rexi to read. After seeing it, Rexi felt a chill like ice water down her spine.

“Meaning… she’ll come kill me too?” Rexi pointed at herself, finger trembling like a leaf in wind.

“Yeah. But she doesn’t seem to know you exist. You’re safe for now. Exposure’s only a matter of time.” Lucimia shrugged, snow-dust sliding off her shoulders.

“Lucimia, you gotta protect me! I don’t wanna die!” Rexi lunged into her arms like a cat seeking warmth, tears and snot wetting her sleeve like cold rain.

“Tsk. Cut it out. I get it. Let go.” Lucimia palmed Rexi’s head and pushed her away, cool as stone.

With that promise, Rexi flipped moods and grinned like a fox at a henhouse. “You said it, okay!”

“…”

Lucimia suspected she wasn’t scared at all—just wanted an excuse to pounce, a playful cub in winter.

“Alright, back to business, Rexi. I need your help to deal with the Purification Deity.” Her voice landed like an iron weight.

“No problem.” Rexi slapped her chest, sparks in her eyes like flint. “Leave it to me. Whatever you need, I do. Killing the Purification Deity—just thinking about it thrills me.”

“…Alright.” Lucimia let out a slow breath, a cloud dissolving into night.

This girl wasn’t afraid at all—her heart a wildfire under snow.

Rexi finished grinning, then paused, rubbing her head like kneading packed snow. “But what if she runs? You told her not to, but she might not listen, right?”

“No, she won’t run.” Lucimia’s reply cut like a clean blade through wood.

“Huh? Why?”

“It’s simple.” Lucimia explained patiently, laying out questions like stones on a path. “If she wants to run, what are her ways? How would she run?”

“Uh… no idea.” Rexi shook her head, hair swaying like frostbitten grass.

“She has two ways to flee.” Lucimia’s tone was steady, winter-hard. “We know she’s under a seal. The one in the Royal Capital isn’t her true body, but a split-off consciousness or soul, riding a form she shaped, a frost-made puppet.”

“So first, she’d cut the tether, sending that consciousness or soul straight back to the body.” Lucimia’s fingers sliced the air like snipped silk.

“But here’s the hitch.” Her words were a drumbeat in the cold. “Because I had you alter her memory, I exposed her presence, a thread in my web.”

“She’s clever. She’ll overthink, wonder if I’ve already laid a net.” Lucimia’s eyes were dark water under starlight.

“If she tries to run, she’ll use Purification Power on herself, head to toe, like rinsing armor in a river.”

“She’ll make sure I haven’t planted any effect. Otherwise, that shard of soul returning could hurt her true body, a venom carried home.”

Just like before, when Lucimia handled Elyssus: Elyssus possessed another, and Lucimia traced through that vessel back to the body, a thread through a needle’s eye.

“And then?” Rexi listened, gaze steady as a still lake.

“Then? Then she’ll find a mark on herself, planted for real.” Lucimia smiled, thin as moonlight on ice.

“Eh? What do you mean? When did you plant it?” Rexi’s voice stumbled like pebbles in a stream.

“No, no, Rexi. It wasn’t me. It was you.” Lucimia wagged a finger, a reed swaying by a black pond.

“Me?” Rexi pointed at herself, dawn breaking in her eyes. “When did I… hmm?! I get it!”

“Right. Your memory edit serves as the effect I ‘planted’ on her, a quiet hook under the skin.”

Lucimia gathered her thoughts, like collecting snowflakes on her palm. “As I said, she’ll try Purification to clear potential danger.”

“If there’s nothing, her Purification flows like clear water.”

“If there is, she’ll feel resistance, a grit under the current, like silt catching on the ankle.”

“She won’t know what it is, but she’ll know something sits on her.”

“She won’t dare cut the link lightly, not with a stone tied to her wings.”

“Plus, she’s sealed; her energy’s limited, like a candle in wind.” Lucimia’s gaze sharpened. “I’ve overlaid your memory edit with Devouring Authority. And we strike first. Her Purification will meet resistance for sure.”

“In short, her first retreat is walled shut like a dam.”

“So strong… Lucimia, did you plan this from the start? Good thing I never crossed you; I’d die without knowing how.” Rexi stared at her like someone staring at a tiger under moonlight.

“What about the second?”

“The second is physical: leave the Royal Capital, kill other Dark Deities, refill energy, then purge the effect.” Lucimia’s words paced like a hunter in snow. “Or flip it: kill Nirael first, then use Purification to clear it.”

“First, the former.” Her logic fell in neat prints across ice. “As I said, she’s smart.”

“With her first path blocked, she hesitates before the second.”

“She’ll think: if I can see it, would Lucimia really leave a hole that big?”

“She’ll waver, whether to fly out of the Royal Capital.”

“She fears stepping out and hitting a snare—like Fuzzy Orb’s ambush, a trapped-beast cage closing.”

“So she’ll consider finding Nirael first.” Lucimia’s tone chilled. “But she can’t; if she could, she’d have already hunted him down.”

“So now, she one hundred percent won’t run, and doesn’t dare. Her feet are nailed to frost.”

“I see…” Rexi’s clarity bloomed like sun through cloud, marveling that Lucimia had stitched so much together so fast. “Scary.”

“Then, if she’s not running, how do you deal with her? First strike matters most, right?” Rexi’s words glinted like a blade’s edge.

“Mm.” Lucimia nodded, a pine bowing under snow. “First, I’ll use Fuzzy Orb’s shadow to ring her in; otherwise she’ll bolt sooner or later.”

“We must cage her while she still hesitates, weave a night net while her heart flickers.”

“As for how, that’s simple.” Her smile closed like a folding fan.

With Lucimia’s will tugging the thread, the Fuzzy Orbs planted across the Royal Capital melted into shadow, wrapping the entire city like ink spilling over snow.

The whole Royal Capital fell under night, not a single thread of light left; a lid dropped over the lanterns.

“Alright, now she truly can’t escape.” Lucimia clapped, small thunder in her hands, and stood like a straight pine. “She’s limited to snow water within the walls, but my spread reaches beyond them.”

“What’s next?” Rexi stood too, brushing off clinging snow like powdered sugar.

“Next… Reversion.” Her voice was a river turning back.

“Eh? Weren’t we about to attack Vosh?” Rexi’s brows lifted like reeds in wind.

“She’s alert now; it won’t be that easy.” Lucimia’s tone flattened like ice. “I throw Devouring, she throws Purification; we trade blows, waves seesawing.”

“In the end I’d win, sure, but I’d be wrecked, a ship lashed by storm.”

“With only a shard of soul, she once made me lose control.” Lucimia’s eyes narrowed, a hawk in dusk. “She’d love a repeat, so I won’t play that game.”

“Alright. Then what point will you revert to?” Rexi asked, curiosity fluttering like moth-wings at a candle.

“Back to… the moment we met Bevi.” Lucimia’s gaze ticked like a frost-stiff clock hand.

“Hmm? Why?” Rexi’s voice rose, light as a reed.

“Because he doesn’t have to die.” The words were a candle relit in a dark room.

“What?” Rexi was shocked, ice cracking underfoot. “He… didn’t he turn Bloodkin? How did he die?”

“Mm…” The sound rolled like a pebble down a slope.

Lucimia thought for a moment, then decided to let Rexi read what she saw in Erwei City, memory unrolling like a silk scroll in moonlight.