Just as Anliena was about to nod, Lucimia cut in, a blade across still water: “Wait.”

“What’s wrong?” Anliena asked, tension tight as a drawn bow.

“I think you misunderstood me.” Lucimia twined her ink-black hair around a finger, careless as drifting smoke. “I mean I need a Time Halt enforced by the Duel Authority Power.”

“Enforced by the Duel Authority Power…?” Anliena echoed, eyes widening like a lamp catching sudden lightning. “You want a Time Halt that freezes me too?”

“Exactly.” Lucimia nodded, calm as moonlight on steel. “With the Duel Authority Power enforcing it, you’ll be frozen too. You challenge me to a Duel. I set the terms. If I win, I gain a one-time Time Halt that can freeze you. If I lose, nothing happens. It’s unfair, but if both parties agree, the Duel still stands.”

“How about it? If you agree, show good faith—concede the moment the Duel starts. If you don’t, then let Ron become an idiot.” Her words pressed like frost on a blade at a throat.

Lucimia held the reins tight, like a hawk gripping prey, leaving no room for the other to breathe.

She paused for two beats, the air like a stalled drum, then added, “Of course, you can try playing loopholes. I’ll immediately rewrite the Duel into a contest for time abilities. You can test whether you can beat me.” The hourglass flipped; the sand threatened to run.

She was pushing Anliena onto a tightrope over a chasm. She was sure Anliena hadn’t prepared to counter her. She wasn’t certain either, but she was saying, neither of us is sure—shall we turn the cards now?

Lucimia judged she wouldn’t dare. Anliena lacked intel; the one hard fact was Lucimia had Authority Power. Authority Power meant Dark Deity, like thunder rumbling behind temple doors.

Though Auril kept a lid on the boiling pot here, if she had watched Lucimia’s first Duel with Auril, she’d know Lucimia could threaten Auril—a knife touching a god’s throat.

In other words, Lucimia could flip the chessboard, even burn the table—mutual ruin.

Anliena had to weigh her options, scales tipping under storm-light.

That’s why Lucimia had declared no malice at the start, offering an olive branch over a calm pond. She didn’t know Anliena’s plan and would likely have to say it again—

“I still say the same: I have no malice,” Anliena said, voice gentle as a gauze veil. “They acted on their own. So I accept your terms. I do want your time ability. But we can work together. I just want to save someone.”

Anliena laid her heart bare like unsealing a letter under rain.

“No!” Ron, silent till now, spoke up, a bowstring snapping in the quiet.

“Don’t agree. If you Duel later, you’ll be at a disadvantage. We can’t let that happen. I’ll concede.” His resolve dropped like a rook from a careless hand.

Anliena bristled, storm gathering in her brow. “Don’t talk nonsense. Do you know what happens if you concede?”

“I know. It doesn’t matter now,” he said, a candle steadying in wind.

Ron waved it off. He fished out a few gold coins, their shine cold as stars, set them on the bar for the drinks. Then more silver, tossed to patrons, a tide of small moons—compensation for losing the Duel.

“Like you said, I acted on my own, so I bear the blame. A teacher’s Duel can’t be lost. We can’t accept her terms.”

Anliena started to speak, but Ron raised a hand, a gate slamming shut.

Facing Lucimia, Ron said, “Listen. This black-haired girl is very, very scary. From a brief clash, she’s very, very good at reconstructing the whole from tiny shards. So don’t give her any information. Not a sliver of advantage. Don’t let her hold the initiative, or we’ll surely lose. The best way to fight her is surprise. The more prep and layers you stack, the more gaps she’ll pierce.” His words drew a web, warned of the spider.

In his last window, Ron poured all he’d learned to Anliena, sand spilling from a closing hourglass.

Lucimia didn’t interrupt; a faint spark in her eyes said Ron had some steel.

After two or three minutes of crossing blades, he had parsed Lucimia’s forte—analysis, a mirror that cuts through fog.

Every tactician has a different edge. Some brim with knowledge. Some read hearts. Some command strategy. It doesn’t mean they lack elsewhere; it means one blade is sharper.

Lucimia knew her sharpest blade was analysis.

That meant whatever web the enemy spun, she could see through it and counter with strategy, a torch burning through silk strands.

Along her road, she had mostly relied on that analytic lantern on a night path.

And the two times she was cornered matched Ron’s words—struck from the dark, when she wasn’t ready.

Elyssus was like that. Back then she wasn’t prepared; her mind was slack, adrift in food, drink, and play like leaves on a lazy river.

Elyssus’s arrival shattered her rhythm, a stone tossed into a still pond. Each reversal came from nowhere, hitting the gap.

Luckily, Elyssus honed her blade. Now, when she thinks, she models that angle—a whetstone’s scrape on steel.

The second was the valley. The Purification Deity set a penned-beast trap; another sudden strike. By the time she sensed it, she was already caged in iron shadows.

Lucimia was still under-defended there. She’d grown paranoid, a hedgehog bristling, yet still couldn’t stop every arrow through the thatch.

There’s no helping it. No one sees another’s heart. Others’ special powers—especially a Dark Deity’s—are mist over a ravine, thunder without warning; impossible to guard, impossible to foresee.

Ron quickly shared his view with Anliena, then shouted his surrender. The long-sword sigil flared like a falling star and faded to ash, marking the end of the Duel.

In the next heartbeat, Ron’s wisdom vanished; his strings cut like a puppet’s. He couldn’t stand, toppled to the floor, babbling “ababa” like a broken reed.

Beside him, Anliena looked stricken, swallowing her storm.

She drew a long breath, then faced Lucimia. “I’m a professor at Kalan Academy. If you want to cooperate, come find me.” Her words held a steady lantern in the wind.

She gripped the now-mindless Ron. Magic opened like a rippling curtain, and both vanished from the spot.

“What… what was that…” Rexi rubbed her head, lost in fog. “They look like they have a story! Anliena said the Storage Ring was made by two people. Is the one she wants to save the other one? And Ron calls Anliena ‘teacher,’ but she looks so young.”

“No idea. Who cares about their story.” Lucimia waved it off like dust from a sleeve. “She said to cooperate—we can check later, not now. Come on, let’s rest.” Night drew its quiet curtain.

“Oh.” Rexi hopped off the chair, took two steps, then turned back and stowed all the bar’s liquor into the Storage Ring, bottles sliding away like glass moons swallowed by a tide.

“Rexi.” Lucimia glanced back, a bell in the mist.

“Eh?! Ah?” Rexi jumped, nerves fluttering like sparrows. “I know minors drinking isn’t great, but wasting it felt wrong—he already paid.”

“I’m not talking about that.” Lucimia massaged her brow, fatigue like dew before dawn. “Alter the memories of everyone here. Better not sit in the center of rumor—smooth the waters.”

“Oh, that. No problem.”

Rexi closed her eyes and tapped her temples, threading thought like a needle through silk.

After a moment, she snapped her fingers, flint sparking in the dark.

“Done. From now on, they won’t know what happened. To outsiders, truly nothing occurred.” The lake’s ripples stilled.

“Mm, let’s go.”

“Okay.”